Islam: The Religion of Peace?

[Joseph]

Part 1

http://www.pipelinenews.org/index.cfm?page=vermaat73107.htm

The Limits of Multiculturalism - The Dutch Labor Party and Islam
By Emerson Vermaat

July 31, 2007 - San Francisco, CA - PipeLineNews.org - "Islamic culture is so deeply entrenching itself in Dutch society, that in the long run one would speak of a land that is based on a Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition," Ella Vogelaar, the Dutch Minister for Residence, Neighborhood and Immigration, told the Dutch daily newspaper Trouw. She claims that Islam will contribute to Dutch culture and society in a similar way as Jews and Christians have done in past centuries. "I want to help Muslims feel at home here, Islam and Muslims must take roots here." "Our society has been formed by Jewish-Christian traditions. These are our roots. Centuries ago, the Jewish community came to the Netherlands and now we can say: The Netherlands is a land formed by Judeo-Christian traditions. I can imagine we will see a similar process with Islam." According to the Minister of Integration, there is a "mutual process" in which cultures influence and stimulate each other.

Ella Vogelaar is a prominent member of the Dutch Labor Party [PvdA] and an outspoken leftist. She is also a feminist, and this is rather strange: How can a leftist feminist applaud a conservative religion like Islam which suppresses women? But there are new alliances between conservative Muslims and leftists. One of Vogelaar's more vocal critics is Nahed Selim, a female Muslim writer in the Netherlands who writes that multiculturalism has become the religion of the left. And Ayaan Hirsi Ali sees parallels between Islamic fundamentalism and the totalitarian temptation of Nazism. These two women know quite well what they are talking about.

Vogelaar's views on Islam reflect a dominant trend within the Labor Party to accomodate Islam and Islamic militancy. Wouter Bos, the Dutch Labor Party leader and Finance Minister, recently indicated that a ban on Islamic banking would be counterproductive. Instead, the Netherlands should evolve into center for Islamic banking and finance, like Dubai and London, he said. This kind of banking is based on the strict Islamic "Sharia" law and very popular among Islamic militants and terrorists from the Middle East, Pakistan and Europe. Most Pakistani immigrants in Spain and Britain use this system and some of these immigrants were linked to terrorist and criminal networks. Sharia banking and "Halal [=ritually pure] financing" is quickly making inroads into European societies. Islamic law and the Koran stictly forbid the giving or receiving of interest, so here is where the advocates of Islamic banking step in.

Both Vogelaar and Bos should be aware of the fact that Islam does not recognize the principle of separation between Church [Mosque] and State, or the separation between religion and policitics. For the sake of the ideology of multiculturalism, the Dutch Labor Party is now in danger of renouncing its own principles.

There is also a growing trend within the Labor Party and other leftist parties to accept Hamas as a legitimate partner in the peace process. During a recent visit of a Dutch parliamentary delegation to Syria, Labor MP Martijn van Dam and his colleagues Harry van Bommel [Socialist Party] and Mariko Peters [Green Party] talked to a Osama Hamdam, a representative of Hamas in Damascus. Harry van Bommel is a known apologist for radical causes in the Middle East and Martijn van Dam is a young and outspoken parliamentarian. Prime Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende, a Christian-Democrat, as well as other members of the parliamentary delegation criticized the talks with Hamas, but Van Dam said he had not done anything wrong.

Who is Osama Hamdan? He is the representative of Hamas in Lebanon. In conversations with Western journalists and politicians he usually poses as a moderate, but as soon as he addresses Arab audiences he is outspokenly radical.

In February 2007, Hamdan told his viewers on Al-Manar TV [Lebanon]:


"The [Zionist] entity is incapable of making peace. This entity is based on plundering and aggression. Seeking peace with it is a waste of time. What should be sought is a true solution, which will restore all the Palestinian rights, and will lead to an end to the existence of this entity in the region."
After having met Hamdan the controversial Dutch activist Gretta Duisenberg said: "What a friendly man! You hear that he means what he says. The Israelis are always lying. They are bastards."

Wim Kortenhoeven, a Dutch expert on the Middle East, recently published a thorough study on Hamas. He shows that Hamas's real agenda is killing Jews. Hamas leaders glorify suicide bombers who kill Jews. Article 7 of the Hamas Charter gives the following quote attributed to the Muslim prophet Mohammed: "Every tree and rock shall say: 'O Muslim, there is Jew behind me; come and kill him."'

Such studies and quotes are usually ignored by those in the Dutch Labor Party who espouse multiculturalism and bend over backwards accomodating radicals. These multiculturalists were not happy when Ehsan Jami, another Labor Party member, established a "Committee of former Muslims." They feared this could antagonize Muslim voters. In the crucial election year of 2006, the Labor Party lost a lot of Moroccan voters. Ehsan Jami was born in Iran in 1985. He, his sister and his parents arrived in the Netherlands in 1996, he later joined the Dutch Labor Party and became a member of the city coucil of Leidschendam.

He rejected his Muslim faith and founded his "Committee of Former Muslims" in May 2007. Other members of the Labor Party accused him of "stigmatizing" Muslims, widening the gap between Muslims and non-Muslims. "But I say: We must call a spade a spade. Why do we have to protect our grassroots support? We must take into account what is good for the Netherlands." A Eddy Terstal, a promiment party member, "advised" Jami to moderater his tone, be more careful in choosing his words when he criticized Islam and take into acconut the views of Muslim members of the party. This was done in consultation with two members of parliament.

What some people in the Labor Party fear most is that Ehsan Jami will evolve into a new Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Muslim asylum seeker from Somalia who first joined the Labor Party and then became a vocal atheist and critic of Islam, especially after she had joined the conservative Liberal Party VVD and became a member of parliament.

One of Jami's closest friends and advisors is Dr. Afshin Elian, also a Muslim from Iran who rejected his faith after arriving in the Netherlands. Elian, Professor of Social Cohesion, Citizenship and Multicultural Studies at the prestigious University of Leiden, has received numerous death threats from radical Muslims who believe that "apostates" must be killed. One of the most recent threats was issued by the firebrand cleric Sheikh Fawaz Jneid who called a Elian a cancerous tumor .

Nebahat Albayrak and the Armenian genocide

The influence exerted by Muslim voters on the Dutch Labor Party is substantial. The current Deputy Minister for Justice Nebahat Albayrak is in charge of immigration policies, but she has both a Dutch and a Turkish passport. She refused to give up her Turkish nationality when she became deputy minister. She now plans to naturalise 30,000 illegal immigrants, something the multiculturalists in the Labor Party have wanted for a long time.

In the election year of 2006, when she was still a member of parliament for the Labor Party, she was suddenly confronted with the question of the Armenian genocide. Initially, she said that the number of those killed was not so important and that "all" sources on the Armenian question have become tainted. The Turkish claim that the Armenians collaborated with the Russians should also be investigated, Albayrak stated. She did not want to take sides on the issue. After a lot of pressure she recognized that there had been "masacres in that period." But the term "genocide," is a matter of legal debate, she said. Turks both in Turkey and Europe must start a debate on these massacres. But in the Turkish newspaper Aksam she said that she would never recognize the Armenian genocide. This is a very typical attitude: In interviews with Western media one says or writes something different than what is presented in the media of their country of origin.

The Labor Party removed Erdinc Sacan, a Dutch-Turkish candidate for the Dutch parliament, from its list of candidates because he publicly refused to recognize the Armenian genocide. This was an embarrassment. But Sacan and many Dutch-Turkish voters were upset and threatened to vote for other parties. Mr. Bulent Arinc, the Turkish parliament Speaker, sent Sacan a letter of support. The Turkish government also began to meddle into Dutch politics. A key advisor to the Turkish Minister of Religious Affairs sent e-mails to Turkish organizations in the Netherlands advising them to call on local Turks to vote for Fatima Koser Kaya, a parliamentary candidate for the leftist D66 party. The e-mails said that this party had never referred to the "Armenian question" as "genocide." These controversial mails had been sent by Ali Alaybeyoglu, advisor to Religious Affairs Minister Mehmet Aydin. Aydin is also in charge of relations with Turkish immigrants in Europe. Thanks to a massive Turkish campaign on her behalf, Fatima Kosher Kaya was indeed elected into Parliament. Strong pressure was put on Dutch-Turkish politicians not to recognize the Armenian genocide. Some of these politicians were threatened and intimidated by local

Turkish immigrants. [I still remember an intimidating demonstration of 3000 Turks waving Turkish flags and banners in front of the EO Radio and Television building in Hilversum when EO wanted to air a film on the Armenian genocide, I never saw so many angry faces.]

In October 2006, Labor Party leader Wouter Bos met Turkish pupils in a school in the city of Amersfoort. They told him to take into account that the Labor Party was the Party of the immigrants [Partij van de Allochtonen]. Bos did not quite share this point of view but it is a fact that the bulk of Turkish and Moroccan immigrants in the Netherlands vote for the Labor Party. Prof. Dr. Paul Scheffer, a Dutch specialist on immigration issues and a prominent member of Labor Party himself, expressed concern about this trends towards "ethnicization of voting behavior." He is afraid his party will return to its pre-2002 policy of avoiding to speak on the negative aspects of massive immigration.

Ethnicization of voting behavior creates opportunities for corrupt politicians [clientalism, conflict of interest, etc.], a recent Harvard University study found. This is the case, for example, in Amsterdam South-East where African and Surinamese immigrants are in the majority and where some of the politicians they voted for became corrupt.

Clientalism occurs when dubious projects are subsidized by local politicians who have a vested interest in staying on good terms with immigrant communities. Ella Vogelaar, the Dutch Minister for Residence Neigborhoods and Integration, said she was not against decisions taken by local authorities to subsidize religious institutions of immigrants. "As long as you subsidize social activities and not religious ones," she added. She did not clarify how you can keep these two things apart. For many Muslims there is no clear distinction between religion, politics and social affairs. Allah is the supreme ruler.

Milli Gorus and the "Wester Mosque"

Things went terribly wrong in Amsterdam when the Turkish group "Milli Gorus" wanted to build a huge mosque in Amsterdam-West. Once again, local politicians from the Dutch Labor Part played a dubious role.

Milli Gorus ["National View"] is a Turkist Islamist movement founded and inspired by the Turkish politician Necmettin Erbakan, a former prime minister. It was closely linked to Erbakan's Welfare or Refah which was banned in 1998. The Islamic Society of Milli Gorus [IGMG] was founded in Germany in 1985. Their headquarters are in the city of Cologne, near the Dutch border. [I once visited these headquarters and it struck me how unfriendly and hostile the atmosphere was.] They have some 27,000 members meeting and 323 mosques. The Dutch branch has more than 30,000 members and 23 mosques. Throughout Europe the total membership is 87,000.

Erbakan was the key speaker at a European "Brotherhood and Solidarity Day" in Arnhem, the Netherlands, in June 2002. He told his 23,000 mainly Turkish friends: "The whole of Europe will become Islamic. Like the army of the sultan we will conquer Rome."

Two years later, Erbakan warned against "the Zionists who are humanity's greatest scourge, they exploit the earth to control the world."

An article published in the Turkish online edition Milli Gazete referred to "the legend of the Jewish genocide," expressing similar views as anti-Semitic Holocaust deniers.

Milli Gorus is against the separation of Church and State and advocates the introduction of Sharia law instead. Milli Gorus Germany is closely monitored by the German domestic security service [BfV].

These extremist views are not shared by everyone. For many years, the Dutch Milli Gorus branch was led by two young and moderate men named Haci Karacaer and Uzeyir Kabaktepe who opposed Sharia law and accepted the principle of separation of Church and State. Both Karacaer and Kabaktepe clashed with members belonging to the older generation and the headquarters in Cologne which pursued a much more conservative line.

In 1994, the Dutch Milli Gorus branch bought a piece of land in Amsterdam-West and opened a mosque in a garage. They wanted to build a new mosque, a huge one. According to the plans, this so-called "Wester Mosque" was not going to be just a mosque but also a cultural and social center, a shopping center and a sports complex. Initially, local authorities in Amsterdam-West [district "De Baarsjes"] led by Papineau Salm [Dutch Labor Party] were opposed. Salm received serious threats which he reported to the police but few people in the Labor Party supported him. Angry Turks then took to the streets. Kabaktepe addressed the demonstrators suggesting there could violent riots if their demands were not met.

Kabaktepe was a local businessman and the Wester Mosque was his idea. Kabaktepe was supported by the influential Amsterdam Center for Immigrants [ACB]. They advised Kabaktepe to engage the builders corporation "Het Oosten" [The East]. Salm's successor Henk van Waveren then gave Milli Gorus and "Het Oosten" permission to build the Wester Mosque. Local authorities in Amsterdam-West believed and hoped that the new mosque would a symbol of integration, tolerance and dialogue. They believed Kabaktepe was a moderate Turkish Muslim. The previous threats issued by the same man seemed to have been forgotten. Kabaktepe was indeed not as conservative as the Milli Gorus leadership in Cologne.

The Dutch branch preferred to be more autonomous and decided in 1999 that the Dutch chairman of Milli Gorus was to be appointed by the local branch and not by the leaders in Cologne. Kabaktepe's friend Haci Karacaer, the son of a Turkish-Kurdish guestworker, became "director of Milli Gorus Netherlands." He once said that Europe's roots are Islamic. "We gave you the Jewish-Christian roots."

This is turning history upside down. But compared to the people in Cologne Karacaer was a moderate, too. Yet, there was a small problem in 2005 when people living in Amsterdam-West objected to plans to build a 42 meter high minaret. Kabaktepe and Karacaer maintained that this was in line with "Ottoman architectural prescriptions." Arbiters decided in 2006 in favor of the 42 meter high minaret. Another problem was money. Milli Gorus needed an extra two million Euros and Labor Party leaders in Amsterdam, the mayor included, was willing to help and gave the money. The Wester Mosque now was a prestige project, a precious symbol of tolerance and multiculturalism. The agreement between Milli Gorus and local city authorities from "De Baarsjes" stipulated that Milli Gorus and their Wester Mosque would pursue a moderate course.

Dutch Justice Minister Piet Hein Donner was present at a special celebration in April 2006 to mark the beginning of the construction work.

But the hard-liners in Cologne did not like the idea that a Dutch Minister, a Christian-Democrat that is, played such an important role that day. They were opposed to dialogue and mutual understanding. And they wanted to get rid of both Kabaktepe and Karacaer who were, in their view, too independent minded and too "liberal." They demanded already in 2003 that Karacaer would leave. They said it was not allowed for Milli Gorus people to have contacts with Jews, Christians and gays. They also did not like Karacaer's strong condemnation of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on America. Karacaer really hated Mohammed Atta and his ilk who represented a demonic perversion of Islam, the face of evil.

[Joseph]

Part 2

The people in Cologne also demanded to have full control over the Wester Mosque project. Kabaktepe was so alarmed that he decided to inform the Dutch Security and Intelligence Service AIVD about the pressure put on him by the movement's headquartes in Cologne. [The AIVD produced several internal reports on the infighting in Milli Gorus, the tone of these reports was not optimistic.] One year later, the Cologne leadership sent a new Turkish imam to Amsterdam.

Osman Pakoz was a hard-liner who had received theologial training in Pakistan. Young men wearing beards and dressed in jellabas [conservative Islamic dress] began to visit Milli Gorus' Aya Sofia Mosque. Kabaktepe had never seen such types in the mosque before and he was highly worried. "They must be gassed just like the Jews," the youngsters dressed in their jellabas said when a city official visited the mosque in 2006.

By that time Kabaktepe and Karacaer had already been removed by the leadership in Cologne [May 2006]. The new Milli Gorus director in Amsterdam was Fatih Dag, a fanatic made socially acceptable statements for public consumption while promoting to a fundamentalist line.

City officials in Amsterdam-West were flabbergasted. They did not like the new man from Cologne at all. It was against their idea of tolerance and understanding and against the agreement with the previous leaders that the Wester Mosque leadership would pursue a moderate course.

Henk van Waveren felt betrayed. "They have deceived us," he said in an interview. "Something radically changed inside Milli Gorus." Frank Blijdendijk, director of the builders corporation "Het Oosten" said: "We were naive." He fears there will be perpetual lawsuits.

Fatih Dag has already threatened "that we Turks will build the mosque ourselves," otherwise it could have dire consequences. He predicted that a "beautiful Wester Mosque" will be ready by 2012. In case the building permit is withdrawn, Dag said he will immediately organize a demonstration:


"There will be busses from every Milli Gorus mosque in Europe, there will be quite a lot of people. I did not tell Al Jazeera about it yet, but I am sure they will soon know about it and I will be on TV. This interview will be seen throughout the Arab world. I don't know what the consequences will be. All Muslims have satellite disks, so they'll see that a beautful Muslim project is being prohibited here. Do not forget, it all began here with a few Turks, but now it has become the project of many Muslims in the Netherlands. I expect a revolt among them within the limits of the law, of course, no violence, but keep in mind: our people are more emotional than you Europeans are."
This is sheer intimidation. To announce that the Muslim masses will rise up against the peaceful nation of the Netherlands, is a real threat. It happened before. It happened in equally peaceful Denmark when a conservative imam mobilized the Arab world against cartoons published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten showing the Muslim prophet Mohammed. But this is not very surprising. Many conservative Muslims in Europe behave as if they are already in control of politics and society. They protest when male doctors examine their wives and ask for female doctors. Some male doctors in the Netherlands have even been threatened with physical violence by bearded men in jellabas. [One wonders what a Taliban commander would do if his wife or daughter would suddenly fall ill; when they ruled Afghanistan the Taliban prohibited women from going to universities, so there were no practicing female doctors in Afghanistan between 1996 and December 2001.]

The Amsterdam City Council decided in May 2007 to break off all contact with Milli Gorus. Milli Gorus, meanwhile, is involved in a number of huge financial scandals [embezzlement of funds, Islamic banking, etc.]. There are indications that Turkish government ministers are involved as well. Multiculturalism is fine within limits. When militant Muslims are beginning to threaten and intimidate us and act as if they are in the majority here, something has gone terribly wrong. This is not just a problem in a country like the Netherlands. Unfortunately, there is a much wider problem with Islam itself.

The problem with Islam Islam is a missionary and politically assertive religion and it is not as peaceful as many Muslim claim. From its inception the religion of Islam spread through violence. The Muslim prophet Mohammed himself was a warrior, ruler and conquerer, a man who declared holy war ["jihad"] on infidels. Those who opposed his rule had to be killed:

"Those that make war against God and His apostle [=Mohammed] and spread disorder in the land shall be put to death or crucified or have their hands and feet cut off on alternate sides, or be banished from the land." [Koran, Sura 5 verse 33 translated by N.J. Dawood].
Mohammed's first biographer Ibn Ishaq [704-768] relates how "the apostle" [Mohammed] once said: "Kill any Jew who falls into your power." The same apostle approved of killing more than 600 Jewish males in the market place of Medina. They "were led out tied together in groups, and beheaded, one by one, on the edge of the trenches and thrown in." The women and children were sold into slavery, the prophet took a concubine for himself, the pretty Rayhana, the widow of one of those who had been executed.

There is a sharp contrast between the life and message of Mohammed and the life and message of Jesus Christ as related in the four Gospels of the Bible. According to the Biblical account the devil once took Jesus to a very high mountain showing him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. "All these," he said, "I will give you, if you only fall down and do me hommage." [Matthew 4 verses 8, 9, New English Bible]. It was Jesus who once said [John 18 verse 36]: "My kingdom does not belong to this world" [literally: "My kingdom is not of this world"]. He explicitly rejected the use of violence to spread his message.

But the religion of Islam Islam spread through the following means:


violent jihad
making converts
emigration to non-Muslim lands
Those who emigrate to non-Muslim lands to spread the message of Islam follow the prophet's example. Mohammed and his followers emigrated or fled from Mecca to Medina in 622. They were persecuted in Mecca and then found refuge in Medina. Those who followed Mohammed to Medina were called Muhajir[o]un [the emgigrants]. According to the Koran, those who leave their homeland will receive special rewards:


"He that flies his homeland for the cause of God [Allah] shall find numerous places of refuge in the land and great abundance. He that leaves his dwelling to fight for God [Allah] and His apostle and is then overtaken by death, shalll be rewarded by God." [Koran, Sura 4:100].
In his A Guide to the Contents of the Qur'an, Faruq Sherif writes:


"Thus the paramount commandment was that believers must migrate from places where Islam was persecuted and proceed to places where they could join and strengthen the Moslem community. Those who failed in this duty would have to answer to the angels of death for their neglect, and when they would plead that they were oppressed in their homeland, the angels would reject their excuse, saying: 'Was not God's earth wide enough for you to migrate in it?" Reduced to silence, they would be consigned to Hell for not having emigrated when they could have done so."
Muslims in non-Arab countries must become a majority by making as many converts as possible. Once their country is a Muslim country, the changes will be dramatic. As Sir Vidia Naipaul, the Nobel prize-winning author, points out:


"Islam is in its origins an Arab religion. Everyone not an Arab who is a Muslim is a convert. Islam is not simply a matter of conscience or private belief. It makes imperial demands. A convert's world view alters. His holy places are in Arab lands; his sacred language is Arabic. His idea of history alters. He rejects his own; he becomes, whether he likes it or not, a part of Arab history. The convert has to turn away from everything that he is. The disturbance for societes is immense, and even after a thousand years can remain unresolved; the turning away has to be done again and again. People develop fantasies about who and what they are; and in the Islam of converted countries there is an element of neurosis and nihilism. These countries can be easily set on the boil."
Honor crimes and arranged marriages

A good example of a volatile and explosive country is Pakistan, one of the countries Naipaul decribes in his book as a violent society dominated by revenge, honor and hot-temperedness. He met a Pakistani who was proud of the Pathan idea of honor. This man told him a story about a Pathan girl who had run away with a male servant of the family. "The couple had been hunted down – no place for them to hide – and tied to a tree and shot; the police had stood by and done nothing." There are many Pakistani immigrants in Britain who stick to their ancestral and tribal traditions of honor and arranged marriages. This is the reason why Naipaul, who was born in Trinidad to Indian parents but who now lives in Britain, is highly critical of "multiculturalism," and the "benefits society," arguing that immigrants must seek to assimilate into their host country. A man who comes to another country "can't say: 'I want the laws and the protection, but I want to live in my own way.' It's wrong. It has become a kind of a racket, this multiculturalism."

Whereas honor crimes and arranged marriages are not restricted to Muslim cultures, Muslims are involved in these evil practices only too often. Sue Lloyd Roberts interviewed a number of victims for BBC television. She claims that "hundreds of young Asian girls in Britain are living in hiding, some at secret addresses for fear of being traced by 'bounty hunters' and returned to vengeful husbands and fathers." One of these terrified girls, 18 year old Neesha, told her:

"When I was 16, my parents took me to Pakistan to get married. They locked me up and starved me until I agreed. My husband beat me, starved me and raped me. So when I got back to England I refused to get him over. And so my family here started to beat me and kept me throwing me out of the house. Even when it was snowing, they would leave me crying on the doorstep. They threatened me, I feared for my life as I ran away."

So-called bounty hunters are employed by the families to trace girls and return them. A bounty hunter told Sue Lloyd Roberts:


"I have a lot of ways of finding the girls. I talk to shopkeepers and I use taxi drivers a lot. They normally know where they are and what they are doing. No I won't tell you how I'm paid and although people call me a bounty hunter, I call myself a community mediator. For example, I once found a girl and her father said he would kill her when she got home so I made sure he didn't. I don't approve of forced marriages and I know that the parents who are prepared to kill girls who don't obey. I've been involved in many cases which ended tragically."
Honor crimes and arranged marriages still pose a huge problem in British immigrant society. These practices contribute to the formation of ghettos and parallel societies. Is multiculturalism bad for women? It is indeed, says Susan Moller Okin who points to widespread practices of rape in some societies.


"But worse fates do exist in some cultures – notably in Pakistan and parts of the Arab Middle East, where women who bring rape charges quite frequently are charged with the serious Muslim offense of zina, or sex outside of marriage. Law allows for the whipping or imprisonment of such women, and culture condones the killing or pressuring into suicide of a raped woman by relatives intent on restoring the family's honor."
Honor crimes also pose a serious problem in a pro-Western nation like Jordan where there are no safe havens for women threatened by their relatives. Women are even placed in prison for their own protection, because the government failed to create shelters for them.

In the Netherlands, Muslim immigrants from Turkey and Morocco have introduced barbaric practices of wife beatings, domestic violence and honor killings. Muslim immigrants from Somalia imported the cruel custom of female genitital mutilation. Between October 2004 and January 2005, there were more than 150 cases of honor related crimes in the city of The Hague and surroundings. In eleven cases these crimes resulted in the death of the victims. In most cases the perpetrators do not show any regret. They regard these killings as restoration of their family honor, a holy duty. Other family members often support them. In many cases the husband beats his wife who then decides to leave him. The husband does not accept this and subsequently kills his wife.

Women often flee to a so-called "Blijf-van-mijn-lijf-huis" or shelter for victims of domestic violence. These shelters are in secret locations. In June 1999, a 29-year old Turkish woman named Kezban Vural was shot dead by her former Turkish husband in the city of Zwijndrecht. Her children witnessed the killing. Kezban had taken refuge in a shelter for domestic violence but her former husband was able to trace her there and killed her subsequently. In court, defense lawyers argued that the Kezban's husband was a primitive Turkish man who was not integrated into Dutch society. He simply did not know better than to kill his "unfaithful" wife. His honor had to be revenged. Such was the age old custom in the land where he had his roots [Turkey]. The court did not accept this kind of "cultural defense" and condemned the Turkish killer to 15 years inprisonment. The court said that he had shot his wife in the presence of their children. This was, in the court's view, "a dispicable act."

In Germany, too, most of the victims and perpretators of honor crimes have a Turkish background.

A number of lawyers and criminologists attach much value to the cultural background of suspects. This should be taken into account by judges when they pass a verdict. Recognizing a suspect's cultural background could lead to mitigation or even annulment of punishment, they say. The right to culture is a fundamental right and non-native suspects can refer to their cultural background. "Pronouncing heavy sentences against the perpetrators of cultural offenses is based on a wrong interpretation of the role of penal law in the multicultural society," writes Mirjam Siesling and Jeroen ten Voorde in the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad.

This is a highly questionably view. Multiculturalism is a kind of ideology which should never dictate judges how to rule in the courtroom. Any social rule or ideology which is used to influence the rulings of independent judges is dangerous. Moreover, how can one ever "culturally" justify plain murder, wife beatings or female genital mutilation?

Honor and revenge play an important role in both Turkish and Arab cultures. Many honor crimes are also committed by immigrants from Iraq. In the past five years, a growing number of Iraqis, Iraqi and Turkish Kurds have settled in Sweden and introduced the problem of honor crimes to Swedish society. And in Spain a young Iraqi woman named Ghufran was told by her parents to end her relationship with her Spanish boyfriend Luis, an infidel. Her father Omar wanted her to marry a 25-year old nephew in Iraq but she refused to comply with his wishes. She was beaten several times. When she and Luis fled to another city, Omar began to target Luis' family, threatening to abduct a son of his sister Miramar.

Moroccan immigrants in Europe are involved in migrant trafficking and drugs smuggling. Thousands of minors from Morocco are smuggled into Europe and it is extremeny difficult to send these minors back to their home country. In the last six months some 900 Moroccan minors arrived in southern Spain alone and local refugee centers no longer have the capacity to take in additional immigrants.

These youngsters are often frustrated and angry. They pose a serious security risk. Monair Mahmoud Ali El Messery, the imam of the Islamic Cultural Center in Madrid, recently issued a strong warning that these immigrant minors are "a bomb ready to explode somewhere." "These youngstes are ready to accept any idea, they are a breeding ground for those who are sowing any type of extremism." It is not restricted to Spain. "Young muslims in Europe are like the blind led by a one eyed man, they lack any frame of reference," El Messery said. A very dangerous situation arises when they meet poorly qualified imams who brainwash them.

Moroccan youths in the Netherlands are over-represented in the criminal justice system. When they are arrested or appear in court they usually deny everything, even in the face of unrefutable evidence that they committed a crime. Denying is a matter of honor, so why admit that you are guilty?

©2007 Emerson Vermaat, all rights reserved.


Mr. Vermaat is a Dutch investigative reporter specializing in crime and terrorism. His website is: emersonvermaat.com

[bell-the-cat]

What a mess that article is.

One minute it is going about the unprincipled attitides of establishment politicians in the Nederlands, next it is about unspecified European "leftists" (whatever they are) and Hamas, then it is on to Turkish nationalists denying the Armenian genocide, then a mention or two about ethnicisation of voting behavior, then onto Pan-Islamic movements in Europe, next it is it is a critique of the origin of and essence of Islam. And that's me not mentioning the many smaller topics as well.
All of those topics deserve detailed examination on their own, none of them deserve the summary Fox-News-style treatment that that author has given them. I think the whole article hides its true intent - it is just a piece of Jewish propaganda.

[Joseph]

What a mess that article is.

One minute it is going about the unprincipled attitides of establishment politicians in the Nederlands, next it is about unspecified European "leftists" (whatever they are) and Hamas, then it is on to Turkish nationalists denying the Armenian genocide, then a mention or two about ethnicisation of voting behavior, then onto Pan-Islamic movements in Europe, next it is it is a critique of the origin of and essence of Islam. And that's me not mentioning the many smaller topics as well.
All of those topics deserve detailed examination on their own, none of them deserve the summary Fox-News-style treatment that that author has given them. I think the whole article hides its true intent - it is just a piece of Jewish propaganda.

The article definitely is all over the place as you wrote but I think it hits upon a growing movement amongst people in Europe to re-think their ultra-liberal attitudes towards Islam, Arabs, Turks, etc with regards to human rights and immigration. People are waking up to the fact that the Muslims that they have welcomed into their countries by and large support terrorism and fascism. I do not believe it is a piece of propaganda though.

[Joseph]

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/017631.php

[Joseph]

ORUM 18 NEWS SERVICE, Oslo, Norway

http://www.forum18.org/

The right to believe, to worship and witness
The right to change one's belief or religion
The right to join together and express one's belief

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Thursday 9 August 2007
AZERBAIJAN: TWO-YEAR PRISON TERM FOR BAPTIST PASTOR

Baptist Pastor Zaur Balaev was yesterday (8 August) sentenced to two years
in jail, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. The Pastor from Aliabad in
northern Azerbaijan was convicted of using violence against a state
representative, and was also accused of holding "illegal meetings under the
guise of religious activity without concrete authority and without state
registration," attracting young people to worship services and playing loud
music at services. Azerbaijan's authorities have changed their accusations
whilst Balaev has been held, initially claiming that he set a dog on police
during a raid on a Sunday worship service. After more than 50 people signed
a written statement testifying to Balev's innocence, the dog disappeared
from the authorities' claims and Balaev was instead accused of attacking
five policeman and damaging a police car door. The authorities' claims are
strongly disputed. Prosecution witnesses admitted that they had not
witnessed the alleged assault by Pastor Balaev. They stated that they had
only heard about it from people at the market, teahouse, or because police
pressured them into testifying. "We're preparing to submit an appeal," Ilya
Zenchenko of the Baptist Union told Forum 18. A court official told Forum
18 that Judge Seifali Seifullaev was not available for comment and had been
transferred to a new position.

AZERBAIJAN: TWO-YEAR PRISON TERM FOR BAPTIST PASTOR

By Geraldine xxxan, Forum 18 News Service <http://www.forum18.org>

Pastor Zaur Balaev was sentenced to two years in prison yesterday (8
August) by a court in the north-western regional centre of Zakatala
[Zaqatala]. Simply announcing the verdict at 4pm local time, Judge Seifali
Seifullaev gave no explanation for his decision, the head of Azerbaijan's
Baptist Union reported shortly afterwards. "It's very sad news," Ilya
Zenchenko remarked to Forum 18 News Service from the Zakatala-Baku road.
"We're preparing to submit an appeal on Friday (10 August)."

The 44-year-old pastor was convicted under Article 315, Part 1 of the
Criminal Code, which punishes the application or threat of application of
violence, including to a state representative when he or she is carrying
out official duties. It carries a maximum three-year prison term. His trial
began on 16 July and the latest indictment also complained that Balaev
"conducts illegal meetings under the guise of religious activity without
concrete authority and without state registration", attracts young people
to services and plays loud music at services (see F18News 16 July 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=994>).

At Judge Seifali Seifullaev's number on 9 August, a court representative
confirmed that Zaur Balaev was yesterday sentenced to two years'
imprisonment under Article 315, Part 1. When Forum 18 raised doubts about
the trial - in particular how Balaev could have attacked five policemen -
he remarked that he had "nothing to do with it", and that only Judge
Seifullaev was familiar with the case. Asked when Judge Seifullaev would be
available for comment, the court representative told Forum 18 that the
Balaev case had been his last in Zakatala, and that he had been transferred
to a new - but not senior - position. The court representative insisted
that he did not know where this was.

Present at packed Zakatala court hearings on 25 and 27 July, Ilya
Zenchenko told Forum 18 that five police officers claimed Balaev had beaten
them when they visited his home in the village of Aliabad during 20 May
Sunday worship. Village Policeman Khalid Memedov explained that he called
in "because what was happening in the house was a violation of public order
and an illegal act and I went to have a chat as a preventative measure."
Queried about the presence of four other officers, Memedov reportedly
responded: "It just turned out that way."

According to Zenchenko, four local witnesses unexpectedly maintained that
they did not actually see the alleged beating, but only heard about it from
people at the market, teahouse or Memedov, who pressured them into
testifying. The Baptist Union leader also told Forum 18 that the court
ignored the absence of evidence proving that the policemen's bruises and
scratches were caused by Balaev rather than sport or gardening.

According to Aliabad church members, police demanded that worship be
stopped, the congregation disperse and Balaev accompany them to the police
station on 20 May, which he did peacefully. They and other villagers
categorically deny the police accusations that the pastor attacked them
(see F18News 22 May 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id-1>).

Pastor Balaev was initially accused by police of setting a dog onto them
during the raid. The congregation vehemently denies this accusation. When
more than 50 people, including villagers who are not Christian, signed a
statement testifying to the Pastor's innocence "the dog completely
disappeared from the accusation," Zenchenko of the Baptist Union told Forum
18 on 12 July. The authorities then changed their accusation to allege that
Balaev, described by Zenchenko as a "thin man," beat up five "strong"
policeman and damaged a police car door. Like the original accusation, the
authorities' latest version of events is also strongly denied by the church
(see F18News 12 July 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=993>).

Pastor Balaev has been in detention since 20 May, and there is increasing
concern about his deteriorating health. Born with a heart defect, he
suffered heart attacks on 23 July and 5 August, Zenchenko told Forum 18,
and is also experiencing kidney pain. On 4 June the pastor was transferred
from the police station in Zakatala to the city of Gyanja [Gäncä], 250
kilometres (150 miles) away. According to the Baptist Union leader, he is
being kept there in what is colloquially known as the "frog pool"
("lyagushatnik"), a remand cell where detainees normally spend only a few
hours or days. "The conditions there are terrible - there is no proper
toilet or ventilation," Zenchenko explained. The Baptists expect that
Balaev will remain in the "frog pool" until his appeal is heard.

While in jail, Balaev has been beaten by police. His family has had to go
into debt to pay to take food to him, and the authorities have denied his
family the opportunity to meet him since his arrest (see F18News 22 June
2007 <http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id - 9>).

The Baptists now suspect that there may be an additional financial
motivation for Balaev's prosecution. According to Zenchenko, Gyanja prison
workers have been ridiculing the nature of the pastor's "brotherhood",
seeing that it is not prepared to pay a bribe for his release. In what is
common practice in Azerbaijan, he told Forum 18, the going rate to buy
someone out of prison is 5,000 US Dollars (4,260 Azeri Manats, 28,840
Norwegian Kroner or 3,627 Euros). Zenchenko believes that Balaev could have
been seen as a lucrative target because he owns land and a tractor.

Zenchenko also reported that local state representatives have not harassed
the Aliabad congregation since briefly detaining its second pastor, Hamid
Shabanov, and confiscating the church library in the wake of the 20 May
raid (see F18News 4 June 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id-8>). "We started going
there from Baku and they stopped causing problems," he told Forum 18. The
church library has not yet been returned, however.

Aliabad village lies close to the border with Georgia in the north-western
region of Zakatala [Zaqatala]. Its 10,000-strong population is largely of
the Ingilo minority, ethnic Georgians converted to Islam several centuries
ago. The reason the police gave for raiding the Aliabad church on 20 May
was that, because the church did not have state registration, it could not
meet (see F18News 22 May 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id-1>).

Officials of the State Committee for Work with Religious Organisations in
Baku frequently deny legal status to religious communities they do not
like, including non-state controlled Muslims, Protestants, Jehovah's
Witnesses and others. Azerbaijan's bureaucratic registration procedures
also allow local officials to obstruct a registration application even
before it reaches the State Committee. When Forum 18 visited the notary
Najiba Mamedova in Zakatala in November 2004, to find out why she
persistently refused to notarise the signatures on the Aliabad church's
registration application, she shouted: "We don't need any Baptists here".
She then threw Forum 18 out of her office (see F18News 8 December 2004
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=471>).

Unregistered religious activity is not formally illegal in Azerbaijan,
though officials often act as though it is. As Zenchenko of the Baptist
Union has pointed out, there is a bitter irony in officials obstructing the
Pastor Balaev's Aliabad congregation's applications for registration, then
punishing it for meeting without registration (see F18News 16 July 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=994>). Baptist churches in
Aliabad have been repeatedly denied state registration since the early
1990s (see eg. F18News 1 December 2004
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=466>).

As well as being repeatedly denied legal status over 13 years, Aliabad's
Baptists have been subjected to vilification by local officials for their
Christian faith. One example of this has been officials denying church
members' children birth certificates, as their parents' choice of Christian
names were deemed unacceptable by officials of Zakatala Registry Office.
Without a birth certificate, it is impossible for children to, amongst
other things, go to kindergarten or school, or to get hospital treatment.
(see eg. F18News 22 June 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id - 9> and 22 May 2007
<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id-1>).

[Joseph]

The answer to this questions is still NO.

[Joseph]

The answer to this questions is still NO.

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/019028.php

[Tongue]

A man kills his daugher over refusal to wear hijab

I am surprised this hasn't been posted yet..


Pakistani Canadian kills daughter over hijab
Submitted by Indian-Muslim on Wed, 12/12/2007 - 06:39.

* Muslim World News

By Gurmukh Singh, IANS

Toronto : A young Pakistani Canadian girl's refusal to wear the hijab cost her her life. Sixteen-year-old Aqsa Parvez was strangulated by her father Muhammad Parvez in their home in the suburb of Mississauga, police said.

Parvez, 57, called the police after the early morning incident Monday. When police and ambulance reached the two-storey home in suburb, which is dominated by South Asians, they found the girl lying in a faint.

She was rushed to a nearby hospital and later shifted to a hospital in Toronto and put on life support system. But it was of no avail. Aqsa died Monday night.

Parvez was arrested and later remanded to police custody.

Aqsa's classmates at the local Applewood Heights Secondary School said the girl had problems with her family for some time as she refused to wear the hijab, the headdress worn by Muslim women in some countries.

On her father's insistence, they said, she would wear the hijab while leaving home only to replace it with trendy clothes when she reached school. They recalled how she would sometimes run to the washroom to change into modern dress.

The incident has shocked modern Muslims across Canada. Toronto-based Sonia Ahmed, who runs the Miss World Pakistan and grooms Pakistani-origin girls for Miss Bikini and other pageants, said angrily: "The hijab was never a part of Pakistani dress. It is an Arab imposition. This should be banned all over North America. This killer father will now think that he has done the `right thing', and he can now go to heaven and claim his 70 virgins. Hang him."

"Ninety-nine percent of our girls want to be free. But because of parental restrictions, they are forced to live dual lives. At home, they live as their parents want. But outside, they have all the fun," Ahmed told IANS.

For various reasons, she said, Pakistanis don't want to blend with Indians "whose culture is all dance and song. So they end up with the Arab immigrants. Hence this Arab culture and hijab among Pakistanis".

"But we Pakistanis are South Asians and the South Asian culture is different. Zia-ul Haq started the hijabisation of Pakistan when started his Islamisation drive. He invited Arab Wahabi scholars who married Pakistani women and started the hijab tradition."

Ausma Khan, editor-in-chief of Muslim Girl magazine, was also outraged: "It is a tiny minority for whom the hijab is an issue. Many of our readers in the 18-24 age group say hijab is an expression of their personality. It is their choice, not anybody's imposition."

Opposing parental impositions on young girls, she said, "I am sure the tragedy will spark a debate on what is wrong with the Muslims and the issues surrounding the hijab. But this tragedy is an example of a cultural and generational conflict."

In a similar case four years ago, a Sikh in British Columbia had killed his 17-year-old daughter for walking out on the family and opting to live with her white boyfriend.

[Tongue]

Muslim leaders denounce Parvez murder but defend importance of hijab

Muslim leaders denounce Parvez murder but defend importance of hijab



By Craig Offman, National Post
Mississauga, Ont. -- Muslim leaders yesterday denounced as un-Islamic the murder of a Toronto-area teenager who had clashed with her family, but said some parents would view themselves as having failed in their duty if their child chose not to wear the hijab.

The comments came at a tense news conference at the Islamic Society of North America Canada headquarters in Mississauga, held three days after the alleged strangling death of 16-year-old Aqsa Parvez. Her father, Mohammad Parvez, is accused of killing her, and friends say the family had argued over the girl’s refusal to wear the hijab, or traditional Muslim head scarf.

While stressing the sanctity of human life, denouncing the crime and describing it as a case of domestic abuse, religious leaders yesterday insisted on the hijab’s importance to such parents as Aqsa’s, even if a daughter rejects it.

“They were believing that part of their culture was hijab, and it is their duty to convince their kids that this is part of their culture,” said Mohammad Al-Nadvi, who sits on the Canadian Council of Imams, adding that if the daughter opts out, then they feel they have failed.

Still, Imam Al-Nadvi said that judging from the information he received, the hijab was only one of the issues.

“This girl, she refused to stay at home,” he said. “There were feelings that she is going in some wrong direction … going with some other boy or some other thing.”
After he made those comments, two women in hijabs interrupted him and started to disagree, before abruptly leaving the gym where the conference was being held.
In an interview afterward, the women -- a mother and daughter -- said they had taken Aqsa into their home on various occasions, but would not offer any more information.

The convener of the event, Sheikh Alaa Elsayed, said that one of the keys to getting daughters to wear the hijab is teaching them about religion at a young age. The other, he said, is “a proper spouse.”

In his introductory remarks filled with religious references, Arabic flourishes and abundant blessings, Sheik Elsayed stressed that parents should teach the benefits of the religious clothing. “We have to be successful teachers,” he said, adding later in the dialogue that parents should encourage daughters “to do the right thing.”

Still, he said, words and deeds were more important than clothing.

Citing the Koran, Sheik Elsayed said it is forbidden to hit anyone, adding that taking away a human life is an act against all humanity. “No religion condones such an act,” he said.

He also spoke out against moving away from religion.” We cannot let culture supersede religion,” he said. “If we stay away from the teachings of Islam, we will pay for it.”

After the meeting, several Muslims had conflicted feelings about the message given to the media.

“I don’t know how important the hijab is,” said the centre’s director, M.D. Khalid. “My wife didn’t wear it until we had children, and then they went to Islamic school and she felt she should set a role in the family.”

Aqsa’s brother Mohammad Shan Parvez told reporters on Wednesday that what happened to his sister “is not [about] culture.” He said his mother was sick with grief.

“She cannot control, because her daughter died, so she’s [feeling] bad,” said Mr. Parvez, shortly after he saw his 57-year-old father make a brief court appearance in an orange prison jumpsuit. Another brother has been charged with obstructing police in their investigation.
Joseph Ciraco, lawyer for the father, said on Wednesday that family members “are torn.”

“I mean, you’ve got a sister that’s gone and your father and brother are in jail. I don’t think it’s a big surprise that they’re distraught and trying to cope as best they can.”

Police have not speculated on a motive for the killing, but indicated on Wednesday that the girl died of a “neck compression.”

Police were called to Mr. Parvez’s Mississauga, Ont., home minutes before 8 a.m. on Monday by a man who told 911 operators he had killed his daughter. Paramedics found the girl lying motionless on the floor of her bedroom. The paramedics detected a faint pulse and rushed her to hospital, where she died several hours later.

Friends have said Aqsa left her home about a week before the attack because she had been fighting with her father and brothers about her refusal to wear the hijab and other traditional clothing. The teenager often would change into Western clothes when she got to her high school, then put the hijab back on before she went home, friends said.

Investigators later charged her father, a taxicab driver from Pakistan, with murder. Mr. Ciraco said his client likely will face a charge of second-degree murder, although that has not been finalized.

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2007/12/13/muslim-leaders-denounce-aqsa-parvez-murder-as-un-islamic.aspx