Islam

One of the more striking photographs from the sadly crowded files of modern Australian terrorist coverage came in 2005, when 17 men were arrested for plotting the murder of hundreds of civilians in a bombing campaign against major landmarks in Sydney and Melbourne.

When the men were rounded up by the Australian Federal Police, two of their wives decided to go public. They said their husbands were just normal Aussies, good blokes going about their business who loved Australia and wished no one any harm.

The women were photographed in a normal suburban backyard with a Hills Hoist and a barbecue in the background and were wearing full body-length niqabs, those burqas on steroids, peering through the slots in their medieval outfits to say that they were no different from any other group of Australians. As a public relations exercise this little photo opportunity wasn’t exactly a roaring success.

Continue reading "Have these terrorists reformed? Fingers crossed" »

This is the final in our Adelaide Festival of Ideas series - the brainfest begins today. In this column Paul Collins talks about how important it is to recognise and protect religion pluralism.

Richard Dawkins and his atheist mates have done us a real disservice by caricaturing all religion as fundamentalist claptrap. The problem is that by pretending that all religions are the same, he obscures the important differences that have to be negotiated if we are going to live in a more peaceful and tolerant world.

This is especially true when we come to negotiate that most important contemporary divides between the West and the Islamic world. At the heart of this is the negotiation between Christianity and Islam, two faiths that really need to talk to each other for all our sakes. But this isn’t going to be easy.

Continue reading "Religions: Not same same, but different" »

Whether you like it or not, multiculturalism is here to stay. I don’t use the word in the political sense, of multiculturalism as an ideology, a doctrine or a social vision. I use it as a general descriptive term, in the absence of any other, to reflect the reality of life in the suburbs of Australia, where for every Tom, Dick and Harry there’s a Mustafa, a Tran and a Nkosana just around the corner.

In the ten years since September 11, 2001, it’s the Mustafas who have been the source of the greatest unease in countries such as ours which have been built on successive patterns of immigration.

Those us who can’t comprehend the concept of flying a plane into a building to make a political point have quite understandably rounded our contempt on those who seek to excuse or explain such murderous conduct.

Continue reading "9/11 and the struggle to retain perspective" »

The 150th floor of the Dubai’s Burj Khalifa would guarantee a great view of the vast desert city. But if you’re Muslim and observing the holy month of Ramadan, it’ll also make you hungry.

Residents occupying the loftier levels of the world’s tallest building, will have to wait two minutes longer than their neighbours on the lower floors to break their fast, given how much longer their elevated position frames the sun on the horizon.

That’s how seriously the Islamic world takes their festival of Ramadan.

Continue reading "If only Christmas was more like Ramadan" »

More than 20,000 people pledged to join a Ban the Burqa protest yesterday by donning balaclavas and trenchcoats to show that… people shouldn’t wear balaclavas and trenchcoats. Or something like that. 

Those who want the burqa banned are facing some pretty big hurdles. Sure, there’s all the civil liberties guff, but they also have a big public relations problem because their side of the debate seems to get regularly hijacked by illiterate, hate-filled, intolerant, violence-prone, ignorant bigots.

So here’s some advice to the burqa banners as to how to keep ‘on message’:

Continue reading "PR 101: Helping burqa banners stay on message" »

A News Ltd survey of Australian imams unearthed a renewed call for the recognition of sharia banking in Australia. At The Punch we weren’t really sure what that meant, so we asked expert in Islamic banking Dr Hussain Rammal, a lecturer in International Business at UniSA, to talk us through the basics.

What are the main differences between Islamic banking and Western banking?

The main difference is in the way the two systems deal with money. Under the Islamic economic system money is seen as a medium of exchange and has no intrinsic value. Therefore charging a higher rate of return (interest) on lend money does not sit well under the Islamic system. Islamic financial institutions use an asset-backed system where they purchase the assets on behalf of their customers and then use various financing agreements to on-sell the asset to their clients. These include profit-and-loss sharing, leasing and hire-purchase, and mark-up based agreements.

Continue reading "Punch Q & A: What is this Islamic banking caper?" »

The latest sortie in the war between Islam and Christendom involves a billboard which in the eyes of its critics is the most offensive bit of advertising since those signs asking us if we want longer lasting sex.

It reads “Jesus: A prophet of Islam” and has been displayed in Sydney and is now heading to Adelaide in a spectacularly muddle-headed gesture by creator Diaa Mohammed to foster greater understanding between the Christian and Muslim religions.

Mohammed has set up an organisation called MyPeace which aims to find common ground between the two faiths. Its thinking stems from the fact that in the Islamic holy book the Koran, while Mohammed is obviously the star of the show, JC also gets a pretty good write-up as a prophet of peace. If you contact the MyPeace website they will send you a free copy of the Koran. Call now, their operators are standing by.

Continue reading "Free to believe in God, free to keep quiet about it" »

Is the case of the niqab-clad Sydney woman who berated a police officer and fronted court this week with an aggressive all-male cheer squad a sign that multiculturalism has failed? Or does it merely signal that the people involved in this case are simply a bunch of persecuted, trouble-making ratbags who would rather have a fight than a feed?

Judging from the commentary this week many people have opted for the first conclusion. I would argue strongly in favour of the second.

The danger in rightly identifying the conduct of these individuals as appalling and unwelcome in this country is that it will get cited as proof-positive of a broader problem. It should not be used to besmirch the name of the vast majority of decent people within Australia’s Lebanese Muslim community who go about their business and live their lives in a civilised and productive manner. Equally, we should call this sort of behaviour for what it is.

Continue reading "Just yobbos, not a crisis of multiculturalism" »

Congratulations shock jocks, David Oldfield, Cory Bernardi, Fred Nile. You have your anti-hero, your Carnita.

All causes need a strong narrative, and anti-Muslim and anti-burqa sentiment just got one. Carnita Matthews, 47, had a conviction for a false accusation against a cop overturned because the court could not be sure it was indeed her that walked into a police station and made the complaint.

It all started, and finished, with a burqa. Read all about it here, here and here.

Continue reading "A burqa, large lie, and behold the pickle" »

In order for democracy to really take hold in the wake of the recent Arab Revolutions, the people of the region should be careful not to conform to Western ideas of democracy and instead develop their own model, one relevant to their own cultural norms and in tune with their own rich history of democracy.

The Arab Revolutions themselves give us insight into what this model might look like. Indeed, recent events are to be admired for the extent to which divergent voices have been heard, legitimate grievances have been aired, and women and minorities have been involved.

They are also to be admired because a balance has often been struck between the pragmatic and the ideal, between the secular and the religious, between the desire not just to oust failing tyrants but to replace them with something new, something that could respond to the varying needs of the citizens.

Continue reading "The Middle East should not adopt Western democracy" »

The death of Al-Qaeda’s leader has sparked a fierce response that lacks an understanding of the real world. The world is not perfect and nobody should pretend that it is.

Nor is foreign policy black and white. It is a cocktail of aspirational idealism and hard fought realism but too often we forget this. The last few weeks have seen an army of armchair commentators purporting their often narrow and moralist interpretations of events as the only courses of action that would have been permissible. So let’s set the record straight on ten fundamental questions with some real world answers:

1. Could Bin Laden have been captured rather than killed?

No.

Continue reading "Everything you ever wanted to know about OBL’s death" »

Sharia should never be part of Australian law. In fact, Australian authorities should be making more concerted attempts to get to grips with sharia law as it is already practised in Australia, and to make sure that the benefits of a secular democracy are better understood in migrant communities.

First of all, though, let’s just be clear that what the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils has proposed in its submission to a multiculturalism inquiry is not about stoning women for adultery or lopping off hands for stealing. What they’re talking about – at this point – is family law; divorces and marriages.

And when AFIC says (in today’s news reports) that they want Government support for a wider spread of schools and halal shops to stop ‘enclaves’ forming, they’re not talking about empire building, but about community support.

Continue reading "I hear ya on sharia, but please no hysteria" »

There is probably no other person in history who altered human behaviour and undermined our presumed freedoms and collective quality of life on the same scale as Osama bin Laden.

Bin Laden easily ranks among the greatest evil-doers of the modern era, alongside Hitler and Stalin – not in terms of the death toll from his deeds but the pernicious ripple effect of his actions throughout the world.

The genius of the organisation he formed is that it functions along a simple franchise model whereby any disaffected and fanatical group, in any corner of the planet, can hang out its shingle and operate as a terrorist cell under the al Qaeda brand. In this small globalised world, the effects of his actions were immediate.

Continue reading "The deserved demise of the man who changed us all" »

On Anzac Day, I along with about 150 protestors stood across from the Villawood Detention Centre where the crumpled remains of a burnt building, barbed wire and a security guard stood between us and them: the scourge of this naton, the ‘refugee’. The protestors chanted while a lone figure of a detainee on top of a tiled roof squatted, looking on despondently.

I wondered if he was thinking what I was thinking: That our brave soldiers who fought in Gallipoli and who today are fighting in Afghanistan, did so to protect our freedoms in the name of humanity. And ironically, while we celebrate those freedoms as a democratic nation, we are locking up people, depriving them of their freedom, their dignity and their common humanity, driving them to acts of insanity.

The Immigration Minister, the Prime Minister and the ALP at large may be caught between a rock and a hard place when it comes to the question of what should be done with asylum seekers; however, Australia not only as a signatory to the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights, but as a democracy, should place human rights before politics.

Continue reading "Don’t blame Muslims for multiculturalism’s failings" »

In light of laws which have recently come into effect France banning the wearing of the niqab and burqa, and WA Minister for Women’s Interests Robyn McSweeney’s recent comments that she finds the burqa to be ‘a very oppressive garment’, Senator Michaelia Cash, opposition spokesperson for the Status of Women, outlines her thoughts on the veiled women in Australia.

Much has been made of the debate over whether women living in Australia should wear a burqa.

As a Liberal, I believe in a free, fair, open and democratic society where people have the right to make their own choices about the way they live their lives.

It is my opinion however that the wearing of not only the burqa, but any apparel that completely covers a person’s face, is alien to our Australian culture and our values.

Continue reading "We need to talk about the ‘alien’ burqa" »

There’s a lot of religion on the site today – sorry. Then again, there’s a lot of religion in the world… anyhoo, welcome to this week’s edition of I Call Bullshit.

They love a good Muslim stoush, those Liberal MPs. Cory Bernardi on the burqa, Kevin Andrews on ‘religious enclaves’ – and now Bernie Finn on beheadings.  Scott Morrison in general. Mr Finn jumped into what has become a rather messy debate on assimilation by saying on Facebook that he failed to understand “how concerns about a religion that seems to sanction decapitation can be construed as racism”.

The halal butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth.

Continue reading "ICB: Does Islam sanction beheadings?" »

Islam doesn’t have much of a reputation for a sense of humour. Maybe its best comics don’t get an airing here in the west – there might be an equivalent of a Peter Cook or a Lenny Bruce doing stand-up at a nightclub in Tehran.

But as a general rule, the more orthodox practitioners of the Muslim faith are more likely to crack a fatwa than a funny. And there are a few Danish cartoonists who found out the hard way that poking fun at the prophet Mohammed by daring to draw a picture of the guy can land you some pretty bad reviews, and also result in your nation’s embassy being burned to the ground.

In Australia, the relationship between Muslim communities and the wider community has often been fraught. The tension has been strongest in Sydney, particularly in relation to the Lebanese Muslim community. There was an amusing and hopeful moment last week which suggested that a genial kind of mutual accommodation may be taking hold.

Continue reading "Multiculturalism: something we can all joke about" »

Public money should not be spent on promoting religion.

We don’t need religious school chaplains. State schools should be well and truly secular. Religion is a choice, not an educational need. Taxpayers should not foot the bill for others to indulge their beliefs.

Except in Indonesia.

Continue reading "We should fund Islamic schools for our own good" »

Many people assume that the events in Egypt over the last 18 days are a simple case of ‘people power’ seeking to remove a drained, corrupt, unpopular president, who is desperately clinging to power. Certainly the renewed vigour and importance of the Arab ‘street’, and the power of the protests in Egypt and Tunisia, have been important.

But what is really happening is a three-way tussle over the future political and economic structure of Egypt.

The protesters in Tahrir Square – and now across many cities and large towns in Egypt – and Mubarak, are indeed two protagonists, and the most visible ones. In one sense, the protesters have already defeated Mubarak: he has agreed to step aside in September after elections for a successor, and to the extent that the protesters were trying to get rid of the president, they have (almost certainly) succeeded.

Continue reading "The army will ultimately triumph in Egypt" »

Religious extremism seems to be on the rise, and the reaction against extremism is only getting more … extreme.

We in the Western world do so like to talk about banning stuff. All sorts of stuff.

But is banning radicals right and, more importantly, does it help?

Continue reading "How do you solve a problem like religious zealotry?" »

There was an unusual and confusing incident in the chamber of one of our Parliaments last week which spoke volumes about the tensions within this multicultural society of ours.

The incident demonstrated the hyper-sensitivity which Muslim Australians feel towards any discussion of their behaviour and, specifically in this case, their attire.

It also demonstrated the logical inconsistency of those Australians who will loudly champion our values of freedom and a fair go, while also demanding that governments pass laws to determine the type of clothing people are allowed to wear.

Continue reading "Holy War in the City of Churches" »

Wham bam! Islam!

DC Comics is about to publish a series in which the Justice League of America fights crime alongside The 99 – the world’s first Islamic superheroes.

Jabbar the Powerful joins forces with The Incredible Hulk. Burqa babe Batina the Hidden teams up with Wonder Woman, the Not So Hidden. Just imagine the conversation.

Continue reading "Wonder Woman meets a babe in a burqa" »

The beginning of the debate into Australia’s commitment to the war in Afghanistan is a refreshing exercise.

For a cynical electorate it has provided impassioned and well reasoned political debate - albeit one in which the major parties agree – and the best thing the new paradigm has provided to this Parliament.

While Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott agreed to the need for Australia to stay in Afghanistan there were subtle differences in the arguments that they made in support of it: one given by somebody with the responsibility for the military commitment, the other from somebody with a firm belief in its ideological commitment.

Continue reading "Nine years on, it could be another ten in Afghanistan" »

Over the past week, two 20-something French students protested France’s new law banning the burqa by filming themselves walking through Paris in a niqab (similar to the burqa but with a slit for the eyes) – teamed with mini-shorts and black high heels.

The self-titled ‘Niqabitches’ described it as a tongue-in-cheek criticism of the ban.

You’ve gotta love the French – particularly French students. Although some may see the Niqabitches’ protest as ridiculing the niqab, their message was quintessentially French: vive la différence! or each to their own.

Continue reading "The Niqabitches: Vive la difference" »

The Clash of Civilizations is a theory, proposed by political scientist Samuel P. Huntington that people’s cultural and religious identities will be the primary source of conflict in the post-Cold War world.

With plans underway to build an Islamic centre and mosque near Ground Zero, New York, where the September 11 attacks took place, many are once again are questioning this theory.

A recent poll by Quinnipiac University showed 67 per cent of voters across New York state want the mosque and community centre to be moved further away from Ground Zero than currently proposed (which is two blocks away). The poll also found 80 per cent agreed the project was legally allowed to go ahead.

Continue reading "What I learned from meeting the Ground Zero Imam" »

Earlier this year a mate and I drove 300km across North Carolina to have a pork sandwich. The town of Lexington is the capital of what our American friends call “barbecue” –slow-cooked, shredded pork shoulder served with a vinegary chilli sauce and coleslaw. You can feel your heart slowing down as you eat it and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Heading west from Lexington, towards the hillbilly heartland of the Appalachian Mountains, we saw a huge billboard on the side of one of the backroads.

It said: “You are now entering Klan Country” and bore the swastika-inspired logo of the Ku Klux Klan and a huge Confederate Flag.

Continue reading "Freedom of speech extends to the vulgar, vacuous and vile" »

This mural has appeared in the trendy Sydney suburb of Newtown.

It was painted by the owner of the property, shop owner Sergio Redegalli who also, apparently, has a ban-the-burqa bumper sticker.

Locals have complained and council officials have visited the owner to talk to him about removing but have said in a statement that legally their hands are tied. There’s a pretty simple freedom of speech issue at play here: should it be painted over?

Continue reading "The burqa mural: should it be painted over?" »

It took an Australian to go through with the whole religious text-burning threat. Brisbane lawyer, Alex Stewart, decided it was a good idea to burn pages of the Koran and the Bible and then appear to smoke them in his now infamous YouTube video. Probably a Queensland thing.

Different religions react differently to having their texts assaulted. Famously, British muslims in 1989 led violent rallies of protest at comments made about the Koran in Salman Rushdie’s novel, The Satanic Verses. Copies of the novel, and effigies of the novelist, were burned across England.

Catholic archbishops burned Protestant Bible translations during the European Reformation. Jews burned New Testaments in Jerusalem in 1980 in obedience to teachings of the Babylonian Talmud.
There are some stunning book burnings in the Bible itself.

Continue reading "Book-burners are rattled by weapons of mass instruction" »

During Ramadan just passed this last weekend, an Australian born Muslim cleric was reported to have called for the beheading of a Dutch MP for denigrating Islam.

The world currently faces the real risk of nuclear weapons being obtained by a Shiite leader, Ahmadinejad, who draws his belief system from a strain of Islam that longs for the apocalyptic return of the 9th century Imam, Mohammad al-Mahdi. A significant portent to the messianic return of the Mahdi will be the re-possession of lands once ruled by Muslims. For Ahmadinejad, this means first and foremost, Israel.

How are we to deal with militant, fundamentalist Islam? For Australians, living as neighbours to the largest Muslim country in the world, this is no minor issue.

Continue reading "Islam is the answer to Islam" »

One little-known factoid from the celebrated spate of robberies by three burqa-clad bandits in Wollongong this May is that the criminals were not Muslims, and most certainly not Muslim women, but three blokes from Colombia who were more likely to have links to the Medellin Cartel than Al-Qa’ida.

Nevertheless, these Colombian fellows were responsible for setting off a wave of spirited and pretty tangential public discussion about how Islam was changing the Australian way of life, and that it was time we followed the lead of France and made it illegal for women to wear burqas in this country.

Fred Nile, who appears to be on speed dial for this re-occurring story, said the case (involving Colombian men) showed how easy it would be for Muslim ladies to hide a bomb or a Kalashnikov up their Taliban-style frock. Liberal senator Corey Bernardi blogged about the issue too, billing the (Colombian) case as something of a final straw in the defence of our way of life.

Continue reading "Rank hypocrisy of bagging Abbott over the burqa" »

Andrew Bolt, the man all lefties love to hate, has really done it this time.

Bolt’s a great opinion columnist. He is well researched, eloquent, and knows exactly which buttons to push to whip up indignation and outrage. That’s his job, and he’s bloody good at it.

But his latest effort treads a dangerous line. It fuels racist thinking. Even more than usual.

Continue reading "Sorry Andrew, you’ve bolted headlong into racism now" »

Tory is very quick to use the “racist” slur to disguise her lack of argument and of comprehension. It’s a dead giveaway these days.

But there is an even more telling sign that she is totally unable to refute, let alone understand, my argument.

It’s that rather than deal with what I actually wrote, she imputes to me sentiments I do not share and arguments I have never made.

Continue reading "Sorry Tory, you should try reading what I actually wrote" »

People often say that without God there would be no atheists. Presumably that’s meant to be some pithy truism that shows no one exists without God.

To an atheist, that’s about as meaningless, smug and lazy as saying that without Bigfoot, Sasquatch-deniers would not exist.

Swathes of people seem to put atheism in the ‘unthinkable’ category. It is a position they cannot empathise with at all – the most similar attitude that comes to mind is homophobia.

Continue reading "“I’ve never met an atheist”, and other tales of certainty" »

One night in an impromptu makeshift dance party in Mosul, in Iraq, I met a young girl of age 20 who I started to talk to about Iraqi politics. We spoke in English - her fractured English was a lot better than my fractured Arabic – and discussed topics as broad as the disconnect between the political class and the people, to the Bollywood blockbuster Slumdog Millionaire. 

I fondly remember that conversation, for one simple reason - Lubna was wearing the niqab, or, what most Australians would refer to (incorrectly) as the burqa.  She wasn’t what I had envisaged a typical niqab wearing woman to be like. 

She was partying and dancing next to both males and females who were drinking alcohol and rocking out to Katy Perry.  She was progressive, easy going and open-minded.

Continue reading "Talking about Green Day with a cool chick in a niqab" »

This month’s debate about banning the burqa was set off by a blog post written by Liberal Senator Cory Bernardi. But instead of banning a piece of clothing, perhaps it’s time to consider banning him, instead.

Imagine a future Australia with Cory Bernardis on every street corner. Where children enjoying an otherwise pleasant family day at the beach could find themselves distraught by the sight of a horde of South Australian Liberal Party senators descending on the sand with their terrifying political thought bubbles. Is this the kind of future we want?

Left unchecked, Cory Bernardis could form ghettos, with God Save The Queen being played over loudspeakers five times a day. Youngsters dressed like Cory Bernardi will gather to listen to bands that performed at WOMADelaide, flashing their Young Liberals membership cards while they cite studies that say climate change isn’t caused by humans.

Continue reading "Forget the burqa, how about a ban on Cory Bernardi" »

If a woman walks down the street in a mini skirt and someone calls her a slut, feminists will be quick to object.  However if a Muslim woman walks down in a burqa then many feminists are happy to concede that she is oppressed, submissive and brainwashed.

Unfortunately many feminists still believe that no Muslim woman could ever choose to wear the veil of her own free will. 

As a Muslim feminist I find this infuriating, condescending and patronising.

Continue reading "Feminists should back off the burqa bashing" »

When it comes to intimate workings and in-depth knowledge of Muslim culture, let’s not beat around the bush, we have no frigging idea what we’re talking about.

We don’t understand the burqa. Hell, we’re not even sure how to spell it. Or the Koran for that matter. Quran? Qar’an? Karan? Who knows. I don’t even know what it’s about. Is it a story, or is it just an instruction manual for the soul? Beggar’s belief.

We haven’t opened it up. We haven’t eyed it on the sale table at Borders and thought, “I reckon I should read this since we seem to be talking about it all the time”. We’ve hardly even worn a crease in our own one. The first stanza of Genesis we all learn by osmosis, but it’s a bit like learning the words to Advance Australia Fair. It’s just something that infiltrates your childhood brain and you blurt out by rote, without any thought as to what the hell “girt by sea” even means.

Continue reading "A mystery wrapped in a riddle wrapped in a burqa" »

I’m going, for the first time, to somewhere with sharia law. Alcohol is illegal, adulterers can be stoned, public floggings occur, and I’ll have to wear a jilbab (headscarf) and ankle-length skirts.

This isn’t the Middle East, it’s not Saudi Arabia or Iran - it’s our close neighbour, Indonesia. Specifically, it’s Aceh, that beleaguered Indonesian province still recovering from the Boxing Day tsunami.

Sharia law can mean all sorts of things. Muslims believe it is God’s law, as derived from the teachings of the Koran and the sayings of the Prophet Mohammed.

Continue reading "We’re all going on a Sharia holiday" »

The Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is due to visit Australia in early March and will be addressing both houses of Parliament.

It’s not that common to have a foreign leader address the Australian Parliament but it will be repeated later in March when the US President Barack Obama is expected to do the same.

Australia-Indonesia relations are always complex. At the leadership and government level they remain strong as the Howard Government had left them, despite frustrations in official Indonesian ranks over the Rudd Government’s handling of the Oceanic Viking saga and the ongoing issue of the Sri Lankan asylum seekers that remain in limbo off a West Java port.

Continue reading "Our role in defending democracy in Indonesia" »

No matter what you think of Islamic veiling one thing is for sure – criminalising the women who wear the burqa or niqab is only going to render them more invisible.

France looks set to pass legislation that bans Islamic face covering. The discussion over how this law could be enforced has centred around punishing the veiled woman. She will be taken home, or fined.

This belies the true intentions of those calling for a ban – banning the burqa is less about liberating oppressed muslim women and more about making white people feel more comfortable.

Continue reading "Burqa ban is about our fears not their oppression" »

I probably should be writing this under a different name.  I’m an Australian woman with a Lebanese Christian heritage, who grew up amidst an invisible social war of Lebanese Christian vs Lebanese Muslim – right here in Australia.  And I’m genuinely concerned about how Muslim people are represented.

Polygamy is a contentious topic, Islam is feared and misunderstood by non-believers.  So naturally, a perfect fit for a festival of dangerous ideas at last week’s Sydney Opera House Event.  And man did they find the perfect speaker.

Kayser Trad.  Nice enough.  What I’ve seen of him anyway.  I reserve all judgement of him, his practises, his beliefs.  I write this based purely on his performance that day.  His topic was ‘Polygamy and other Islamic Values are good for Australia’.

Continue reading "Keysar Trad doesn’t do his fellow Muslims any favours" »

At 3pm on Sunday, Hazem El Masri will run onto the world’s worst footy ground to play his final home game. Sydney’s ANZ Stadium (Or Glebe Morgue, as we call it) is an embarrassing venue for such an occasion, but we’ll defer that argument for the sake of keeping the mood upbeat.

For the blue-and-white army in the distant stands, Hazem’s farewell will be something akin to the retirement of a beloved community leader.

Now in the month of Ramadan, Hazem will take no food or water between dawn and dark on game day.

Continue reading "Man of God whose greatest deeds are done off the pitch" »

If you really want to depress yourself, type the name Sheik Hersi Hilole into Google.

He’s an Islamic scholar and Somali spiritual leader who, almost two years ago when still based in Sydney, was howled down as a rabble-rouser for issuing what his (Islamic) critics dismissed as a reckless, baseless warning about the radicalisation of young Somali refugees in Melbourne.

Hilole is now living and working in Singapore as an academic. No doubt he watched the events in Melbourne this week with a sense of weary despair. For without wishing to prejudge the terror charges, the case which the prosecution will try to prove is pretty much a scene-by-scene enactment of the scenario painted by the cleric in 2007.

Continue reading "The decent Islamic leader whom we ignored at our peril" »

The Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow with a local community church has opened a new exhibition that originally aimed to “reclaim the Bible as a sacred text”.

.

In a somewhat unorthodox way of achieving this end they have left a Bible open at the exhibition inviting people to write whatever they want in it.

“If you feel you have been excluded from the Bible, please write your way back into it,” asks the gallery.

Continue reading "Bible bashing is easy, but would artists touch Islam?" »

Before this commentary gets underway, I feel that it is necessary to close the gate before the horse bolts. So first up, let me say that I am not anti-Islamic, I have lived as a Muslim woman from the age of seventeen until I was twenty two (and admittedly, found it not to my liking for a number of reasons).

Much of my professional life has been spent working with, and for Muslim people in the war zones of Bosnia Herzogovina, Kosovo and Albania as an humanitarian relief worker, and I have traveled and worked extensively in the Middle East, Europe, Africa and Asia - so I have seen quite a bit of the world and can compare how varying societies adapt the Islamic religion to the cultural morays and sensitivities of their regions.

Tory Maguire’s piece yesterday and the reader’s comments that followed had much to say on the reasons often cited by western media and society about what is believed to be the motivation for Muslim women to don the burqa and headscarves. 

The common, misinformed perception is that Muslim women mostly wear the burqa to express their religious devotion. 

Continue reading "The truth behind the burqa" »

If I was married to Carla Bruni I wouldn’t be a big fan of the burqa either, so it is perhaps no surprise that French President Nicholas Sarkozy is not in favour of women covering themselves from head to toe.

But Sarkozy’s forceful condemnation of the Islamic shroud as a symbol of female “subservience”, not religious faith, was absolutely right.

There is no greater way, other than locking the front door, to ensure a woman’s total invisibility in society - and thereby formalise her lack of worth - than to cover every inch of her, including her eyes, in heavy fabric.

Continue reading "Nicholas Sarkozy was right: the burqa is misogynist" »

In August 2007, Barack Obama promised that if he were elected president he would ‘travel to a major Islamic forum and deliver an address to redefine our struggle.’

His impressive speech in Cairo yesterday fulfilled that promise.

Obama is the finest orator in a generation. His national political career was kicked off by a single speech: his keynote address to the Democratic National Convention in Boston in 2004.

Continue reading "The speech that could make the world a safer place" »