BLOG: Bolt blames Islam, ignores terror victims ...

I've already referred to the genocidal comments Andrew Bolt and his colleagues at the Herald Sun have allowed to be published on his blog. But what did Andrew Bolt himself have to say?

Bolt's response can be read here. At the time of writing this, there are 11 updates to his initial post. Update 11 contains these words ...

I think the apologists are running out of excuses. The US, we were told, brought 9-11 on itself through its aggression. We invited Bali on ourselves by siding with the US. India provoked the Mumbai slaughter by discriminating against Muslims. But the Sri Lankans? How on earth can even the barking mad blame them for this? Now, can we start discussing the role of Islam in political violence, and without the usual shut-ups of “racist!”.

So while terrorists have attacked cricket, Bolt wants to talk theology and its alleged role in promoting terrorism. But how serious is he about terrorism? After all, what can terrorism be if not the slaughter of innocents? Yet in his entire post, not even once does Bolt mention those killed in this attack. He doesn't spare a word for those brave Pakistani police officers and the 2 innocent passers-by who died in the attack.

Bolt wants to blame Islam and the Koran at a time when the victims' relatives will be reciting chapters from the Koran and praying to God that these victims are shown God's mercy and entered into paradise. Bolt wants to blame the religion of the victims.

Bolt has given the green light for the miscellaneous bigots that crowd his blog to spray their filth on the Herald Sun's website. But before that, Bolt and his buddies must moderate what are clearly the comments of trolls:

Ah, the rich and vibrant tapestry that is Islam. Every day another majestical experience...
Infidel Tiger (Reply)
Tue 03 Mar 09 (03:58pm)

kristof replied to Infidel Tiger
Tue 03 Mar 09 (06:11pm)
oh come on, these sorts of things happen all over the world and you are blaming islam? this is really terrible and cant be defended BUT people get slaughtered in every isla.. oops sorry every country every day what is so special about a bus in lahore? are you racist?? islam would never permit this. it must be jews. this could happen in a christian country and it could be nuns and you are drawing strings..... sammer will explain.

Still, who needs trolls when naked hatred will do the trick?

One disagreement, Andrew. It isn’t Pakistan that’s being lost. It’s everywhere there is islam. Including right here in Oz.
Appeasement was the entrance door to WW2. Now it beckons another even larger conflict.
Terry of Sydney (Reply)
Tue 03 Mar 09 (04:07pm)

Red Baron replied to strange days indeed
Tue 03 Mar 09 (07:21pm)
What do you mean by “Pakistan being lost?”
Pakistan was never “won” in the first place. Pakistan is build on Islam and nothing but Islam, it never had an economic base, it doesn’t have a language or culture of its own, it seceeded from India and is dependent on the jiziyah, the tribute from Western, infidel countries that have sustained it till now.
Its the same in Bangladesh.
Pakistan is another failed state. Because of Islam.
But hey, call me ‘racist’ or ‘Islamophobic’- like I care!

No, clearly Red Baron doesn't care. After all, this is his blog. And the moderators of this blog have no problem with hate-speech, even if they have a problem with swearing:

Verax replied to Bill
Tue 03 Mar 09 (06:04pm)
SNIPPED - swearing.

And then there is this classic.

Apart from Double dealing, Hatred, Misery, Depravity and Fanaticism what else is Pakistan famous for? ...
JV of North Essendon (Reply)
Tue 03 Mar 09 (05:42pm)

Well, I realise this isn't quite relevant to the present discussion, but Pakistan is famous for producing some world-class cricket and for manufacturing cricket equipment. Anyway, back to the hate-speech:

Perhaps a few people of all kinds will now begin to wake up to the horror that is islam.
Appeasement has to stop in all Western nations and these multitude of muhammadans, who we keep being told are a minority, who have hi-jacked the ‘religion’ must be imprisoned and sent back to their respective nations.
A halt has to be called on immigration of muslims to Western countries. I’m sorry for any who genuinely want out and would integrate, but they must really stay and rectify their own lands.
We have imported enough trouble and it has to stop if we want to continue to have freedom of speech, freedom of action and just plain decency.
I, for one, don’t want to see my children growing up under the yoke of islam, which is an evil political ideology not a religion.
Marilyn LeBez of Australia (Reply)
Tue 03 Mar 09 (05:54pm)

I'm sure Bolt would have allowed a similar comment about Jews during the Israeli bombardment of Gaza. No? He wouldn't have? I'm glad. Because such a comment would have been grossly unfair. But when it comes to certain groups Bolt isn't exactly fond of, fairness can go get ...

Tonight the ABC had the story of the Sri Lankans shooting followed by kev’s 20
million rebuilding gift. My conclusion, muslims declare war on the world and the
world say’s, here’s more money, so you can do a better job.If this is not a
declaration of war, God only knows what it is, just as well the Indians didn’t
go.
ark (Reply)
Tue 03 Mar 09 (07:54pm)

What’s the excuse of the
muslims this time? Occupation? Foreign policy? What is it now?
Ben of
Springvale (Reply)
Tue 03 Mar 09 (07:55pm)

And then there are some crazy people who still think Colonel Gaddafi is some kind of pro-Islamist terrorist involved in a deep dark conspiracy ...

Ironic but significant - the attack was made near the GADDAFI stadium…
Could someon please tell me what exactly is so attractive about the Islamists to people who refuse to “see” them?
Is it the cunning way they use weapons or what?
dowp (Reply)
Tue 03 Mar 09 (08:25pm)

This is freedom of speech, Andrew Bolt style. Throw the statutes out the window. Defend democracy while ignoring the rule of law. Regard yourself as above the law. And start pointing fingers at 1.2 billion people before anyone has even named a suspect and any group has claimed responsibility.

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf


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MEDIA: The Tele does its own racial profiling ...

News Limited’s Sydney tabloid Daily Telegraph today published a story about a man who appeared in court yesterday, facing “15 charges, including having a firearm in a public place”. Among the weapons found by police were a loaded pistol, a tazer, and a Russian semi-automatic. He had been sentenced once before for similar crimes and was refused bail.

I’d seen plenty such defendants during my days as a Western Sydney Local Court hack during th 1990’s. This case should have been no different. But for the Tele, this case was different.

The headline of the article was “Man named Jihad caught driving with loaded gun, tazer”. Six out of 11 paragraphs mentioned the accused’s surname Jihad.

Yet neither the police nor prosecutors nor the magistrate raised any racial or ethno-religious issue during the hearing. It seems only the Tele has racially profiled this accused. It’s a wonder their reporter didn’t quote the accused telling the Magistrate: “Derka Derja, Muhammad Jihad”.

The story comes just days after a racist diatribe from senior columnist Piers Akerman who claimed Muslims in Sydney and Melbourne were “shutting themselves in closed societies and demanding immunity from criticism”.

In Akerman’s world, Muslims are locked up, never appearing in public on Sydney Road in Brunswick or Auburn Road in Auburn. Those funny looking people with beards on their faces and/or tea towels on their heads are just top gun actors recruited by Team America.

Akerman’s 430-plus blog comments (amongst them far-Right bloggers and activists like this clown) echoed his Team America worldview, blaming all the world’s ills on Muslims.

We can laugh all we want. But the fact that this kind of racist diatribe is allowed to be published so brazenly in the most popular newspaper of our nation’s most populous city should make us very worried. Either that, or our friends at the Tele just aren’t getting any. Perhaps they need to take the example of Gary from Team America, using pages of their newspaper to remove any carpet stains.

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf


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MEDIA: Kerbaj’s Claytons Scoop

Richard Kerbaj has again “broken” a hot story about Muslim leaders. Sadly, it’s little more than extracting the tallest mountain from a microscopic mould hill.

No doubt The Oz’s hysterical front-page packaging of Dr Ali’s relatively benign remarks (not to mention the hysterical responses of caricatured sheiks) will assist in his re-appointment to the PM’s undemocratic handpicked Muslim Community Reference Group. But how revolutionary were Dr Ali’s words?

The gist of his message seems is that the Prophet Muhammad wasn’t perfect. But what kind of perfection is he talking about? Muslims agree that the Prophet was a perfect human (al-insan al-kaamil in Arabic). But the word for human (insan) itself means negligent. Muslims agree that, as a human being, the Prophet was perfect. Yet there are places in the Koran where he has been corrected in his conduct.

So how is this perfection to be worded? This is where the controversy among different Muslim denominations begins, whether in the Indian sub-Continent or the Middle East.

At worst, Dr Ali could be accused of using somewhat inappropriate language to describe the Prophet. He should have used more careful phrasing. Then again, had Sheik Hilaly bothered to learn English during his last 2 decades in Australia, he might have recognised the problem not in Dr Ali’s message but rather in his choice of words.

The rest of Dr Ali’s comments are nothing new, especially those relating to the process of renewing the understanding of Islamic sources. Similar thoughts have been expressed by the likes of prominent Swiss scholar Dr Tariq Ramadan and the American sharia academic lawyer Professor Khaled Abou el-Fadl.

Yet The Oz’s editorial on 5 October continues with manufacturing Mt Everest from a speck of dust, describing Dr Ali’s remarks as evidencing

... great courage ...

... and applauding them for ...

... promoting honest discussion that is in the interests of Islam, its followers and the Australian community.

The editorial took swipes at both Sheik Hilaly and his arch-nemesis, Muslim Community Reference Group member Mustapha Kara-Ali. For once, these two find themselves on the same side of an argument.

The editorial further claims that ...

... Dr Ali's standing cannot be easily dismissed.

How so? He has a doctorate in economics and teaches at a university. An economist claiming expertise on Islam’s most argued esoteric theological controversy. About as nutty as suggesting Sheik Hilaly be appointed to the Reserve Bank Board.

Speaking of Sheik Hilaly, Dick Kerbaj wrote on October 5 about Hilaly’s response to Ali’s remarks. Kerbaj described the Sheik as ...

... the head of Lakemba Mosque in Sydney's southwest.

Had Kerbaj done his research, he would have found out that there is no such a place as “Lakemba Mosque”. The Sydney suburb of Lakemba is home to at least 5 mosques, the largest of which is the Imam Ali ben Abi Taleb Mosque. Further, the head of that mosque (where Sheik Hilaly is senior imam) is in fact the President of the Lebanese Moslems Association which owns and manages the mosque and the property on which it is built.

Words © 2006 Irfan Yusuf


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COMMENT: Richard Kerbaj, Wahhabism & The Taliban

Richard Kerbaj regularly writes for The Oz on issues relating to local Muslim groups. He claims fluency in Arabic and has a Middle Wastern background (I think his family is from Lebanon, but I stand to be corrected).

Unlike some reporters, Kerbaj has made every effort to be accessible to ordinary Muslim community members as well as self-appointed leaders. The last time I did that was in a professional capacity working as a lawyer with two offices (including one in Auburn). It almost drove me nuts!

In the 31 August edition of The Oz, Kerbaj writes about a Muslim leaders’ conference to be held in September. The headline of the article is “Radical clerics to be brought in from the cold.”

Kerbaj is not responsible for the headline. Decisions about headlines are made much higher up in the chain, and tend to reflect the bias or slant of the newspaper. Unfortunately, it is the headline which sets the tone for the entire article in the minds of most readers.

My problem with Kerbaj’s article is with his information on a phenomenon he describes as Wahhabism. Before I start talking about this, I should lay my cards on the table.

I am an implacable opponent of Wahhabi/Salafi theology. I regard it as a fringe theology which rarely complies with mainstream orthodox Sunni or Shia Islam. I regard Wahhabism has being on the very fringes of Islam, and particularly object to:

a. It’s opposition to Islamic spirituality (known to Sunnis as tasawwuf and to Shias as irfan);

b. It’s rejection of the following of 4 schools of law by Sunni Muslims;

c. It’s tendency to regard Shias as non-Muslims.

Of course, these tendencies are characteristic of most Wahhabism that I have been exposed to. Like many Muslims brought up in Australia, my knowledge of Wahhabism is gained from reading books published in Saudi Arabia.

I also understand that there are many Wahhabis who do not agree with the Saudi formulation of Wahhabi doctrine. Just as with Sunni and Shia Muslims, Wahhabis represent a broad spectrum, and cannot be typecast.

Which makes Kerbaj’s formulation of Wahhabism disturbing. The published version of Kerbaj’s article states:

… Wahhabism, a fundamentalist teaching of Islam that is preached by Osama bin Ladin and inspired the fanatical Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

According to Kerbaj’s formulation:

1) Wahhabism is a single kind of teaching.

2) Wahhabism is one of numerous “fundamentalist” teachings.

3) Wahhabism is preached (perhaps exclusively, if not mainly) by Osama bin Ladin.

4) Wahhabism inspired the Taliban regime.

I don’t wish to comment at this stage on the first three suggestions. I’d like to speak with Richard and find out what his source is for this information. Which books has he read? Which experts has he consulted? Which websites does he rely upon?

Anyone who believes that Wahhabism is one monolithic teaching should visit the website of the Canadian based wahhabi TROID where one can find numerous attacks by this Wahhabist group on other Wahhabis.

What surprises and amuses me most is the claim that Wahhabism inspired the Taliban regime. The most reliable information on the subject suggests that the Taliban were a mish-mash militia funded by Pakistani and Saudi interests. However, the dominant theological strain of the Taliban was not Wahhabi but Deobandi.

The Deobandi school is named after Darul Uloom Deoband, the most prominent Islamic institution in India. Yet one in four Muslims is from the Indian sub-Continent, and Indian Islam has its own unique theological spectrum. Indian Muslims are mainly Sunni. Indian Islam, like Hinduism, is a deeply mystical affair. Sufi spirituality plays a large role in the two main Indian Sunni schools – the Deobandi and Barelwi. The anti-Sufi Ahl-i-Hadis (India’s answer to Saudi-style Wahhabism) has few followers

Not Pakistan. Not Saudi Arabia. Not even Afghanistan. India. A nation where Muslims make up hardly 15% of the population.

The Deobandi school/sect is by no means Wahhabi. Indeed, prominent Deobandi authors and scholars have written detailed refutations of Wahhabi doctrine.

It would take a substantial amount of space to explain what the Deobandi strand of Islam teaches. Suffice it to say that it is a uniquely sub-Continental strand and is often in conflict with a competing Barelwi strand of Indian Islam.

To understand the Deobandi/Barelwi dispute, one must understand something of the unique nature, history and Sufi terrain of North Indian Islam. Perhaps the best Western source on this is Professor Barbara Metcalf.

The conservative Deobandi sect was founded in the north Indian village of Deoband during the late 19th century. Despite its orthodox, Deobandism played a pioneering role in educating Indian Muslim women in theology frequently regarded as the sole domain of men.

Deobandism competes with the Barelwi sect founded during the same period by Indian Sufi Syed Ahmad Raza Khan who hailed from a nearby town called Bareilly (from whose name the sect’s label is derived). is derived the school’s popular label of “Barelwi”.

Khan criticised Deobandi scholars for what their alleged lack of respect for the status of the Prophet Muhammad and their claims that certain cultural practises of Indian Muslims represented unnecessary and deviant innovations in orthodox liturgy. The gulf between the two was further widened due to various political differences.

Differences between Deobandi and Barelwi Muslims represent a sectarian divide unique to Indian communities and virtually non-existent in other Muslim communities, including among our own South East Asian neighbours.

Political differences between the two schools are numerous. During the movement for Indian independence most Deobandis worked with Gandhi and opposed Pakistan’s creation. Barelwis tended to support Pakistan.

I’ve provided an imperfect summary which hopefully provides some understanding of Deobandi Islam. If this is what the Taliban stood for, it is a far cry from the alleged Wahhabism attributed to them by Kerbaj and his sources.

© Irfan Yusuf 2006


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