So this is how democracy works?

In 2004, France banned headscarves and school principals chased after young "defiant" Muslim girls who continued to cover their heads in school. Now, following a national referendum, Switzerland has banned the construction of minarets, because minarets also somehow symbolize oppression. Thanks to the dedicated action of the far-right Swiss People's Party, the Alpine skies will be free from the snaking menace, which would spread intolerance and taint the splendor of Swiss architecture.

In between these two peculiar events, the targeting of Muslims in Western countries and the subjugation of entire Muslim nations all over the world has never ceased. Not for a day.

Moreover, the collective targeting of small or large Muslim communities in Western countries, and the deliberate abuse and degradation of Muslim individuals and Islamic symbols (from the Holy Qur'an to the Prophet Mohammed) has also never ceased.

Bizarrely, most of these actions have been done through "democratic" channels and justified in the name of democracy, on the basis of upholding the principles of secularism and Western values.

Many thoughts come to mind here; all unreservedly angry.

I remember when the word "democracy" used to resonate so loudly among Arabs and Muslims around the world. The more they were denied it, the more they yearned for it. University campuses in Cairo, Gaza and Karachi took their student union elections so very seriously. Innocent blood was spilled in clashes around campuses as students desperately tried to express their right to vote, to speak out and to assemble.

Those were the days, when al-demoqratia, Arabic for democracy, was the buzzword in the Middle East and beyond. Even Palestinian political prisoners held their elections, ever so faithfully, surrounded by highly fortified towers and under the deriding gaze of armed men in the unforgiving heat of the Naqab desert.

Arab and Muslim masses were keen on democracy to the extent that there was a near consensus that democracy, although a Western conception, could be distinguished from the many ills invited by Western interventions, imperialism and wars that scarred and continued to impair the collective Muslim psyche.

An entire school of Muslim thought was in fact established around the concept that democracy and Islam are very much compatible. Such a notion goes back to Egypt's Azharite scholar Rifa'a al-Tahtawi, who argued in the first half of the 19th century that the principles of European modernity were compatible with Islam.

"Al-Tahtawi's work influenced the philosopher Muhammad Abduh [1849-1905], another Azharite who is often described as the founder of Islamic modernism, which is captured in his statement that in Europe he found Islam without Muslims, while in Egypt he found Muslims without Islam," wrote German anthropologist, Frank Fanselow.

If one sets his prejudices aside to ponder this for a moment, one would realize the intellectual valor it takes to consider and even embrace commonalities with the very powers that have instilled so much harm and fear.

Even in their darkest, least proud moments, Muslim intellectuals and nations displayed impressive open-mindedness. They are hardly ever credited for that.

More recently, in Egypt, people tried hard to vote, in the face of beatings, public humiliation and imprisonment. In Palestine in 2006 the price was even higher — starvation. Gaza continues to endure under a medieval Israeli siege, ultimately because of an election.

Muslim communities in the West have long been considered the luckiest; after all, they live in the abodes of democracy. They drink from the fountain of rights and freedoms that never runs dry.

However, these idealized assumptions missed the fact that Western democracy was conditional. And unconditional democracy can only be a farce.

Much has been said to explain the West's faltering on its own commitment to democracy. No, the tragedy of September 11, 2001, is hardly the defining moment that created the growing chasm that made the West fearful of Islam. Despite all that has taken place since then — the constant spewing out of right-wing hatred, fanatic evangelical preaching and all the rest — America is still more tolerant than Europe. Nor was the growing anti-Muslim sentiment in Europe a response in solidarity to America's woes.

Honestly, the French are not fond of Americans, nor are the Germans necessarily that passionate about the Swiss. But this didn't stop a German Christian Democratic state interior minister, Volker Bouffier, from making a "recommendation" to Muslim communities in his own country: "Naturally the Muslims in Germany have a right to build mosques. But they should make sure not to overwhelm the German population with them."

How do you overwhelm people with minarets? Is this a post-post-post-modernistic logic that we are yet to be informed of?

There are only four minarets in the entire country of Switzerland, a country with a population of approximately 7.6 million people. How overwhelming can that be? And aren't religious freedom and the freedom of collective and individual expression basic rights guaranteed by democratic values?

But this is hardly about a 4.8-meter tall minaret in the northern Swiss town of Langenthal. It's about the fact that the one who suggested the structure is a Muslim furniture salesman by the name of Mutalip Karaademi. He didn't know, of course, that his modest idea of adding a minaret to the community's mosque would generate a nationwide referendum, and an international "controversy."

Karaademi was not trying to "Islamificate" the Swiss. He just wanted his community to have a place for worship (as opposed to the unused paint factory it currently uses for prayer), to be able to express its collective identity without fear. Ironically enough, the Muslim community in Langenthal is mostly Albanians, refugees who fled Kosovo seeking escape and deliverance.

What a strange paradox: Muslims escaping to the West, physically and figuratively, only to find double standards, self-negation and, at times, pure hypocrisy.

For now, however, a new consensus is forming: democracy can be invoked and used against Muslims only, and not for Muslims. It can be manipulated to deny them their identity in Europe and their freedom in Palestine, to ensure their subjugation in Iraq and in Afghanistan, and to meddle in their internal affairs everywhere else.

Al-demoqratia, indeed.

Ramzy Baroud (www.ramzybaroud.net) is an author and editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His work has been published in many newspapers, journals and anthologies around the world. His latest book is "The Second Palestinian Intifada: A Chronicle of a People's Struggle," (Pluto Press, London), and his forthcoming book is "My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza's Untold Story." (Pluto Press, London), now available for pre-orders on Amazon.com.

Arab American News, 11 December 2009

CHICAGO – A Chicago man accused of planning a terrorist attack against a Danish newspaper knew in advance about a plot to attack Mumbai and offered congratulations to the killers afterward, federal prosecutors charged Monday.

In papers filed in federal court in Chicago, prosecutors said Tahawwur Hussain Rana learned an attack was about to happen while traveling in Dubai days before the Nov. 26, 2008, attack in India that left 166 people dead.

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Long-feared by US intelligence, Muslim radicalization is gaining momentum in the United States, hit by a spate of recent cases featuring youths recruited and trained overseas for jihad, analysts say.

The latest case -- five US nationals arrested in Pakistan Wednesday on suspicion of plotting an attack -- deepened concern that militant Islamist groups are successfully enlisting potential attackers inside the United States, much as they have in Britain.

"We also as a community realize there is a problem," Nihad Awad told reporters in announcing that his organization, the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), had steered worried parents of the five to the FBI.

CHICAGO (AFP) – A Pakistani-American pleaded not guilty Wednesday to helping plan the deadly 2008 Mumbai attacks and plotting to attack a Danish newspaper which published cartoons of the prophet Mohammed.

David Coleman Headley, 49, appeared in court in an orange jumpsuit, shackled at the ankle, accused of being a scout for two different Pakistani-based terrorist groups who used a friend's Chicago-based immigration company as a cover for his surveillance activities in India and Denmark.

His attorney John Theis entered the not guilty plea on Headley's behalf and waived his right to a grand jury trial. The next hearing was set for January 12, with the case moving now towards a full trial.

LONDON (Reuters Life!) – A Christian couple who run a hotel in northern England were cleared on Wednesday of abusing a Muslim guest for wearing a hijab and then insulting her beliefs.
Benjamin and Sharon Vogelenzang were accused of launching a tirade against white British Muslim convert Ericka Tazi, 60, at their hotel in Liverpool where she had been staying while she attended a course at a local hospital in March.

Chicago: US prosecutors have filed fresh charges against suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba operative David Coleman Headley in connection with last year's deadly attacks in Mumbai that took the lives of 166 people.

Headley, an American citizen of Pakistani origin already accused of plotting to murder a Danish newspaper cartoonist, was cited in charges unsealed Monday morning in Chicago with conspiracy in connection with the Mumbai attacks.

Headley, whose birth name was Daood Gilani, is accused of scoping out locations for the attacks in India. He'd been travelling throughout India last year, conducting surveillance in anticipation of the coordinated bombings that also left hundreds injured, federal authorities said.

 By KIM GAMEL, Associated Press Writer

ISLAMABAD – The FBI is sending a team to Pakistan and India as part of an inquiry into a Chicago man accused of plotting against a Danish newspaper and sizing up targets ahead of last year's deadly terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India's financial capital.

Pakistan's role in alleged plots spanning three countries has increasingly come under scrutiny as new details emerge about the case and suspect David Coleman Headley's links to the country.

Headley, 49, an American of Pakistani descent, and Chicago businessman Tahawwur Rana, 48, a Pakistani-born Canadian national, were charged in October with conspiring to attack the Jyllands Posten newspaper in Denmark. The newspaper had published 12 cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad in 2005 that set off protests in parts of the Muslim world.

Muslimmatters.org
By Yasir Qadhi
November 30th, 2009


Switzerland. The very name evokes images of almost heavenly beauty – idyllic enclaves of pristinely pure lakes surrounded by magnificent lush snow-peaked mountains, dotted with honeymoon-enticing chalets nestled within forests of pine furs towering to the skies. Beautiful, scenic Switzerland – it deserves its status as being one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world. It has one of the highest per capita incomes in the world, and its cities are regularly ranked as being amongst the highest in terms of quality of life, in the entire world.

Masjid in Switzerland

DOHA (Reuters)

A film about the Prophet Mohammad backed by the producer of "The Lord of the Rings" and "The Matrix" is under discussion, a Qatar media firm said on Sunday, with the aim of creating an English-language blockbuster for the world's 1.5 billion Muslims.

Filming of the $150 million movie is set to start in 2011, with Barrie Osborne as its producer, Alnoor Holdings said.

Alnoor said the film - in which the Prophet would not be depicted, in accordance with Islamic strictures - was in development and talks were being held with studios, talent agencies and distributors in the United States and Britain.