C L O S E R

Frontaal Naakt. ‘Wij zijn de vrouwen van de toekomst’

Op Frontaal Naakt een leuk interview van Peter Breedveld met Samira el Kandoussi van het internetmagazine Maghrebia.nl.

Jaja. Toen ik Maghrebia zat te lezen, als autochtone, blanke, niet-moslimse Nederlander, kreeg ik een beetje het gevoel een voyeur te zijn. Een buitenstaander die bij Marokkanen naar binnen zit te gluren om te zien hoe ze met elkaar omgaan.

Dat is toch mooi? Dat is toch wat jullie willen weten? Waar wij, vrouwen, onderling over praten, dat ga je allemaal op Maghrebia zien. Ik vind ook dat er problemen zijn in de Marokkaanse gemeenschap, die zijn er gewoon. Ik ben ook kritisch naar de gemeenschap en ik wil ook graag discussie losmaken, maar niet op de manier waarop de gemiddelde autochtone journalist dat doet, want er is ook heel veel humor en er zijn leuke dingen en modeshows en concerten. Er is van alles aan de gang binnen die Marokkaanse gemeenschap wat gewoon geen aandacht krijgt. Daar zou wat afwisseling in moeten komen. Er is ellende, maar er is ook heel veel lol.

Als je daar dan toch bent lees dan ook even de reacties of je het nu scheldkannonades en verwensingen aan het adres van Samira vindt of slechts speldeprikjes.

The controversy about the Danish Muhammad cartoons seems to gain some new speed. There is a call for a boycott against Danish and Norwegian products:

According to Islam-Online.net Muslims Seek UN Resolution Over Danish Cartoons

Ihsanoglu said the UN General Assembly would be asked to “pass a resolution banning attacks on religious beliefs.”

CAIRO, January 30, 2006 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) and the Arab League, the Muslim world’s two main political bodies, are seeking a UN resolution, backed by possible sanctions, to protect religions following the publication of cartoons depicting and ridiculing Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

Also it seems that Danish sites are the victims of cyber-attacks (for example the website of the Jylland Posten)
and blog Uriasposten.

Not all Muslims agree with the actions and the lobby of the larger organizations. Hadi Kahn, chairman of the Organization of Pakistani Students in Denmark (OPSA), stressed that the group travelling to the Muslim countries does not represent all Muslims.

The are some early Persian pictures of the Prophet Muhammad by the way, which you can find on Superluminal.com such as the one below with the Prophet Muhammad on his prayer rug.

Not that that picture comes from the Shi’a tradition and not from the Sunni-tradition. Nevertheless, I have never received any notice that that site had any threats. So why did that happen in the Danish case. I have written about that earlier.

In the meantime, for the people who want to post comments here. By my guest, keep it polite and decent and you have to be patient. Due to large amounts of spam, all comments have to be moderated before publishing.

Iviews.com
No Talks With Hamas?

An opinion article on Iviews.com Uri Avnery. Does not completely represent my opinion, but still it is worthwile to think about it.

No Talks With Hamas? This Was Said About PLO Too ..

If Ariel Sharon had not been in a deep coma, he would have jumped out of his bed for joy.

The Hamas victory fulfills his most ardent hopes.

For a whole year now, he did everything possible to undermine Mahmoud Abbas. His logic was quite obvious: The Americans wanted him to negotiate with Abbas. Such negotiations would inevitably have led to a situation that would have compelled him to give up almost all of the West Bank. Sharon had no intention of doing so. He wanted to annex about half of the territory. So he had to get rid of Abbas and his moderate image.

During the last year, the situation of the Palestinians got worse from day to day. The actions of the occupation made normal life and commerce impossible. The West Bank settlements were continuously enlarging. The Wall which cuts off about 10 percent of the West Bank was nearing completion. No important prisoners were released. The aim was to impress on the Palestinians that Abbas is weak (”a chicken without feathers”, as Sharon put it), that he cannot achieve anything, that offering peace and observing a cease-fire leads nowhere.

The message to the Palestinians was clear: “Israel understands only the language of force.” Now the Palestinians have put in power a party that speaks this language.

Why did Hamas win?
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On Holocaust Exploiters, Deniers, & Heroes - altmuslim.com

For it’s Holocaust Memorial Day 2006. Mas’ood Cajee reflects on the politics of memory and why Muslims should represent the best of Islamic tradition and spirit. A story on altmuslim.com,

Six decades on since the slaughter of World War II and the Nazi holocaust, we hear extremist voices alternately exploiting or denying the Holocaust for political gain. By warping our memory of the Shoah (the Hebrew word for the Holocaust), both exploiters and deniers miss the stark, vital message of the Holocaust and its heroes - those who displayed uncommon moral courage in the face of evil.

Holocaust exploiters

A growing chorus of voices which exploits the Holocaust for political gain has been trying to smear Muslims - and Arabs in particular - with grand accusations of complicity in the Holocaust and support for the Nazis. These voices serve hawkish interests in Israel and the United States who wish to justify and legitimize continued war, violence, and yes - even genocide - against Muslims and Arabs. Identifying Muslims with and as Nazis eases the task of selling continued bloodshed to war-weary publics. Reading the books and op-eds of the smearers, one could almost conclude absurdly that the Nazi holocaust was an Arab Muslim and not a European Christian project. As evidence, the smearers usually trot out the pro-German Mufti of Jerusalem Amin Al-Husayni and the Bosnian Muslim SS “Handschar” division.
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Iviews.com
Islam and the West - Who Hates Whom?
1/24/2006 - Political - Article Ref: AN0601-2885

By: Fahmi Howaidi

The Danish Case

The Danish government’s attitude toward the blasphemous caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad published by a newspaper in the country should not be dismissed lightly as it is typical of the manner in which Western governments and intellectuals treat topics related to Islam. The lethargic reaction of the Muslim governments to the European newspaper’s outrageous treatment of the Prophet too deserves censure .

Are we to understand that abusing the Prophet is a less serious offense than an insult to an Arab head of state that would have triggered angry reactions accompanied by withdrawal of ambassadors and threat of severing diplomatic and economic relations. Should it not be feared that official silence over such issues in the Muslim and Arab world would play into the hands of extremists in the Muslim communities who are waiting for an opportunity to choose the path of violence .

The Danish drawings also reopen the question that is often raised whenever the topic of the relations between Islam and the West comes up: Really who hates whom?

On Muslim WakeUp! also a discussion about the cartoons in Denmark. Here one of the articles by Mona Eltahawy

Muslim WakeUp! A Mountain Out of a Molehill Over Danish Cartoons

By Mona Eltahawy

Can we finally admit that Muslims have blown out of all proportion their outrage over 12 cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad published in a Danish newspaper last September?

In the latest twist, both the Organization for the Islamic Conference and the Gulf Cooperation Council condemned a Norwegian newspaper for reprinting the drawings - a decision the publication defended as protecting freedom of expression. Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador from Denmark for “consultations” and Iraqis called in sermons and demonstrations for an investigation into the Danish and Norwegian publications that published the cartoons.

The initial printing of the cartoons in Denmark led to death threats being issued against the artists, demonstrations in Kashmir, and condemnation from 11 countries. What did any of this achieve but prove the original point of the newspaper’s culture editor, that artists in Europe were censoring themselves because they feared Muslim reaction? He commissioned the cartoons after hearing that Danish artists were too scared to illustrate a children’s book about the prophet.
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While one cartoon was particularly offensive because it showed the prophet as wearing a turban with a bomb attached to it, a great deal of the anger had to do with the mere depiction of the prophet. Muslims seem to forget that just because they are prohibited from representing the prophet in any way, this does not apply to everybody else. Even with regards to the egregious cartoon showing the prophet with a bomb, Muslim reaction was exaggerated. This should have remained an internal Danish issue. Muslim groups in Denmark have been pursuing a legal course and have vowed to appeal a prosecutor’s refusal to file charges against the newspaper.

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen was right not to intervene, insisting the government has no say over media - the argument used by Arab leaders when they are asked about anti-Semitism in their media, by the way. But in a New Year’s speech, Rasmussen condemned “any expression, action or indication that attempts to demonize groups of people on the basis of their religion or ethnic background.”

Is it important to be progressive Muslim. On Muslim WakeUp! a discussion.

Why I’m A Progressive Muslim Some arguments:

7. My penis. As the owner of a penis I can assure those without one that my penis confers no significant religious insight upon me its owner. Nil. Nada. I will go out on a limb and assume that my penis is somewhat similar in thinking ability to others’. I extrapolate from that similarity that a woman leading a prayer is perfectly fine since a penis cannot think.

10. Big words like patriarchy, misogyny, hegemonic power. Because thankfully progressive Muslims don’t need any of them to get their point across. Sure they could bore you with talk of the need to create a counter discourse to the received orthodoxy inherent within the socio-, political economy of the faith as constructed and understood both subjectively and implicitly; that this has been and continues to be based on certain constraints that are arguably social and not religious in the strictest sense; that their enterprise is merely an attempt to marry Islam as praxis to external experience so as to negate the disconnect between the temporal and spiritual, and that such an endeavor presupposes a certain dynamism that runs counter to the current orthodoxy. But who in the world would want to listen to that?

Or Why I am not a progressive Muslim, some arguments:

16. Labels suck. They don’t do us complex humans justice. (And you’ll note that I use them anyway, just like you do, so shuttup.)

And the Number One reason I am not a progressive Muslim: I don’t want my teenaged kids hanging out with them if that leads to their thinking that all the openness-postmodern-fluidity yadda-yadda means I will budge on our family’s no-dating rule. And no premarital sex, ibni, binti! No judgment implied on any readers—you folks do what you deem right in your life path, your decisions are between you and God, I will defend your right to privacy. I know this issue is not as black-and-white as the conservatives make it, that abstaining from or engaging in sex outside sanctioned relationships is not the isolated standard by which purity of heart is discernible (by God, in any case, not by us), and that honor is an internal quality known to God, not a quality indicated by, say, an intact hymen. So I won’t shake my holier-than-thou finger at you, and I won’t tell you how to raise your kids. Me, I’d rather hang with Mormons and Baptists on this issue. Until my kids—male and female—are, like, at least thirty. Yeah, you heard me. Same person from the Sex and the Ummah column. This will come as absolutely no surprise to anyone who knows me, or has read me carefully, as opposed to alarmists and cheerleaders. Just because a person writes openly about sex and respects discourse from differing opinions about it, doesn’t imply she advocates in her personal life all the practices described in the writing (the imbeciles who believe that it does know who they are). And just because the damn conservatives believe in this principle (no premarital sex) for all the wrong, anti-feminist reasons, guess what progressives, doesn’t make it automatically wrong. It’s right in my book, on entirely other, spiritual-ethical grounds.

And you can discuss it further on their forum.

Dat Samir A. na zijn vrijlating bezig was zijn oude netwerk op te zoeken cq te herstellen, was me al duidelijk. Het blijk dat hij daar al behoorlijk ver in was: na de Hofstad-/Arlesgroep nu de Piranha’s:
de Volkskrant - ‘Samir A. in afgesplitste terreurgroep’

Twee kopstukken uit de Hofstadgroep hebben in de periode dat zij op vrije voeten waren een nieuwe terreurgroep gevormd. Zij waren tussen april en oktober 2005 bezig aanslagen voor te bereiden op Nederlandse politici en het hoofdkantoor van veiligheidsdienst AIVD.

Dit blijkt uit de aanklacht die officier van justitie Den Hartigh vrijdag formuleerde voor de Rotterdamse rechtbank. De kern van de nieuwe groep, door justitie Piranha genoemd, wordt gevormd door SamirA.(19) en Nouredine elF.(23). Het duo werkte nauw samen met MohammedC. (31), schoonzoon van de Syrische geestelijk inspirator van de Hofstadgroep.

Het onderzoek heeft niet kunnen vaststellen dat de Piranha-groep ook een aanslag voorbereidde op de Israëlische vliegtuigmaatschappij El Al en Schiphol. Een informant van de Amsterdamse Criminele Inlichtingen Eenheid had dit gemeld.

Het Openbaar Ministerie schetste gisteren SamirA. als een uiterst gemotiveerde terrorist, die ‘graag een teken voor de wereld wil achterlaten’. Onmiddellijk na zijn vrijspraak, op 6 april 2005, ging A. op zoek naar wapens en explosieven. Hij nam de taken van de Syriër Abu Khaled over en omringde zich met volgelingen, onder wie medeverdachten MohammedH. (19) en BrahimH. (22). Hij zocht contact met Nouredine elF., die toen nog voortvluchtig was.
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AD.nl - Verdonk: meeste verblijfsvergunningen /

Moet het toch even vermelden (probeer er altijd als de kippen bij te zijn wanneer een stereotyp geweld aan gedaan wordt - ahum)

STRAATSBURG - Minister Verdonk heeft veel meer verblijfsvergunningen afgegeven op humanitaire gronden dan haar voorgangers.

De minister van Vreemdelingenzaken heeft inmiddels circa zevenhonderd van deze uitzonderlijke vergunningen verleend.

,,Mijn voorgangers deden dat elk maar enkele tientallen keren”, zei de minister donderdag tijdens een bezoek aan de Raad van Europa, de organisatie van 46 landen voor mensenrechten en democratie.

Verdonk lichtte toe dat het grote aantal samenhangt met het afhandelen van een grote groep oude asielaanvragen. ,,Ik heb toen gezegd: ik zal met mijn hart kijken”, zei Verdonk. ,,En zo zit ik dus elke avond met een stapel dossiers thuis, om ze te bekijken.”

De minister was naar de Raad van Europa gekomen om haar uitzetbeleid te verdedigen. Haar plan eind 2003 om 26.000 asielzoekers desnoods gedwongen uit te zetten, had destijds vragen opgeroepen.

Maar een onderzoeksrapport van de Raad van Europa, opgesteld door de Zwitserse christendemocrate Zapfl-Helbling, viel juist tamelijk positief uit. Het rapport stelt dat ,,het beleid in grote mate voldoet aan de aanbevelingen van de Raad van Europa, hoewel sommige kenmerken reden tot zorg zijn”.
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Several American bloggers have been invited by the Dutch Tourism Agency to visit Amsterdam in the end of February.

One of the bloggers is AMERICAblog: Because a great nation deserves the truth.

Three days ago I got offered a trip to Amsterdam from the Dutch Tourism Agency. The Dutch were very excited to organize a first-ever trip of bloggers (they invite journalists all the time, but have never invited bloggers). But as it was their trip, I didn’t want to scoop them on it by telling you guys on Tuesday. Well, today they told the public about it, so today I’m telling you about it.

Basically, the trip is really an in-kind blog ad buy - they get a month-long ad on the blog (the ones in the right column), and they pay for the ad with a trip instead of cash (the trip is actually valued at much less than the one month cost of the ad on this site). But still, I’d be far less likely to spend the money on a trip had they paid in cash, so I kind of like being nudged into going.

You really should read the comments in that entry; it gaves you an interesting picture of how others think of the Dutch and Amsterdam: blowing, bikes, tulips and Muslims

Other bloggers are going to, but are also very critical about the organisation, such as Progressive Gold:

I’m angry that the Dutch Tourist Board, rather than try and promote the Netherlands by supporting the blogs of people who actually live and work here ( blimey, give me free entrance to the galleries& museums and I’ll blog ad infinitum) they’d rather shell out big bucks for US bloggers to come out and give their week-long impressions. And the invited bloggers aren’t even obliged to do that for their 5 star trip.
Many of us, sitting here every day actually in the bloody country, are blogging about Holland Dutch politics, Dutch food, Dutch culture and life in Holland, in English, right under their damned noses.
But does the Dutch bloody Tourist Board actually want to hear what we have to say about this country and its inhabitants? It wouldn’t fit in with the ‘tulips, coffeeshops, and Rembrandt’ agenda so i guess that answers that.
It makes me want to spit, especially when the American blogs get to show this nifty little logo:

Aaargh. Bloggers In Amsterdam? No, except in the purely technical sense and then for only 7 days.

Well I will be in Germany then, but I wish them all the best and I hope the Baltimore Factor isn’t to big.