From the BBC we have this report published today demonstrating the cutting edge of current Muslim scientific thinking.

Muslim scientists and clerics have called for the adoption of Mecca time to replace GMT, arguing that the Saudi city is the true centre of the Earth.

Mecca is the direction all Muslims face when they perform their daily prayers.

The call was issued at a conference held in the Gulf state of Qatar under the title: Mecca, the Centre of the Earth, Theory and Practice.

One geologist argued that unlike other longitudes, Mecca's was in perfect alignment to magnetic north.

He said the English had imposed GMT on the rest of the world by force when Britain was a big colonial power, and it was about time that changed.

Mecca watch

A prominent cleric, Sheikh Youssef al-Qaradawy, said modern science had at last provided evidence that Mecca was the true centre of the Earth; proof, he said, of the greatness of the Muslim "qibla" - the Arabic word for the direction Muslims turn to when they pray.

The meeting also reviewed what has been described as a Mecca watch, the brainchild of a French Muslim.

The watch is said to rotate anti-clockwise and is supposed to help Muslims determine the direction of Mecca from any point on Earth.

The meeting in Qatar is part of a popular trend in some Muslim societies of seeking to find Qur'anic precedents for modern science.

It is called "Ijaz al-Qur'an", which roughly translates as the "miraculous nature of the holy text".

The underlying belief is that scientific truths were also revealed in the Muslim holy book, and it is the work of scholars to unearth and publicise the textual evidence.

But the movement is not without its critics, who say that the notion that modern science was revealed in the Qur'an confuses spiritual truth, which is constant, and empirical truth, which depends on the state of science at any given point in time.

To adopt Mecca time, start by turning your clocks back 1400 years.

I'm probably not the first nor certainly the only blogger to post Geert Wilders' film, but I feel it must get as much distribution as possible.

Here it is.



UPDATE: Mar. 29,2008. No doubt some recent visitors to my blog were unable to access the film. Unfortunately, because of serious threats to their staff, LiveLeak felt they could no longer host "Fitna." To their undying credit,the film has been picked up by Google and is now hosted on Google Video.

In an attempt to undermine, or at least neutralize as much as possible, Geert Wilders’ as yet unreleased anti-Islamic film “Fitna” the Dutch government has countered with its own film.

In the aftermath of considerable recent criticism from Islamic countries, particularly Iran, regarding the Wilders’ film and the possible repercussions if and when it is released, they are trying to convince the world that this does not represent the views of the majority of Dutch citizens and that the current situation is indeed an aberration.

While emphasizing freedom of speech in the Netherlands the government film, released through Radio Netherlands Worldwide, fails to make a well reasoned case against Wilders' position regarding Islam and immigration from non-Western countries and resorts to making ad hominem attacks on Wilders himself. People interviewed characterize Wilders as “looking for attention,” “not worth writing a book about,” and “a crazy politician.”

I mentioned it in my last post that "Fitna" would be released on March 23^rd. I will try to control my anxiety and reserve further discussion about the film until then.

This brilliant send-up of bridal magazines (and Muslim extremists) made the rounds of the blogosphere two years ago. For those who missed it, as I did, here it is again.


Almost makes me want to subscribe.

After 900 years of cultural stagnation Islam may yet see its Age of Enlightenment.

From: guardian.co.uk

Feb. 27, 2008.

Turkey is engaged in a bold and profound attempt to rewrite the basis for Islamic sharia law while also officially reinterpreting the Qur'an for the modern age.

The exercise in reforming Islamic jurisprudence, sponsored by the modernising and mildly Islamic government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the prime minister, is being seen as an iconoclastic campaign to establish a 21st century form of Islam, fusing Muslim beliefs and tradition with European and western philosophical methods and principles.

The result, say experts following the ambitious experiment, could be to diminish Muslim discrimination against women, banish some of the brutal penalties associated with Islamic law, such as stoning and amputation, and redefine Islam as a modern, dynamic force in the large country that pivots between east and west, leaning into the Middle East while aspiring to join the European Union.

A team of reformist Islamic scholars at Ankara University, acting under the auspices of the Diyanet or Directorate of Religious Affairs, the government body which oversees the country's 8,000 mosques and appoints imams, is said to be close to concluding a "reinterpretation" of parts of the Hadith, the collection of thousands of aphorisms and comments said to derive from the prophet Muhammad and which form the basis of Islamic jurisprudence or sharia law. "One of the team doing the revision said they are nearly finished," said Mustafa Akyol, an Istanbul commentator who reflects the thinking of the liberal camp in Erdogan's governing AK party. "They have problems with the misogynistic hadith, the ones against women. They may delete some from the collection, declaring them not authentic. That would be a very bold step. Or they may just add footnotes, saying they should be understood from a different historical context."

Fadi Hakura, a Turkey expert at the International Institute of Strategic Studies, described the project as an attempt to make Turkish Sunni Islam "fully compatible with contemporary social and moral values.

"They see this not as a revolution, but as a return to the original Islam, away from the excessive conservatism that has stymied all reforms for the last few centuries. It's somewhat akin to the Christian reformation, although not the same."

Under the guidance of Ali Bardokoglu, the liberal Islamic scholar who heads the religious directorate and was appointed by Erdogan, the Ankara theologians are writing a new five-volume "exegesis" of the Qur'an, taking the sacred text apart forensically, rooting it in its time and place, and redefining its message to and relevance for Muslims today. They are also ditching some of the Hadith, sayings ascribed to and comments on the prophet collected a couple of hundred years after his death.

A Roman Catholic Jesuit expert on Turkey and Islam, Felix Koerner, is working with the Ankara professors, reportedly schooling them in the history of western religious and philosophical change and how to apply the lessons of historical Christian reform movements to modern Islam. "This is really a synthesis of modern European critical thought and Muslim Ottoman Qur’anic tradition," said Koerner. "There is also a political agenda. With this government there is more confidence in these modern theologians."

Erdogan insists his AK party, in a country that is constitutionally secularist, is a Turkish Muslim equivalent of a European Christian democratic party - traditionalist, conservative, based on religious values, but democratic, tolerant, and liberal. With Spain and the Zapatero government, he is pushing an "Alliance of Civilisations" aimed at a rapprochement between the Muslim and western worlds. After years of fighting the militantly secularist Turkish establishment, he has just succeeded in lifting the ban on Islamic headscarves for girls in higher education. His many opponents decry it as part of Turkey's slide away from secularism down the slippery slope of Islamism.

Sources say the Islamic reform project is so ambitious and so fundamental it will take years to complete, but that it is already paying dividends - abolition of the death penalty, a campaign against honour killings, and the training and appointment of several hundred women as imams.

There seems to be no end to the demands made by Muslim immigrants with respect to their religious beliefs. While often some accommodation can be made, in this instance their demand is simply unacceptable.

From the Daily Mail, UK - Feb. 26, 2008

Muslim medics refuse to roll up their sleeves in hygiene crackdown - because it's against their religion

Health officials are having crisis talks with Muslim medical staff who have objected to hospital hygiene rules because of religious beliefs.

Medics in hospitals in at least three major English cities have refused to follow the regulations aimed at helping tackle superbugs because of their faith, it has been revealed.

Women medical students at Alder Hey children's hospital in Liverpool objected to rolling up their sleeves when washing their hands and removing arm coverings in theatre, claiming it is regarded as immodest.

Similar concerns were raised at Leicester University and Sheffield University reported a case of a Muslim medic refusing to "scrub" because it left her forearms exposed.

Some students have said that they would prefer to quit the course rather than expose their arms, but hygiene experts said no exceptions should be made on religious grounds.

A Royal Liverpool hospital spokesman said they had experienced issues of Muslim staff not sanitising their forearms with alcohol gel although this had now been addressed.

Dr Steve Ryan, medical director at Alder Hey said that while the "bare below the elbows" dress code is a matter of patient safety, the trust would work with Muslim students to find a solution.

He said: "We specify bare below elbows, no wrist watches, nail varnish or false nails in clinical areas.

"Good hand hygiene is one of the most important and simplest actions we can take to prevent healthcare associated infections.

"A number of female Muslim students had approached the University of Liverpool to ask if we would provide facilities for them to change their outerwear and Hijab for theatre scrubs.

"We were pleased to accommodate this request and these facilities have now been incorporated."

Dr Charles Tannock, a Conservative MEP and former hospital consultant, said: "These students are being trained using taxpayers' money and they have a duty of care to their patients not to put their health at risk.

"Perhaps these women should not be choosing medicine as a career if they feel unable to abide by the guidelines everyone else has to follow."

But the Islamic Medical Association insisted that covering all the body in public, except the face and hands, was a basic tenet of Islam.

It said: "No practising Muslim woman - doctor, medical student, nurse or patient - should be forced to bare her arms below the elbow."

The new Department of Health guidance was introduced this month in a bid to restrict the spread of potentially fatal infections such as MRSA and Clostridium difficle.

The code of practice helps NHS bodies to plan and implement how they can prevent and control healthcare- associated infection.

It sets out criteria by which managers of the NHS organisations are to ensure that patients are cared for in a clean environment and the risk of infections is kept as low as possible.

The End of the World as We Know It

As the subtitle indicates, in his first book author Steyn contends that the Western world is going to hell in a hand basket. The future, if there is to be one, lies with a conservative America.

Steyn sees three destructive forces at work.

1. Demographics.

2. The multicultural and social policies of the political left.

3. Muslim aggression.

Assuming their accuracy, Steyn’s demographics are hard to refute. The “replacement” fertility rate – the number of babies per women needed to maintain a stable population, not getting any bigger, not getting any smaller is 2.1. The United States is just at the replacement rate with 2.11 births per woman. Ireland at 1.9, Australia at 1.7. Steyn’s (and my) home and native land Canada’s fertility rate is down to 1.5, well below replacement rate; Germany and Austria are at 1.3; Russia and Italy at 1.2; Spain at 1.1 – about half replacement rate. Therefore Spain’s population is halving every generation.

He states that a major contribution to this dismal forecast is the dependency of European countries and Canada on government social programs which are slowly bankrupting the population because of the high taxes required to finance them. Meanwhile, the native born population is aging and unable to sustain the financial burden alone. Furthermore, we’ve become so dependent on government “like a junkie on the state narcotic” that we no longer have the moral fibre to effect change.

Tax revenues required to support the growing number of elderly and retired have to come from an equal number of new young workers. The question is - where’s that workforce going to come from? The answer for Canada and most of Europe has been immigration. Islam is the principal supplier of new workers in Europe and the second biggest in Canada. Ironically, according to the UN the global fertility rate is currently around 1.85 eventually resulting in a total population decline. However, the fastest growing population on the planet at the moment is Muslim, giving them a numerical advantage at least for some time. Net result, according to Steyn – soon Europe and Canada will be overwhelmed by an ever-increasing number of young Muslim immigrants having little interest in Western values of freedom, democracy and secularism.

All this combined with the Muslim rampant desire (if you believe the American conservative element) to convert the infidels to Islam or impose the jizyah tax on those that refuse, leaves us with little hope. In fact, Steyn believes that Europe is already lost and Canada is half way to becoming Canuckistan.

America, on the other hand, a bastion of gun carrying independence and low taxes with a favourable fertility rate will be the saviour of Western culture. Hence the title of the book.

Nice try Mark, but it just ain’t so.

Steyn assumes that current conditions are permanent and no change is possible. In truth, conditions are changing very quickly. All European countries including the UK have introduced integration programs for their admittedly neglected Muslim populations as well as made sweeping changes to their immigration policy while maintaining human rights obligations. Among the changes, doors are being opened to educated and skilled immigrants from former east bloc countries such as Poland.

A recent poll conducted in the Netherlands indicated that 50% of the population is unhappy with the immigrant situation in that country. With that number of disgruntled voters it will not take long for politicians to enact further legislation. Already, the Dutch require potential immigrants to write an examination in their own country and expect them to be able to speak Dutch. Amusingly, would-be immigrants are shown a film featuring scenes of a nude woman and of two gay males kissing with the express message “If this offends you, don’t come.”

Steyn notes gleefully that Pakistan is the number two supplier of immigrants to Canada. Despite his pessimism Pakistanis are integrating well into Canadian society with very few problems. What he does not mention is the number one source of immigrants to Canada – China. Young Chinese immigrants, staunchly secular, have integrated seamlessly and are already well represented in business, industry and education.

Like a good conservative, Steyn wants to keep most of his earnings and prefers the low tax environment of the U.S. where a serious disease or accident means financial ruin for 47 million Americans and the infrastructure is crumbling as levees fail and bridges collapse.

Good luck.

So Mark, while I think your book's conclusions are faulty, I will defend to the death your right to publish it.

Well, maybe not to the death.

The Dutch cabinet has decided against a general ban on burqas, clothing that covers the whole face except for the eyes.

The cabinet argues that a general ban would violate the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of religion

The timing of the announcement suggests that the government hopes the move will help ward off violent repercussions should Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders decide to release his anti-Qur’an film at the end of this month as promised. See my post of yesterday. Currently, he is delaying release.

The conservative VVD and Wilders’ Freedom Party have expressed disappointment at the cabinet decision.

They back a general ban because they believe that clothing that covers the face causes unacceptable feelings of insecurity among the general public.

Would you buy a used car from this woman?

The government of the Netherlands is worried.

Leader of the right-wing Freedom Party, Geert Wilders says he will release a ten minute anti-Qur’an film at the end of this month. Mr. Wilders announced his plans last November. He said he was making the film to show that the Qur’an is a fascist book which incites believers to violence and hatred.

While recognizing Wilders' right to freedom of speech, Dutch authorities are concerned about the possible repercussions similar to the violent reprisals by Muslims after the publication of the Danish “Mohammed cartoons.” The Prime Minister, Interior Minister and Justice Minister have been holding secret meetings about the expected consequences for some time. The National Coordinator for Counterterrorism is also involved in the discussions. Security plans are being made and Dutch nationals overseas have been asked to register with their embassies and local mayors in the Netherlands have been put on standby.

In the past, Wilders has said that half the Qur’an should be torn up and compared it with Adolf Hitler's book "Mein Kampf," the only book banned from distribution in the Netherlands. He has claimed the Netherlands is being swamped by a “tsunami” of Islamic immigrants.

Immigrants from Muslim countries number about 1 million of the country’s 16 million people.

Wilders said he is not afraid of reprisals if his film angers Muslims. “I have lived with 24-hour protection for three years,” he said.

“I will make the film and see what reaction it creates.”

Wilders is not alone in his opinion of Islam and the Qur’an. A poll conducted in September of 2007 showed that Wilders’ Freedom Party has become almost as big as the governing PvdA party in the 150-seat Dutch Parliament. If elections were to held today the Freedom Party would get 19 seats (compared to only 9 in the last elections) while the governing party would only get 20 (down from 33).

Wilders is therefore expressing the opinion of a considerable percentage of Dutch citizens.

To a large extent the Dutch government is responsible for the current unrest in that country. From my post of Nov. 4, 2007:

“The roots of the Dutch situation can be traced back to the 1960’s when thousands of unskilled immigrants came to the country as part of a “guest worker” program for jobs in the textile, ship building and mining industries. Initially from Italy and Spain and later from Turkey and Morocco, they were expected to stay a few years and then return home. Many did indeed leave, but many more did not. Government policy at the time was essentially one of liberal multiculturalism and encouraged people to be educated in their own language and culture. Continuing to turn a blind eye to reality, it was assumed that these workers would assimilate and seek relationships among the existing Dutch population. They didn’t, and were then allowed to sponsor relatives and potential spouses from their own countries.

As the needs of industry evolved from unskilled labour to a high tech workforce Holland found itself divided into essentially two societies – a highly skilled affluent group and an unskilled, impoverished, mostly Muslim underclass with little motive to assimilate.

The 1990’s saw a further influx of immigrants as refugees from countries such as Somalia. Today, Muslims constitute 5.5% of the total population of the Netherlands.”

From her self-imposed exile in Washington, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a former member of the Dutch parliament, last week criticized the new film as ‘provocation’ and called on the major Dutch political parties to restart a debate on immigration that has split Dutch society in recent years, rather than leave the field to extremists.

The Dutch government must reconsider its immigration, cultural and education policies not only with regard to Muslims but with the object of changing the attitude of much of its non-Muslim citizenry as well - sooner rather than later.

Although, as noted in the above mentioned post, immigrants to Canada are better educated and have marketable skills and therefore pose few problems, Dutch officials could do worse than study the Canadian model.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper in a year end interview with The Canadian Press on Dec 23, 2007:

“I first of all think immigrants come to this country to belong to this country. I also think that the Canadian approach to this, which is a mixture of integration and accommodation, for lack of a better term, is the right approach.

I know there's a popularly expressed view that immigrants come here and they should change to suit the country. I think they overwhelmingly do. But I think the fact is our country also consciously changes somewhat for new immigrants and new cultures, and I think that's a successful model. I think if you look around the world for issues of immigration and cultural integration, Canada is as successful as any other country in this regard.

In Ontario, there's been some concern about radical elements in the Muslim community, but these are at the margins. The fact of the matter is there aren't cultural tensions in the country, there generally is a healthy process of integration along with accommodation and if you focus on the Islamic community, yes there are extremist elements but they are small and marginal and the problems we face in this country compared with other countries are tiny.”

Harper said his cabinet has been discussing issues of Canadian identity and how to foster a sense of Canadian values.

"We probably need to have some thought about what the shared values really are, and how we strengthen those, but that said I don't see a cultural fragmentation in this country, I just don't see it."

Bruce Anderson, president of Harris-Decima Research, said Harper's approach seems to mirror how Canadians feel about the issue of racial harmony.

"Voters in Canada have tended pretty routinely in the past to saying, 'Look, we know we have a fragile consensus. On balance, rather than blow that consensus up because we have strong opinions, we'd rather bury our strong opinions and make the fragile consensus continue to hold.’

It’s time the governing party of the Netherlands and its coalition partners address the problem realistically.

Wilders' provocative film, if indeed he does release it, will not make that process any easier.

The Anglican Bishop of Rochester (UK), Rt. Rev. Michael Nazir-Ali has created considerable notoriety claiming that there are areas across Britain where it is too dangerous for non-Muslims to enter. He says that people of a different race or faith face physical attack if they live or work in Muslim dominated communities.

Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, Dr. Nazir-Ali said there had been attempts to “impose ‘Islamic’ character on certain areas” by, for example, amplifying the adhan (call to prayer) from mosques and questioning whether non-Muslims “wish to be told the creed of a particular faith five times a day, seven days a week on the loudspeaker”

There are several versions of the adhan. This is one of them.



The Muslim Council of Britain calls his comments “frantic scaremongering.” and describes the call to prayer as no different than the ringing of church bells.

Really.

While I normally much prefer to post original material to The View from Here, I feel strongly that the following op/ed piece from The Boston Globe deserves a much wider audience than it may be receiving locally. My thanks to Jeff Jacoby for his permission.

The Boston Globe, USA
Dec. 23, 2007
Opinion
Jeff Jacoby

The “Quatif girl” won a reprieve last week. On Dec. 17, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah pardoned the young woman, who was sentenced to 200 lashes and six months in prison after she pressed charges against seven men who had raped her and a male acquaintance in 2006.

Two weeks earlier, Sudan’s president extended a similar reprieve to Gillian Gibbons, the British teacher convicted of insulting Islam because her 7-year-old students named a teddy bear Muhammad. Gibbons had been sentenced to prison, but government-organized street demonstrators were loudly demanding her execution.

In January, Nazanin Fatehi was released from an Iranian jail after a death sentence against her was revoked. She had originally been convicted of murder for fatally stabbing a man when he and two others attempted to rape her and her niece in a park. (Had she yielded to the rapists, she could have been flogged or stoned for engaging in nonmarital sex.)

The sparing of these women was very welcome news, of course, and it was not coincidental that each case had triggered an international furor. But for every “Qatif girl” or Nazanin who is saved, there are far too many other Muslim girls and women for whom deliverance never comes.

No international furor saved Aqsa Parvez, a Toronto teenager, whose father was charged on Dec. 11 with strangling her to death because she refused to wear a hijab. “She just wanted to look like everyone else,” one of Aqsa’s friends told the National Post, “and I guess her dad had a problem with that.”

No reprieve came for Banaz Mahmod, either. She was 20, a Kurdish immigrant to Britain, whose father and uncle had her killed last year after she left an abusive arranged marriage and fell in love with a man not from the family’s village in Kurdistan. Banaz was choked to death with a bootlace, stuffed into a suitcase, and buried in a garden 70 miles away.

More than 25 such “honor killings” have been confirmed in Britain’s Muslim community in recent years. Many more are suspected.

There has been no storm of outrage about the intimidation and murder in Basra, Iraq, of women who wear Western-style clothing. Iraqi police say that more than 40 women have been killed so far this year by Islamists; the bodies are often left in garbage dumps with notes accusing the victims of “un-Islamic behavior.”

By Western standards, the subjugation of women by Muslim fanatics, and the sometimes pathological Islamist obsession with female sexuality, are unthinkable. Time and again they lead to shocking acts of violence and depravity:

In Pakistan, a tribal council ordered a woman to be gang-raped as punishment for her brother’s supposed liaison with a woman from another tribe.

In San Francisco, a young Muslim woman was shot dead after she uncovered her hair and put on makeup in order to be a maid of honor at a friend’s wedding.

In Tehran, a father beheaded his 7-year-old daughter because he suspected that she had been raped; he said he acted “to defend my honor, fame, and dignity.”

In Saudi Arabia, the Islamic police prevented schoolgirls from leaving a burning building because they were not wearing headscarves and abayas; 15 of the girls died in the inferno.

The president of Cairo’s Al-Azhar University, a renowned center of Islamic learning, described the proper method of wife-beating in a television interview: “It’s not really beating,” Sheikh Ahmad Al-Tayyeb explained on Egyptian television. “It’s more like punching.”

When the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan in 1996, the repression of women was among their first priorities. They issued a decree forbidding women to leave their homes, with the result that work and schooling for women came to a halt, destroying the country’s healthcare system, civil service, and elementary education.

“Forty percent of the doctors, half of the government workers, and seven out of 10 teachers were women,” Lawrence Wright observed in “The Looming Tower,” his Pulitzer Prize-winning history of Al Qaeda. “Under the Taliban, many of them would become beggars.”

Women are not the only victims of this rampant misogyny. Mohammed Halim, a 46-year-old Afghan schoolteacher, was dragged from his family and horribly murdered last year - disemboweled and then dismembered - for defying orders to stop educating girls.

All these are only examples - the tip of a dreadful iceberg that will never be demolished until Muslims by the millions rise up against it. As for the rest of us, we too have an obligation to raise our voices. It took a worldwide outcry to spare “Qatif girl” and Nazanin. But there are countless others like them, and our silence may seal their fate.

Canadian Muslims are using Canada’s democratic principles to further their own non-democratic agenda.

Responding to complaints by the Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC), the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC) and the British C0lumbia Human Rights Tribunal have launched proceedings against author Mark Steyn and Maclean’s Magazine over an excerpt from Steyn’s book “America Alone” which appeared in the magazine.

The “offending” article can be read here.

According to the CIC, the article was “flagrantly Islamophobic” and “subjects Canadian Muslims to hatred and contempt.”

Flagrantly Islamophobic? Based on demographic studies, the article forecasts a number of possible results - some of which have already begun to become apparent - of the declining world population of those with Western values while the same studies show that the Muslim population is skyrocketing.

“Every Western woman in the EU is producing an average of 1.4 children. Every Muslim woman in the same countries is producing 3.5 children."

That Islam has a non-democratic agenda is clear and has been expressed quite succinctly by many Muslim leaders including Libya's Colonel Moammar Gadhafi.

“There are signs that Allah will grant Islam victory in Europe -- without swords, without guns, without conquests. The fifty million Muslims of Europe will turn it into a Muslim continent within a few decades."

This is exactly Steyn’s contention.

As for "hatred and contempt," one has only to open a newspaper or turn on the television news to quickly realize that Muslims the world over are doing a superb job of bringing hatred and contempt upon themselsves. Nothing Steyn writes could make a more negative impression.

The problem lies not with Steyn or Maclean’s. The problem lies with the Canadian Human Rights Commission. The mandate of the CHRC is not to prosecute hate crimes. It was originally set up to investigate complaints regarding infractions of laws regarding unfair employment and rental practices etc. based on race or colour. That the Commission sees the CIC’s complaint as having merit and has accepted it is absurd. Nonetheless, should they stupidly go through with the case and convict Steyn, the conviction will no doubt be overturned by the Supreme Court of Canada on appeal as a violation of section 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms – Freedom of Expression.

Even the 1985 conviction of the infamous anti-Semite and holocaust denier Ernst Zundel for publishing “a statement or tale, namely, "Did Six Million Really Die?" that he knows is false and that is likely to cause mischief to the public interest in social and racial tolerance, contrary to the Criminal Code." was overturned by the Supreme Court as a violation of the Charter.

All this is not to say that we should ignore Steyn's situation. The use of hate and human rights laws to stop honest comment regarding any identifiable group is a perversion of the law’s intent. Protests regarding the CHRC action should be lodged in the strongest possible terms with the Prime Minister, Members of Parliament as well as the Human Rights Commission itself. Freedom of expression is too precious a right to ignore.

Two courageous Muslims who have it right. Let's hope this serves as a wake-up call to the danger in our midst.

Tarek Fatah and Farzana Hassan,
National Post
Wednesday, December 12, 2007

The tragic death of a Mississauga, Ont., teenage girl -- allegedly at the hands of her own traditionally minded Muslim father -- has sent shock waves across the world. Canadians are justified in raising concerns as to whether this is a sign of the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in their own backyard.

Aqsa Parvez, a sprightly 16-year-old, beloved of her friends and peers at Applewood Heights Secondary School, was only trying to be herself, was only wishing for a normal adolescence amid Canada's rich cultural mosaic. Her father has now been charged with murder, and his son with obstruction, while a young life has been snuffed out -- likely in the name of honour and Islam.

Radical Muslim men consider themselves ultimately responsible for the conduct of the womenfolk. This outlook is rooted in a medieval ethos that treats women as nonpersons, unable to decide for themselves what they should wear, where they must go and what they must accomplish in life. If their conduct is seen as contravening this austere religious outlook, they are invariably subjected to abuse.

The hijab in particular has become a thorny issue among Muslim families. It has been elevated as a sort of "sixth pillar of Islam" among militant sects. Young teenage girls are often lectured over the virtues of the hijab by their family members. Once they hit puberty, compliance is deemed a non-negotiable religious requirement.

Yet none of this is actually mandated by the Koran. The Qur'an, while speaking generally of modesty in dress and demeanour, falls short of specifying the details of that modesty. Scripture also makes allowances for non-compliance of religious edicts if the environment is not conducive to their observance.

The Qur'an exhorts compassion upon parents, caretakers and guardians of young girls. Yet some families instead exhibit a strict conformity to doctrine and dogma, which in turn leads to violence, bigotry and intolerance of alternative understandings of faith.

There is much discussion in Canadian society about the religious freedoms of those who choose to wear the hijab. We hear relatively little about the oppression of young girls who make the opposite choice. Seldom is their oppression from within their own community, or even their own family, cast as a human rights issue.

If convicted, Aqsa's father and brother must be handed the strictest penalty available under the law. As for the imams and clergy of Canada's mosques, who constantly berate young women for not wearing the hijab or snub them for "violating Islam," they need to reflect on the consequences of their sermons.

Consider, as an example, the Montreal mosque that recently posted on its Web site a warning to the effect that if young girls took off their hijab, they could end up getting raped and having "illegitimate children." Other proffered risks included "Stresses, insecurity and suspicion in the minds of husbands" and "instigating young people to deviate towards the path of lust."

As if the threat of rape and the fear of illegitimate children were not enough, these pre-teen girls were told that if they took off their hijab, they would cease to be Muslims: "By removing your hijab, you have destroyed your faith. Islam means submission to Allah in all our actions." Little wonder then, that Canadian girls walk away from sports tournaments rather than remove their hijabs.

Muslims need to stand up to this sort of emotional and religious blackmail by imams who spread the competing agendas of Saudi Arabia and Iran into Canada. Young Aqsa Pervez's death cannot be reversed. But in her memory, we can at least challenge those whose message leads to rage and madness.

-- Tarek Fatah is author of Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State, to be published by Wiley & Sons in March, 2008. Farzana Hassan is author of Islam, Women, and the Challenges of Today. Both are members of the Muslim Canadian Congress (mcc@muslimcongress.ca).

Skirt too long to please employer
Muslim airport worker, laid off after altering uniform, takes case to rights commission
The Star
November 17, 2007
John Goddard, Staff Reporter

A few inches of skirt length have led to an airport security guard's suspension. The skirt is too long – not too short – to please the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority.

Halima Muse, a practising Muslim, has been laid off without pay until she agrees to wear a standard uniform that includes either slacks or a skirt falling at the knee. Instead, she has filed a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Commission saying she is the target of religious discrimination, as Islam instructs that she dress modestly in a way that covers the body and conceals its curves.

"My skirt is not that much different – it's a bit longer," she said yesterday from her home not far from Pearson airport, where she has worked for more than five years. "It's not about style, it's about my dignity."

Muse, 33, is the single mother of one teenage son. She came to Canada from Somalia in 1989 and says she enjoyed working at the airport and never had problems with her immediate employer, Garda of Canada.

"I love my job," said Muse, who scanned passengers and luggage in the security area. "I like the people working with me. All the managers are nice to me. Most of the travellers are nice. We meet lots of different kinds of people ...

"It's flexible," she also said. "I pray five times a day for five minutes."

Until February of this year, Muse wore slacks with her uniform but never liked them, her brief to the commission says. They showed the shape of her body. She asked the Garda employee in charge of uniforms for a skirt longer than the standard one. No such skirt existed, she was told, but she negotiated a solution. Matching colour and material, she made her own skirt that reached the ankle.

For six months all went well, Muse said in the interview. Then a Garda manager said she must conform to regulations.

"The regulations are established by (the air transport security authority)," said Garda communications director Joe Gavaghan.

"We neither set those requirements nor can we interpret them ...

"We immediately went to (the federal authority) indicating what the situation was and asking them to please direct us as to what we could do. They came back and had made the decision that there are two alternatives: Women can wear a skirt that is knee length or they can wear pants."

The Canadian Air Transport Security Authority will take questions next week, a spokesperson said.

Muse's suspension from work happened in stages. On Aug. 11, Garda suspended her one day for wearing the ankle-length skirt. On Aug. 15, she was suspended for three days. On Aug. 22, the penalty became five days. On Aug. 29, she was sent home indefinitely.

"I am talking for all women who would like to wear a long skirt – practising Christians, Jewish, Muslim, all of them," Muse said.

Taking a stand has already cost her, she said. Out of work nearly three months, she is running up debt on a credit card and borrowing money from her brother.

The federal employment insurance agency has refused to qualify her, she said, because she is not officially unemployed – she can go back to her job if she conforms to regulations she considers to violate her religious rights. The welfare department has similarly denied her application, she said.

Uniform
Adjective: 1. Always the same, as in character or degree; unvarying.
2. Conforming to one principle, standard, or rule; consistent
3. Being the same as or consonant with another or others.
4. Unvaried in texture, color, or design.
Noun: 1. A distinctive outfit intended to identify those who wear it as
members of a specific group.
2. One set of such an outfit.
The American Heritage® Dictionary

Let us begin by clearing up one significant issue. Ms. Muse’s wardrobe choice is a cultural belief, not a religious one. The Qur'an enjoins women (and men) to dress modestly only. Nowhere is it mandated that they must cover their bodies almost completely from head to toe (actually an Arab tradition.)

“Tell the believing men to lower their gaze and guard their chastity; that is purer for them. And tell the believing women to lower their gaze and guard their chastity, and not to make a display of their beauty except what is apparent, and let them cast a cover over their bosoms.... And turn to Allah (God) altogether, O believers, in order that you might succeed” (Qur'an 24: 30-31)

“O prophet, tell your wives, your daughters, and the wives of the believers that they shall lengthen their garments. Thus, they will be recognized and avoid being insulted. God is Forgiver, Most Merciful.” ( Qur'an 33:59)

These two short passages are the total dress instruction in the Qur'an. Ms. Muse may be alluding to the latter which mentions lengthening garments. However, no instruction is given regarding how long or, for that matter, which garments should be lengthened.

Ms. Muse comes from a society where “modestly” has long been interpreted as fully covered by some of the most strict, fundamentalist, hardline, male Islamic clerics on the planet. In the Canadian cultural context, a knee length skirt or slacks are considered modest dress.

Ms. Muse, who “loves her job,” has worked at the airport for over five years and has worn slacks during this time apparently without complaint. She was no doubt made aware of the conditions of employment when she accepted the position. Why the discomfort now?

Her employer, Garda of Canada, a Montreal based international security firm, does not dress their employees in a uniform for frivolous reasons. As a security organization it is essential that employees present to the public an appearance of competence and near-military efficiency. A standard uniform helps to produce that impression.

A popular buzzword regarding immigrants with respect to their culture and religion is “reasonable accommodation.” Garda have certainly been reasonable in allowing Ms. Muse time to pray. Prayer is religious. Dress is not. Expecting Garda to make exceptions to company dress policy is not reasonable.

This is Canada. On her own time, Ms. Muse is free to go about in a burqua, should she choose to do so. On company time, she is obliged to conform to the company standard.

Canada Employment Insurance and the local welfare office have made the correct decision in this instance.

Update: A Very Canadian Resolution to the Problem

TORONTO (Reuters) Nov.21,2007 - A Muslim airport screener who was suspended from her job at Toronto's Pearson airport because her skirt was too long has been allowed to return to work under a compromise with her employer.

The security company, Garda of Canada, has offered the worker, Halima Muse, a full-time administrative job that will allow her to wear civilian attire instead of the uniform required in her previous role, the Teamsters union said in a statement on Wednesday.

Muse's employer had suspended her for wearing a skirt longer than the knee-length garment the company had issued her. She wanted to wear the longer skirt to conform with the Islamic dress code.

The union, which represents security workers at Pearson airport, said Muse would also receive back pay for the three months she was on suspension.

Muse said she is content with the ruling as long as her salary stays the same.

Under the agreement, Muse will stay in the administrative position until the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA) can evaluate its policies, which required Muse to choose between a shorter skirt or pants, neither of which she deemed modest enough. Garda of Canada said it had to follow CATSA's guidelines.

After a misinterpretation by Elections Canada officials of federal election laws passed this spring allowed Muslim women to vote in three Quebec by-elections without removing their veils for identification purposes, the federal government has tabled new legislation requiring all voters to reveal their faces before being allowed to vote. It is expected that the new legislation will be supported by all parties. The Quebec provincial government is expected to follow suit within the next few days.

While the incidents of the Quebec by-elections were minor and certainly had no effect on the ultimate results, they did highlight a potential future problem which Canada must be prepared to face. Are we required to accommodate religious and cultural beliefs of immigrant groups and if so, to what extent?

The 750,000 Muslims in Canada, slightly over 2% of the total population, present the country with a situation which it has never been forced to acknowledge before. Previous influxes of immigrant groups have been essentially from secular countries. Muslims, of which over 90% are first generation Canadians, come largely from religion based, although not necessarily theocratic, societies. Malaysia, for example, has a Muslim population that represents 52% of the total, although officially a secular state – a legacy of 150 years of British domination.

A SES poll conducted this past September and reported in the Oct. 22nd issue of Maclean’s Magazine is summarized as follows:
“…. by significant majorities in Canada as a whole, and by overwhelming majorities in Quebec, Canadians and Quebecers declare limits to reasonable accommodation. When asked whether it was reasonable to accommodate religious and cultural minorities or whether immigrants should fully adapt to culture in Canada, only 18.0 percent of respondents said reasonable accommodation best reflected their personal views, as opposed to 53.1 percent who thought immigrants should fully adapt, and 21.3 percent who agreed with neither statement.”

Also, as reported in Maclean’s, there is considerable concern in this country about European Muslims, particularly those of the Netherlands – that “our Muslims are like their Muslims.” However, an examination of the origins and circumstances of the Dutch experience indicates that current conditions in the two countries are not at all similar. That is not to say that Canada could not inherit some of the same problems in the future should government not approach immigrant policy in a rational and intelligent manner.

The roots of the Dutch situation can be traced back to the 1960’s when thousands of unskilled immigrants came to the country as part of a “guest worker” program for jobs in the textile, ship building and mining industries. Initially from Italy and Spain and later from Turkey and Morocco, they were expected to stay a few years and then return home. Many did indeed leave, but many more did not. Government policy at the time was essentially one of liberal multiculturalism and encouraged people to be educated in their own language and culture. Continuing to turn a blind eye to reality, it was assumed that these workers would assimilate and seek relationships among the existing Dutch population. They didn’t, and were then allowed to sponsor relatives and potential spouses from their own countries.

As the needs of industry evolved from unskilled labour to a high tech workforce Holland found itself divided into essentially two societies – a highly skilled affluent group and an unskilled, impoverished, mostly Muslim underclass with little motive to assimilate.

The 1990’s saw a further influx of immigrants as refugees from countries such as Somalia. Today, Muslims constitute 5.5% of the total population of the Netherlands.

Large, mainly Muslim ghettoes developed in major cities. Satellite television antennae sprouted from the rooftops of state housing projects tuned, not to programs supporting Western values, but to programs from their homeland often featuring inflammatory anti-Western rhetoric of extremist clerics.

In her autobiography “Infidel” Ayaan Hirsi Ali describes the existing situation. “As I went on doing research, it became painfully apparent that of all non-Western immigrants in Holland, the least integrated are Muslims. Among immigrants, unemployment is highest for Moroccans and Turks, the largest Muslim groups, although their average level of skills is roughly the same as all the other immigrant populations. Taken as a whole, Muslims in Holland make disproportionately heavy claims on social welfare and disability benefits and are disproportionately involved in crime.”

The murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh in 2004 by a young, alienated jihadist served to alarm the country to the danger inherent in many Muslim populations - the existence of an Islamic extremist element. Although some factions continue to call for a continuance of liberal policies, strong efforts are being made to curb immigration from Islamic countries as well as to reform internal educational and cultural policy. Unfortunately, these efforts may have come too late.

The life of Muslims in Canada bears little resemblance to that of Dutch Muslims, with the exception of their faith.

Citizenship and Immigration Canada accepts applications for potential immigrants in two basic categories – Skilled Workers and Professionals and Investors, Entrepreneurs, and Self-Employed Persons, both of which have very stringent standards based on education, skills, language ability and financial viability. Applicants can also be nominated by individual provinces again providing they qualify. All applicants must pass health, security and criminal record checks. There are additional requirements to sponsor family members by permanent residents. There is no “guest worker” program. As a result of these standards Canadian Muslims, having qualified for immigration to Canada, begin their new life with a substantial investment in achieving success.

On average, Canadian Muslims are younger and more educated, and are not ghettoized, as are their European counterparts. However, as the newest ethnic group they suffer a higher rate of unemployment compared to other groups while those with employment initially tend to be in jobs in which their skills are not fully utilized such as Sales and Services. Some see this as a result of discrimination and there is no doubt some truth in this. It must be added that better Canadian jobs often require a year or two of Canadian experience which can sometimes only be gained in these relatively low-skill areas.

As a rule, Canadian society is comparatively more tolerant and there have not been serious confrontations between the Muslims and the rest of the society and the government. Nonetheless, most Muslims in Canada have no doubt experienced at least some form of racism or “Islamophobia”. Historically, all new cultures have had initial negative reaction from a minority of biased “native” Canadians – the Italians after WWII, East Indians and currently, the Chinese, although racism against the latter is declining rapidly as they assimilate. In time Muslims will receive similar acceptance depending, of course, on their willingness to adapt to their new environment.

Officially designated as a “multicultural” society in 1971, over the years Canada has developed a singularly Canadian culture which is recognized and respected world wide. While remaining sympathetic as far as possible to the needs of its diverse population, Canada remains firmly entrenched in Western Enlightenment values – respect for the individual, freedom, democracy, rationalism and British Common Law. In the past, there have been challenges to these values by various ethnic groups usually based on religious grounds – the failed effort in 2004 to have Sharia law accepted by Ontario family courts and more recently, an equally unsuccessful attempt to initiate public funding for faith-based schools. Nonetheless, where it is in their interests, accommodation is being made voluntarily by a number of organizations, public and private, for Islamic religious practice during work hours.

Canada has the opportunity to avoid the social and political problems currently being experienced by the Dutch. However, to do so, we must remain vigilant lest our liberal policies be used against us by those who may neither understand nor accept the values from which these policies have emerged. To “over-accommodate” would be a serious mistake.