Losers all around in French Muslim council election
Even the winner risks ending up among the losers in France’s Muslim council election on Sunday as the organisation meant to represent Islam here is torn apart by rivalries, boycotts and bitter attacks. Incumbent Mohammed Moussaoui will be returned as head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM), but a boycott by the two rival Muslim federations competing with his Rally of French Muslims (RMF) group makes the victory a hollow one.
The campaign has also fuelled the ethnic tensions crippling French Islam, which is split among factions backed by Algeria, Morocco and Turkey and others who oppose any meddling from the Muslim countries that they or their forefathers left behind.
“This CFCM will start off an empty shell and continue to run on empty,” Kamel Kabtane, rector of the Grand Mosque of Lyon, told Lyon Capitale magazine after announcing he was boycotting the election. “It risks dying a quiet death.”
The curious voting method used, which allocates electoral college delegates to each federation according to the total floor space of its mosques around the country, was the reason Moussaoui’s rivals gave for the boycott.
“Faith has never been measured by the square metre,” declared Dalil Boubakeur, leader of the Algerian-backed Grand Mosque of Paris (GMP) federation and head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM) from its start in 2003 until 2008. The third major federation, the Union of French Islamic Organisations (UOIF) which is close to the Muslim Brotherhood, urged a delay in the vote until the system could be reformed. But the government insisted it go ahead, so they also pulled out.
The broader reason for the boycott is that French Muslims of Moroccan origin, although fewer than those with an Algerian background, are generally more devout and — with encouragement from Rabat and Moussaoui’s RMF — are building more mosques.
Banned Islamists say time for change in Morocco
The banned Islamist group Justice and Charity, believed to be Morocco’s biggest opposition force, has said “autocracy” will be swept away unless the country pursues deep democratic reform.
The group of Sufi inspiration is believed to have 200,000 members, most of whom are university students, and is active mainly in the poor districts of some cities. Banned from politics, its avowed aim is to achieve a peaceful transition to a pluralist political system inspired by Islam.
In a statement posted on its website late on Sunday, Justice and Charity said the unrest in Egypt and Tunisia left “no place today for distortions … and empty, false promises… The gap between the ruler and the ruled has widened and confidence is lost … The solution is either a deep and urgent democratic reform that ends autocracy and responds to the needs and demands of the people, or the people take the initiative and (it) erupt peacefully … to sweep autocracy away.”
A group on social networking website Facebook has gathered hundreds of followers for a Feb. 20 protest meant to restore “the dignity of the Moroccan people and (press) for democratic and constitutional reform and the dissolution of parliament”.
Support for UN vote against defaming religion wanes
A U.N. General Assembly committee has once again voted to condemn the “vilification of religion” but support narrowed for a measure that Western powers say is a threat to freedom of expression. The non-binding resolution, championed by Islamic states and opposed by Western countries, passed by only 12 votes on Tuesday in the General Assembly’s Third Committee, which focuses on human rights, 76-64 with 42 abstentions.
Opponents noted that support had fallen and opposition increased since last year, when the Third Committee vote was 81-55 with 43 abstentions. The 192-nation General Assembly is expected to formally adopt the measure next month.
The resolution was amended from versions passed in previous years in an attempt to secure support from Western nations. Instead of defamation of religion, it speaks of “vilification.” It also condemned acts of violence and intimidation due to “Islamophobia, Judeophobia and Christianophobia.” Last year’s resolution, as in previous years, focused on Islam and did not mention Judaism and Christianity.
Despite the changes, however, the United States, European Union and their allies rejected the resolution’s calls for legislation banning the defamation of religion.
The text, submitted by Morocco on behalf of Muslim states, said the assembly “urges all States to provide … adequate protection against acts of hatred, discrimination, intimidation and coercion resulting from vilification of religions, and incitement to religious hatred in general.”
Algerian court clears Christians of charge of flouting Ramadan by eating during day
Two Christian men on trial in Algeria for eating during daylight in the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan were acquitted on Tuesday, a verdict their supporters said was a triumph for religious freedom.
The two men, members of Algeria’s small Protestant community, were charged with offending public morals for eating at the building site where they were working before the Ramadan fast had been broken for the day.
After the judge in the small town of Ain El-Hammam, about 150 km (93.21 miles) east of the Algerian capital, ruled they were innocent, a group of about seven Protestants standing on the steps of the courthouse shouted “Hallelujah!”
This article on Slate.fr says Algeria is clamping down on Muslims who do not fast during Ramadan. A local newspaper, Le Quotidien d’Oran, has an op-ed piece (from a writer in Paris) calling for the freedom to fast or not. A group called Mali in neighbouring Morocco has a Facebook page in French where it argues that human rights include the right to eat during Ramadan in a Muslim country.
In another Ramadan case, two women in Indonesia’s Aceh province were caned for selling food during daylight hours in the month.
Morocco expels proselytising Christians ‘to prevent conflict’
Morocco has expelled foreign Christians who tried to convert Muslims because, as a moderate Islamic state, it wants to foster “order and calm” and avoid a clash between faiths, its Islamic affairs minister has said.
The government has expelled around 100 foreign Christians since March, many of them aid workers, in what Western diplomats have called an unprecedented crackdown on undercover preaching.
“These incidents (expulsions) were prompted by the activism of some foreigners who undermined public order,” Religious Endowments and Islamic Affairs Minister Ahmed Toufiq told Reuters in an interview late on Thursday. “There are some who hide their proselytism and religious activism under the guise of other activities.”
The Islamist-leaning newspaper Attajdid reported on Thursday that the authorities had ordered 23 foreigners to leave last week and that this was part of a new wave of such expulsions.
Read the full story by Lamine Ghanmi here.
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Morocco resists Islamist calls to ban Elton John from music festival
Elton John will headline Morocco’s biggest music festival this week despite calls by religious conservatives for the gay singer to be turned away. Allowing the British singer and songwriter to perform at the Mawazine World Rhythms festival in the capital Rabat would tarnish the image of the north African kingdom, say powerful opposition Islamists.
“Elton John is one of the best artists in the world. He is great and extraordinary when he appears on stage. That’s why we invite him and welcome him to the Mawazine festival,” festival director Aziz Daki told Reuters. “The private life of a singer is not our business. We do not invite singers and artists after assessing their private lives.”
The festival, backed by Morocco’s King Mohammed, brings together musicians from 50 countries and has drawn criticism from Islamists who say such events encourage promiscuity and alcohol consumption, corrupting Islamic values.
France’s burqa debate stokes passions in North Africa
A French proposal to ban full face veils has stoked debate in Europe and also provoked strong reactions across the Mediterranean in North Africa, where many of France’s Muslims trace their origins.
Former French colonies Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia are still tied to France by history, language and migration, so their views on the “burqa” issue could have a direct influence on how Muslims inside France react to a ban.
People in North Africa are split between those who see the proposed ban — a version of which has already been approved by Belgium’s lower house of parliament — as an attack on Islam, and those who applaud Europe for defending secular values.
What is shared though by at least some people on each side of the argument is a concern that talk of a ban could be exploited by unscrupulous politicians and ratchet up tension between the authorities in Europe and Muslim communities.
“I am against this form of dress … but we should not enact laws against it,” Khadija Riyadi, president of Morocco’s leading independent human rights group, AMDH, told Reuters.
Read the full story by Lamine Chikhi and Zakia Abdennebi here.
Following are quotes from academics, clerics and ordinary people in North Africa interviewed for this feature by Tarek Amara in Tunis, Tom Pfeiffer and Zakia Abdennebi in Rabat and Hamid Ould Ahmed and Lamine Chikhi in Algiers.
Algeria also opts for “Sufi card” to fight Islamist extremism
FaithWorld recently ran a post about Pakistan considering playing the “Sufi card” in its campaign against Islamist militants. The idea is that promoting this mystical and tolerant school of Islam could counteract the influence of more radical readings of the faith. It looks like they’re not the only ones considering this:
After using police raids, arrests and gun battles in its fight against Islamist insurgents, Algeria is now deploying a new, more subtle weapon: a branch of Islam associated with contemplation, not combat.
The government of this North African oil and gas producer is promoting Sufism, an Islamic movement that it sees as a gentler alternative to the ultra-conservative Salafism espoused by many of the militants behind Algeria’s insurgency.
The authorities have created a television and radio station to promote Sufism and the “zaouias” or religious confraternities that preach and practise it, in addition to regular appearances by Sufi sheikhs on other stations. All are tightly controlled by the state.
Neighbouring Morocco is taking a different approach, opting to reinforce the authority of state-appointed imams in the hope this will cut off support for jihadism.
What do you think? Do state-supported campaigns to promote certain types of Islam are an effective way to counter militancy?
The idea of supporting Sufism to combat “jihadism”, which is usually anti-western and pro-Qutbist in nature, is one of the more intelligent ideas which Islamic regimes are now advocating after Saudia Arabia’s efforts to return to the Salafism and Wahabist currents which have destroyed the Ummah and broken it into 72 warring sects opposed to each other: whereas Sufism seeks the Unity which the Elect know is the “essence” or “Fruit” of the Tree of Life.
To overcome the demons of ignorance it is far more perplexing to the supporters of hatred and violence to deal with the reality of the Sufis than conventional tools of repression and civil authority and the police; thus we are now seeing the manifestation of the true jihad that the Apostle Muhammed advocated: the one within.
It is for this reason that he said; to wit;
“The ink of the Learned is holier than the
blood of the Martyr”.
The advent of Misih ad-Dajjal Osama bin Laden has not been recognized in Islam due to the destruction of the schools of Sufism and their adherents: now Islam sees that to survive it is indded the Sufus and the 4 Major Orders who are that of the People of Salvation for the Ummah.
Could the Voice of Reason by those like Sayed Hisham Kabbani and others be making itself heard?
Perhaps the real jihad against the ego and it’s attendent blindness and greed can now begin; as we are at the Last Day of which Muhammed and Jesus both spoke; the 2 Brothers of the Truth of Allah that restored the relationship Ishmael and Issac were to have enjoyed and thus healed the heart of Abraham; and it is this which will unite the Believers at the End.
Rabat bets on better imams to counter extremist Islam
Morocco has shifted from mass arrests to tight surveillance in its fight against Islamic militants and hopes a new campaign to reinforce the authority of state-appointed imams will cut off support for jihadism.
As militants reach a growing audience through DVDs and the Internet, the government has tried to seize back the initiative, revising laws governing mosques and adding new theological councils to tighten control of religious life in the regions.
Now it is preparing to send 1,500 supervisors into the north African country’s towns and villages to make sure that imams are preaching the moderate local version of Islam and respect for King Mohammed in his role as leader of Morocco’s Muslims.
“In this era of satellite TV, people no longer accept to see religious officials who are not trained,” said Hakim el Ghissassi, a cabinet member at Morocco’s Ministry for Religious Endowments and Islamic Affairs. “If today we deny religious instruction to the young, where will they look for it? On extremist Internet sites with self-proclaimed radical Imams.”
Imams should be entitled to freedom of speech like everyone else. Everyone should be allowed to say anything they want. However, people should be held accountable for their actions.
For example, if you incite people to violence, that is a crime. If you participate in slander or defamation, these carry potential civil and criminal reprecussions. Everyone is responsible for what they say.
When you train Imams in a certain nation to tell the population things which they know are not true, you almost defeat the entire purpose of Friday prayers.
If Hillary goes to Jakarta, can Barack be far behind?
Is U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit to Jakarta a hint that President Barack Obama will pick Indonesia as the first Muslim country he visits in his drive to improve U.S. relations with the Islamic world? There were lots of other suggestions when he first mentioned this back in December, including Egypt (the New York Times pick) and Morocco (judging by what might have been a write-in campaign on our comments page).
My tip at the time was either Indonesia or Turkey. In recent weeks, Turkey’s star has probably faded as its relations with Israel soured recently. Those strains came after Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan angrily accused Israeli President Shimon Peres of “knowing very well how to kill” in Gaza during a debate at the World Economic Forum in Davos and then stormed off the stage.
Clinton said all the right things today, like telling the country where Obama spent four years as a boy that it was proof that modernity and Islam can coexist. “As I travel around the world over the next years, I will be saying to people: if you want to know whether Islam, democracy, modernity and women’s rights can co-exist, go to Indonesia,” she said at a dinner with civil society activists. Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda reciprocated by telling her Indonesia shared the United States’ joy at Obama’s election and she should tell the U.S. president “we cannot wait too long” for a visit.
Obama spent four years in Indonesia after his American mother, Ann Dunham, married Indonesian Lolo Soetoro following the end of her marriage to Obama’s Kenyan father. He told President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono during a phone call after his election that he’d like to visit Indonesia again. It would help forge greater cooperation between the two nations and give him a chance to try local food again including meatball soup, nasi goreng and rambutan, a local newspaper reported him as saying.
The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum (APEC) will meet in Singapore in November. It’s just a short flight from there to Jakarta.
If, as this article suggests, Turkey’s star has faded because it democratically elected Prime Minister had the audacity to tell it like it is to Shimon Peres, then I hope Turkey’s crescent fades alongside the star. The Turkish Prime Minister was rightly commended for saying what needs to be said.
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Resident FaithWorld Expert
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