In the past weeks Muslims around the world have been offended, hurt and upset as a consequence of Westerners feeling the need to stress their freedom of expression — but for what reason?

Except for a few details, the recent incidences have had remarkable similarities with something we have seen before: the short film ‘Submission‘, made in 2004 by Theo van Goghon, a Dutch film director, and Somalia-born Ayaan Hirsi and the Mohammed Cartoons incident by a Danish newspaper in 2005, which caused the Arab world to boycott Danish-produced goods like dairy products. These are just a few of the examples to be mentioned.

Most Muslims in Egypt and elsewhere in the Arab world keep their feelings to themselves and their family and friends, or express them in a peaceful way – just like many Westerners fail to comprehend the purpose of publishing that type of material, time and again. However, it seems like a controversy that we, on both sides, are forced to witness again and again which makes it valuable to investigate some potential underlying dynamics for the recent incidents.

According to Politiken.dk, a feeling exists in the Arab world of differential treatment practiced by Western Governments; examples include that Western Governments support free will except in cases where Islamic parties win elections. They fight for human rights except in countries where the oppressor is a dictator who cooperates with the Western world; Western Governments support freedom of religion, except when it concerns Islam.

Additionally, Western politicians continuously make hostile comments about Muslims and Islam. This is reinforced by my research (to be published in Arab-West Report in April 2013) on the migration of Egyptians where Muslims indicate that they feel as second class citizens in their own country next to expats living there. At the same time they feel unwelcome in Western countries such as the U.S.A. and several European countries.

So while Western countries claim they are fighting for equal rights, freedom to be whoever you are, as well as the right to control your own life, it easily comes across as the exact opposite in the countries that are the target for that fight.

Politiken.dk continues that while the mentioned examples by people in the Arab World are perceived as differential treatment and interference, Western Governments understand it as isolated reactions to specific incidents. This could be related to what Charles Clay Lemert, Professor in Sociology, characterizes as ‘colonization’ in his book Sociale Forhold -En indføring i det sociologiske liv (2004), which he defines as the process where people with power and money get the idea that their theories and perspectives of the world gives them the right to take over other countries, their assets and sometimes even the soul of the native people, who rarely are in a position to defend themselves.

And it is all justified by the perception that the invasion will result in a better moral, a better political system, and in general a better way of living. But according to whom?

If the world is believed to be a social construction that only makes sense in relation to the society in which it exists, it makes sense that people around the world have not only different ways of living, but more importantly different perceptions of what ‘the better way of living’ is. No doubts that people in the Arab world are dreaming about a better world, as witnessed during the Arab Spring that last year permeated in several Arab countries. We are still, at the time of writing, witnessing how Syrians fight against the local regime, or how Palestinians continuously experience their rights to land reduced — but is this battle a cry for the Western world to free them from Islam, Islamist or Islamic values?

Without a doubt there is a perception in the Western world that politics and religion should be two separate entities in a modern society, anno 2012 — or is there? Maybe it is more the perception that politics and Islam should be separated? This leads back to the imagination of the world as a social construction: if we acknowledge that different people have different perceptions of ‘the better way of living’, it might again be reasonable to assume that different societies have different ways of structuring a democracy.

Can democratic values not be implemented in a religious society? It is true that according to the construction of democracy that exists in the Western world, it is difficult entities to unite, but Egypt and the rest of the Arab world have a different way of constructing their societies. In this light it might be fair to assume that the construction of a democracy, in these countries, would contain different elements than what we see in Western countries’ understanding of democracy -elements that focus less on freedom of expression and more on mutual respect and the right to practice your religion.

However, as Ahram Online writes in an article on their English website, the challenges may lay in the rapid development of technological tools that connect the world, crossing societies of different social constructions. This means that a film like that of the recent controversy can be made and distributed online in Western countries where legislation is developed in the context of Western social constructions, without repercussions. One such filmmaker, or a cartoonist for that matter, may be perceived as offensive to a group of people but cannot be indicted for a criminal act, because one segment of the world does not perceive it as such.

However, in the same breath it must be stressed that individual action, like the ones discussed here, does not represent perceptions, opinions or acts of neither entire populations nor every politicians. But because of societies based on different social constructions of what is legal and what is not, a Western politician cannot demand the person behind such material brought to trial. But does this mean that Western countries should consider reversing their understanding of democracy and put restrictions on what can be expressed and what cannot?

As one of the focal points for democracies in Western countries it is hard to see that happen. Being a Westerner, brought up in the social constructions of a Scandinavian country, it is believed that having the freedom to speak up against the current government, the practices of the church, or other societal institutions that are disagreed with, is a crucial fundamental right, which should neither be restricted nor jeopardized.

But does this give the people in Western countries the right to offend the values of people in countries where social constructions of societies are different?

With an economic crisis dominating most of the Western world, it might be time to start rethinking what used to be ‘the center of the world’ – to a growing extent, the Western world depends on countries and people around it. It may be worth considering if respecting other cultures’ way of life wouldn’t be more productive than upsetting them purposefully.

Image Courtesy of  arindambanerjee / Shutterstock.com

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On August 16, a fourteen-year-old Christian girl, Rimsha Masih, was arrested in Islamabad for having allegedly burned pages from the Quran. She was found carrying a plastic bag containing several singed papers inscribed in Arabic. It was then unclear whether the leaves had come from the Quran; but an incensed mob, tipped off by the local imam, had converged at her door, threatening to torch the house.

300 Christian families fled in the incident’s wake for fear that they, as minorities, would be made scapegoats – as has happened in previous infringements of Pakistan’s unforgiving blasphemy laws. As investigations ensued, however, authorities’ perusal of Rimsha’s medical reports revealed she had been born with Down’s Syndrome and that her mental age was several years shy of her real age. A game-changing revelation rocked the case when a month later, Khalid Jadoon, the religious leader who had initially called the police, was arrested on suspicion of having planted the burned papers.

In an interview with ABC News the day before his arrest, Jadoon stoically declared that Rimsha had confessed to the burning of the pages. “It’s a matter of my religion. If there’s a threat to Islam, if our government doesn’t stand up to that person, then the people will. I’ll be the first of them.”

What Jadoon had really meant by “threat” became clear when two witnesses and Jadoon’s deputy, Hafiz Muhammad Zubair, brought evidence against him. Zubair had seen several people handing Jadoon some burnt papers. To this pile Jadoon had added additional pages of the Quran. “I asked him what he was doing,” Zubair told a television station, “and he said, ‘This is the evidence against them (the local Christians) and this how we can get them out from this area.’”

Religious tension as just one factor

Rimsha’s arrest had been at the nucleus of a larger scheme to evict Christian families from the neighborhood. “I have known for the last three months that some people in this area wanted the Christian community to leave so they could build a madrasa (on their land),” Hafiz Mohammad Ashrafi, Chairman of the All Pakistan Ulema Council, a body of senior muslim clerics, reportedly said. “Our heads are bowed with shame for what [Jadoon] did.”

Breaking the political code of simply glossing over religious tensions, Paul Bhatti, the minister for national harmony, conceded, “It is not just a religious problem. It’s a caste factor, because (the victims) belong to the poorest and most marginalized people. Unfortunately, they are Christians, and this caste system creates lots of problems.” The Muslim-Christian animosity predates the British occupation of Pakistan, stemming from a Hinduism-instilled social hierarchy that demoted the Christians to the most menial and despised rank.

Rimsha was acquitted and released from a prison in Rawalpindi on September 8, from where she was flown in a military helicopter to meet her family in an undisclosed location. Rimsha’s neighbors told ABC News reporters they do not believe she and her family will ever return to her village.

Implications for the future

Despite the exonerating evidence, Rimsha’s acquittal is a miracle in a country where those convicted of defiling the Quran face life in prison. The family is living in protective custody, in constant fear of assassination by vigilantes and Islamic hardliners who side with the tunnel-vision judiciary.

Critics of the blasphemy law, however, nurture a cautious hope that the court’s decision bodes a revision of the laws, as the case has highlighted how the stringency of the laws can invite people to misuse them for their own advantage. “The decision by a Pakistan court to grant bail to Rimsha Masih is an encouraging step, but the Pakistan government must urgently reform its blasphemy laws to prevent similar cases in future,” said a spokesman from Amnesty International. “In the recent past individuals accused of blasphemy have been killed by members of the public, often in incidents where the victim has not been formally charged by the authorities,” he continued. He then went on to stress the importance of “legal, policy and social reforms” to address “vilification on the basis of religion that has lead to almost daily intimidation and deadly attacks.”

Dr. Nazir S. Bhatti, President of Pakistan Christian Congress (PCC) has demanded reinvestigation in all cases lodged against Christians, Ahmaddiya and Muslims under charges of blasphemy.

Image Courtesy of   Mikhail Levit / Shutterstock.com

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Washington, U.S.A. — A new Christian Solidarity International (CSI) report released recently calls on Egypt’s Islamist government and the international community – especially the U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – to investigate and take strong measures to prevent the disappearance, forced marriage and forced conversion to Islam of Coptic Christian women and girls.

The report, entitled “Tell My Mother I Miss Her,” confirms that Coptic women and girls are deceptively lured or abducted into forced marriages with Muslim men and then to conversions to Islam, which frequently take place under duress and physical abuse.

The report’s co-authors, Michele Clark, adjunct professor at George Washington University, and Coptic human rights activist Nadia Ghaly, undertook research in Egypt in November 2011 in the midst of the uprising that resulted in the political ascent of the Muslim Brotherhood and other radical Islamist forces. According to Clark and Ghaly, the disappearance of Coptic women and girls has “escalated” since the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak in February 2011.

“Tell My Mother I Miss Her” was released in connection with the Congressional Helsinki Commission hearing on violence against Coptic women in Egypt, chaired by Congressman Chris Smith. Speaking as a witness before the hearing, Professor Clark stated, “Coptic women in Egypt are disappearing from their homes, their schools and their jobs.  These cases are not allegations.”

The hearing also featured testimony from an Egyptian Christian woman who received asylum in the United States after narrowly escaping abduction in Alexandria in January 2011. She was rescued by a doorman who saw her and her infant daughter being dragged into a taxi by a man shouting that she was “an enemy of Islam.”

“I’m here today, so I can tell you what happened to me,” she said. “I wonder about the others that weren’t saved. What happened to them?”

Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), who chaired the hearing, called the forced disappearances “an outrageous crime,” and called the U.S. State Department’s failure to respond to repeated requests from the Commission to investigate the disappearances “appalling.”

“Unless the Copts and Coptic women and girls are protected,” he said, “Egypt will not be strong, Egyptwill not be stable, and Egypt will not be a successful democracy.”

Dr. John Eibner, the CEO of CSI-USA, called on the U.S. State Department and non-governmental organizations that specialize in women’s rights, human trafficking and religious liberty to conduct further research into this crime, commenting that, “Denial and obfuscation will neither help victimized Christian women, nor challenge the religious bigotry and sexism that impedes the development of democracy inEgypt.”

The new report can be accessed online at: http://csi-usa.org/TellMyMotherIMissHer.pdf. It should be read in conjunction with the 2009 report, which is available at http://www.csi-int.org/pdfs/csi_coptic_report.pdf.

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With rising instability in the Middle East and experts predicting a major earthquake, Heart to Heart is launching a virtual blood donation campaign to maintain a plentiful blood supply for the State of Israel.

Heart to Heart exclusively supports Israel’s national blood bank which always needs to increase its capacity and supply to be prepared for every emergency. As Israel’s population nears 8 million, and with the need for Israel to maximize and protect its blood supply, Heart to Heart is the right answer at the right time.

“Since all blood in Israel is donated voluntarily, and the expenses to sustain a steady supply of blood are ever increasing as the population and needs increase, Heart to Heart campaign will underwrite these costs and provide extra funds for the future,” Heart to Heart Director Jonathan Feldstein said.

For a $100, a person can save three lives in Israel. “For people looking for a meaningful way to bless Israel, save lives, and fulfill the biblical mandate of Genesis 12:3, a virtual blood donation is a way to accomplish three goals,” Feldstein added.

Heart to Heart partner Pastor Brian Jacobs noted, “When a member of my church introduced me to Heart to Heart, I jumped at the chance to participate, personally and for my whole church. Since I have spoken often about our obligation to bless Israel, Heart to Heart gives a direct action that we can undertake in addition to our prayers. As a Christian, Heart to Heart gives us the opportunity to express our solidarity with Israel and a vehicle to honor Israel.”

Heart to Heart will be featured at the National Religious Broadcasters convention in Nashville, February 19-21 and representatives available to be interviewed and explore partnerships to carry out its mission.

Heart to Heart is a project of American Friends of Magen David Adom, a non-profit organization devoted exclusively to saving lives in Israel for more than seven decades.

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The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has called on Mayor Richard Meehan of Ocean City, Md., to reconsider his speaking invitation to retired Lieutenant General William G. “Jerry” Boykin, who believes that “[Islam] should not be protected under the First Amendment” and that there should be “no mosques in America.” Boykin is scheduled to speak at the Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast on January 26.

In a letter he emailed to Mayor Meehan, CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper wrote in part:

“We question the appropriateness of this choice for an official event, given Boykin’s long, shameful history of extreme and bigoted views. . . It will be a discredit to your office and a disservice to the citizens of Ocean City if such a man is allowed to spread his divisive falsehoods and prejudiced ideas at a government-sponsored function.

“We respectfully ask whether any taxpayer funds are being spent on this year’s Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast, and how your office plans to address the appearance of an official endorsement of Boykin’s extremist views. We ask that you reconsider inviting him, given that the biased ideas he espouses — though protected by the First Amendment — should be repudiated, not given a legitimizing platform.”

Boykin’s views came under scrutiny in 2003 when media reports revealed that in a public discussion of his efforts to capture a Muslim Somali warlord, Boykin said: “I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol.” Speaking in uniform, the general said America’s “spiritual enemy. . .will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus.”

Since then, Boykin has continued to openly attack Islam and portray Muslims as a “threat,” even stating that there can be no interfaith dialogue or cooperation between Muslims and Christians. In September 2011, Boykin declared on the radio show Focal Point that there should be “no mosques in America.”

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The dedication of a new Catholic cathedral in the city of Mongomo, Equatorial Guinea, on December 7, served as a symbol of the nation’s economic development and the vigorous religious life of a country where the church was once violently suppressed.

President Obiang Nguema Mbasogo dedicated the new Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Equatorial Guinea’s easternmost city.  In his remarks, he reminded his countrymen of his government’s efforts to restore religious freedom as one of its first acts upon assuming power.

The previous regime had forced the “closure of churches and persecution of Christians, many of whom were forced into exile,” President Obiang said. “With our arrival, we proceeded to reopen all the churches closed by the former regime. We proceeded to release [political] prisoners, and ecclesiastical activity regained its vigor and normality.”

The event was held on the eve of the feast of the Immaculate Conception in the capital of Wele Nsas province, President Obiang’s birthplace. More than 1,000 guests attended the religious ceremony, including President Francois Bozize of the Central African Republic, papal envoy Francis Cardinal Arinze, and Antoinette Nguesso, wife of the President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The attractive new basilica, done in a variation of neoclassical style, is named for the Blessed Virgin Mary, the patron saint of Equatorial Guinea. It can hold up to 8,000 people and took nearly six years to construct. President Obiang presented the plan for the basilica to Pope Benedict XVI during a state visit to the Holy See in 2005 and laid the cornerstone on December 9, 2006.

President Obiang expressed the hope that Pope Benedict would visit the country and recalled the critical role Pope John Paul II played in promoting national healing and renewal during his eight-hour visit to Equatorial Guinea in 1982.

“The Pope arrived at the airport in Malabo, kissed the earth, and blessed our country with his hands raised,” President Obiang said. “The people turned out in such a way that he left with the idea that our country was where he was received with the greatest fervor.” The population of Equatorial Guinea is overwhelmingly Roman Catholic.

After the inaugural Mass, which was attended by five cardinals, 45 bishops, and some 300 priests from the central African sub-region, President Obiang and the Cardinal Arinze cut the ribbon, signifying the official opening of the basilica.

Gasper Furman / Shutterstock.com

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