The Dar Al-Victimhood

The Dar Al-Victimhood

Judeopundit

Irshad Manji, writing in The Austrailian, makes an interesting distinction between “Moderate Muslims” and “Reform-minded Muslims”:

Moderate Muslims denounce violence in the name of Islam but deny that Islam has anything to do with it. By their denial, moderates abandon the ground of theological interpretation to those with malignant intentions, effectively telling would-be terrorists that they can get away with abuses of power because mainstream Muslims won’t challenge the fanatics with bold, competing interpretations. To do so would be admit that religion is a factor. Moderate Muslims can’t go there.
Reform-minded Muslims say it’s time to admit that Islam’s scripture and history are being exploited. They argue for reinterpretation precisely to put the would-be terrorists on notice that their monopoly is over.

Denial that religion has anything to do with terror is one side of the coin. The other side is that many Moderate Muslims, using a vocabulary of concepts supplied by the Western Left, have embraced the politics of victimhood. And it is not just that Muslims thereby let religious extremism off the hook–political extremism also involves hatred of the West, and religious extremists can recruit among an already enraged population. A recent Al-Ahram editorial (entitled, of all things, “In a state of denial”) presents a wide-spread view of the world divided into the Dar Al-Colonialism and the Dar Al-Victimhood:CONTINUE READING THIS GREAT POST.

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Gateway Pundit Reports from Secular Islam Summit (UPDATE)

UPDATE1:** No surprise really- Sharp attacks against this Secular Islam Summit are now hitting the internet.** I just heard that there was another Muslim organization that is holding their own summit across town after hearing about this secular Islam Summit.
CAIR may be the organizers for this "opposition" summit.
There were also rumors that CAIR may be protesteing this secular Islam conference. (why am I not surprised!!!)

Jim from Gateway Pundit:

Day 1: Sunday March 4, 2007
Author Ibn Warraq led off the summit today.
Senior Research Fellow

His prepared speech is titled:Enlightenment Rather than Reformation
The root cause fallacy:Islamic Terrorism is not caused by:
- Povery
- The War in Iraq
- Colonialism
- Slavery

Ibn Warraq - a senior research fellow at the Center for Inquiry specializing in Koranic criticism.How to bring about enlightenment:
-Defend universal human rights
-Defend out values, Western values: maintain seperation of church and state

What Western Nations can do:
-Iran's influence has been enormous
- the present regime must be toppled
- help students, trade unionists, and dissidents

Universal Human RightsCreation of Human Rights Centers
-Push for the resturcturing of the UN Human Rights Commission:* it is far too political* unable to criticise Sudan in the south* Commerorate genocide of Christians in Turkey
Defend the rights of non-Muslims, Apostates, and Atheists
Defend the rights of Women

Criticism of Islamic States, Statesmen and mullahs:
-Fatwas: In the west we must be able to take mullahs to court
-More assertiveness in taking Muslim leaders to task
-Demand the rewriting of Saudi testbooks preaching hatred of the West
-Fund exhibitions in Museums of Pre-Islamic Civilizations of Iran, Iraq, and North Africa

Why do they hate us? ...Because they are taught to hate us!
We Must Defend our Values
Defend Western Civilizationa

What we can do:
Trade union must suppory their counterparts in Islamic countries, as well as:
- Womens groups- Homosexuals- Humanists must support Human Rights workers in jail in Islamic countries

What the State can do:
-Fund Ex-Pat Secular groups (eg: Iranian groups such as not to political Islam)
- Defend rights of women
- No to female genital mutilation
- No to segregation of Muslim girls from school activities
- No to segregation of Muslim girls in public swimming pools
- No to forced marriages against girl's wishes
- All women must be protected of the state

More on "Faith Without Fear" from Irshad's website- Muslim Refusnik:

Irshad Manji is the internationally best-selling author of The Trouble with Islam Today: A Muslim’s Call for Reform in her Faith.

Through a new lens, this questioning Muslim takes a journey to reconcile her faith in Allah with her love of freedom. Along the way, she reveals the personal risks — emotional and physical — that come with such an urgent mission. The result is FAITH WITHOUT FEAR.

Trekking through the Arabian peninsula, Manji speaks with Osama bin Laden’s former bodyguard, who explains why he’s willing to turn his young son into a martyr. She also engages a California convert to Islam who now lives in Yemen and says that by covering her body and face, she’s exercising American-style freedom of religion. But is it really freedom if you’ll be punished for not covering? Manji meets one Yemeni woman who faces a steep price for rejecting the rules. Through them, Manji discovers what she thinks has corrupted a religion of justice to become an ideology of fear. She can relate: Her own home has bullet-proof windows.

Why Irshad does what she does?Because...Courage is not the absence of fear...Courage is the recognition that some things are more important than fear."I have a call to head my conscience no matter who is affected."

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Secularists of Islamic Societies Gather for Summit

Leading Dissidents to Launch Movement for Reason, Pluralism, and Freedom of Conscience

Telos: New York, N.Y.(January 26, 2007)— From Pope Benedict XVI to the Princeton historian Bernard Lewis, people are asking, What went wrong? How did Middle Eastern cultures transform from the openness and intellectual ferment of the medieval period to the closed theocrat societies of today? Where are the secular voices of the Muslim world? Until now, they have been largely stifled and silenced. Now, bold critics of orthodoxy are calling for sweeping reforms from inside Muslim societies. With the intent of catalyzing a global movement for reason, humanist values, and freedom of conscience, delegates from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan and Bangladesh will assemble March 4-5 in St. Petersburg, Florida for an unprecedented Secular Islam Summit (see www.secularislam.org).

According the chair of the meeting, the rationalist critic of Islam and acclaimed author Ibn Warraq, "What we need now is an Age of Enlightenment in the Islamic world, of the Islamic mind-set or worldview. Without critical examination of Islam, it will remain unassailed in its dogmatic, fanatical, medieval fortress; ossified, totalitarian and intolerant. It will continue to stifle thought, human rights, individuality; originality and truth."

Said one summit delegate, Irshad Manji, author of The Trouble with Islam Today, "This summit is proof positive that reform-minded Muslims are creating a movement. We no longer exist in isolation. Those who hate our message of free thought in Islam will keep trying to pick us off individually, but collectively we're not going anywhere except forward."

The historic Summit, to be held at the Hilton St. Petersburg, will set in motion the generation of new practical strategies from the world's leading thinkers and activists in an ongoing cross-cultural forum. At issue will be secularist interpretations of Islam, the importance of expanding Koranic criticism, the state of freedom of expression in Muslim societies, educational reform and the urgent need for a paradigm shift in Islamic philosophy. Speakers include Mona Abousenna, Magdi Allam, Shaker al-Nabulsi, Nonie Darwish, Afshin Ellian, Fatemolla, Tawfik Hamid, Shahriar Kabir, Nibras Kazimi, Irshad Manji, Walid Phares, Amir Taheri, Mourad Wahba, Ibn Warraq, and others.
To promote emerging solutions, the delegates will craft a statement of values and principles expressing the call for a new Enlightenment in Islamic culture. The statement will be released in English, Arabic, Farsi and Bengali to the world media at a press conference at 2 p.m. Monday, March 5, 2007 at the Summit, after which participants will take questions.

"The Secular Islam Summit hopes to encourage a new global movement for reason, science, and secular values within Islamic societies," said Summit organizer Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi, an Iranian-American activist.

The Summit is sponsored by the Center for Inquiry-Transnational, a secularist think tank, and held in cooperation with The Intelligence Summit (www.intelligencesummit.org).

For more information, call Austin Dacey at (212) 265-2877, ext. 11; (917) 664-3855; or e-mail info@secularism.org.
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