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Globe and Mail – October 24, 2007
Islam sparks fiery debate in Quebec
TU THANH HA
TROIS-RIVIÈRES, QUE. — There was the woman who feared that Quebec would be overrun by Muslims. There were anecdotes about Muslims unwilling to integrate. Mentions of massacres in Muslim countries.
For an area where Muslims make up less than 0.7 per cent of the local population, Islam repeatedly came up as a source of anxiety last night as the public commission looking at religious accommodations stopped in the Mauricie area, midway between Montreal and Quebec City.
It was in this region that the village of Hérouxville made headlines last year with its "code of conduct" warning prospective newcomers that practices such as wearing face veils or stoning women would not be tolerated.
While the code was decried by pundits as a mean-spirited caricature of Islam, its initiators say they have been flooded with supportive mail from across Quebec.
On the one hand last night, there were people like Jean-Pierre Trépanier, who made the first remarks at the open-mike forum attended by more than 180 people. "I am ashamed to be a Quebecker when I hear the stupidities and inanities such as those of Hérouxville," Mr. Trépanier said.
But most who followed him had gripes against minorities.
"When someone imposes something on you, it's up to them to stop imposing it if it bothers you," said André Drouin, a Hérouxville municipal councillor who was behind the code.
Mr. Drouin and Bernard Thompson, another originator of the Hérouxville code, are presenting a brief today where they will argue that no accommodations should be granted to religious minorities.
"If they're not happy and they're unsatisfied, let them go back to their country and make it better," Jacques Landry said to applause, as he thanked the people of Hérouxville.
Jacques Deschesnes complained about a relative treated at a Jewish hospital who couldn't mix milk and meat when she ate lunch.
Andréa Richard had fears for the future, warning of an Islamic onslaught.
"Would you like to see your grandchildren become Muslims? Would you like to see your granddaughters wear the veil?" she told the commission's co-chairs, academics Gérard Bouchard and Charles Taylor.
"I am not racist but ..." began Denise Béland as she explained her fears that the hard-earned equality of sexes here is foreign to newcomers.
"Only with the Muslims do we have problems," said Paul Garneau, talking about religious massacres in Algeria or Iraq. The co-chairs sometimes had to step in. One woman complained that Christian minorities are disappearing in Turkey. Mr. Taylor told her that non-Muslims were protected under the Ottomans and their persecution took place under secular governments.
Jacqueline Guillemette, a local woman who converted to Islam, concluded the evening with a call for mutual concessions and tolerance. "There's a lot of ignorance," Ms. Guillemette said afterward in an interview. "They should look at regular [Muslims], not the fundamentalists."
One woman stopped and told her it was sad that Ms. Guillemette had to wear a headscarf. "Lady, the Holy Virgin wore a veil too," Ms. Guillemette replied.
The commission, which has until now travelled mostly in outlying areas, has heard mostly from white francophones, with some calling for more tolerance for minorities. For example, Stéphane Gendron, an outspoken radio host, called the people behind Hérouxville's code "twits" and "a national shame."
He said Quebeckers have no business expecting immigrants to integrate quickly when it took three generations for French-Canadians who moved to New England to fit in….
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071024.whearing24/BNStory/National/?page=rss&id=RTGAM.20071024.whearing24
National Post - October 09, 2007
Ban teachers from religious dress, Quebec group says
Zosia Bielski
The group that 12 years ago fought vehemently for the rights of students who wore a hijab in Quebec's public schools is now trying to ban their teachers from wearing the Islamic headscarf and other "ostentatious" religious symbols while at work.
The Quebec Council on the Status of Women, a 20-member body that advises the government on issues relating to women, is urging the province to force public employees to remove visible religious signs when they are on the job. Aside from large Christian crosses, Sikh turbans and Jewish yarmulkes, these also include the hijab, a veil that generally covers the hair and neck, and the more controversial niqab, which covers the face, leaving only the eyes exposed.
The council argues that equality between men and women trumps religious freedoms, and that the symbols oppress.
"Freedom of religion must be limited, intrinsically, by the right to equality between women and men," a "hallmark of the Quebec identity," president Christiane Pelchat said in a statement, declining to comment last week.
"The niqab sends a message of the submission of a woman, which should not be conveyed to young children as part of a secular education, which is required to promote equality between men and women," the council said.
In the proposed ban, it also stressed the protection of Quebec culture and the religious neutrality of state institutions.
It is a quite a different stance from the one Ms. Pelchat's predecessor took in 1995, when Montreal high school students were being expelled for wearing a hijab and the council was defending them.
Then, council president Marie Lavigne advocated for the headscarf. She argued that a prohibition would infringe on freedom of choice and actually be sexist, as it would only affect female Muslims.
"Banning the veil is not the best way to fight fundamentalism or the best way to ensure equality between the sexes," Ms. Lavigne said at the time, as the council published a 54-page document on Islamic veils in the school, part of a report on women's rights that it prepared for the provincial government.
Then, Ms. Lavigne reasoned that girls who were allowed to wear hijab to school would better integrate in Quebec, a "pluralistic" society.
Today, Ms. Pelchat argues that when they are worn by such civil servants as teachers, symbols such as the yarmulke, the turban and the niqab run contrary to the "long march of Quebec towards secularity."
Many critics see the council's move as a shift toward laicite, which has long informed France's heritage and which played itself out most recently when the country banned religious apparel from public schools in 2004. In France's drive to disconnect government from religion, religion is given no special status, although it can be freely practised.
Asha Varadharajan, a professor who teaches women's studies and English at Queen's University, says the logic behind the ban is problematic.
"They're looking at it from the point of view of civil servants being members of public institutions who abide by federal law, which is a secular law by any stretch of the imagination. But the trouble is, the secular law is precisely what also allows for freedom of religious expression."
Prof. Varadharajan says religious artifacts such as the veil are hardly a national costume, but have everything to do with the "everydayness of the wearer's existence." She takes issue with how the council has framed the issue, between women's equality and religious freedom.
"Feminism tends to be conceived of in a kind of a monolithic way. It's usually a kind of ill-examined Western form of feminism that's upheld as the kind of equality all women need to strive for."
Alia Hogben, executive director of the Canadian Council of Muslim Women, which works to integrate Muslim women into Western society, says the proposed ban also fails to properly distinguish between the hijab and the niqab, and their context in Canada.
"If you go to the argument that a woman has the right to dress as she chooses, a state should not be telling people how to dress."
The most vocal opposition came from the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-CAN), which demanded an apology last week. "I don't know why they keep going after Muslim women. We do have brains under these scarves," she said…..
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=e34f88e3-8254-46ed-908c-a1339f350c22&k=26370
AKI – October 25, 2007
Eighth mosque attacked in Italy’s
northern region of Lombardy
Rome, 25 Oct. 2007- A mosque in a small town outside Milan has been the target of a violent attack - the eighth on mosques in the region of Lombardy surrounding the city.
Italian media reports said the Alif Baa Islamic Centre, in the northern Italian city of Abbiategrasso, 20 kilometres west of Milan, was subjected to fresh violence yesterday.
Witnesses said a masked man was seen throwing a Molotov cocktail inside the courtyard of the mosque from his motorcycle in the late afternoon. No major damage or injuries were reported in the attack.
This is the eighth assault against Islamic centres in the region of Lombardy in recent months.
The Alif Baa Islamic Centre reported other attacks on 25 July and 10 August this year.
Another mosque in the nearby city of Segrate was attacked on 5 August and the car of the Imam, Hamid Zariate, was destroyed.
The Islamic community of Abbiategrasso is considered to be one of the most integrated in northern Italy. It is also the hometown of the Italian missionary, Giancarlo Bossi, kidnapped by Philippino rebels in the south of the country in June and released after a month of captivity.
"There is a need for dialogue among religions," said Bossi.
"Whoever committed this act is a fanatic who does not respect a sacred place."
http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Religion/?id=1.0.1472225001
Guardian- October 11, 2007
The rise of mosques becomes catalyst
for conflict across Europe
Ian Traynor in Wangen, Switzerland
North of Berne in an idyllic Alpine valley cowbells tinkle, a church steeple rises, and windowboxes tumble with geraniums. It has always been like this.
But down by the railway station the 21st century is rudely intruding and the villagers of Wangen are upset.
"It's the noise, and all the cars. You should see it on a Friday night," complains Roland Kissling, a perfume buyer for a local cosmetics company. "I've got nothing against mosques, or even against minarets. But in the city. Not in this village. It's just not right. There's going to be trouble."
The target of Mr Kissling's ire is a nondescript house belonging to the region's Turkish immigrant community. The basement is a prayer room where hundreds of Muslims gather every week for Friday rites.
And in a case that has gone all the way to Switzerland's supreme court, setting a keenly watched precedent, the Turks of Wangen have just won the right to erect a six-metre-high minaret.
"We'll build it by next year. We're still deciding what colour and what material," says Mustafa Karahan, the sole person authorised to speak for Wangen's Turkish Cultural Association. "We don't have any problems. It's the other side that has the problems. We're not saying anything else until the minaret is built."
If Ulrich Schlüer has his way the Wangen minaret will be toppled. An MP from the rightwing Swiss People's party (SVP), the country's strongest, Mr Schlüer has launched a crusade to keep his country culturally Christian.
"Unlike other religions," he argues, "Islam is not only a religion. It's an ideology aiming to create a different legal system. That's sharia. That's a big problem and in a proper democracy it has to be tackled. If the politicians don't, the people will."
Switzerland's direct democracy rules require referendums if there is enough public support. Mr Schlüer has launched a petition demanding a new clause in the Swiss constitution stating: "The building of minarets in Switzerland is forbidden." He already has 40,000 signatures. If, as expected, he reaches 100,000 by this time next year a referendum is automatically triggered.
"We've got nothing against prayer rooms or mosques for the Muslims," he insists. "But a minaret is different. It's got nothing to do with religion. It's a symbol of political power."
In a country with more than 300,000 Muslims, mainly immigrants from the Balkans, there are only three minarets in Switzerland. Wangen would be the fourth and the first outside the cities…..
Backlash
The native backlash has begun. And not just in Switzerland. "It seems our experience here is resonating across Europe," says a Swiss official in Berne.
"Culture clashes" over Muslim religious buildings have erupted in Italy, Austria, Germany, and the Netherlands.
"Christian fundamentalists are behind this," says Reinhard Schulze, professor of Islamic studies at Berne University. "And there's also a lot of money coming in from the Gulf states."
From London's docklands to the rolling hills of Tuscany, from southern Austria to Amsterdam and Cologne, the issue of Islamic architecture and its impact on citadels of "western civilisation" is increasingly contentious.
The far right is making capital from Islamophobia by focusing on the visible symbols of Islam in Europe. In Switzerland it is the far-right SVP that is setting the terms of the debate.
"This is mainly about Swiss politics," says Prof Schulze, "a conflict between the right and the left to decide who runs the country ... Islam [is] a pretext."
Next door in Austria the far right leader Jörg Haider is also calling for a ban in his province of Carinthia, even though there are few Muslims and no known plans for mosques. "Carinthia," he said, "will be a pioneer in the battle against radical Islam for the protection of our dominant western culture."
In Italy the mayors of Bologna and Genoa last month cancelled or delayed planning permission for mosques after a vociferous campaign by the far-right Northern League, one of whose leaders, Roberto Calderoli, threatened to stage a "day of pork" to offend Muslims and to take pigs to "defile" the site of the proposed mosque in Bologna.
While the far right makes the running, their noisy campaign is being supported more quietly by mainstream politicians and some Christian leaders. And on the left pro-secularist and anti-clericalist sentiment is also frequently ambivalent about Islamic building projects.
Cardinal Joachim Meisner of Cologne has voiced his unease over a large new mosque being built for the city's 120,000 Muslims in the Rhineland Roman Catholic stronghold. A similar scheme in Munich has also faced local protests.
The Bishop of Graz in Austria has been more emphatic. "Muslims should not build mosques which dominate town's skylines in countries like ours," said Bishop Egon Kapellari.
This opposition is on a collision course with an Islam that is now the fastest-growing religion in Europe and which is clamouring for its places of worship to be given what it sees as a rightful and visible place in west European societies.
"Islam is coming out of the backyards. It's a trend you see everywhere in Europe," says Thomas Schmitt, a Bonn University geographer studying conflicts over mosques in Germany.
Estimated at about 18 million and growing, the Muslims of western Europe have long worshipped in prayer rooms located in homes, disused factories, warehouses or car parks, hidden away from public view. Their growing self-confidence, though, is reflected in plans for the Abbey Mills mosque, Britain's biggest, in east London, which is intended to have a capacity of 40,000.
Last month there were scuffles at the site of the Westermoskee in west Amsterdam. A Dutch government minister broke ground for building one of the Netherlands' biggest mosques last year. But the project is mired in controversy and may not be completed.
Confidence
"The whole idea of having these huge mosques is about being part of Europe while having your religion," says Thijl Sunier, a Dutch anthropologist. "You have young Muslims showing their confidence, stating we are part of this society and we want our share. And you have growing anxiety among many native Europeans."
In Berne, the Swiss capital, the city authorities have just denied building permission for turning a disused abattoir into Europe's biggest Islamic cultural centre, a £40m complex with a mosque, a museum on Islam, a hotel, offices and conference halls. Organisers are looking for an alternative site.
Dr Schmitt says that by hiring leading architects to build impressive mosques that alter the appearance of European cities Muslims are making a commitment to the societies in which they live. "They are no longer guests. They are established. This is a sign of normalisation, of integration," he says…………
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