POLITICS: Halal: much ado about nothing in particular

Mackay is a central Queensland city of mixed fortunes. Blessed with riches thanks to its proximity to the Bowen Basin, a region that produces 80 per cent of Queensland's saleable coal, not to mention gold, silver, limestone, gemstones and magnesite. Tradespeople and even truck drivers could easily earn a six-figure salary, buy a hotted-up ute or two (or three or four) and a swag of investment properties.

But times started getting tougher as coal prices started going down and the BHP-Mitsubishi Alliance began trimming its workforce. Queensland Resource Council chief executive Michael Roche was quoted by ABC on October 4, 2014, as saying: 

"This has been some of the toughest times for the coal industry in about 20 years."

With such a potentially large economic blow to the city and its surrounds, you'd think the Federal LNP member would be run off his feet consulting with mining companies, unions, smaller contracting businesses and other stakeholders. You'd think the recent G20 Summit in Brisbane and talk of free trade agreements with China and India that would see key tariffs scrapped on resources would have the local MP talking up his region to visiting dignitaries instead of just a short chat (through interpreters) with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Canberra.

Instead, the federal member for Dawson, George Christensen, is too busy harming another major export industry simply because it may have some connection to a religious culture he doesn't like very much.

Lots of people in this country object to aspects of Islam. Lots of Muslims choose not to practise aspects of their own faith. There are plenty of different sects and denominations and rulings and interpretations of various Islamic teachings on everything from how to place your hands when standing in prayer to how long a bloke's beard should be.

Of course, where there is religion, you'll always find money. The Vatican wasn't built in a day, and nor was that massive clock tower overlooking Mecca. In Australia, some Muslim individuals, religious institutions and private companies make money out of certifying certain foods to be halal.

And what does it mean if you eat something halal? Basically it means you transform into a jihadi monster with a massive beard covered with a black burqa. Your love of beer disappears and you develop an urge to vote for the Greens if IS or Hamas is not on the ballot paper.

Relax! I was just kidding. Basically the word "halal" means religiously permissible to consume or do. Having sexual intercourse with your spouse is halal. Drinking water is halal. Going fishing is halal. Driving to work is halal. Learning how to say "thank you" in Mandarin is halal. Xi Xi.

When it comes to food, strictly speaking only certain foods require certification. I've never heard of fish in Australia being certified. Why? Because religious regulations state that what comes out of the sea is always permissible.

Many Muslims cannot see the point in certification. As far as they're concerned, if it doesn't contain alcohol or pig meat, just eat it. I tend to belong to this school of thought except when on Sydney Road, Brunswick, or Auburn Road, Auburn. Other Muslims go to the extent of publishing a list of ingredients, emulsifiers and colourings that are not halal. Apparently Emulsifier 007 is not halal as it makes you attractive to lewd women.

In areas with plenty of Muslims who like plenty of saturated fats, fast food outlets take advantage of the forces of supply and demand. If you look closely, you'll notice halal certificates taped to the wall at your McDonald's outlet. If you object, chances are there are 10 others nearby without the certificate.

Some readers may be wondering what all the fuss is about. They might wonder how Christensen came up with the idea that halal is used to fund extremist groups and sharia ("robbing women of all of their marital property rights") and burqas and all that other nasty stuff. And that food companies are being as deceptive about halal as they are about how obese their ingredients are making many of us.

It all sounds rather kosher, and that's because it virtually is. Halal certification operates in a similar way and on similar principles to kosher certification. Animal slaughter processes are almost identical. Companies in the United States, Israel and South Africa are making a huge profit exporting their stuff to kosher supermarkets. I doubt the money goes to some wacko settlement in the West Bank or a Beth Din court in Israel that deprives women of their marital property rights. Of course, the availability of this stuff doesn't stop many Jews from eating a Big Mac, halal or otherwise.

Many Dawson voters would have hoped their federal MP would have moved beyond his university days when he wrote material blaming Jews for the crucifixion of Jesus and labelling women as "stupid". They must have cringed when they heard him blame live cattle export to Indonesia on "the religion that actually inspires the torture of cattle there". Sadly, if halal-certified Australian food manufacturers lose export markets, it will be Australian workers (including many in Christensen's own electorate) who will lose the most. Nothing halal about that.

(Irfan Yusuf is a lawyer and award-winning author. First published in the Canberra Times on 22 November 2014)

TRIBUTE: Peter Andren we need you more than ever to keep our MPs honest

It's often said that the major problem with our Parliaments is they are inundated with lawyers. As a lawyer myself, I admit that we are excellent at splitting hairs. Our plain English skills also leave a lot to be desired. Little wonder one of our most complex pieces of legislation – the Social Security Act – is barely understood by most lawyers let alone Centrelink clients. Yet anyone falling foul of Centrelink rules, even accidentally, can expect all the resources of the Department of Human Services to come down on them hard.

One advantage of having so many lawyers in Parliament is that they all understand financial trust. They are trained in how to honestly handle other people's money through trust accounts. Law graduates can only become lawyers if they pass an exam on trust accounting. Once they start practising on their own account, solicitors can expect regular visits from the trust account inspector.

Which explains why our MPs are so scrupulously honest about their parliamentary entitlements. They know they are handling money provided on trust by taxpayers. They know that if they do the wrong thing, all hell could break loose.

In theory, at least. Once out of law practice, our ex-lawyer law-makers have gained a reputation for ignoring, bending, stretching if not flouting the rules regarding spending other people's money.

The few MPs who speak out against the rorts tend to be those elected as independents, as opposed to career party hacks. One of these, a former Federal Member for Calare in central NSW, is sadly no longer with us. But we do have Peter Andren's 2003 memoir, The Andren Report: an independent way in Australian politics.

After being elected to Parliament in 1996, Mr Andren increased his majority in 1998. Despite attacking the government's position on asylum seekers, he won again in 2001 with a primary vote of over 50 per cent and a two-candidate-preferred vote of 75 per cent. Many in his electorate would have despised some of his political positions, but they appreciated his honesty and preferred not being represented by a party hack. Maybe it helped that Mr Andren was not a lawyer but rather a local and prominent broadcast journalist.

One of Mr Andren's chapters is titled "Lurks, Perks, and Rorts". As a new MP, he was shocked by 

"... just how deep the publicly funded well from which members of Parliament drank. I was immediately shocked at the generosity and virtual accountability of the members of Parliament's travel allowance scheme … MPs had for many years used travel allowances to pay off mortgages for property in Canberra".

Mr Andren was for some time at the centre of the 1997 scandal surrounding former ALP Senator and deputy president of the Senate Mal Colston. When Mr Colston wasn't supported for the plum job by the ALP, he resigned and sat on the cross benches before the incoming Howard government offered him the job with its $16,000-plus pay rise. Eventually Mr Howard had to refer 

... a series of allegations involving misuse of entitlements, Commonwealth cars and postal and travel allowances … to the Commonwealth police.

At the time, Mr Andren was visiting a young offenders' prison farm in his electorate. One inmate asked him a rather logical question: 

How come that bloke Colston can't be charged, when I'm in here for 16 months for stealing a car and possessin' dope? 

Eventually charged, Mr Coston's charges were later dropped.

Following questions from Mr Andren, a number of Coalition MPs and Ministers were forced to amend their records. One minister was forced to pay back $8740 to the Department of Administrative Services. One senior cabinet minister, a minister and an MP who admitted to repaying false travel claims of around $9000 resigned or were sacked. Two of Mr Howard's staffers were also made to resign for covering up the secret repayments.

In September 1997, Mr Andren questioned Mr Howard about 

... members given the opportunity to correct and amend their signed-off travel claims prior to enforced scrutiny … and before their tabling and publication in this house. 

He also asked when MPs would acknowledge that 

... the TA [travel allowance) and overseas travel system had been systematically abused and rorted over many years. 

Mr Howard's response was to accuse Mr Andren of making "a cheap shot" and engaging in "generalised smears". Mr Andren was then ejected out of the House and into the arms of an adoring media and public.

Mr Andren found neither side wanted to engage in reform, but were happy to accuse each other of rorts. After a vicious attack from Peter Costello, a Labor Senator from Tasmania was found in his Canberra flat with slashed wrists. But Mr Andren knew the system was rotten and pursued the matter.

"I realised I was not the flavour of the month among government and Labor members of the house … who had been part of a system that regarded the lurks and perks of office as something of a right than a privilege".

Peter Andren died in 2007, his quest to end the rorts unsuccessful. Since then, Australians have had to put up with the Peter Slipper affair, Choppergate and numerous other examples of MPs taking advantage of a rotten system. Meanwhile, we are constantly being lectured about the end of the age of entitlement. Essential services such as legal aid are slashed.

Voters deserve better than this cartel of rorts. If only we had more Peter Andrens to clean up the mess.

(Irfan Yusuf is a PhD candidate at the Alfred Deakin Research Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation at Deakin University. First published in the Canberra Times on 5 August 2015)

OPINION: The terror of anti-terror laws

Last June, I was sitting in a KL restaurant with some Malaysian lawyers. I was explaining to them the intricacies of Australia's new anti-terror laws and the negative impact these had on civil liberties.

In particular, I was telling them about a special new order known as a "control order". This order enabled internal security officials (including the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation or ASIO) to approach a judge and obtain an order that someone be detained or their movements be restricted for a certain fixed period (usually a week or two).

I was surprised when one lawyer's face lit up.

Irfan, you people are so lucky in Australia. Here in Malaysia, we have this legal beast called the Internal Security Act whereby innocent people can be locked up for months!

Another provision of Australia's anti-terror laws is one which allows the Federal Attorney-General to declare a particular organisation to be placed on a list of terrorist organisations. Once an organisation is placed on the list, anyone deemed to be a member or supporter of that organisation could be prosecuted and jailed. I am offering no awards for anyone guessing which religion all banned organisations are linked to.

In this respect, Australian law is similar to laws enacted in the UK and US. Following the London bombings on July 7, 2005, the Blair government tried to have one specific organisation (known as Hizb ut-Tehrir or HT) banned. He knew this group had already been banned in countries - the bastions of democracy and human rights - such as Pakistan and Uzbekistan.

On Dec 24, 2006, The Observer newspaper reported that senior police and the Home Office opposed Tony Blair's efforts to have HT banned, fearing such a step "would serve only as a recruiting agent [for] the group". A similar debate has raged in Australia, with many State Governments calling for HT to be banned and the Federal Government resisting.

HT has operated in Australia freely and ineffectually for decades. Its platform is the establishment of an international caliphate in Muslim-majority states. HT believes that the solution to the many problems facing Muslims is the establishment of a caliph who will implement the sacred law of Islam (known as sharia) as the law of the land.

Paranoid columnists

In recent times, the Australian branch of HT has made headlines with its seminars, many of which have deliberately provocative titles. Yet their meetings would be lucky to attract 400 people, despite plenty of free advertising from the hostile press. Compare this to the typical Friday prayer service at the Auburn Gallipoli Mosque (one of the largest in Australia), which each Friday attracts 5,000 people. Remember that Friday is a working day in Australia, and even the most hostile newspapers don't bother with Friday sermons.

HT's radical rhetoric has provided more paranoid columnists and commentators with plenty to talk and write about. Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald on Jan 27, Miranda Devine claimed that HT was a bigger threat to Australian social cohesion than the white supremacists who orchestrated the racial riots at Sydney's Cronulla Beach.

A report in the Melbourne Age cited Anglican minister Dr Mark Durie who alleged HT was "a major world force for radical political Islam, with links to terrorist groups". The report didn't remind readers that Durie was and remains a supporter of Danny Nalliah, a radical Melbourne Christian preacher who has called upon his supporters to call for the destruction of Hindu and Buddhist temples.

HT recently made headlines again with their Jan 28 conference whose theme was "Khilafate". They invited two guest speakers, including the Chairman of HT's Indonesian wing Dr Ismael Yusanto. The Federal Government condemned Yusanto's presence in Australia, though their condemnations soon ended when the Sydney Morning Herald reported on Jan 29 that Yusanto had been invited by the government to speak at a security conference only three years earlier. Further, Yusanto is known to be a regular guest at the Australian embassy in Jakarta.

I attended the conference for most of the day. Hardly 400 people were in attendance, many of them present were there to show support for a group they otherwise disagreed with but which they felt was being unfairly targeted.

For many young Australian Muslims, HT is a temporary ideological pit-stop on their way to more refined and sophisticated Islamic thinking. HT thinking provides them with a simplistic device to understand their troubled world.

Double-standards

HT speaks of double-standards when it comes to human rights and fighting terror. It criticises Western governments sponsoring tyrannical rulers, generals and kings in many Muslim countries. It speaks of restoring some collective dignity to the Muslim ummah (faith-community).

Such views often resonate with young Muslims tired of seeing their faith maligned and their sentiments ignored by Australian governments and peak Islamic bodies. Perhaps one good antidote to stem the perceived growth of HT influence is for Australian governments and political parties to start involving Muslim Australians in the foreign policy discourse.

When the Australian government and Muslim peak bodies ignore the views of young people, the youth are often pushed into the waiting arms of fringe groups like HT. Fifteen years ago, I used to go to Muslim youth camps with HT's Australian leaders. In those days, they were young teenagers with sharp tongues for whom a Muslim youth camp was one of the few opportunities they got to escape their difficult household. They went onto achieve an extraordinary degree of academic success.

Although I now detest HT's isolationist ideology, I can understand its attraction. I could so easily have become addicted to the same kind of thinking. Those were the days when radical political Islam was regarded by Western governments as an antidote to what was considered the bigger enemy of communism. I can understand how HT's Australian followers ended up where they are. It could so easily been me also.

A good way to turn HT into a real security risk is to ban them using anti-terror laws and send them underground. This will galvanise support for HT amongst even mainstream Muslim Australians who feel marginalised and ignored by governments and peak Muslim bodies. Time will tell which way the government inevitably goes.

(IRFAN YUSUF is a Sydney-based lawyer, writer and blogger whose articles and reviews have appeared in various newspapers including the Sydney Morning Herald , Melbourne Age , Canberra Times , Australian Financial Review and New Zealand Herald. First published in malaysiakini on 15 February 2007)

OPINION: Care needed lest terror beget terror

Perpetrators of Boston tragedy must be brought to justice, but not at the cost of more innocent lives.

When that tragic bomb blast shook the vicinity of the Boston marathon finishing line, few people on this side of the world would have known about it immediately. I only heard of it while browsing at a bookstore in Dandenong, a suburb in southwest Melbourne that is famous for its large Indian, Sri Lankan, Afghan and other non-Anglo communities. Each community has a separate area in the Dandenong town centre where restaurants, food markets and clothing shops can be found.

As I picked up Salman Rushdie's memoir, the sounds of a popular music station Fox FM could be heard on the store's radio. Instead of the usual techno, two DJs were discussing at length a bomb blast. I listened closely and found out a bomb attack had claimed the lives of at least two people near the finishing line of the Boston tragedy. Among the victims was an 8-year-old boy.

The voices of these radio hosts weren't of the usual excited and chirpy mode. Instead, they sounded sombre. It was only appropriate when discussing an event so extremely tragic. They spoke about the loss of loved ones, of the young boy who lost his life and of the American nation in mourning.

One announcer spoke of the possibility that this was a terrorist attack. She suggested this might only be the case if the attackers were from overseas. So how would we describe the attack if those responsible were Americans? I guess you can't expect political sophistication from everyone.

In Australia, there has been saturation coverage of the Boston tragedy. And with good reason. Many Australians study and work in the United States. It is perhaps our closest ally, a country with whom we share a cultural and linguistic affinity.

But one wonders what Afghan shoppers listening to the radio at this bookstore must have been thinking about all this focus on Boston's victims meant when similar tragedies happen in Afghanistan every week at the hands of not just terrorists but also coalition forces.

Afghans from the Hazara ethnic group have especially been targeted for ethnic and sectarian reasons in Pakistan. In recent days, bombings across Iraq have claimed the lives of more than 50 people and injured 300 in the lead-up to local elections on April 20.

This kind of thing happens in Iraq perhaps once a month. Apart from in the Shia Muslims of the southern marsh areas and some Kurdish cities and towns, this generally wasn't happening when Saddam Hussein was in power. But isn't Saddam's oppression of his own people one of the main reasons used by the Coalition of the Willing invaded Iraq in the first place?

If the Boston attack is indeed an example of international terrorism, one wonders whether a large number of anonymous innocents will die in the hunt for Boston's perpetrators. It seems that when the United States is a victim of terror, it cannot help but terrorise others. Within the first year of the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, Coalition forces killed more Afghan civilians than were killed on 9/11.

The vast majority of victims of al-Qaeda, the Taleban and Saddam Hussein have been people belonging to faiths and cultures that Western cultural warriors love to associate with terrorism. It is hard to resist the conclusion that what we are again seeing is a situation where all terror victims are equal but some are more equal than others.

Still, talking about terror and terroristic reprisal may be premature. President Obama has mentioned this was a terrorist attack though he has refused to declare which group are the prime suspects.

It won't be easy for investigators to determine who was responsible. Pressure cookers stuffed with gun powder and nails are the weapons of choice for terrorists and criminal gangs across the Third World, from India to Central Africa.

We should hope and pray the perpetrators are found and brought to justice. However, we should also hope the Obama Administration doesn't use this incident to commit acts of terror on others. Perhaps the sign held up at a school peace rally by 8-year-old victim Marty Richard should be the guiding principal. 

"No more hurting people."

(Irfan Yusuf is a Sydney lawyer. First published in the NZ Herald on 18 April 2013)

OPINION: Australia turns its back on the desperate

 

The beachside Sydney suburb of Manly is home to many an Aussie boat-owner. Indeed locals (including the abundance of Kiwi settlers) will tell you that the most enjoyable way to get to Manly from the city is by boat. Manly is also the heartland of Tony Abbott, the conservative Opposition Leader who is also desperate to become Prime Minister.

In the 2010 elections Mr Abbott almost made it to the top job with the slogan of "Stop The Boats". Until some days ago, this mantra should have been Mr Abbott's ticket to the PM's house. Mr Abbott has effectively capitalised, indeed monopolised, on the love-hate relationship many Aussie voters have with boats.

In Mr Abbott's electorate, just about every punter owns a boat. Elsewhere, owning one is just about every bogan's dream. But boats are also a nightmare because they're often the vessels that bring dark-skinned unwashed illegal immigrants to our shores. The 5600 boat people that flooded the country in 2010 represented a huge threat to our migration system and our security compared to, say, the 53,900 harmless overstayers largely from Europe and North America.

So who is to blame for this influx of boat people? Is it the bullets and nooses and torture chambers of the God-awful governments, militias, mullahs, juntas and civil wars these people are fleeing? Is it crazy theocrats like the Taliban our brave troops are fighting in Afghanistan and our American allies are cosying up with in peace talks in Qatar?

Since 2001, Australian politicians have had a simple answer. The blame for the influx of asylum seekers lay with the asylum seekers and the people who smuggle them here. Boat people are "queue jumpers". People smugglers, often former asylum seekers themselves, are a bunch of crooks.

Mr Abbott's solution - send in the navy to turn any boats around so they can go back to where they came from. Almost always that means Indonesia. Too bad for Mr Abbott that many Indonesian leaders find this approach inhumane and impractical. And Indonesia knows our Opposition will take their opposition seriously.

Now Mr Abbott faces a new Prime Minister who is just as ruthless. A few days ago, Kevin Rudd signed a deal with Peter O'Neill, leader of Australia's impoverished northern neighbour and former colony Papua New Guinea. Mr O'Neill has agreed to house unlimited numbers of boat people on the remote northern island of Manus or in other facilities.

Mr Rudd has instructed the Immigration Department to place advertisements in local newspapers declaring "If you come here by boat without a visa YOU WON'T BE SETTLED IN AUSTRALIA". A version of this message in video form is also in Arabic, Dari, Farsi, Pashto, Sinhalese, Tamil and Vietnamese.

Mr Rudd has effectively closed the door to asylum seekers arriving by boat and has thrown away the key in the direction of Port Moresby. A recent issue of the Economist rates Port Moresby as the 139th most liveable city in the world, below Karachi and Harare. Manus Island would unlikely make any list of liveability. It's true that PNG has at least acceded to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention, but they have sought exemptions on providing basic services to refugees such as employment, education and housing.

But that's not all. Catherine Wilson writes in Crikey: 

Female asylum seekers will find themselves in a society grappling with very high levels of gender and sexual violence, with inadequate law enforcement. Last year the World Bank reported that violence victimisation rates in PNG were among the highest in the world and violent crimes were on the increase.

Bleeding heart do-gooders like myself are frothing at the mouth and penning editorials on how Mr Rudd's new policy is tougher and less humane than anything Mr Abbott ever came up with. And that's exactly the message Mr Rudd wants to get out there. On asylum seeker and border protection, Kevin Rudd sounds more like Tony Abbott than Tony Abbott. At least that's how it will look until Mr Rudd wins the election and then reviews the policy in 12 months time.

Retired Brigadier Gary Hogan, a former Australian Defence Attache to Papua New Guinea and Indonesia, recently wrote for the Lowy Institute: 

A cargo cult mentality is alive and well in PNG and this afforded the necessary levers for the Australian Prime Minister to pull so deftly in his game-changing policy statement, which will almost certainly stem boat arrivals in the near term, until people smugglers and Australian activists are able to find paths around the absolutist decree that even legitimate asylum-seekers will now not find sanctuary in Australia.

Australia, a huge and sparsely populated island continent whose European incarnation was established by criminals arriving in boats, has turned its back on desperate boat people who have in the past made terrific citizens. Still, our loss could be Kevin Rudd's gain. Which I guess is really all that matters.

(Irfan Yusuf is an Australian lawyer and author. First published in the NZ Herald on 25 July 2013)

RELIGION: Jewish leaders defend Muslims

Some years back, a Malaysian prime minister had turned blaming Jews for the world's ills into an art-form. He blamed the Jewish heritage of at least one currency speculator for Malaysia's currency woes.

He then banned Schindler's List, a Steven Spielberg movie concerning a German businessman who saved some Jews from the Nazi death camps.

He even accused Jews of ruling the world by proxy, something which must have angered his Muslim supporters. I can just imagine how they would have responded.

"Does Dr Mahathir Mohamad think the Jews are stronger than Allah?"

... they would (or should) have asked themselves.

Muslim leaders in Australia at the time were silent over Mahathir's blasphemy. Jewish leaders were incensed. Australian politicians were too busy giving their shirt measurements for the next APEC summit to worry about the allegedly recalcitrant Asian leader.

Now, it seems Mahathir has an ally in such verbal gymnastics. And one from, of all places, a tiny strip of the earth's surface which Jews might rightly claim control of. Recently, a visiting Professor of Chinese and Islamic history from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem made some remarks about Muslims in general and Muslim migrants in particular.

On Thursday, Feb 15, 2007, the Australian Jewish News reported the comments of Prof Raphael Israeli, who teaches Chinese and Islamic History at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Israeli happily gave the newspaper's readers some advice on how the "war of words" was insufficient to oppose what he described as "this threat of Islam".

National headlines

"You have to adopt some kind of preventative policy. In order not to get there, limit the immigration and therefore you keep them a marginal minority, which will be a nuisance, but cannot pose a threat to the demographic and security aspects of a country And one of the big possibilities is Australia, so they will continue to come legally, or illegally, and settle here, and when they get to the rate of the 10 percent like in France, then you will see life will become untenable."

At one point, Israeli takes a cue from The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, claiming:

"Then they control whole sections of the economy, there are areas in France where you cannot be elected to Parliament without the support of the Muslims and so on. And therefore, by increasing their numbers they start to have an impact on the social, economic, political and cultural nature of the country."

Israeli concludes his conspiracy theory as follows:

"Muslim populations, which are very often minorities, very often abuse that hospitality and use democracy, openness and tolerance to their benefit, to spread their faith and to intimidate their hosts, and very often, to impose their standards and values upon them."

Israeli's comments made national headlines. He was lambasted by many in the mainstream media. He claimed that the Australian Jewish News had misconstrued, misunderstood and/or misquoted his words. But when asked to clarify his position on Muslim migration to Australia, Israeli said that countries whose Muslim populations reached a "critical mass" (usually 10%) would "have problems", and that this was "the general rule, so if it applies everywhere, it applies in Australia."

Muslim leaders silent

And just like the situation with Mahathir's remarks about Jews, Muslim leaders are largely silent. Jewish leaders (believe it or not) are by-and-large incensed. And Australian political leaders are too busy grovelling to visiting US Vice President Dick Cheney.

Thus far, only one Muslim community leader has spoken and written against Israeli. Islamic Council of Victoria spokesman and Melbourne lawyer Waleed Aly wrote a devastating critique of Israeli's remarks in the Melbourne Age on Feb 19, 2007. Here's how Aly disentangled Israeli's argument on the 10 percent Muslim minority scare:

"Rwandan Muslims were once held in low esteem. They were traders in a land where farmers held prestige. Moreover they were socially and politically negligible, constituting roughly five percent of the population, and largely confined to the unspectacular neighbourhood of Kigali. Then came the genocide of 1994 in which tribal violence between Hutus and Tutsis claimed 800,000 lives.

"Meanwhile, Kigali was a sanctuary. Muslims, both Hutu and Tutsi, resolved that they would stand against the genocide. When Hutu militias surrounded the neighbourhood, Hutu Muslims refused to co-operate. They hid Tutsis - Muslim and Christian - in their homes and in their mosques. Now, Islam in Rwanda is booming. Masses of Christians, incapable of returning to the churches in which their families were slaughtered, sickened at the thought of praying next to those who massacred them and listening to priests who sanctioned it, have converted to Islam. Today, Muslims constitute around 15 percent of the population."

Aly was alone among Muslim leaders. Not a single imam made a public statement. Nor did any leaders of Muslim organisations. So why would Muslim leaders be silent on such an outrageous attack on Muslim migrants?

They were too busy lobbying and being lobbied for votes at the upcoming elections of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC), Australia's peak Muslim body. The town is burning, and the foremen are too busy fighting over who should be given the keys to start the fire truck.

Jewish leaders to the defence

In an ironic twist of fate, Australian Jewish leaders were more effective in protecting and defending Muslim communities from Israeli's venom. On the same day his comments were reported, one of his sponsoring organisations (the Australia-Israel Jewish Affairs Council) issued a press release rejecting his comments. They further state that they 

"... will not be co-hosting any of his further appearances in Australia".

The CEO of the Sydney-based New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies, Vic Alhadeff, said Israeli's comments 

"... do not reflect the position of the Jewish community and are unhelpful in the extreme". 

He reminded us of the Jewish community's 

"... strong record in fighting racism and condemn[ing] all expressions of bigotry".

Meanwhile, the only defence of Israeli came from the stable of newspapers owned by ex-Australian media mogul Rupert Murdoch. His only broadsheet newspaper, The Australian, commissioned a column from Israeli which was published on Feb 22. He accused Jewish leaders of being two-faced, hypocritical and spineless for 

"... statements that were geared to placate Muslims".

The same newspaper published an article by a former Australian politician who claimed Australia's "Muslim problem" was a bigger threat than global warming and climate change.

Israeli also claimed in his defence that he had "been researching Islam in Europe". Yet anyone reading his resume on the Hebrew University website will discover the man has written virtually nothing on European Muslims in peer-reviewed academic journals. In fact, even Israeli's Chinese history credentials are nothing to boast about. He has not taught in mainland China even once, his only visit in the region being to Taiwan.

So there you have it, dear readers. Jew attacks Muslims whose leaders remain silent while Jewish leaders defend Muslims. Only in multicultural Australia!

(IRFAN YUSUF is a Sydney-based lawyer, writer and blogger whose articles and reviews have appeared in various newspapers including the Sydney Morning Herald , Melbourne Age , Canberra Times , Australian Financial Review and New Zealand Herald. First published in malaysiakini on 6 May 2007)

REFLECTION: Lessons from Rumi's jihad

My ancestry is Turko-Mongolian (or "Mughal"). My ancestors were not very nice people. The Mongols turned terrorism and genocide into an art form and a sport, all at once. They plundered cities, massacred men and children and raped women before killing them.

Just thinking about my Mongol ancestors' atrocities makes my hair stand on end. They used to grab infants and babies by the feet and smash their heads against the wall. They used to cut foetuses out of the bellies of mothers using swords.

Baghdad was the London or New York of its day. The Mongols decimated the place. Baghdad was a city boasting thousands of libraries. Virtually all books were burnt. A handful of Jews and Muslims sought asylum in India and Turkey. The rest were slaughtered.

One asylum seeker was a boy named Jalal ad-Din, born in the Afghan city of Balkh on Sept 30, 1207. As a young boy, he was exposed to the horrors of the Mongol invasion. Jalal saw family members and friends butchered as he was fleeing the Mongols. He was among a large group of asylum seekers that arrived in Konya, then the capital of the Seljuk Turkish Empire. Jalal's father was a lawyer, and Jalal was trained to be a lawyer.

Jalal had a phenomenal intellect. At an early age, he was appointed a judge and professor of law. He also received a generous stipend from the state, a house and servants. Jalal lived the high life.

Then at age 37, at the height of his career, Jalal met a man named Shums, an asylum seeker from Tabriz, a city also ravaged by the Mongols. Who knows what horrors the old disheveled Shums had seen. Most people in Konya looked upon Shums with disdain, especially when he made an appearance in the presence of Professor Jalal.

The Professor didn't see in that way. I believe one reason for this was that Professor Jalal ad-Din recognized the reasons behind the disheveled appearance and the painful eyes. This man survived a genocide, just as Jalal did.

From asylum seeker to spiritual leader

This man and Professor Jalal both had every reason to hate the Mongols. They had every reason to attack Mongol lands and terrorize the Mongol hordes. They even had the backing of powerful states.

These men had every reason to preach a theology of hatred. Instead, Professor Jalal learnt from Shums the message of divine love. That love was and is so powerful that to this day people of all faiths are benefitting from Professor Jalal's poetry.

Indeed, most people know of Professor Jalal as Rumi, the great Muslim mystical poet. Growing up an asylum seeker, Rumi rose to the top of the worldly ladder, then leaving it all behind temporarily to learn the message of divine love. Had he not joined the disheveled Shums, he would have remained Professor Jalal.

But filled with divine love, he became the Mevlana, the spiritual leader of millions of people across the world. Now, 900 years after his birth, people are still discovering the Islam of surrendering to divine love through Rumi's words.

Rumi returned from his spiritual retreats completely transformed. He wrote with such force that his lengthy Mathnawi is often described as "the Persian Qur'an."

Years after Rumi's death, the Mongols caught up to Konya. One of Rumi's students is believed to have set an example of kindness and generosity to the Mongol leader who felt inspired to adopt Rumi's religion of Islam. His entire army did the same. They settled down and intermarried with Turkish Muslims.

The ancestors of these converted Mongol Turks eventually came to India and conquered the place. Had they not been inspired to put down their weapons, the Mongols may have raped and pillaged as far as Paris or London. Instead, they founded a Muslim civilization that gave us the Taj Mahal.

Neither a suicide bomber, nor a terrorist

Rumi taught a genuinely orthodox Islamic message more powerful than all the allegedly Islamic suicide bombings and terrorist attacks. He taught a message that defeated the enemies by transforming them into friends and brothers.

Rumi had every reason to hate the Mongols. They killed half his family. They almost killed his spiritual teacher Shums. Rumi's experiences aren't dissimilar to those of so many oppressed Muslim groups in places like Kashmir and Chechnia. But neither Rumi nor Shums were students of hatred, vengeance and violence. They were students of divine love.

If Muslims of Rumi's time could win over the Mongols, what is there to stop Muslims enjoying the relative freedom of the West from winning over our countrymen and women?

This year, millions of Muslims will commemorate the 800th anniversary of Rumi's birth.

Perhaps this year, Muslims will remember the simple message of this asylum seeker who had seen too much of war. If you fight oppression with terror, you push the hearts of enemies away from God and from showing any mercy to you. Terror breeds hatred and more terror. But love turns your worst enemy into your bosom friend.

Rumi was no suicide bomber, no terrorist. Armed with divine love and proper conduct, he and his students conquered the hearts of their enemies.

This was Rumi's jihad, and it needs to become our collective jihad. If only those engaged in pseudo-jihad by committing acts of terror in the name of Rumi's religion would realise the futility of their actions.

(IRFAN YUSUF is a Sydney-based lawyer, writer and blogger whose articles and reviews have appeared in various newspapers including The Sydney Morning Herald, Melbourne Age, Canberra Times, Australian Financial Review and The New Zealand Herald. First published in malaysiakini on 14 May 2007)