Paris "Charlie Hebdo" Killings

Yesterday, a group of gunmen burst into the French Satirical Magazine Charlie Hebdo and killed atleast a dozen people.

The families of all those killed will be suffering right now and their pain can be easily felt and shared as a human connection (especially with others who have shared similar pain, especially through the chaos in the Muslim world).

Indiscriminate murder is wrong and against Islam.

If that is not enough of a statement for some who will question past acts of Charlie Hebdo, other news outlets have confirmed that some of those killed were actually friends of Muslims and fought against discrimination in France against Muslims and even supported Turkey joining the EU.

Due to the target, a lot of initial suspicion suggests that the attackers are muslims. A few years ago Charlie Hebdo  had printed cartoons depicting the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wa Sallam (Peace and Blessings be upon him) which Muslims around the world found offensive. It had also recently mocked ISIS leader Al Baghdadi.

This suspicion has strengthened by witnesses stting they had been told by the killers that they were part of Al Qaeda from the Yemen. Other reports had the attackers shouting "Allahu Akbar".

ISIS is in competition with the al qaeda linked groups so it in unlikely that the recent mocking of al baghdadi would have been the causes for the attackers, though generally those who have turned to violence have in the past been a lot more dim witted and often incompetent to the level that they have been unable to carry out their attacks.

A few other notables from the present attack is that the attackers were prepared, had body armour and according to some reports even managed to obtain a rocket launcher. There are questions about how such weaponry has been obtained and where they recieved training.

Suspects have been named, one of them having handed himself into the police. Others linked to the suspects have been arrested. It is likely that the attackers were muslims.

It is likely that the named suspect who handed himself into police was not involved as people have been coming forward stating that he was in a lecture with them at the time of the incident.

There will be a push in France (and maybe other parts of the world) seeking blood, for many this attack providing evidence of their pre-existing prejudices.

Some mosques and a kebab shop have already been attacked in acts of vengeance. If these continue to escalate, many innocents will suffer and Muslims who have already been ostracised and isolated by french society targetting Muslims for the past decade will feel even more targetted, causing even more isolation and paranoia that will be counterproductive.

If the French people give in, they will only help re-inforce the views fo extremists and help destroy any cohesion that exists.

French government actions of the recent past have not been positive steps for social cohesion and some of these may have helped already re-inforce the views of extremists who then can and do carry out acts of violence and senseless murder.

Self inflicted wounds

There will be much written about Charlie Hebdo as the target and about freedom of speech (hint: its not a european concept, but American) and the dangers of provocation and insult. I will not focus on them because the suspects are still suspects and without any formal statemetnt of their political goals, any attempt at analysis of them would be guess work at best.

I will comment instead on deeper issues in French society that can lead to isolation, paranoia, extremism and ultimately violence.

France could have been a great story for social cohesion. It was only a few years ago that the majority of the French national football team were Muslim. Zinedine Zidane could have been national heroes.

Instead the story of community cohesion is pretty poor and in the past decade there has been a massive campaign targetting immigrants and Muslims.

France always been a proud nation (to such an extent that in WW2 it wanted the first brigade of soldiers that entered Paris after liberation to be white french soldiers and not soldiers of colour, which made up large parts of their colonial army) and the supremacists have always made life harder by targetting those are not the white majority.

This has meant passing laws banning headscarves in classrooms, banning veils in public and preventing mothers who wore headscarves from participating in civic society by preventing them from eg minding children on school trips.

All of this has helped in creating isolation, paranoia and seeking fellow citizens as part of the "other", either as the oppressor or the bogeyman.

These events that have hurt all of France. While I hope that instead of seeking vengeance, doors are opened and past actions causing separation, isolation and paranoia are reconsidered, that is the harder more difficult path to follow when people are in pain and events since the killings have shown that atleast some want revenge.

Comments

I like this post.

More than revenge (and being unconnected with the victims, I don't need that), I want to be as free to say, write, or draw anything about Islam and Mohammed as I am about other religions and religious personalities. You know I don't hate Muslims, but it is fair to say I fear offending Muslims, so you could call that Islamophobic. Islamophobia is a logical response to jihad in Mohammed's name on any western target, especially one as non-violent as a pop satire circular.

Freedom to make a robust point about Mohammed (not Prophet Mohammed as the media has taken to calling him), to depict him any way, makes one a lot less inclined to cause any offense. Fear of Muslims, Islamophobia, might silence people, but they will fight back. You will see far more offensive media about Mohammed in the coming days than would otherwise affront you.

So it seems that this attack has resulted in Muslim fear of non-Muslims, non-Muslim fear of Muslims, and offensive comment against Islamic beliefs. All the more reason to root out actively all the backwards misogyny, racism and incitement to violence of jihadi politics, from the Islamic mainstream.

Respect for the condemnation. Sorry that it took this to move me to post again, pissed off since I write and paint and discuss religion freely, no holds barred, and don't like to be intimidated (I stopped posting hugely nonplussed at the loyalism some members were starting to show to Hamas, but let's leave that alone today).

  • It can never be satisfied, the mind, never. -- Wallace Stevens

I wasn't defending CHarlie Hebdo. I don't buy into their whole defending freedom of speech malarky.

Charlie Hebdo often published offensive and racist cartoons that are undefendable, for instance a French-African politician as a monkey and the kidnapped school girls in Nigeria as benefit scroungers.

It has also not been a bastion of defending free speech as it has previously fired cartoonists for the political content of their cartoons. (i have not seen it, but apparently a cartoonist was fired when his work it was considered anti semitic.)

I hope the place is closed down for good.

A debate is a debate and Islam and Muslims are open for discussion. But what you will find instead is insults and offence. Respectful meaningful debate generally leaves such things at the door.

Muslims are open to criticism, Muslim groups are open to criticism and this is not prevented, frowned upon or attacked. Offence and injury is caused when the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wa Sallam (Peace and Blessings be upon him) is insulted.

 

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'" - David Cameron, UK Prime Minister. 13 May 2015.

EDITED

Shame, I thought for a second you sounded intelligent and compassionate.

  • It can never be satisfied, the mind, never. -- Wallace Stevens

I see that after calling for intelligent debate you have resorted to throwing insults.

I can see that you are blinded in your anger at the hostage situation that arose in the Kosher supermarket in Paris.

But that does not excuse your behaviour now or during the Israeli massacres committed in Gaza.

When I call something wrong, I don't do it expecting a pat on the back or to make friends.

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'" - David Cameron, UK Prime Minister. 13 May 2015.

Look, Charlie Hebdo's cartoons are offensive, and I have said that before. I did not throw around any insults, I responded appositely to your complaint about blasphemy. I can speak freely about religious beliefs. If you can't, that is a problem with your religion, a glass ceiling on your quest for truth.

I am angry about not just today's events, but the overall ideological support on this website, which I have known for years, to the Qutbist politics that underlie these terrorist acts and Hamas and IS and AQ and so on, the denial that these politics have given Britain, or Israel, or France any great cause to take action. Delineate yourself, if you do condemn it. Now, there are other interests at play. I know that, maybe you do too, but for your part, The Voice of The Muslim Youth might just make clear that terrorists are unsupported and unwelcome.

I must go. Shabbat Shalom.

  • It can never be satisfied, the mind, never. -- Wallace Stevens

I edited a previous post of yours because while the insults may have been baseless, I am thin skinned.

"Voice of the Muslim Youth" is a bit of a misnomer. Hence why I removed it.

It was the aim of this place for young Muslims to raise and share their voice. "Voice of the Muslim Youth" did and does not mean telling them what their voice is.

Right now there is no "Voice of the Muslim Youth", only me as a blogger with a tiny-insignificant audience.

After cleaning up the performance and visuals for this website, that might change, or it might not.

Now, there are other interests at play. I know that, maybe you do too

I am interested to know what you mean.

As for linking everything to a "qutbist hamas, Alqaeda, ISIS" blob equating everything in one, I see that as a play from the hasbarah playbook - use the worst exampled to tar everyone into one group in an attempt to equally delegitimise them all.

I will not apologise for my support for Gazans and I under the different yardsticks used by your lack of condemnation for Israeli Massacres.

Israel had over 10 years to agree to the Saudi peace plan - something that would have given it peace with all its aerab neighbours. Instead it played games while increasing its occupation until in managed to find an excuse in ISIS.

If you blame Hamas, fine where are your concrete steps towards peace in Fatah controlled West Bank? Have you stopped settlement building, incursions, killings? no.

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'" - David Cameron, UK Prime Minister. 13 May 2015.

Good article by Jonathan Freedland: Charlie Hebdo:

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'" - David Cameron, UK Prime Minister. 13 May 2015.

I guess to add perspective it should also be mentioned that some people in the Kosher supermarket .

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'" - David Cameron, UK Prime Minister. 13 May 2015.

OK, I didn't have to wind you up by disrespecting Mohammed. I am sorry about that.

You still fail to understand the centrality of Israel and Jerusalem in Judaism, making an awful lot of distinguishing Zionism from Judaism, and you deny by default that the whole last century of bloodshed there stemmed from a combination of British, Arab and Zionist policies, from de facto warfare, not from marauding Jewish colonisers. To my mind you are not reciprocating the respect you ask for. That is a salient observation about Islamic politics. But we can agree to disagree, since over a decade of conversation and argument on the subject has made us, I think, better neighbours but arrived at few conclusions.

I fear you cut too much from my earlier comment but thanks for reasoning with me, you are right that causing you offense was not a decent response to the events on the news. And don't be so thin-skinned. It delimits honesty.

The mention of other interests is merely a reference to the machinations of various religious, state and corporate shits around the world, the things we don't know, but that we should remember we don't know.

  • It can never be satisfied, the mind, never. -- Wallace Stevens