Let's Get Closer To The Arabic Mentality: Jan 5, 2008

Storm Track Disinformation: Terrorism by the Numbers

January 5th, 2008 by WC

It’s obvious that Dr. Raja Muzaffar Bhat has not heard the truism that not all Muslims are terrorists but the majority of terrorists are Muslims. By ignoring this obvious fact, he goes on to do what every moral equivalence pin head has tried to do over the last several years. Show that Muslims aren’t the only ones who commit terror and if they do, it’s a form of freedom fighting.

Muslim terrorism is just another form of Western propaganda, he says.

The simplistic, uni-dimensional view in a large section of Western media has tarnished the image of Islam, dubbing it as a religion of terrorism and violence. This trend has gained ground after 9/11. To many Muslims, it sometimes seems as if all anti-Islamic forces have united to destroy Islam which only strengthens the determination of Muslims. Defining “terrorism” is not simple. There are various interpretations and definitions, mainly in terms of acts of violence and deaths of innocents at the hands of non-state actors. Some legitimize such acts as political struggles. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), Assam’s ULFA, the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and Kashmiri militants, who have all been labeled as terrorists in their respective countries, are regarded as “freedom fighters” among other sections, even in their own countries. The case of Bhagat Singh is particularly interesting. The British dubbed him a “terrorist” but many Indians see him as one of the greatest revolutionaries and as a freedom fighter.

Blah, blah, blah. Let’s play find any terrorist in a haystack and show that they are no different than Muslim terrorist. Unfortunately, he sidesteps the mathematical facts.

Here’s Muslim terrorism by the numbers.

More people are killed by Islamists each year than in all 350 years of the Spanish Inquisition combined. ( source)

More civilians were killed by Muslim extremists in two hours on September 11th than in the 36 years of sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland. (source)

Islamic terrorists murder more people every day than the Ku Klux Klan has in the last 50 years. (source)

19 Muslim hijackers killed more innocents in two hours on September 11th than the number of American criminals executed in the last 65 years. (source)

How about those numbers, Dr. Bhat?

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Dakar Rally cancelled due to 'direct' terrorism threat

[Published: Saturday 5, January 2008 - 15:29]

The world's most arduous race, the Dakar Rally, has been cancelled.

Organisers of the rally cancelled the event following "direct" threats of terrorism against the event, and the slaying of a family of French tourists in Mauritania on Christmas Eve.

Eight of the rally's 15 stages were due to pass through the African Republic.

The annual car and motorcycle marathon had been due to start in Lisbon on January 5th with the finish coming in Dakar on January 20th.

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/breaking-news/sport/motor-sport/article3310729.ece
© Belfast Telegraph

For Dutch educators, Islamophobia can be a teaching aid for Holocaust studies

Tags: Yad Vashem, Israel
The Yad Vashem Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority this week hosts a week-long seminar for 21 teachers, the first run by the museum for Dutch educators, with one day devoted to discussions about teaching Holland's Muslim minority about the Shoah.

When teaching Holocaust studies to Dutch Muslim teenagers in Amsterdam, Mustafa Daher says he first has to defuse his pupils' own hostility toward Jews and Israel.

"If I don't capture their interest, then I have done nothing. So I use the rising Islamophobia to help them connect to the persecution of the Jews," the seasoned educator says.

"For example, I tell them that when the Nazis suspected someone was Jewish, they would pull down his pants to see if he was circumcised. Then I remind my Muslim students they are also 'snipped.' So they, too, would've ended up in a concentration camp," says Daher.

Judith Whitlau, who teaches groups about the Holocaust at the Dutch Theater in Amsterdam, says she has to contend with another analogy.

"Some point to media reports from the occupied territories, and they want to know what exactly Israel itself is doing to internalize the Holocaust's lessons as it preaches others should do."

But not all the teachers in the group have Muslim students. Franca Verheijen teaches at an affluent school in Leiden, some 35 minutes by train from Amsterdam. There, drawing parallels between Islamophobia and anti-Semitism can be counterproductive.

"If I make this connection, some students usually reject the analogy, saying that unlike the Muslims, the Jews never engaged in terrorism," she says.

Another charged issue for the teachers is the question of complicity. Some 100,000 Dutch men and women belonged to the country's Nazi party during the war, openly collaborating with German authorities.

Despite this, Meir Villegas Henriquez from the Hague-based Jewish non-profit Center for Information and Documentation on Israel (CIDI), said he wouldn't want to see a whole chapter in the school curriculum on Dutch Nazis.

"We're here to educate, not blame," the delegation organizer said.

Other participants in the seminar - which is partly funded by the Dutch government's Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies - were also hesitant about the issue.

"For many people this is taboo and we can't afford to waste our two weekly hours [for history] on it," said Wout Claessens from the eastern Netherlands.

One advantage Dutch teachers have over colleagues abroad, they all agreed, was the diary of Anne Frank, the world-famous manuscript written in hiding in Amsterdam by the young girl who later died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

Her story, which is mandatory reading in Dutch elementary schools, is still very useful in helping young pupils connect to the Holocaust, the teachers said. According to Henriquez, Frank's image is so indelibly etched into the Dutch psyche, that it can sometimes overshadow current problems.

"When our organization, CIDI, released its annual report last month on a 64-percent hike in anti-Semitic incidents, the study received less exposure than the decision to fell the tree outside Anne Frank's hiding place," he complained.

"Her story is a big frame of reference, but the Netherlands still has a Jewish population which is facing some challenges."

Morocco, Polisario to start new round of W. Sahara talks

11 hours ago

UNITED NATIONS (AFP) — Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front resume UN-sponsored talks on the disputed Western Sahara in suburban New York Monday amid warnings that failure to clinch a deal could lead to renewed fighting.

UN spokeswoman Michele Montas confirmed Friday that a third round of closed-door discussions would be held in the New York suburb of Manhasset from Monday through Wednesday to try to resolve the 32-year dispute.

As in the two previous exploratory rounds held last year at the same location, the secluded Greentree estate in Manhasset, UN envoy for Western Sahara Peter Van Walsum will serve as mediator.

The two rounds held in June and August failed to narrow wide differences between Rabat and the Polisario independence movement.

And diplomats say they do not anticipate any breakthrough this time around either.

Last month, the Algerian-backed Polisario warned it would resume its armed struggle against Morocco if negotiations fail.

"We hope that Morocco this time is going to cooperate for the full implementation" of UN resolutions on the issue and "will engage in substantive negotiations," Ahmed Bujari, the Polisario's UN representative, told AFP Friday.

He said the Moroccans must agree to discuss not just their proposal for broad autonomy for the Western Sahara but also the Polisario's call for a referendum that would include the option of independence for the former Spanish colony.

"Our people have been frustrated (in their aspiration for independence)," he said. We believe peace is possible... But a new failure of the (negotiation) process would have negative consequences for the entire (northwest African) region)."

"It could push us on the way to a resumption of hostilities and Morocco will be responsible," he added.

Last October, the UN Security Council voted unanimously to urge the two sides to resume stalled talks "without preconditions" to settle their 32-year dispute over the Western Sahara.

It passed a resolution calling on the parties to "engage in substantive negotiations ... without preconditions and in good faith ... with a view to achieving a just, lasting and mutually acceptable political solution."

Morocco annexed the phosphate-rich, mainly desert Western Sahara in the 1970s following the withdrawal of colonial power Spain, sparking a war with the Polisario guerrillas.

The two sides agreed a ceasefire in 1991, but a promised self-determination referendum never materialized and since 2002 Rabat has insisted that holding such a plebiscite is no longer realistic.

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