---------- Forwarded message ----------
> ROMAIPS AP CR DV IP
> MALAYSIA: 'Muslims Angry at War on Terror, not Cartoons'
> Baradan Kuppusamy
>
> Feb 12 , KUALA LUMPUR (IPS) - Delegates at an international conference
> here entitled 'Who Speaks for Islam? Who speaks for the West', were
> inclined to blame the ferocity of reactions against the cartoon
> controversy, which gripped the world this past week, on the 'war on
> terror' in Iraq and Afghanistan.
>
> The cartoons, depicting Prophet Mohammad as a terrorist and published in a
> Danish newspaper, dominated the two-day conference which ended Saturday.
> The timing of the meet was a matter of coincidence.
>
> Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi, current chairman of the
> Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC), urged Muslims and the western
> world to join hands against fringe elements in both societies that, he
> said, are ''hell bent on keeping us apart''. He called for bridges to be
> built so that ''the West will speak for Islam and Muslims speak for the
> West''.
>
> Badawi, however, blamed the ''hegemony of the centres of power in the
> West'' for the widening chasm between Islam and the West.
> ''They (Muslims) see the subjugation of Palestine as an indirect
> concretisation of this hegemony. They see hegemony manifested directly in
> the attack upon Afghanistan and in the occupation of Iraq.''
>
> At the same time, said Badawi, the West wrongly equated Islam with
> violence. ''They think Osama bin Laden speaks for the religion and its
> followers. Islam and Muslims are linked to all that is negative and
> backward,'' he said, adding that the U.S.-led 'war-on- terror' has widened
> the chasm.
>
> Badawi told delegates from 100-odd countries that ''those who deliberately
> kill non-combatants and the innocent; those who oppress and exploit
> others; those who are corrupt and greedy; those who are chauvinistic and
> communal,'' cannot speak on behalf of Islam.
>
> ''We must acknowledge that in the West, principles such as freedom and
> equality have found concrete _expression_ in the rule of law, public
> accountability, acceptance of political dissent and respect for popular
> participation. However, for a lot of Muslims today, this is not the face
> of the West that they see,'' he told an audience of academics and
> policymakers.
>
> Anger against the cartoons has been muted in this multi-ethnic country
> that officially practices 'Hadhari', a moderate form of Islam on the
> appeal of which, Badawi enjoys a solid electoral mandate, controlling
> nearly 90 percent of the 217 seats in parliament.
>
> Prominent among the foreign delegates was former Iranian president
> Muhammad Khatami who, in comments to reporters, said that he hoped lessons
> had been drawn from the caricature controversy. ''The Muslim world has
> reacted to this issue and if this policy continues, we will be engaging in
> continuous violence," he warned.
>
> While Malaysian newspapers were full of the rage that swept the Muslim
> world over the week, none of the anger was reflected in the country's many
> mosques.
>
> Badawi himself expressed sadness at the mischief the cartoons have caused
> and went out of his way to say that that Malaysia would not boycott
> Danish products unlike many other Middle Eastern countries.
>
> The only official sign of discomfort was when Danish ambassador Borge
> Petersen was 'summoned' and told that Malaysia deplored publication of
> such insensitive cartoons.
>
> Denmark has, in fact, requested Malaysia's help in restraining Muslim rage
> at the European nation whose media first published the caricatures of
> Prophet Muhammad but was quickly reprinted by media in other countries.
>
> Malaysian foreign minister Datuk Seri Syed Hamid Albar said, on the
> sidelines of the conference that he took a telephone call from his Danish
> counterpart Per Stig Moller seeking Malaysian support in containing the
> rage.
>
> Albar vowed that the fires raging around the world over the cartoons
> ''would not find kindle wood here in Malaysia.''
>
> Leading Malaysian Islamic thinker Chandra Muzaffar credits the quietness
> in this country to a lack of fear and insecurity among Malay Muslims.
>
> ''Unlike the other Muslim countries caught in the eye of the storm,
> Malaysia is free of the hegemonic consequences of big powers that are
> experienced by Afghanistan and Iraq for example,'' said Muzaffar,
> president of the International Movement for a Just World or JUST, an NGO
> dedicated to inter-ethnic peace.
>
> ''Malaysia is relatively free of the negative consequences of hegemonic
> trends,'' he told IPS.
>
> Muzaffar said social justice, religious harmony and reasonably good
> governance in Malaysia are the key reasons why the sense of loss and deep
> grievances, seen in other Muslim societies, is absent here.
>
> ''Muslims here don't feel dispossessed or have the same fear that Islam is
> under threat as Muslims in other countries like Palestine or Afghanistan
> and Iraq,'' he said.
>
> Muzaffar agreed with Badawi's view that the war on terror has aggravated
> Muslim insecurity. ''Western media images and commentaries have reinforced
> the erroneous equation of Islam with terror. This explains why some of the
> offensive cartoons of the Prophet published in the Jyllands-Posten made
> that link,'' he said.
>
> ''But equating Islam and Muslims with violence and terror is not new. It
> has been going on for a long time,'' Muzaffar said.
>
> ''What Muslims have been witnessing in recent years is the stark
> consequences of global hegemony reflected in the slaughter of innocent
> Muslims in Palestine and Iraq, the humiliation of occupation and
> subjugation, the treachery of double standards and the machinations of
> exclusion and marginalisation,'' he said.
>
> ''It explains to a great extent the explosion of violent fury in different
> parts of the Muslim world over the abusive cartoons. It is anger that is
> driven by more than their boundless love for Mohammad,'' he said.
>
> At the close of the conference, Malaysia's deputy prime minister Datuk
> Seri Najib Tun Razak said the majority of mankind had allowed a few people
> to voice biased opinions because ''we have allowed them to speak for us''.
>
> "The terrorist who straps a bomb to his chest and blows up a shopping
> mall,'' does not speak for Islam any more than does a ''newspaper editor
> who sees fit to ridicule a holy prophet who is venerated by more than one
> billion people around the globe,'' said Razak.
>
> Najib dismissed talk of a 'clash of civilisations', saying this need not
> happen if fundamental fault lines between the Muslim and the Western
> worlds were adequately addressed. (END/IPS/AP/IP/CR/BK/DV/RDR/06)
>
>
> = 02121323 ORP001
> NNNN
>
>
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-------------------------
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{Invite (mankind, O Muhammad ) to the Way of your Lord (i.e. Islam) with wisdom (i.e. with the Divine Inspiration and the Qur'an) and fair preaching, and argue with them in a way that is better. Truly, your Lord knows best who has gone astray from His Path, and He is the Best Aware of those who are guided.}
(Holy Quran-16:125)
{And who is better in speech than he who [says: "My Lord is Allah (believes in His Oneness)," and then stands straight (acts upon His Order), and] invites (men) to Allah's (Islamic Monotheism), and does righteous deeds, and says: "I am one of the Muslims."} (Holy Quran-41:33)
The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said: "By Allah, if Allah guides one person by you, it is better for you than the best types of camels." [al-Bukhaaree, Muslim]
The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) also said, "Whoever calls to guidance will have a reward similar to the reward of the one who follows him, without the reward of either of them being lessened at all."
[Muslim, Ahmad, Aboo Daawood, an-Nasaa'ee, at-Tirmidhee, Ibn Maajah]
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