Misunderstandings

"After a final review of the handbook, the RCMP could not support the adversarial tone set by elements of the booklet and therefore directed RCMP Manitoba not to proceed with this initiative."
Sgt. Greg Cox, RCMP

"No one has brought to our attention that we were adversarial. I don't know what is being referred to."
"This is a democracy and we have a right to our opinion."
 Shahina Siddiqui, executive director, Islamic Social Services Association

"[The book] offers Canadian Muslims detailed information about how to actively participate in all aspects of civic life and to respond to misinformation. It also offers concrete steps for families and communities in responding to fears or concerns that a loved one has been swayed by extremist ideology, and strategies for dealing with unfair labels, stereotyping, and stigmatization."
Ihsaan Gardee, executive director, National Council of Canadian Muslims

The two groups, the Islamic Social Services Association and the National Council of Canadian Muslims, at an earlier date known as CAIR Canada, whose links with the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas are well known, have, with a handful of others, and the assistance of the RCMP produced a self-help booklet for Canadian Muslims. The booklet is labelled as a counter-radicalization handbook, with the title, "United Against Terrorism".

And, in fact, its content makes it appear more likely as a handbook to evade detection of untoward associations to aid in circumspection, not necessarily directing people away from fundamentalist Islamism. The inferred hostility contained in the booklet is more likely to lead uncertain Muslims to the impression that Canada's security bodies, engaging in liaison with Muslim groups in an bid to combine efforts to guide impressionable Muslim 'youth' away from radicalism, wish them ill.

The booklet offers the presumptuous advice to Canada's security agencies to avoid violating Islamic sensibilities by bypassing the terminology they find offensive, as in "Islamist terrorism", "Islamic extremism" and "jihad", these verbal descriptive realities considered by CAIR to be a symbol of Islamophobia. CAIR and groups like them with their suspect loyalties and ties, have found it most useful to use democracy's tools of tolerance and rule-of-law to protect themselves against scrutiny.

When the Prime Minister was preparing for his first Middle East trip, CAIR had objected to his invitation to a Canadian rabbi to join his delegation, in response to which Jason MacDonald, the prime minister’s director of communications responded: "We will not take seriously criticism from an organization with documented ties to a terrorist organization such as Hamas".

CAIR/NCCM's response was swift in denying any ties to terrorist groups. The executive director of the National Council of Canadian Muslims (CAIR) forwarded a warning by email that "Our legal counsel is of the view that this statement is defamatory and libelous and will be taking this up with the PMO (Prime Minister's Office)." In 2002 an American judge concluded that an earlier incarnation of CAIR, the Islamic Association of Palestine acts in support of Hamas.


And so, the RCMP directed its Manitoba branch not to attend the unveiling of the handbook, citing its "adversarial" tenor. Within its 38 pages, released at a Winnipeg mosque, a section gives terminology political sensitivity advice to the RCMP, and urges it to withdraw from "inappropriate information gathering techniques", which it examples as "showing up at workplaces" and "intimidating newcomers". Contact between law enforcement and the Muslim community, the handbook states, should be undertaken "socially and recreationally".

It furthermore states that co-operation with the Canadian Security Intelligence Services and the RCMP through their investigations should be of a "voluntary" nature, with "no obligation" to respond to questioning, or to surrender to interlocutors personal information relating to family members and friends. Ms. Siddiqui, speaking for the Islamic Social Services Association, confesses to having no idea what any fuss is about relating to the instructions given in the booklet.

The handbook, she points out, has a disclaimer indicating that contributors do not, despite their presence in the publication, endorse other material that may be present in the handbook.

While encouraging members of the Muslim community to speak with elders when they become aware of people with extremist views and to be aware of websites capable of manipulating Islamic teaching and history, it seems to reject the security establishment latest agenda of cooperation between themselves and the established Muslim community.