Do Unto Others

"I have doubts about that [that Canada represents a much safer place than New Zealand for Muslim security]."
"These attackers are not too many, but they are sleeping wolves and you never know when they will attack."
"The threat is there and it's real."
Abdel Feifel, trustee, Ottawa Muslim Association

"As details [of the New Zealand shootings] became clear this morning, the first reaction is of feeling very unsafe as a Muslim. Especially considering that Canadian Muslims today are going to Friday prayers and that means going to a space here they might not feel safe."
"It's difficult to find words to explain what my community is going through. It's difficult to find an explanation for why this happened. It's more important, however, to be here, to stand against this."
"We need to start calling it out for what it is. I think of [Conservative Leader] Andrew Scheer when I say this and it's really important for me to call it out. When you go to a rally with a white supremacist, it says something to me. It says that Muslim women like me don't mean much to you."
Shahad Khalladi, vigil organizer, Ottawa

"My first reaction was that I was horrified by the number of people who lost their lives. And my second reaction is today is Friday for a lot of the Western countries, and that meant a lot of Muslims across the country are going to go to their Friday prayers with this being first on their mind."   CBC

"We're deeply disturbed that today's terrorist act in New Zealand was actually inspired by the Quebec City shooting."
"Our children are emotionally distraught and afraid to return to school after the March break. It's extremely difficult to explain to them what has happened and why."
Ottawa Muslim Association trustee Charles Ghadban

"Today it's in New Zealand, but two years ago it was in Quebec City. Who knows, God forbid, what would be the next place?"
"[While some mosques use entry fobs and passwords for access] ... It is ridiculous, in a way, because these are sanctuaries."
Monia Mazigh, Board member, Ottawa Muslim Association

 Monia Mazigh, right, wife of Maher Arar, Syrian-Canadian imprisoned in Syria, awarded $10-million 'compensation' by government of Canada -- a member of the board of the Ottawa Mosque. Julie Oliver / Postmedia

"I was at the mosque earlier today and I was talking to our Muslim brothers and sisters whose children are too scared to come to the mosque. Some of them are too scared to go to school next week."
"So to everyone here that's Muslim, we stand with you. And to people of all faiths, you should be free to practise your faith ... and you should not be scared to go to wherever you practise your faith. We need to call out Islamophobia, we need to call out hatred of all kinds."
Catherine McKenna, Member of Parliament for Ottawa-Centre, Cabinet Minister for Environment and Climate Change

People speak with Ottawa Centre MP Catherine McKenna outside the city's main mosque on Friday, March 15, 2019. McKenna was among those who gathered at the mosque to offer support and condolences following fatal shootings at two mosques in New Zealand earlier in the day. (Stu Mills/CBC)

Anything can be politicized for advantage. And the current Liberal-led government of Justin Trudeau is immensely thankful that there is no cessation of dire, gruesome events on the world stage that can be used to divert public attention and politically polarize Canadians at a critical time for the prime minister and his cabinet, facing down charges of political interference in Canadian justice, among other instances of a government that feels entitled under the Liberal banner to exercise its eternal penchant for corruption.

No one would deny that the horrible death of 49 innocent people and the wounding of scores more at the hands of a hateful racist does not qualify as an atrocity that all decent people decry. In the Western zeal to prove how compassionate we are, news media fill their pages with mournful stories of the losses of ordinary people going about their ordinary lives peacefully only to have those lives violently interrupted, a community left in grief and disbelief. The inordinate focus on an event that occurs daily in the Muslim world in fact, but because it happened in a Western setting, outrage is spontaneous.

Grief and disbelief is without doubt how communities in Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Nigeria and elsewhere in the world of Muslim-majority countries feel when Islamists target Muslims and Christians and ethnic groups and other religions whom they find offensive to Islam in a jihadist blow to fulfill obligations of their faith. So the very people of Muslim faith in Ottawa who claim disbelief that a 'sanctuary' can be defiled by slaughter appear not to give a thought to fellow Muslims targeted by Islamist terrorists while themselves at prayer.

New Zealand is a long way away from Canada. Psychotic incidents of hate-filled non-Muslim psychopaths are rare. Similar events carried out by Islamist fundamentalists the world over are somewhat less rare, their victims far more numerous. While jihadists target those of their own faith in their ongoing sectarian dissonance of violent hatred, they also target Western non-Muslim communities and therefore represent a threat to the entire globe. Jihadist assaults throughout Africa, Asia and the West are numerous.

Yet to point this out, to criticize Islam for being a base of religion-inspired violence in the name of an ancient pledge to conquer the world on behalf of the Prophet Mohammad's Allah, is to engender accusations of 'Islamophobia'. Relatively few courageous Muslims exist around the world who will commit themselves to efforts to initialize a global move by Islam to reform itself, to search for a much needed enlightenment, to turn its followers away from the violence that its sacred writings espouse.

But those that do, become instant traitors to Islam, they are besieged with hatred, they become victims of assassination, they have fatwas issued against them, and they must employ security measures such as bodyguards to ensure their deaths not be hastened as punishment for the clarity of their thoughts on human rights and justice. Their very presence on earth is viewed as anathema to the clerics and intellectuals, and leaders of Islam.

When Islam no longer reminds its followers of their divine obligation to martyrdom on behalf of Islam, when Muslims understand that non-Muslims are just as worthy of living as they are, when Muslim-majority countries permit other religions freedom to practise the tenets of their faith without persecution, isolation and threats of violent attack, and finally when the Muslim majority rejects the current status of jihad as the major thrust of their faith and demands it be withdrawn, they will diffuse the suspicion, resentment and fear their religion has aroused in others.

Hate Crimes in Canada

"It's obviously disturbing and alarming [increase in racist attacks]. But we have to remember the vast majority of Canadians are exceptionally tolerant and welcoming and accepting to minorities of all kinds."
"It's tricky [establishing a national strategy on hate crimes, particularly online]." But when people are engaged in really vociferous rhetoric online, that can also fuel and foreshadow violence off line, so we have to curb it."
Andrea Freedman, president of the Jewish Federation of Ottawa

"We were obviously surprised by the data, and not really surprised."
"It [the Muslim society's own tracking mechanism for racist attacks] doesn't track crimes based on their perceived identities."
"Islamophobia doesn't just target Muslims. It targets people perceived to be Muslim, like Sikhs, Christian Arabs and those from Southeast Asian communities."
Ihsaan Gardee, executive director, National Council of Canadian Muslims 

People hold up a signs during a demonstration to oppose motion M103 in Montreal, Saturday, March 4, 2017.
THE CANADIAN PRESS IMAGES/Graham Hughes

The latest report out by Statistics Canada on hate crimes taking place throughout the country in 2017 contained few surprises. That there would be a jump, although it is even so well known that up to 2/3 of total hate crimes that occur are not even reported, was expected. Casual narratives of ongoing incidents attest to the constant presence of prejudice, hostility and hatred directed against certain groups in society. Blacks in Canada have experienced incidents of prejudice since forever and continue to, accounting for 16 percent of all hate crimes reported in 2017. They characterize the most common race-, or ethnicity-related hate crime.

A doubling of incidents directed at Muslims was seen between 2016 and 2017. There were 139 incidents of hate crimes in 2015 and that number had soared to 349 the following year after an initial decline for that population group. The overall percentage of such crimes directed against Muslims in Canada represent 17 percent of the total, as opposed to 16 percent for Blacks. And then there is the perennial, most-favoured-by-racists target, the Jewish population accounting for 18 percent of all nationwide hate crimes; the second consecutive year of increases identifying Jews as the most targeted victims of hate crimes.

Jews, and undoubtedly Muslims and Blacks as well, must take steps to ensure security in high-profile gathering places such as synagogues and community centres where attacks are most common by employing electronic security measures along with hiring security guards. In a country like Canada, one which was built on immigration and where a general consensus exists that people of various backgrounds have traditionally integrated and accepted one another it is all the more shocking that the pernicious persistence of such incidents occur, grow in numbers and continue to threaten.

Police forces across the country dealt with a record number of hate crimes in 2017, Statistics Canada data found. Here, anti-Semitic graffiti that was spray painted on the door of The Glebe Minyan in Ottawa in 2016 is cleaned up. (Justin Tang/The Canadian Press)

Yet a more comprehensive Statistics Canada victimization survey dating from 2014 found respondents to be victims of over 330,00 incidents believed by those suffering them to have been motivated by hate; and two-thirds of such incidents failed to be reported to police. Even so Statistics Canada feels that their records showing substantial increases year over year may be the result of a growing tendency to report, and perhaps not indicate an increase in incidents.

Nowhere in the report is there the merest hint of a suggestion that while Muslims speak constantly of "Islamophobia", inclusive of any kind of criticism of Islam, or reference to terrorism and Islam in one breath, many among them have indulged in slanderous campaigns against the state of Israel, bringing Middle East politics to Canada, and by extension impacting deleteriously on the lives of Jews in Canada through their all-inclusive campaigns. And if those campaigns don't qualify as hate campaigns, what would?

From establishing "Palestinian" friendship clubs on university campuses, to staging anti-Israel protests and campaigning against Jewish students who are Zionists as enabling a purported "Apartheid" regime, the vicious slanders fomenting hatred sweep Jewish students and their families into the wide-ranging anti-Semitism launched by Muslim-Canadian groups influencing non-Muslim leftists to swell the numbers of "anti-Zionist" anti-Semites clamouring against Zionism and isolating Canadian Jews.

One of the most active chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine, at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology, organizing anti-Israel campaigns and events throughout the year (SJP at UOIT/DC Facebook page)

The incidents of Islamofascist terrorist attacks whenever and wherever opportunities arise more than adequately demonstrates a seriously dysfunctional Islam that threatens security and stability wherever Muslims have migrated, fail to integrate and agitate for Sharia law, threatening to Islamicize whichever European, North American or Asian country they infiltrate in astonishing numbers fulfilling their obligation to Islam's injunction to its faithful to jihad.

It's hardly surprising under those conditions that fear and resentment at the presence of Muslims who ghettoize themselves in Islamic communities, inspire in the surrounding population. A search of any daily newspaper where Muslims have congregated rewards by the appearance of Arab or Muslims names attached to crime reports of gangs and violence, disproportionate to their numbers in society. Little wonder that distrust and fear is the result, among the general population.

As for Jews, law-abiding, proud of their Canadian citizenship, leaders of industry, valuing  higher education, reaching out to the wider population base to build bridges, nothing seems enough to convince some bigots that their suspicion, fear and hatred has no rational basis. The result of which is that despite making an effort to be model citizens, reflecting a cultural, social proclivity to just that, there seems to be no successful way to convince detractors that in detesting the presence of Jews they expose their innate racist malice.

Numbered Days for French Jews

Anti-Israel Protesters Rally Across France, Defying Ban Imposed After Synagogue Clash    Protesters run by a fire barricade near the aerial metro station of Barbes-Rochechouart, in Paris, on July 19, 2014.  AFP

"From 2012 through 2016 France has suffered from a significant increase in the number of anti-Jewish hate crimes and their severity; part of an increase in anti-Jewish attacks across most of Western Europe and increased expressions of anti-Jewish racism and bigotry. France has Europe’s largest Jewish population, estimated at between 500,000 and 600,000 individuals. Attacks against Jews in France have been particularly violent and more frequently so than in other European countries. This climate of aggression against Jews remains ongoing and at high levels without precedent in the post World War II era. "
"The report [by Human Rights First] explains that the rise in anti-Semitism is fueled in part by the marginalization of French Muslims, immigrants, and French citizens hailing from the Middle East, North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa who, 'also suffer from hate crimes, prejudice, and discrimination that arises in an environment in which racist, xenophobic, and antisemitic discourse is on the rise.' The report notes that social media directed at marginalized French Arabs and Muslims scapegoats Jews, depicting them as powerful, wealthy, domineering, and evil, and the cause of Arab and Muslim marginalization. It also acknowledges that traditional media plays a role in exacerbating the pejorative anti Jewish stereotypes and incitement to hatred against Jews found in social media. The report states, 'The impact of this antisemitic content is further intensified by certain media coverage of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict as well as fierce anti-establishment and far left-wing criticism of Israeli policies in France'."
Noam Schimmel, senior fellow, Oxford University: French Responses to Anti-Jewish Racism, Bigotry and Discrimination: The 'Loneliness' of French Jews -- published Humanity in Action

People participate in a unity rally after the murder of French Holocaust survivor Mireille Knoll in Paris. (photo credit: GONZALO FUENTES / REUTERS)

"What you've got to understand is that there is a sort of obsession, fantasized around the position that Jews hold in the French republic, that develops as a kind of resentment, a jealousy."
"And then there is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which gives the whole thing its energy."
Rachid Benzine, French-Moroccan political scientist 

"Antisemitism is not a Jewish affair, it is everyone’s. [France has] become a theater of murderous antisemitism."
"When a prime minister at the National Assembly declares, with the applause of every country, that France without Jews is no longer France, it does not feel like a beautiful, consolatory phrase, but a solemn warning [February speech by Prime Minister Edouard Philippe on the floor of the French parliament after the assault of an eight-year-old Jewish boy attacked for wearing a kippa] France is experiencing] a new form of brutal and violent antisemitism."
"Why the silence? It is because radical Islam is considered exclusively by some of the elite French parties as an expression of social revolt... because the old antisemitism of the extreme Right is added to the antisemitism of the radical Left, which has found anti-Zionism as their alibi for transforming the executioners of Jews as victims in society."
"[Verses of the Koran advocating violence against Jews should] be struck from the theological authorities... so that no believer may rely on this sacred text to commit a crime."
"We ask that the fight against the democratic weakness that is antisemitism will become a national cause before it is too late. Before France is no longer France."
Manifesto penned by 250 French intellectual signatories

The Marais neighbourhood in Paris. Nearly 40 percent of racially or religiously motivated acts of violence were committed against Jews in 2017, though at 500,000 people they make up less than 1 percent of France’s population.  Credit Guia Besana for The New York Times

On the streets of the 17th Arrondissement in Paris there is a new assortment of kosher grocery shops and restaurants. Only a few synagogues existed there two decades earlier, but now there are fifteen. This part of northwestern Paris has become, for French Jews, a tactical retreat toward safety and security, a haven for French Jews who face harassment in areas they once populated but which now host growing Muslim populations. They move to the 17th Arrondissement from Paris suburbs where "anti-Semitism is pretty high" in the words of 28-year-old Joanna Galilli.

The "new anti-Semitism" has stimulated a lively debate in recent months, over how its corrosive and dangerous presence should be addressed. Close to 40 percent of violent incidents classified as racially or religiously motivated took place in 2017 against the Jews of France. Representing less than one percent of France's population, anti-Semitic acts increased by 20 percent from 2016, a rise of events that the French Interior Ministry characterized as "pre-occupying"; most certainly so if you're a Jewish target.

The protests united campaigners from all walks of life, but many want to know how politicians plan to combat anti-Semitism

From 2011 forward the French government no longer categorized those responsible for anti-Semitic attacks. Up to then, the largest group identified as perpetrators according to researchers, were Muslims. Flare-ups between Israel and the Palestinians were seen to spark violent spikes in France. With the larges population in Europe of both Jews and Muslims, and where Muslims are faced with discrimination in employment opportunities and in police treatment, they turn to Jews as being responsible for their condition in France.

Fearing that one side will be increasingly pitted against the other, even acknowledging that a dynamic where Muslim-versus-Jew exists leads French authorities to bypass mentioning the two communities in one breath. This would constitute an incitement, contrary to a central tenet of French social ideology, that people not be categorized by race or religion, referenced only as fellow citizens, all equal before the law. "But this doesn't correspond to reality. All the politicians speak of living together. And yet, instead, we have de facto groupings based on culture and community", observed pollster Jerome Fourquet.

A synagogue in Sarcelles. Tens of thousands of Jews have left the peripheries of Paris and Lyon, where Muslim populations are rising, and have retrenched in neighborhoods with larger Jewish populations. CreditCapucine Granier-Deferre pour The New York Times

The phrase "new anti-Semitism" offends Muslim leaders who argue that the phrase places broad blame on Muslims, pointing out that within France's estimated six to ten million Muslim population, hate crimes have also increased from 2016 to 2017. This is a typical Muslim counter-attack, to claim themselves victimized as a shield against acknowledging their propensity to victimize Jews. As though to say within the Muslim community, 'if we are to be victimized, then we will victimize the Jews', as though this illogic is a defence of the indefensible.

French Jews for whom France will always be their home, have decided in their tens of thousands and with great reluctance, to leave the country in the face of increasing violence and the growing prevalence of a fraught Muslim presence where Jews have traditionally lived in France. Many have moved internally, leaving the peripheries of Paris and Lyon, where the rise of Muslims in the population has led to threats against Jews. French Jews retrench in neighbourhoods hosting larger Jewish populations; feeling there is comfort in strength of numbers for a Jewish population one-tenth the size of their Muslim counterparts.

Numerous French intellectuals -- Jews and non-Jews -- signed a manifesto, warning of a "silent ethnic purge", calling on Muslims to renounce anti-Semitic Koranic verses. A recommendation that infuriates Muslim leaders, one of whom responded: "People leave because they have reached another economic level". Some Muslims feel discriminated against in French society, particularly in citizenship, believing Jews enjoy better treatment by far than Muslims, according to French political scientist, Rachid Benzine.

A memorial to Mireille Knoll, an 85-year-old Jewish woman stabbed to death in Paris last month. Photograph: Lionel Bonaventure/AFP/Getty Images

Righteous Idiocy on Dysfunctional Immigration

"We definitely showed them that Halifax won't stand for xenophobia and Islamophobia."
"We showed them that we stand together as a community today, that we stand with all our neighbours."
Jessica Dueling, politically-correct, 'progressive' activist, Halifax, Nova Scotia

"The original booking was made by an individual for a private function."
"When RCL [Royal Canadian Legion] Branch 27 learned that the booking was intended as a town hall meeting for the National Citizens Alliance, the booking was cancelled."
Valerie Mitchell-Veinotte, executive director, Nova Scotia/Nunavut Command, RCL 

"We apologize to anyone who may have felt unsafe at the Grand Street Parade [Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival] because of this political party's attendance and derogatory messaging."
Organizers, Kentville, N.S festival

"They're the ones dividing people. If we offended people, that's their problem, not ours."
"As far as we're concerned, we probably added some nice spice to the festival."
Stephen Garvey, leader, National Citizens Alliance

"[The National Citizens Alliance's core tenet is a] strong, no-nonsense immigration policy that puts the well-being and safety of the Canadian people first, and implementing a temporary pause and substantial reduction in immigration."
National Citizens Alliance

The National Citizens Alliance marched in the 86th Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival in Kentville, N.S., on May 26, 2018  
National Citizens Alliance/Facebook

So those in Canada who believe they have a right as citizens with a stake in the future of the country, to express their opinion on a sensitive topic such as who they will share the country with, are brought to the reality of the prevailing situation where 'progressives', led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau are free to champion their idea of the future of Canada, but thoughtful conservatives may not. Those who argue against an open immigration system with little attention given to the fact that some cultures and religions are resistant to integrating civilly with those of the West are given short shrift.

The supporters of entry to Canada of a religious group that has more than amply demonstrated over the past several decades their religious devotion to forcing their own beliefs on others at pain of death may express their wishes; those opposed may not. This is not only idiocy of the first rank, but it is illegal under Canadian law where the right to free speech is lionized as a basic human right, and all Canadian citizens are guaranteed their rights under the legal framework of an egalitarian social order.

When Calgary-based National Citizens Alliance attempted to rent meeting space in Halifax they were refused by no fewer than three locations, all of which identified them as 'far right' and fascist. They were forced to meet in a public space, a local park, and when they appeared to take part in their arranged location they were hounded by protesters, some of whom became not only verbally but physically violent, leading the two sides into a shouting match with police on the sidelines.

What makes the NCA racist and fascist? Its promotion of "integration" of new arrivals to embrace "basic cultural norms of Canada". Given the Canadian experience, mirrored by the experiences known to have occurred and are ongoing across Europe and elsewhere by the introduction of Islam and Muslims into Western society in great numbers, the group believes that political correctness threatens the identity and culture of Canada.

Leader of the NCA Stephen Garvey, can argue till the cows come home that the characterization of the alliance is not only wrong but slanderous, and no one in his party issues hateful comments, nor have any of them given rein to hate speech. He assures his critics that his group will not tolerate racism, but was intent on taking part in normal activities just as other political parties do, to make themselves seen and heard, the basic function of any such group.

The reaction to the presence and the message of this group is reflected in what happens across the country, including the nation's capital, where as an example, federal NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan protested over the tenor of a letter sent from Canadian immigration to an applicant in Pakistan which questions the legitimacy of her claim to marriage for purposes of immigration. The letter, she sputters, is "offensive and insulting". When in fact, it reflects cultural Pakistani norms to question the authenticity of the applicant's claim making her eligible for permanent residency.

The experience of the Immigration Department leads it to use methods of interrogation in reflection of cultural norms elsewhere that are not compatible with those making application for entry to Canada use to state their case. Particularly when it's well known that false marriages are often used to gain entrance to Canada by those who would otherwise not be eligible. "Our department continues to uphold measures to safeguard against marriage fraud and other program integrity risks", was the Department's response.

Supporting Immigrants : Spurning Nationalists

"I was born in '58, and both of my parents were marked by the Nazi period. The older I get, the more I understand how traumatized my father, in particular, was."
"Today, seventy years later, you have the feeling for the first time that history could repeat itself. That's not out of the question."
Raif Teepe, German foreign service, bookstore client

"I think in the next few years we are going to need to not just 'protest' against, but really come up with a 'for'. What do we want in our society?"
"We wanted to take back the public space. At a certain point, you just have to do something."
Jorg Braunsdorf, proprietor, independent bookshop, Tucholsky Bookstore

Tucholsky Bookstore helped organize protests against right-wing extremists last month. Credit Gordon Welters for The New York Times

Mr. Braunsdorf's bookstore is a neighbourhood installation, much frequented by the people living there. The area in Berlin is known as the old Jewish quarter. The street the bookshop is located on is named after a German-Jewish writer of some renown who in the 1930s wrote critically of the new fascist movement in Germany. His name was Kurt Tucholsky and the street was named in his honour. When Mr. Braunsdorf opened his bookshop he thought it appropriate to name the shop after Mr. Tucholsky and he maintains a section in his shop dedicated to the author's work.

Mr. Braunsdorf was offended and angered when in 2016 a group of 'right-wing extremists' marched through his neighbourhood in a free-speech expression of nationalism. In speaking with his customers who were also his neighbours a general consensus of anger against the entitlement of the fascist movement to express its rancid message of hatred through the old Jewish quarter gripped them. And Mr. Braunsdorf went into consultation with his neighbours and they conceived of a counter-march plan.

Meant to inform the marchers in no uncertain terms that their loathsome message was not appreciated, and they had no business littering their street with their hate propaganda and their wretched presence so reminiscent of the dreadful past. They looked elsewhere also for support and linked with "Berlin Against Nazis" group targeting racism and anti-Semitism.

One customer said that he visits Tucholsky Bookstore once a week, in lieu of church, for spiritual enrichment. Credit Gordon Welters for The New York Times

Posters were designed along with fliers and three protest stations were set up along the route the marchers were taking, to be manned by some among the 200 to 300 people who showed up to demonstrate solidarity. They brought spoons to bang on pots and pans. The rise of groups such as the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West and Alternatives for Germany (AfD) has convinced ordinary Germans that the far right is making inroads they would prefer they not do.

The 58-year-old Mr. Braunsdorf is an agreeable man who considers himself and his shop to be something more than merely a purveyor of books. He hosts readings at his shop and has done so for refugee children with German-Arabic reading events. As well as moderating meetings on subjects as diverse as gentrification, the economy, politics, saying he "can't imagine running a bookstore just as a selling point".

Neighbors gather at Tucholsky Bookstore to discuss topics such as gentrification and how to respond to neo-Nazi marches. Credit Gordon Welters for The New York Times

For hundreds of years German Jews prided themselves on how seamlessly they integrated into German society. They considered themselves German first, Jews after. They felt secure in Germany, it was a country they loved and considered themselves an integral part of. Until the National Socialist Party took it all away, bit by bit and then entirely, including their lives. None of which could have happened without the compliance of the German public.

So it is very nice to see now that Germany is willing to be so inclusive as to introduce another ethnic and religious group to be given free reign to prosper and to multiply in numbers that Jews never achieved. And whereas Jews were content to be Germans, the new immigrants, refugees and migrants seek to achieve a milestone of their own, the Islamification of Germany, stifling its native culture with their own.

File:Hitler with Catholic dignitaries.jpg - Wikimedia Commons

commons.wikimedia.org

But there are those like the good Germans living in what was once the Jewish quarter who are swift to come to the defense of the immigrants, the refugees and the migrants, willing and eager to aid them in any way conceivable, and to counter the ill intentions of the nationalist Germans who unaccountably press for a Germany for Germans. It is, of course, the Jews remaining in Germany who are now increasingly targeted with anti-Semitism by Islam. As they are throughout Europe.

Where Nazi Germany once occupied Europe and succeeded in exterminating six million Jews, millions of Muslims now occupy Europe and many among them promise that they are more than capable of aspiring to finish what Nazi Germany never quite completed. And that would be the ambition to conquer Europe and to rid it entirely of any Jewish presence.

The Night of Broken Glass
On November 9, 1938, Jewish people in Germany and German-controlled territories were beaten, arrested and killed. Synagogues were burned and Jewish businesses were vandalized. In most cases, the police made no effort to control the mobs that carried out these crimes. Bettmann / Corbis

“I think in the next years we are going to need to not just protest ‘against,’ but really come up with a ‘for,’” he said. “What do we want, in our society?”Read more: https://forward.com/culture/398534/berlin-bookstore-owner-anti-nazi-protest-organizer/

“I think in the next years we are going to need to not just protest ‘against,’ but really come up with a ‘for,’” he said. “What do we want, in our society?”Read more: https://forward.com/culture/398534/berlin-bookstore-owner-anti-nazi-protest-organizer/

Optics Vs Reality: Migrating Islamist Fundamentalism

"Saudi Arabia's export of the rigid, bigoted, patriarchal, fundamentalist strain of Islam known as Wahhabism has fuelled global extremism and contributed to terrorism."
"[It is deplorable that] radical schools and mosques around the world [exist] that have set too many young people on a path towards extremism."
New York Times 2016 expose

"In each place I visited, the Wahhabi influence was an insidious presence, changing the local sense of identity; displacing historic, culturally vibrant forms of Islamic practice; and pulling along individuals who were either paid to follow their rules or custodians of the Wahhabi world view."
"Funding all this was Saudi money, which paid for things like the textbooks, mosques, TV stations and the training of Imams."
Farah Pandith, U.S. special representative to Muslim communities, U.S. Department of State

WikiLeaks documents involving cables between diplomats at the Saudi embassy in Ottawa and government officials in Riyadh, contain conversations from 2012 and 2013 about a $211,000 donation to a school in Ottawa and $134,000 to a school in Mississauga.  Dave Chan/The Globe and Mail

"There were also small signals that all was not well with the Muslim communities in Canada, especially those of Pakistani origin. For example, the mother of one of my children’s classmates of Pakistani origin, asked me why my kids sang the Canadian national anthem when it is haram, forbidden. Upon asking where she got that information, she confessed that the imam of the local mosque had told the congregation that it was against the faith to sing the national anthem, or, indeed, to show loyalty to Canada."
Raheel Raza, Pakistani Canadian, Writer, Activist

Special representative Farah Pandith toured 80 countries between 2009 to 2014 in pursuing her official mandate. Her conclusion after all that she had seen and experienced was that the Saudi influence succeeded in destroying 'tolerant' Islamic traditions. Of course, Saudi Arabia is not alone in this deliberate, institutional religiously ideological pursuit of normalizing extreme-to-radical Islam in countries around the world, particularly those in the West. The Muslim Brotherhood has succeeded to an alarming degree in infiltrating all levels of national government in the West in pursuit of establishing their own, and very similar brand of Islamism.

Moreover, although fundamentalist jihadi groups like Hamas and Hezbollah are identified as terrorist groups and listed as such on various government terror lists, they too are known to have a substantial presence abroad for the purpose of propaganda, enlistment and wealth-gathering, both through 'charitable' donations and through the substantial proceeds of criminal activities such as illicit drug dealing and weapons smuggling.

The schools (madrassas), community centers, mosques and other gathering points for Muslims abroad that have been built with foreign funding by countries whose agendas are to create a foundational space in the West for the proliferation of fundamentalist Islamic values have a defined purpose, to instill in followers the sense of Islamic entitlement to help alter the fundamental values of the nations they have migrated to, and challenge the indigenous laws while stifling the social culture with their own.

In Canada, the national security policy has seen fit to establish the Canada Centre for Community Engagement and Prevention of Violence; at the present time, a hollow sham under the Liberal government. An opposition Member of Parliament and former federal Minister in the previous Conservative-led government has introduced Bill C-371, the Prevention of Radicalization through Foreign Funding Act, now moving through Parliament and slated for a second reading vote a month hence, representing long-overdue legislation in the making.

The Bill would allow Canada the establishment of a list of foreign states meeting specific criteria; those who promote obvious forms of religious intolerance, and/or those who engage in activities supporting radicalization. All Canadian religious, cultural and educational institutions, should that Bill result in legislation making it legal, would be prohibited from accepting funding from listed foreign governments. Receiving funding from individuals and entities linked to those states would also fall under its restrictive provisions.

For fairly obvious reasons an exception clause would list a number of other countries reflecting Canada's own liberal democratic values; countries that include the United States, France, the United Kingdom, and Israel would have listing immunity, among others. The Bill itself is an acknowledgement of the faulty permission of Canadian educational, religious and cultural institutions being influenced by foreign states that promote extremist ideologies. Canada's open, pluralist society is being subverted by these financial infusions in support of Islamist exceptionalism.

The Iranian Revolutionary Republic Islamist regime was invited by the previous Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper to exit Canada, closing its embassy while withdrawing the Canadian mission and its diplomats from Tehran. The current prime minister, Justin Trudeau, has stated aspirations of reversing that situation, re-establishing the Canadian mission in Tehran and inviting Iran's Ayatollahs to re-open their embassy in Ottawa.

The Khomeinist ideology which today rules Iran as a theocratic totalitarian government was fully involved in building networks sympathetic to its creed through the funding of religious institutions, schools and cultural centres within Canada. Two such Iranian cultural centres, one in Ottawa, the other in Toronto were seized in 2014 and their assets distributed to victims of terrorist attacks which Iran's proxy militia, the terrorist Hezbollah group had mounted on Iran's instructions, as a sponsor of Islamist terrorism.

While solving the problem of radicalization will remain a dilemma that alert governments must continue to confront, Bill C-371 can become a useful tool in blocking those maleficent influences within Canada. The Bill is there, it remains for the ruling Liberal government to affirm its intention to protect Canadians from ongoing terrorism in the name of Islam, by voting in favour of C-371 at its second reading.

It may be too late for France, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and others to mount a defense against full Muslim conquest of their traditions, values and laws, but Canada, it is to be  hoped, still has time in its favour, but certainly not forever....

A case in point is Turkey's belligerent interest in the presence of German-Turks resident in Germany.  Both Turkey and Saudi Arabia have spent billions constructing countless mosques servicing Muslims throughout Germany, and the sermons that come out of those mosques are definitely not geared to persuading German-Turks that they should render unto Caesar; rather than persuading Muslims to defer to German values, culture and laws.

Religious leaders in those mosques preach Islamist values and Sharia law, contrary to the citizenship of German Turks, who then turn around and complain they don't feel  'accepted' as equals in Germany, they feel alienated from its general society. Irascible, bellicose Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan feels entitled from time to time to scaldingly berate German authorities for mistreating Turkish Germans, brooking no interference in his own propensity to interfere in German politics.

Here's hoping Canada can do better.

Islamist Exceptionalism and Privileges of Victimhood

"Islamophobia refers to fear, prejudice, hatred or dislike directed against Islam or Muslims, or towards Islamic politics or culture."
Toronto District School Board definition of Islamophobia.

"The debate about “Canadian values” — started by Kellie Leitch, one of the candidates for the leadership of the Conservative Party — erupted into the predictable insinuation that she was racist, xenophobic and guilty of the ultimate offence of the times: Islamophobia."
"Fortunately, for her, it did not take long for the question of Canadian values clashing head on with medieval beliefs to erupt when the Globe and Mail on Tuesday reported on how a number of Muslim families in Toronto had taken their children out of music classes, insisting they 'cannot allow their children to be in the same room where musical instruments are being played'."
"The story revolved around Mohammad Nouman Dasu, a Quran teacher at Scarborough’s Jame Abu Bakr Siddique mosque, who led the campaign to ban Muslim students from being exposed to music.
It wasn’t just him. The senior imam of the mosque, Kasim Ingar, told the Globe and Mail: 'We [Muslims] here believe that music is haram [forbiddenl]. We can neither listen to it, nor can we play a role in it."
"Imam Ingar, who also heads the Scarborough Muslim Association, added: 'We do not compromise with anyone on the clear-cut orders and principles conveyed by the Prophet [Muhammad]'."
Tarek Fatah, Journalist, The Toronto Sun

Dear Prime Minister:
Re: Designating January 29th as the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Islamophobia
On behalf of the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM), I am writing to you about the upcoming first anniversary of the Quebec City mosque attack that will take place on January 29, 2018.
One year on, Canadian Muslim communities are still reeling from the devastating terrorist attack that claimed the lives of six Muslim men worshipping in their mosque – fathers, husbands and sons – and gravely injured many others. For the first time in Canadian history, a place of worship was targeted by a horrific act of violence solely because the victims were Muslims.
The question on so many minds is how do we prevent such a violent hate-motivated attack targeting Canadian Muslims, or any other religious community, from ever occurring again?
With the rise of far-right extremist groups that continue to threaten the safety of Canadian Muslim institutions and congregations, it is critical that our elected leaders stand firmly against Islamophobia and the agents of bigotry who aim to foment hateful division between Canadians and their fellow Muslim citizens. We must not allow voices of hate, even ones that may initially appear to be on the margins, to permeate our public discourse and damage our social fabric.
As you have eloquently stated, in these difficult times we must always remember the bonds of unity as Canadians and protect the diverse and open nature of our society.
To that end, we call on your government to designate, by order-in-council or by proclamation, January 29th as a National Day of Remembrance and Action on Islamophobia, on or before the first anniversary. This call is supported by a host of other Canadian Muslim organizations and community partners, listed below.
Such a designation will enable Canadians to collectively remember the victims of the attack and to enhance public education about the perils of hate, bigotry and Islamophobia.
We look forward to your response to this important issue. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Ihsaan Gardee
Executive Director
National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM)

Azzedine Najd and his wife Fadwa Achmaoui look at the memorial near the site of a fatal shooting at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City on January 31, 2017. Reuters/Mathieu Belanger

One thing invariably leads to another ... give them an inch and they'll ask for a mile ... these old adages in observation of human nature and group identity agendas have never rung more true than with Islamic organizations and groups within non-Muslim societies agitating for exceptional recognition reflecting the very reality which they set conveniently aside, that Muslims following strict Koranic codas are never amenable to living under secular laws that prevail in most non-Muslim countries. 

Groups that argue they speak in the name of national Muslim communities such as the National Council of Canadian Muslims (CAIR Canada) which once urged for Sharia law to be recognized and given equal status to Canadian law, and which later orchestrated a motion brought by Liberal MP Iqra Khalid to parliament to "condemn Islamophobia and all forms of systemic racism and religious discrimination", and to follow up by mounting a government study to document hate crimes against Muslims in Canada, now have another goal.

The NCCM or as it was once known before a name change, as CAIRCan, has written a request to the prime minister to have the federal government declare January 29 to be the first anniversary of an attack on a Quebec City mosque that killed six worshippers and injured others, naming it a "National Day of Remembrance and Action on Islamophobia". This is the same group that obligingly gave the 'appropriate' wording to a definition of Islamophobia for the Toronto District School Board's guidebook to Islamic Heritage Month.

You might ask why the Toronto District School Board would even have a guidebook to Islamic Heritage, much less recognize a month set aside for that purpose. But doing so would reveal your ignorance about the power of lobbying, and the overwhelming aura of political correctness that has assailed all educational institutions in Canada, from elementary schools up to post-secondary institutions, identifying any who question Islamic precepts and Muslim behaviour as "racist".

In the Muslim community anywhere in the world there are notable instances of 'honour' bullying and sometimes killing of girls and women who have disobeyed the injunction to be 'modest', to cover their hair with a hijab, not to associate with boys or men other than family, for to do so is seen as dissolute, dishonourable, injurious to the reputation of the family, the tribe, the religion and the culture. But the Muslim community takes umbrage at mention of any such atrocities.

Just as it gathers itself indignantly into victimhood when the connection is made as it must be, between Islam and injunctions to jihad leading to terrorist attacks both within the Islamic community when sectarian brutalities and killings occur, and without the Islamic community targeting the West, its culture, its politics its values, its very existence in martyrdom attacks. To mention any connection between Islam and terrorism is tantamount to Islamophobia, racism, discriminatory hatred writ large.

Why it has been so relatively simple a task for groups such as the NCCM to guilt Western societies into silence over Islamist excesses and violent attacks is one of those mysterious episodes of human nature gone awry, that those who have much to answer for insist that others do the answering. Canada acknowledges with sincere empathetic sorrow that a sole individual acted on a psychotic impulse to enter a mosque and kill worshippers.

This horrific event represents a one-off; not a terrorist attack, but an attack by someone clearly unhinged for reasons unknown to the public. And this man will stand trial for his dreadful misdeed, but the entire population of the country has no need to do penance, at the behest of the NCCM. Remembrance of the event will be sharp within the Muslim community, and it will fade within the rest of society as other wretched events move in to take its place in our consciousness.

The NCCM is Islamic-centric and it is understandable they wish to keep their memory alive. Due to their agenda to make inroads into the Canadian consciousness, politics, society at large to view Islam as exceptional, a memory fog would be well suited to make Islamist crimes against society opaque and forgotten, while the view of Islam as a martyr to non-Muslim misunderstanding of it as a religion of peace requires the rectification of highlighting the Muslim community as persecuted.

It is not, necessarily, any more than the gay community, the Jewish community, the Black community and the Asian community. The latest figures released by Statistics Canada register a diminished number of anti-Muslim events in Canada, while anti-Semitic incidences have risen. In no small part due to the venom expressed by the increasing number of Muslims who migrate to Canada bringing with them their tradition of anti-Semitism bolstered by passages in the Koran, refreshed at Friday mosque sermons.

Moral Destitution and the Absolution of Time

"Germans are the only people in the world who plant a monument of shame in the heart of the capital."
"[Germany needs to perform a] 180-degree turnaround [in remembering its past, to produce an exorcism of penance for the Holocaust]."
"This laughable policy of coming to terms with the past is crippling us. There were no German victims any more, only German perpetrators."
"[Any suggestion I have criticized the Holocaust memorial is] a malicious and deliberately denigratory interpretation of what I actually said. In my Dresden speech I wanted to ask how we Germans look at our history."
Bjorn Hocke, history teacher, Bornhagen local chief, Alternative for Germany [AfD]

Björn Höcke (centre) marches with AfD members in Raguhn (Getty)

The German protest party that is appealing to Germans to reject the presence of foreign refugees and migrants flooding into the country and welcomed by German Chancellor Angela Merkel is described as a 'far-right' party, grooming itself on the fascistic model of Nazi Germany, responsible for the mass murder of millions of Jews, political prisoners, Roma, homosexuals and communists. It pains this man that a memorial to the Holocaust has been erected in Berlin, the capital of his nation. Most memorials cater to pride in one's country; this one has been built to mourn the depths of human depravity that Germany succumbed to.

Agreed, it is a tediously tiresome thing to keep recalling the death camps, slave labour, the occupation of the German military throughout the conquered states of Europe, the conflict, the losses that humanity suffered, all because one country was overtaken by a malignant demagogue who visualized Germany as a conquering nation of superheroes ruling the world; judge and executioner of those the Third Reich deemed degraded and disposable, the mentally defective, the crippled, those infected with a nuisance ideology; above all those who could be identified as members of the Jewish race, as though nature herself differentiated her racialized humans.

"We wanted to remind Mr. Hocke that he can turn German history however much he likes, it doesn't change." 
"[People like Mr. Hocke deserve] not one millimeter [of attention or trust]."
"He broke the mother of all taboos, he challenged the founding narrative of modern Germany and he got away with it."
"We are doing our neighbourly duty. We hope he enjoys the view every day when he looks out the window."
Philipp Ruch, co-founder, Center for Political Beauty artist collective, Berlin 

A version of Berlin’s Holocaust Memorial built by a German political art group next to the home of Björn Höcke. Photograph: Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters

Mr. Ruch and his group set out to teach Mr. Hocke a bit of a lesson on his home turf, the village of Bornhagen, a peaceful location where residents live in social harmony, irrespective of their ideological beliefs. And for the most part accepting the shame that Germany earned in 1939-45 with its wartime agenda of a Thousand-Year Reich, its pride in the purity of the German volk, and its contempt for the lesser mortals in Europe, the despicable halt and the lame, its jetsam and flotsam of humanity cluttering the landscape begging for the Final Solution. In Bornhagen, supporters of Germany's Greens make no social distinction between themselves and supporters of the AfD: "We don't talk about politics", said one villager.

It is Mr. Hocke's misfortune that it grieves him that his beloved Germany holds itself to account for its terrible misdeeds, for he feels that there has been shame and repentance enough, that Germans need to feel pride in themselves, their culture, their heritage, now being assailed by the presence of an alien culture, heritage and religion, one which, like Nazi Germany itself, has expressed its sacred duty to conquer the world with another ideology, Islamofascism. Mr. Hocke feels horrified that what fascist Germany imposed on others, Islam is now imposing on all; its very own conquest by stealth of migration.

The irony here is that Germany did make its 180-degree turn. Reluctantly at first, it has taken to doing its penance. The Jewish "never to forget" has become the German obligation taken on itself, its Scarlet Letter of unforgivable shame in being complicit to unimaginable horrors in the desecration of human life. In its turn-about, it has felt an obligation to correct its collective assault against humanity by opening its doors wide in accepting a flood of migrants who will never -- as the Jews before them became fully integrated, proud of their German-Jewishness -- integrate fully into the prevailing culture, justice and social contract.

Muslims now comprise a significant proportion of the German population, with well over six million now resident in the country; significant enough in that this is a number replicating Jews exterminated throughout Europe by the Nazis' Final Solution. The vacuum has been filled. The German artists came to the village and erected a tent, informing neighbours that the tent -- positioned in a garden next to Mr. Hocke's house in the village he calls his "refuge" and "locus of inspiration" -- was preparation for an engagement party. In that tent the artists were busy at work constructing a rebuilt- to-scale Holocaust memorial replicating the Berlin Holocaust Memorial.

The surprise was all Mr. Hocke's, when the tent was taken down, and from his bedroom window he viewed that Holocaust memorial, with the slabs rotated 180 degrees to conform with his earlier message to AfD followers that Germany needed to make a 180-degree turn. Mr. Hocke now refers to the artists as "terrorists", while they name themselves "aggressive humanists", and never the twain shall agree. School classes in the village come to visit the memorial and as they do, far-right opponents slash the car tires outside the site while far-left supporters hold anti-fascist marches.

"We have become the Nazi village", mourned Silvya Rinke, a tour guide and life-long Greens voter. Children now ask, she observed, "why people are being mean to Mr. Hocke. How do you even begin to explain this?" Precisely why it is that the memorial has been placed where it is, counters 30-year-old farmer and site volunteer Susanne Prinz; making people take notice of the presence of the memorial, impacting on their need to take a position on its presence.

"Yes, it's uncomfortable. But then, Germany's history is uncomfortable", she added.

The EU Outlier

"There is a growing feeling in Brussels that solidarity cannot be a one-way street, and that it becomes difficult to justify the ten billion-euro per year net transfers for a country that is increasingly at odds with the bloc's values."
"It is high time the EU reacted, or it risks losing its soul."
Bruno Dethomas, senior policy adviser, GPLUS consultancy, Brussels

"[It's up to Poles to show] the sick Europe of today the path back to health, to fundamental values, to true freedom and to the strengthening of our civilization based on Christianity."
Jaroslaw Kaczynsky, leader, Law & Justice party, Warsaw

"Hostility towards the EU is part of Law & Justice's DNA, and if it was up to the party, Poland would leave the bloc."
"But Kaczynski knows he can't do that because Poles are benefiting from EU membership. Hence, the party slowly builds a negative attitude towards EU -- while declaring that Poland has no intention of leaving."
Marcin Matczak, law professor, Warsaw University

A couple hold flares as as thousands gather for the nationalist march of Poland´s Independence Day.

Photographer: SOPA Images/LightRocket

Leaders of the European Union in Brussels are resentful of the fact that the EU member receiving the greatest aid from the EU of its 28-member group appears to be slighting and bypassing the intention that all members must accede to the demands imposed upon them to accept the dictates of the European Parliament and European Commission in all matters directed toward the membership, inclusive of accepting their allocated share of the flood of refugees reaching Europe from Africa and the Middle East. Poland has been defying the EU's mandate to order its members' obligations.

Poland receives $270-billion in aid through to 2022 which it absorbs into general revenues to be used for everything and anything it sees fit in infrastructure improvement. The country benefits hugely by its inclusion in the European Union. Polish workers have the right to match their inclination to migrate wherever they wish to other EU member-states for employment; they represent the largest migratory worker group in Great Britain. And, like Britain, they have become a headache to the EU.

Poland's defiance -- under the leadership of Jaroslaw Kaczynski of the increasingly authoritarian Law & Justice party -- against knuckling under the directives of the European Parliament are increasingly worrying. To the EU. The EU is flirting with the imperative of exacting a penalty on any such member countries who flout EU disrespect for the EU's democratic rule of law. Germany, France and the Nordic states in particular would like to see some penalties imposed upon Poland for its refusal, among other things, to absorb refugees.

But of course, Poland is not alone in eastern European EU members refusing to take in Muslim migrants.

Poles are fundamentally nationalist in character, mostly agreeing with their new government's encouragement to remain so, and seeing validation in the statements of intent issuing from the U.S. Trump administration. Neither Poland's government nor its people feel compelled to absorb Muslim refugees. That the EU lacks unanimity to pressure Poland for its stance to strip it of its voting rights at EU summits, leaves the EU leadership fuming  and Poland beyond punishment. For the present.

French President Emmanuel Macron warns that Poland could yet face consequences for defying the EU. The Dutch coalition government signed an agreement in October that specifies "subsidies should be reduced for member states that do not fulfill their obligations". The European Union prides itself on coercing all its members to fall into line from the most insignificant of market rules to the most urgent initiatives relating to the refugee-and-migrant invasion emergency of recent years.

That the Polish government additionally is in the process of finalizing legislation that would alter its Supreme Court and Judicial Council along lines more reflective of the current government's views, risks the basics of democratic convention, according to Poland's commissioner for human rights. "I will vote in line with my party. But this measure is a glaring contradiction to the constitution", commented a parliamentarian of the legality of court changes.

Kaczynski, who in the first place was a critic of Poland's 2004 entry into the European Union, lost when 78 percent of Poles were in support of EU membership. Entry on the conditions negotiated by Poland, he warned at the time, represented a "threat to fundamental values including independence and democracy." Certainly he was right on the issue of 'independence'.

Protesters hold a banner which reads, "Stop the Islamization of Europe" during their protest against refugees in Krakow (Image: Reuters)