We were shocked by the act of aggression against French civilians in its capital Paris that occurred a few days ago. Up until this moment the act of aggression had led to the death of 128 civilians and left hundreds injured. Immediately following the act the finger of blame was pointed towards Muslim individuals from North Africa whilst it was said that they were affiliated to ISIS. As for the President Francois Hollande then he declared “France is in a state of war” whilst others considered what happened to represent the beginning of a third world war. The coming days will prove the seriousness of what they are saying however the undeniable and certain truth is that what happened will have a negative and great impact upon the general Muslim masses and particularly those who live within the homelands of the west. As for the Dutch Prime Minister Rutte rode the waves and also stated that Holland is in a “state of war” whilst the Dutch government will take many measures “some of which will be seen whilst others will not be” in the coming days. This is whilst on the level of the regular people there has already been an attempt to burn down a Masjid in Holland on the very same night as the events in Paris took place.
Before the blood of the victims had dried, the French authorities had begun to demand the Muslim community to explicitly express their rejection of terrorism and violence. This is in the case where it is customary for them to direct the blame upon the Muslims and the large numbers of Muslims living in the major French cities whilst considering them to represent the source of most problems. And today despite the fact that some of the victims were Muslim in these places, the authorities nevertheless are talking in a manner as if the victims of this acts of aggression were only French people without paying any attention to the Muslim victims. In this way they are providing an image of their viewpoint towards Islam and the Muslims through this matter.
As for the condemnable matter, then it is the desire of the French authorities for Muslims to display their sympathy with the victims and their families whilst they don’t display any sympathy with anyone other than a Westerner. During the previous months there had been acts of aggression in Turkey and Syria and just a few days before a similar act of aggression took place in Lebanon and yet we did not see any demonstration or support offered to its victims; not from the governments and not even from the people!
And when we display our sympathy to non-western innocent civilians who in a direct or indirect manner are victims of western military operations in the Muslim lands like Africa, Syria and Iraq amongst other Muslim lands, and when we talk in opposition to the western colonialism of the Muslim lands, they then consider and regard us as being radicals and extremists who threaten the western way of life. For that reason they only demand our solidarity with them when the victims are theirs and not when the victims are others. This represents the peak of selfishness and we have seen this selfishness vividly on Facebook when the Facebook administration encouraged people to display their sympathy with France through providing the opportunity to the Facebook users to colour their pictures with the colours of the French flag.
Those who are required to display sympathy are the majority of the West in France and the other European countries and not the Muslim minority. That is because they are the reason for the tragedies befalling the Muslims. Despite that will the western politicians seek to please and satisfy the climate of hate that has been created and then undertake reactionary actions against the Muslim minority along with all the consequences that this will bring? Or will their reaction be rational where they don’t generalise what some individuals undertook to cover the Muslim minority as a whole whilst working to protect them from hostilities and oppression?
What is awaiting the Muslims in Europe now will be more severe than the policy of integration that the western governments have been following for a long time and the western governments will seek to intensify the procedures against the Muslims and within this charged atmosphere the rate of attacks will increase against the Muslims. For that reason it is necessary to keep the doors of dialogue between the Muslims and non-Muslims open albeit without the demand for Muslims to integrate and live in accordance to the dominant western culture in the western societies. Within this dialogue, it is necessary for the discussion to take place about the oppressive internal and foreign policy of the western states. With our confidence that that the Muslim community derives its strength from its deep Imaan and that it will never compromise and give up its Deen, it is nevertheless obligatory upon it to beware of the attempts of the government to shake their Imaan through people that they present as being representative of the Muslim minority and who go on to justify the government’s policies.
This must be rejected and opposed intellectually and by the Deen. It is also necessary to reject the attempts of some desperate people to ‘Reform’ Islam to formulate a European version of Islam after stripping it of its political concepts.
This is merely advice that we are presenting to the Muslim community and we have no doubt that the Muslim community will hold on firmly to its identity more than before in these intense times because all the more the Muslim is exposed to oppression it only increases his adherence to his Aqeedah.
Okay Pala
Media Representative of Hizb ut Tahrir
in The Netherlands
