This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/4186
December 14, 2009
By EMERSON VERMAAT
‘All rise!' This is the first thing one hears when the judge enters a courtroom. It is a traditional sign of respect for the court's impartiality and wisdom, indeed for the rule of law. But in Holland, Mohammed Faizel Ali Enait, a Dutch Surinamese Muslim defense lawyer, refuses to rise when the judges enter the courtroom, even though this is normal practice in Muslim countries such as Turkey and Morocco. The Dutch Council of Discipline recently said they did not object to Enait's point of view. They also allowed him to wear his traditional Muslim headgear in court.
The Netherlands Bar Assocation was not happy about the decision by the Council but they will have to abide by it. They had lodged a complaint with the Council of Discipline in September 2008. Willem Bekkers, President of the Netherlands Bar Association, said then that Mr. Enait was not justified in arguing that his faith compels him to so. ‘There is separation of Church and State in Holland,' Bekkers said. What he probably meant to say was that people like Enait want to impose their own so-called Islamic rules and dress code on the secular Dutch court system. The Council of Discipline's lame decision has serious legal implications. How can one now prevent a female Muslim defense lawyer from wearing an Afghan Burqa in the courtroom if she claims it is a religious obligation for her?
Enait, of course, was jubilant about this months's decision. It was in the popular Dutch TV talkshow ‘Pauw & Witteman' that he summarized the Council of Discipline's decision as follows: ‘We are living in a multicultural society.' Enait claims his refusal to rise for the judge and his Muslim headgear are not meant to show contempt to court. ‘It is out of respect for God that I wear this headgear,' he said. He justified his refusal to stand up in court by saying: ‘For me, all people are equal.' In my view, this is just another lame excuse. It is well known that fundamentalist and Salafist Muslims refuse to rise when the judges enter or leave the courtroom. They do not want to show respect for so-called unbelievers. I saw it happen many times during terrorism trials – when extremist Muslims were on trial.
Enait said on Dutch TV that the prophet Mohammed – ‘Peace be upon him,' he added in Arabic (which no one understood, of course) – was also wearing headgear. He likes to follow the holy prophet's great example. Is that so? Why force desert traditions on our secular courts? Why doesn't Mr. Enait leave for Saudi Arabia – the place where Mohammed, whose behavior he obvioulsly wants to copy, once lived and preached?
While calling for respect for his own absurdist views, Mr. Enait does not show any respect for journalists. He even calls them ‘elite racists.' Here we have a young Muslim hothead who simply walks out of a TV studio after Jeroen Pauw, a well respected Dutch journalist, dares to pose a few critical questions to him. ‘Calm down, calm down,' Pauw said to an angry man who obviously did not listen anymore. Pauw also said he did not believe in multiculturalism. Last year, the same Enait was rather rude to a Dutch female TV journalist named Clairy Polak. ‘Hold your horses, Mrs. Polak!' he said. Being polite to women is not one of his strongest points. Indeed, Mr. Enait even refuses to shake hands with women. And he seems to hate journalists who ask critical questions. He is very quick to accuse his alleged enemies of ‘racism,' yet he once contemptuously referred to native white Dutch as ‘aboriginals.' (If I were a real aboriginal myself I would also feel offended by such a remark.) For people like Enait, ‘multiculturalism' seems to imply one thing only: My own views are always right – come what may. Or is he just another example of a frustrated angry and aggressive young male suffering from an inferiority complex? I don't know. But I don't rule it out either.
‘Tolerant' Dutch multiculturalists opposing Christmas trees and display of Christian symbols
So-called multiculturalist tolerance is now even interfering with Christmas traditions. The ‘Haagsche Hogeschool College' in The Hague, Holland, will not put up a Christmas tree his year. This is a Christian festival, ‘and we are too diverse for a Christmas tree,' the school's management explained. In other words, a Christmas tree would interfere with cultural and religious diversity. One third of the students are immigrants, many of whom are probably Muslims. Students now put up their own Christmas tree. The Christmas tree in December had been part of the school's tradition for many years.
It is also a problem in Amsterdam, a city known for its tolerance and liberalism (marihuana, gay parade, etc.). Invoking ‘multiculturalism' the Amsterdam management of the Municipal Public Transport Company (Gemeentelijk Vervoersbedrijf or GVB) decided earlier this year to abolish the traditional Christmas party for its own staff. Although it was a tradition appreciated by many, the GVB management now suddenly, so it seems, does not want to ‘offend' the feelings of the Muslims.
Female tram or bus drivers are allowed to wear the Muslim headscarf or veil, but a male Christian bus driver who was visibly wearing a Christian cross was threatened with dismissal. Ezzat Azziz originally comes from Egypt. Should I now conclude that the one-sided tolerance of the Amsterdam multiculturalists simply refuses to accept the fact that a naturalized Egyptian immigrant happens to be a Christian, and not a Muslim? Mind you, it is just a question.
Mr. Azziz had been visibly wearing a Christian cross for years. (Headscarfs are very visible, too!) Nobody was complaining about it, but this year the GVB managers suddenly ruled there was a problem. Mr. Azziz took the GVB management to court last week. He and his defense lawyer told a Dutch TV reporter: ‘Muslim women are allowed to wear headscarfs, but the Christian cross is now being banned. The headscarf is a religious symbol, too!' I wonder what the verdict of the judges will be. The GVB management and the judges would be well advised to read George Orwell's illuminating book ‘Animal Farm': ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.' Or, ‘all people are equal, but some people (Muslims?) are more equal than others.'
It was in multicultural and liberal Amsterdam that Muslim fundamentalists and so-called ‘Salafists' held a major conference last May. One of the speakers was Sheikh Khaled Yasin, a radicalized black Muslim cleric from the United States. Yasin told his one thousand strong audience that superior Islam will eventually prevail in the West. ‘You have to be in it to win it!' (In order words, penetrate Western institutions, schools and governments and then take them over.) An obscure London based Palestinian sheikh named Haitham Al-Hadded said: ‘Islam means submission, it does not mean peace.' He also justified female circumcision and the introduction of Sharia law in Holland where ‘Muslims are growing in number.'
Last year, the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly adopted a resolution condemning ‘Islamophobia.' Belgian journalist Mia Doornaert criticized this resolution in the Flemish newspaper ‘De Standaard.' She wonders why criticism of Islam is being singled out. Why not likewise condemn Christianophobia? This is imbalanced and one-sided, it is appeasement, she says. ‘It is indeed everybody's right to criticize Islam – yet, those who do so are now being branded as racists. That will play into the hands of the Muslim fundamentalists.'
Tammy Bruce, an American feminist, makes the following interesting obversation: ‘No matter how noble the original intentions, the seductions of power can turn away any movement from one seeking equal rights into one that would deny them to others.' This is a warning one can only ignore at one's own peril.
‘The kindness that kills'
It was back in 1984 that an important book appeared in Britain criticizing the Christian churches' often ‘simplistic response to complex social issues' as being ‘the kindness that kills.' Sloppy, ill-thought out, ignorant, one-sided, hysterical and simplistic reports issued by liberals who pretend to speak on behalf of the churches and who invariably pull the racism card. They adhere to the undemocratic view, for example, that it is unacceptable for the majority native population of a community or country to prefer and seek to perpetuate its own majority. That is why the Swiss should not be condemned for recently voting against too much Muslim influence in their country. Or, to quote British sociologist Dr. Dennis O'Keeffe in the study ‘The Kindness that Kills': ‘If there were a Caribbean island to which people of different races wished to move in large numbers, would its citizens be "racist" if they sought to favour the entry of those most like them in appearance and/or culture?' And how would black South Africans or Zimbabweans react if 10 or 15 million ‘whites' decided to emigrate to South Africa or Zimbabwe?
The book "The Kindness that Kills' was recommended by Graham Leonard, the Anglican Bishop of London. (The publisher was also linked to the Anglican Church.) Today, a similar book should come out on the subject of ‘Islamophobia.' Well intentioned but misleading resolutions from prestigious bodies such as the Parliamentary Assembly will not help to promote freedom. Indeed, multicultural kindness, white liberal guilt, naive Third Worldism might eventually kill our much cherished freedoms. Western liberals seeking to appease today's fascist Muslim militants are perhabs more detrimental to the cause of freedom than the militants themselves.
Some day, ardent multiculturalists might say, ‘Well, let's abolish Christmas and Easter altogether because these festivals are linked to Christian traditions.' This is exactly what some of the most militant Nazis – people like mass murderer Heinrich Himmler and party ideologist Alfred Rosenberg – proposed back in the 1930s. They wanted to replace the annual Christian festivals by neo-paganistic festivals glorifying totalitarianism and primitive religion. Hitler, however, wanted to wait till the war was won by Nazi Germany. Hitler's view basically came down to this: ‘After we have won the war, Christianity will die a natural death. It's most important that the higher belief should be well established in simple people before the lower belief (=Christianity) has been removed. We must finally achieve this.' And the Jews? The ‘Jewish race' will be eliminated, Hitler said more than once.
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Emerson Vermaat, a law graduate, is a Dutch investigative reporter specialized in terrorism and crime. Website: emersonvermaat.com
Sources:
Pauw & Witteman (popular talkshow on Dutch TV), December 11, 2009: Faizel Enait: ‘Eliteracisten. Dat zijn de mensen die in de media zitten.'
De Volkskrant, September 9, 2008, p. 2 (‘Advocaten vinden collega respectloos'). Netherlands Bar Association.
Nova (Dutch TV newsprogram), August 21, 2008.
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohamed_Enait (‘Aboriginals').
De Telegraaf, December 8, 2009 (‘School "te divers" voor kerstboom').
Parool, June 5, 2008 (‘GVB schaft kerstmis af'), Internet.
De Telegraaf, December 9, 2009 (‘GVB verbiedt dragen christelijk kruisje'), Internet; Netwerk (Dutch TV), December 9, 2009: ‘Vrouwen met hoofddoek mag wel, een kruisje niet? Hoofddoeken zijn óók een religieus symbool.'
Kustaw Bessems, ‘Lesje voor moslims: Be in it to win it!', in: Dagblad De Pers (Netherlands), May 18, 2009, p. 2, 3; Bart Jan Spruyt, Onderwerping, in: Elsevier (Netherlands), May 30, 2009, p. 18 (weekly column). Dr. Spruyt is a Dutch historian and a columnist for ‘Elsevier.'
Council of Europe, Paliamentary Assembly, Resolution 1605 (2008), 9.2: ‘Condemn and combat Islamophobia.'
Mia Doornaert, Islamisering van Europa, in: De Standaard (Belgium), August 7, 2009, p. 17 (‘Opinie & Analyse'). ‘Maar de islam, bekritiseren, verdenken of verafschuwen – wat ook ieders recht is – wordt gebrandmerkt als racisme. Dat speelt helemaal in de kaart van de moslimfundamentalisten.'
Tammy Bruce, The New Thought Police. Inside the Left's Assault on Free Speech and Free Minds (Roseville, Cal.: Prima Publishing, 2001), p. 59.
Diggy Anderson (Ed.), The Kindness that Kills. The Churches' Simplistic Response to Complex Social Issues (London: SPCK/Holy Trinity Church, 1984), p. 69. American examples of liberal theologians who adhere to simplistic political views are William Sloane Coffin Jr. and David Ray Griffin. Both embrace silly 9/11 conspiracy theories. Coffin, who died in 2006, also courted the Iranian fundamentalists.
Katha Pollitt, Whose Culture? in: Susan Moller Okin, with respondents, Is Multiculturalism Bad for Women? (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), p. 28: ‘...that is partly because of multiculturalism's connections to Third Worldism, and the appeals Third Worldism makes to white liberal guilt...' I do not agree with everything that is being written in this book, but on page 29 there is another important quote on female circumcision, a primitive non-Western tradition: ‘Clitoridectomy, it's worth remembering, was falling into desuetude in Kenya when nationialists rivived it as part of their rejection of British colonialism.'
Hitler's Table Talk 1941-1944 (New York: Enigma Books, 2008), p. 48, 49 (October 14, 1941). This book was first published in Britain in 1953, it has now been reprinted. The words ‘after we have won the war' have been added by me. It is an interpretation of other statements made by Hitler saying that the Christian churches will be dealt with at a later stage – after the Nazi victory. These statements were not made in public, of course.
This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/4186