Daily Times

A young man burned the Holy Quran under the aegis of the Swedish authorities. This time round, the global ummah did not respond as violently and militantly as it had in the past. Pakistan called for action by the United Nations and a meeting was hence convened. There were peaceful demonstrations in Pakistan and abroad, including Sweden. Perhaps. the ummah is becoming inured to such acts. The shock value of such disrespectful acts has worn off, due to their frequency.

The ummah has ignored the elephant in the room. The man who burned the Quran, was never asked why he did so? This action has to be understood in its proper political and social context. Europe opened its doors to refugees in 2014 after the humanitarian crisis resulting from the Syrian civil war. Syrians fleeing war, boarded rubber boats to cross the Mediterranean sea. The perilous journey promised little hope. It was from one such dinghy, that three-year-old Aylan Kurdi fell off and his dead body reached the shores of Turkey. The boy’s picture tugged at the heartstrings of Europe. Angela Merkel, then the Chancellor of Germany, opened Europe for Syrians. However, Iraqis, Afghans and others also arrived in Europe in big numbers.

The humanitarian disaster created in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and other refugees was a direct result of the war on terror. I have covered this subject in detail in my May 22, 2023 column. However, for the common man anywhere in the globe, the Islamic world’s crisis was not not viewed in this context. Europe did not see Syrian refugees as victims of the US’s intervention in Syria, leading to Russian bombings in support of President Bashar-al-Asad. The refugees were seen as part of the greater equation of the crisis ridden and war prone Middle East. There was hence no context of a western moral responsibility viz a viz the refugees. They were instead seen as someone whom Europe had sheltered, when the Islamic nations of Saudi Arabia, UAE and Qatar had kept their doors closed. Europe already had issues with migrants from its former colonies. France was grappling with immigrants from its French speaking former colonies in North Africa. Germany had issues with its Turkish immigrants – whose third generation still refuses to learn the German language. England had issues with Pakistani immigrants forcing their teenage daughters to marry cousins and relatives back home.

Assimilation remains the greatest obstacle to the acceptance of Muslims in European societies.

Assimilation remains the greatest obstacle to the acceptance of Muslims in European societies and nations. In contrast, most immigrants to the United States and also to Canada, are educated professionals with open minds. Doctors and engineers makeup a significant share of the diaspora in the US. Most Muslim immigrants seek college education in pursuit of the American dream.

In Europe, many of the Muslim immigrants from former French colonies come with a chip on their shoulder. They do not assimilate and do not seek to improve their lot by becoming educated and progressive. They carry their tribal mindsets to Europe and to live in enclaves to continue their customs and traditions, refusing to assimilate. Quite often these customs clash with European humanistic or ethical values. They also bring their ethnic, religious and sectarian conflicts with them, causing them to get into battles with each other. The Muslim immigrants insolently continue their inhumane misogynistic practices and refuse to extend human rights to their women. This brings Islam a bad name, even though these beliefs, customs, and practices are neither taught nor condoned in Islam.

The refugees who entered Europe in the last decade or so have been guilty of all kinds of objectionable behaviors and practices. A prime example of this is sexual assaults on over 1200 women on 2015-16 New Year night celebrations in three cities of Germany. In the city of Cologne, the police chief suggested that the perpetrators had come from countries where such sexual assaults by groups of men are common. When the culprits were identified later, they were either immigrants or asylum seekers mostly from North Africa, but also came from Afghanistan, Syria, and Iraq etc. It may be noted that in 2014, it was Syrians who were welcomed by Europe. The Afghans encashed on that sympathy, and wriggled their way into Europe, without being officially entitled.

Dr. Cheryl Benard from the Rand Corporation specializes in the Middle East/Islamic world and has extensively worked with refugees. She has written a paper on the unique Afghan refugee issues. According to her: “Afghans attackers display breathtaking contempt for the law. Old men with gray hair will claim to be minors. They ruthlessly exploit welfare systems, due process, and Western norms to not just attack women but to suck all the resources they can from their increasingly angry and frustrated hosts.”

According to her, welfare fraud makes sense, for those who have no regard for rule of law or fairness and are lazy. Such men sexually assault women as they cannot tolerate them being happy, confident and feeling safe in public spaces. Dr Bernard calls the Afghan sexually depraved youth “social terrorists.”According to her: “They are saying that they have no intention of respecting law, custom, public opinion, local values or common decency, all of which they hate so much that they are ready to put their own lives, their constructive futures and their freedom on the line for the satisfaction of inflicting damage. She further explains their law-defying psyche: “Given the weakness of state institutions in their country of origin, the arbitrariness of its corruption-riddled administrations for centuries.”

Dr. Bernard’s friend, an Afghan court translator, put forward his own theory, on the basis of his hundreds of interactions with Afghan young men in his professional capacity over the past several years. He states that “they are motivated by a deep and abiding contempt for Western civilization. To them, Europeans are the enemy, and their women are legitimate spoils, as are all the other things one can take from them: housing, money, passports.”

Dr Bernard’s report was based on Austria, but she states that “I could write the same report about Sweden, Germany, or any other country of asylum in Europe.” She ends her paper with the recommendation: “Girls and women should continue to feel safe in public spaces, be able to attend festivals, wear clothing appropriate to the weather and their own liking, travel on trains, go to the park, walk their dogs and live their lives. This is a wonderful Western achievement, and one that is worth defending.”

This perfect;y explains how the young man who burned the Quran in Sweden, sees the Muslim immigrants as “social terrorists.” The glue that binds these anti-social men from Africa and Asia is the religion of Islam. Therefore he burned the book which in his mind teaches them the worst of human conduct. Dr Bernard’s findings should also find an echo chamber in Pakistan, as the TTP and their Afghan sympathizers carry the same attitude towards the Pakistani state and its citizens. The Pakistani police and military is under attack from the TTP who find their support base in Afghanistan. The only difference is that as Muslims, we view their hate filled ideology and depraved behavior as antithetical to the teachings of the Quran.

The writer is an independent researcher, author and columnist. She can be reached at aliya1924@gmail.com