The Aussie Mossie

BLOG: Closed

2009-04-20T18:53:00.000-07:00

This blog is now closed. Material from this blog will be gradually transferred to the Madhab Irfy blog.

Welcoming Michelle home with an open heart ...

2005-11-18T07:12:00.000-08:00

Muslim peak body leaders need to make up their minds. Do they represent their version of orthodox Islam? Or do they represent Muslim reality, warts and all?

Muslim Aussies aren’t perfect exemplars of Islamic values. Muslims defraud, assault, murder and commit all the same crimes that bad followers of other faiths commit. All believers, good or bad, have their weaknesses and idiosyncrasies.

But in Islam, committing a sin doesn’t take you outside the fold. What takes you outside the fold is what you believe in your heart. And that is something only you and God know about.

For that reason, the absurd comments reported and attributed to Dr Ameer Ali concerning Australian model Michelle Leslie are yet another example of a narrow-minded infantile middle-aged migrant man shooting from the hip and then wondering why most Aussies (Muslims included) think he is a drop-kick.

According to the November 19 edition of the Daily Telegraph, Dr Ali remarked the following words: “If she is a Muslim I don't think she should go back to her job as an underwear model because Islam is about modesty. Taking off her clothes and being half-naked on the catwalk will raise a lot of eyebrows in the community. She can't have it both ways. Either practice Islam and do something decent or don't practice it at all.”

With respect, Dr Ali, who on earth are you to judge? Yes, you may be right that Islam teaches modesty of dress. But what individual Muslims do with their lives is between them and God.

And when was the last time you lectured Sri Lankan and Indian Muslim women who wear sari’s that show nothing except, to use the phrase of American Muslim stand-up comic Azhar Usman, “their back and their fat gut”?

For any Muslim to suggest that Michelle Leslie comply with the dress code set by the President of a peak Muslim body to maintain her relationship with God and the Muslim communities is medieval and absurd.

In fact, it’s just as absurd as politicians seeking to regulate what schoolgirls at state schools wear on their heads.

Australia is a free country. Women of all faiths have the right to dress as they wish, regardless of what Dr Ali or Mrs Bishop think.

Dr Ali’s suggestion that Ms Leslie should “do something decent” or not try to practise her religion at all is also grossly offensive. Islam accepts humans as they are. It seeks to improve them gradually, not write them off before they have had a chance to make an effort.

Ms Leslie has taken an enormous step. She has changed her faith. It will take her some time to change her lifestyle. Human beings are not robots or computers that can be programmed into a new set of habits and behaviour.

I have a Muslim friend who works behind a bar. She serves alcohol, and she enjoys drinking white wine or champagne mixed with orange juice. But woe be tied anyone who says something nasty about her father’s religion. She may not be the most observant Muslim on the planet, but in terms of passion for her faith I have known few people better and stronger.

Most important than her job and her drinking habits is the goodness of my friend’s heart. She is one of the most compassionate people I have met. She is extraordinarily sensitive to other people’s feelings. I have never heard her speak ill of anyone. And when she rebukes her lawyer-friend Irfan on his eating habits, she does it ever-so mildly.

Islam teaches that what matters more than appearances is a good heart and noble intentions. Some rednecks claim that Muslims believe all martyrs go to heaven into the arms of 72 martyrs. But the Prophet Muhammad taught that a martyr who dies with the intention of being glorified will in fact be sent to hell. Same with the cleric and the philanthropist.

The same Prophet also spoke of a sex worker who finished her shift and went to the well to drink some water. She saw a dog dying of thirst and gave the dog water first. For that good deed and for the purity of her intention, God made this woman destined for heaven.

Like all mainstream faiths, Islam teaches that what counts at the end of the day is the goodness of your heart. Whether you’re a barmaid or a swimsuit model or a sex worker, what counts isn’t what people think of you. What counts is the goodness of your heart.

I hope Australians of all faiths will welcome Michelle home with open hearts.

The author is a Sydney lawyer.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Mooning and Terrorising

2005-11-06T00:00:00.000-08:00

Some months ago, a Melbourne tabloid made a huge deal about how imams in Melbourne still couldn’t figure out whether Usama bin Ladin had something to do with 9-11. It was somehow inferred that imams were some deep dark force of extremism within the Muslim communities south of the Murray River.

(Of course, what the tabloid didn’t mention was that many imams probably think the Russians are still occupying Afghanistan, and regard Usama as still one of Ronald Reagan’s political love-children!)

Some neo-Conservative commentators published in the Opinion pages of that American newspaper known as The Australian claim that the biggest threat of terror to Western countries comes from Muslim minorities. It is said that Muslim cultures forbid their adherents from properly integrating with their host societies. Some even suggest that mosques and imams are at the forefront of hiding terrorists and plotting terrorist attacks.

That’s what the paranoid neo-Cons claim. But let’s be serious here. Pulling off a terrorist act requires meticulous planning and execution. The September 11 attacks were timed to perfection. It was all coordinated, the hijackers were trained and the level of damage was almost predetermined.

I am not for one moment suggesting that the people responsible for 9-11 were not from Muslim countries or backgrounds. But seriously, I find it really hard to believe that imams and Muslim organisational leaders could pull off a stunt like that.

How do I know this? Because these guys (and no, I’m not being sexist) couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery. Consider this.

The Islamic religious festivals are determined by the Islamic calendar which is a lunar calendar. This means that, in terms of our solar calendar, Ramadan and other Islamic months begin and end on different days each year.

Back in the days of the Prophet Muhammad some 14 centuries ago, people used to sight the new moon with their naked eye. Those were the days before telescopes, and well before men landed on the moon.

At that time, the Prophet gave instructions about what to look out for when using their naked eye to see the new moon. Then again, he also gave instructions on how to calculate the times for prayer using the length of a stick’s shadow.

Today, of course, we don’t need sticks and shadows. Instead, we have watches and prayer timetables to determine when to face Mecca. But when it comes to determining when the months begin and end, each year sees a fresh controversy. And Aussie imams are at the thick of it.

Australian mosques are largely organised along ethnic lines. For instance, the Imam Ali Mosque in Lakemba is known to be a Lebanese Mosque. In fact, you cannot be a member of its managing association, the Lebanese Moslems Association, unless you are eligible for a Lebanese passport.

The ethnic group with the largest number of mosques and imams are the Turks. And in Turkey, imams, astronomers and mathematicians have calculated the lunar months well in advance. That means each year, Turkish Muslims in Australia and across the world know exactly when Ramadan begins and when the feast of Eid (to celebrate the end of Ramadan) will be.

The other ex-Ottoman Muslim groups (Bosnians, Cypriots and Albanians) tend to follow the Turks. The Lebanese and other Arabs also fall into line. So do the Indonesians, Malaysians and Central Asians.

But a sizeable number of imams and ethnic groups insist that pre-determined dates are not valid. They insist on sighting the moon with their naked eye. This inevitably means they start fasting a day later and have their Eid feast 1 or 2 days after everyone else.

Those who follow the naked-eyes method claim their way is closer to the way of the Prophet Muhammad who insisted on using the naked eye. The rest of the people say that insisting on actual sightings is a silly as throwing our watches and prayer timetables away and grabbing sticks and calculating their shadows. Or like throwing out the cars and investing in some camels.

Who is correct? Which method is right? Well, for the average Muslim, it really doesn’t matter. They just wish all the imams and mosques could agree. I mean, think about it. You employ 3 Muslims. Each wants to take a day off for Eid so they can spend time with their family. But each has Eid on separate days. What would you do?

Or imagine trying to explain to your boss why your imam says Eid is on Thursday while your colleague’s imam says Eid is on Friday.

This is exactly what happened this year. And to make matters worse, Muslims are still arguing about it. On the forum pages of IslamicSydney.com, they are now into their 5th page of argument on the issue.

With Muslims too busy mooning each other over whether to sight with the naked eye, it’s highly their imams could have the time to plot a terrorist attack. But this isn’t the most mundane thing Muslims argue about. Some Muslims actually argue about … wait for it … where to place their hands in prayer! Some claim wahhabi Muslims are the real terrorists. But most wahhabis I know are too busy objecting to the way I pray because I place my hands just below my belly button and not on my chest as they do.

It gets better. There are verses in the Qur’an talking about God’s hands and eyes. Now some Muslims actually will argue until they are black and blue in the face. And what about? About whether you take these references literally or metaphorically.

Imams and their followers can hardly be expected to pull off a terrorist attack when they cannot even agree on basic matters. To expect them to do otherwise is giving them more credit than is due to them.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Islam and Australian Politics: Can a Muslim get elected to Parliament During the War on Terror

2005-10-19T20:04:00.000-07:00

by Ed Husic

I would like to thank Gerard, Anne and the Sydney Institute for the chance to speak with you tonight.

A few years ago I would never have imagined myself talking to The Sydney Institute about Islamic issues and contemporary Australian politics.

But a lot has changed in four years.

It’s well established now that September 11 re-directed our lives both individually and collectively.

Even the phrase 9/11 invokes a reaction, perhaps silent, but undeniably evident.

Since 9/11 secular, predominantly Christian, Western societies are actively contemplating their relations with Muslims.

My address to you tonight is part of this contemplation.

Tonight will not deliver an in-depth lecture on the cornerstones of Islam.

As a former party political candidate in a Federal election – who is Muslim – I don’t intend to burden this talk with partisan points.

My arguments tonight are not framed upon a sense of victimhood or belief in denied opportunity. And I don’t come here to unload sour grapes.

I certainly won’t be pointing fingers at people within my party. I don’t seek to make myself stand out by trampling the reputations of others.

I have received great party support, spearheaded by the former NSW ALP Secretary Eric Roozendaal, maintained strongly by his successor Mark Arbib and buttressed by the goodwill and hard work of volunteers from local ALP branch members – and non ALP supporters who wanted to lend a hand on my campaign.

Right upfront I should tell you: neither I nor anyone else who was part of my campaign team believes I lost the election solely because of my religion.

A scare campaign about interest rates and the capabilities and limitations of our former Federal Labor Leader helped weigh down Labor’s vote in Greenway.

I would like to build tonight’s address on positive foundations – so as to look forward, so that we can strengthen relations at a critical juncture in home affairs.

Islam in Australia

It’s estimated that 1.5 per cent of all Australians identify themselves as ‘Muslim’.

Muslims immigrated to this country from all corners of the globe, over the course of nearly 150 years.

Islam first came to our shores with the arrival of around 2,000 to 4,000 Afghans in the late 19th century.

At around this time – in the 1870s to 1880s –many Lebanese Muslims started migrating to Australia, although, according to Fethi Mansouri, they identified themselves as Syrians – only to be later classified as Asians under the then Immigration Restriction Act 1901.

Noticeable growth in our local Muslim communities only occurred after 1970. This was driven largely through the migration of Lebanese and Turkish Muslims.

Lebanese born Muslims make up around ten per cent of Australia’s Muslim population, Turkish born around eight per cent.

Many Muslims who migrate to Australia are eager to forge a close bond with their new country.

In research by Michael Humphrey, we know that very high numbers of overseas born Muslims take enthusiastic steps down the path of naturalisation, which Humphrey argues reflects Muslim identification with Australia.

Within Middle East immigrants, the take up of citizenship is 74 per cent – nearly 92 per cent among Lebanese-born migrants.

Humphrey argues that liberalised citizenship laws helps cement stronger identification with Australia, as opposed to the situation in Europe. This is an important point to reflect upon.

However as I said earlier Muslim immigrants arrived from all over the world – from nearly 60 different countries.

Given this, it is not accurate to lump Islam as a monolith. Just as world outlooks might vary between Catholics, Protestants and Anglicans, the same can be said within communities of Sunni, Shite and Ahmadiyya Muslims.

A sizeable section of the world’s total Muslim population lives within the lands of the continent that is one of our greatest trading partners – Asia. Within Asia there are 400 million people who call themselves Muslim.

And within this region, Malaysia and Indonesia are strong examples of how democracy, market economies and Islam can co-exist. Malaysia – in the memorable words of Bob Carr – is punching above its weight, transforming itself into a model of pluralistic Islam.

The reason I’ve listed these facts is to highlight two important points:

·The ethnic diversity of Muslims means you cannot apply a ‘one size fits all’ interpretation to their motivations and political outlook.
·Secondly, there are compelling reasons for us as a nation to build a greater understanding of Islam, and to appreciate the various world outlooks of the different people who call themselves Muslim.

My own upbringing – importance of education

I mentioned earlier that Muslims were drawn here from 60 different countries across the world. One of them was the former Yugoslavia, chiefly Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Both of my parents migrated from the former Yugoslavia in the late 1960s.

Dad worked, as a welder. He travelled away from home regularly to follow work.

Mum stayed at home to mind my brother, sister and I.

We grew up in Western Sydney.

Getting educated was a big deal in my family.

We attended local public schools in Blacktown, Blacktown South Public School and Mitchell High School.

Dad didn’t want us to take blue-collar jobs. He lived through recessions and redundancies. He said blue-collar workers suffered worse through downturns. He said he never wanted his kids to have to go through that.

So he pushed us to learn. He wanted us to become doctors or lawyers – a dream job of ethnic parents.

Conveniently overlooking their advice I took up an Arts degree at the University of Western Sydney, my brother became a mechanic and my sister took up Arts at Sydney Uni, then transferred to UWS.

While their children’s education choices denied them the chance at gaining free medical and legal services in their later years, my parents were happy to see that we took on further education.

Besides emphasising education, my parents were big on tolerance. And this wasn’t a surreal concept to be learnt through book or lecture – our family breathed the value.

We maintained close friendships with people from different backgrounds -- Catholics from Mauritius, Croatia, Albania, Eastern Orthodox Serbs, Church of England Aussies.

And some of the funniest things I saw growing up was coming home to see Dad talking theology in our lounge room with Jehovahs’ Witnesses or Mormons.

I don’t think they knew what they were getting themselves into when they knocked on our door.

But they received traditional Bosnian hospitality with cake and coffee strong enough to keep you awake for days.

Religion as a political issue 2004

I knew religion was going to be an issue during the federal election. I knew people would raise my religion whenever I stood for public office. I wasn’t naïve.

I could put myself in the shoes of others who wonder “Can a Muslim represent me in Parliament, if he or she has no connection with my take on the world?” Muslims aren’t the only people to confront this.

The test for anyone running for Parliament should not focus on their religion. It should focus on the potential contribution they might make to elected office – chiefly, how will they help their local community?

I always saw myself as just a regular Australian, who happened to be Muslim. I never saw myself as a Muslim candidate. I ran because I wanted to get things done for the area I grew up in.

The first time that many people knew I was Muslim was during the campaign. And many of these people had known me for 10 years.

When people are asked to list their religion on their census form they put down their answer, while probably only going to church one or twice a year. I can relate in my own terms to the way people refer to themselves as ‘cultural Catholics’.

In July 2003 I was endorsed unopposed as the ALP candidate for Greenway.

Coming as it did after the strain of One Nation and September 11, I interpreted my preselection as proof positive that religion was not seen as a disqualifier for preselection in the ALP or contemporary Australia.

Then, one year out from the 2004 election, pollsters were calling homes across Greenway, probing voters thoughts on a variety of federal matters. One question stood out.

·“Of the following people who would you be more likely to vote for: a married man, three children, regular church goer, a woman with two children, or a single 33 year old man (the last description was about me)?”

I knew 2004 was going to be a religious year.

By June 2004 I had to deal with a stream of media inquiries that were along the lines of – “you’re a candidate in a tightly contested marginal and we just want to do a profile on you and your campaign.”

This wasn’t just from Sydney media – this was national and interstate interest, from Victoria to Western Australia.

However these enquiries only occurred after a wave of interest in my opponent’s religious background.

Fortunately, there was one media outlet in the country to shine a spotlight on what was actually going on here.

In July 2004 Christian Kerr from Crikey wrote an in-depth piece focussed largely on the media’s discovery of God in the seat of Greenway.

In a broad ranging, well researched article, Kerr asked why so much interest in one western Sydney seat? And he asked whether the Liberal Party had “found a nasty way of picking up Greenway”.

Only after the Kerr piece did the media interest subside –temporarily.

I took a decision that if the media wanted to talk about issues involving the things that mattered to local people, I would be more than happy to talk.

While I can appreciate the news value of having candidates of different religions face off in a marginal electorate, I declined media requests for interviews that wanted to focus on religious issues. Was that a mistake?

I was certain then that my focus be on the issues that mattered to locals.

The local media responded.

Flick though the Blacktown Sun, the Advocate or Western Weekender and you would find balanced coverage of local political debate.

For fourteen months, I could show how I had raised issues through the local media and was responsive to them.

The local media really set an admirable benchmark for balanced coverage, which I thought deserved commendation.

The name game

Another thing I noticed during the election was interest shown by sections of the Liberal Party in my name.

For example, Labor campaign workers at pre-poll booths would come and ask me what my real name was. When I would ask why, they would inform me that Liberal Party workers would ask them – while handing out how-to-votes to people walking in to vote – and ask why I wouldn’t go by my real name on a daily basis.

Also imagine my surprise to see a prominent Sydney Morning Herald columnist Paul Sheehan kick off his column on me by referring to me as “Edham” Husic in his lead paragraph.

By election day, there wasn’t even a hint of subtlety.

At a polling booth at Riverstone, with voters lined up waiting to cast their ballot, a Liberal Party worker on the top of his voice called out: “Ask Ed Husic what his real name is and ask him why he doesn’t go by it every day.”

I remember when I was growing up, asking my dad why he and mum gave me the name I have.

My Bosnian name is Edham Nurredin Husic.

Dad explained that part of my name was supposed to mean “the flame of God”.

Actually, when I was very young I nearly burned down my bedroom wall playing with matches – but unhelpfully dad never bought my defence based on ancient name interpretation!

Like many other children of ethnic parents, it’s jarring to spell out your real name. But names are not only tied to our culture and history – they are a daily, ever present, link back to your parents.

Many people from ethnic backgrounds will – in our country’s case – Anglo-cise their names. Overseas ethnic names might be reformed into a local variant. It’s a cohesive gesture. We do it to fit in.

So everyone from school days knew me as Eddie or Ed.

But sometimes people think it’s important to reveal the ethnic names of others in the interests of ‘transparency’.

Interestingly, Paul Johnson in his work “Modern Times” comments that during 1948-49 the growing anti-Western feeling in Soviet Russia transformed into anti-Semitism.

According to Johnson, Stalin hated Jews and loved telling anti-Semitic jokes. Yiddish publications were banned. Prominent Jews vanished. Even Khrushchev, then one of the bullies, encouraged factory workers to beat up their Jewish colleagues -- and those with Russified names had their ‘real’ Jewish names printed in the press, “an old Nazi technique,” Johnson says.

From a broader perspective, I hope we can agree that this practice doesn’t have to become a feature of marginal seats campaigning.

Under the radar

There were other incidents that occurred during 2004.

After finishing a round of doorknocking I received a worried call from my campaign office telling me about a brochure that was being distributed. It focussed in potentially negative ways on my opponent’s religious background.
The leaflet was being distributed in Kings Langely, a strong, Liberal leaning section of the electorate.

I took that pamphlet straight to my opponent’s campaign office. I spoke directly with her campaign manager and told him on the spot that I did not fight politics on this basis, neither did my campaign team, and I wanted him to know we would take strong action against people spreading this material.

He certainly accepted those assurances, adding that he had spoken with his ALP contacts, who told him that underhanded campaigning was not my style.

Just before election-day, I learned about the distribution of another pamphlet, this one claiming that I was a devout Muslim fighting for a better deal for Islam in Greenway.

The sheet was a dummied version of one of my campaign ads, designed to mislead a reader into believing it was put out by me.

I was also told there was a phone banking campaign that repeatedly rang voters with identified strong religious beliefs to let them know that I was Muslim.

Even Mark Latham, while at a community forum in South Australia, was asked by a supposed ALP member about the wisdom of preselecting Muslim in a bible belt seat. It turned out later the person was not an ALP member.

These events just reaffirmed in my mind a thought that had travelled with me through the campaign – the way that continual, sometimes supposedly neutral, references to religion were conveniently helping to underscore what people believed to be my big negative.

Remember, in October 2003 pollsters were asking people if they would vote for a church-goer.

Fast forward to election-day, I heard voters being told they should support my opponent because she is a “good Christian”.

Obviously there was a big, organised effort to keep this issue alive. Was Ed a real dinkum Aussie? Could he be relied on? Would he be fighting for you or for Islam?

We can debate for ages whether this was a deliberate, constant tactic – of making religion an issue of active consideration during this campaign, either through media or under the-radar channels. In one sense, of course, you’ll never absolutely know. Then again, you’re never meant to.

Election as a turning point

As I said earlier, I always considered myself as a regular Aussie, who happened to be Muslim.

But when I woke up the day after the election I didn’t completely feel like a regular Aussie any more.

I actually felt – for the first time in my 34 years – that I had this brand stuck on my forehead.

I might not have understood or appreciated what it was like to feel part of a sub-group that was treated differently – but I got a good sense of what it was like.

I have no evidence to believe that my opponent was involved in any of the grubby stuff. I lost largely because of the wider issues – particularly unease in aspirational Sydney about Labor’s leader.

Whatever your politics, I believe that this use of religion as a campaign tactic was unbelievable in our country. It was worse than galling.

It was unAustralian. And its ramifications are significant for Aussies of all backgrounds. That’s not as it should be.

While my own future and where I will end up is unclear, I know I still want to be involved in politics.

I want to speak out against the things that took place last year. Being quiet doesn’t help.

The use of religion in that election as a political tactic was wrong.

Not because it stopped me from being elected. A different scare campaign tripped me up, one about interest rates.

It was wrong because it weakens our community. It diminishes. It divides to conquer – at a time when we should be drawing together a united front, with all faiths working together to promote a secure, safer community.

Know also that these tactics rippled through the minds of many Muslims. The proof? In the age of the Internet, word travels in moments and remains cast in cyberspace. Websites as far as Bosnia, or the United States or even Iraq carry copies of articles detailing these election stunts.

But I get another sense of that ripple when I meet another Muslim who learns who I am. The minute they say “You’re the guy …” I know what they’re recalling.

The Liberal Party – re-elected in Federal Parliament, tasked with the critical role of making people comfortable with new national security measures – is now trying to convince Muslims that they have nothing to worry about.

That Muslims are recognised citizens. Their religion isn’t an issue. But at this point in time, trust is much more valuable when it is earned not demanded.

Muslim responsibility

There’s no denying that Muslims in Australia would like to see someone of their faith elected to an Australian Parliament. It’s not an isolated ambition – it spans faiths.

And there is a disappointment – laced with deep concern – when a view forms that religion or ethnicity is a potential hindrance on the path to elected office.

Examples of this type of situation can be found overseas. The 2004 Californian state legislature elections are a case in point.

In that race Democrat Ferial Masry, a Saudi-born Arab American woman, faced a late minute under the radar manoeuvre that some believed denied her success. If she had been successful she would have been the first Saudi American elected to public office in the US.

In the last days leading up to that election a taped telephone message was broadcast to registered Republican and independent voters with mentions linking 9/11, terrorism and Ferial Masry's name, purportedly in the context of discussing illegal immigration.

Masry’s son was a registered Republican who was stationed with his U.S. Army Reserve unit in Iraq. His mother publicly defended him and his fellow soldiers from war opponents. She lost to her Republican opponent.

From what I have been able to learn the US, with its 250 million population, four successful candidates of Muslim background were voted in by a minimum of 60 per cent in their electorates.

In New Zealand and the UK MPs have been elected with Muslim backgrounds. In Australia, there is one MP who is Muslim, sitting in the Victorian Parliament.

I spoke recently with the head of the Forum on Australian Islamic Relations Kuranda Seyit, who said that at this point in time, it was critical Muslims are elected to democratic parliaments.

The reason was simple: it would send a signal to both moderate and extremist.

Not only because it reflected a determination by the broader community to allow opportunity for engagement with people from all walks of life -- but it was reaffirmation that Muslims were choosing a better path than that offered by extremists.

Bringing together the cross, star and crescent under the one roof of our national Parliament would be a great step forward, but there is another pressing priority.

How do we ease the fear that divides people of different faiths and backgrounds at this point in time?

I think it was Bill Clinton who said, “people vote for a future, not for the past.”

We need to have a clear view about the future we want. That future is one of acceptance and inclusion, earned through an investment in a number of important measures now.

The biggest step Muslims can take is to recognise people are scared. They see so-called Muslims doing terrible things to others in the name of religion. People wonder if they too will be a victim.

Suggestions that there is some subterranean theological struggle between faiths over the minds and souls of Australians are overblown and serve only the purposes of extreme religious recruiters.

Australia is not ‘heart on your sleeve’ religious.
A Pew Research Centre study found Americans are the most religious in the OECD world – 59 per cent there say religion plays a “very important role in their lives.”

But, as Australia’s history demonstrates time and again, we’re big on security, on feeling safe.

We have to acknowledge fear.

Muslims fear too. They include the moderate Muslims not interested in politics, but getting a job, paying the bills, making sure the kids finish homework before dinner.

The ones who are scared of going out in the street wearing a hijab.

The ones who worry if they will get a job with their Muslim name.

The ones anxious about how they went in job interview when quizzed about their views on Al-Qa’ida -- for non security related employment.

Or the parents that worry about nominating Islam as their child’s religion on official paperwork.

Every one of those last four instances is real, passed on to me by Muslims who felt these concerns, lived those experiences.

Let me state clearly – the fear about security is particularly strong. I don’t seek to balance out these fears or underplay the security concerns people have.

But we have to acknowledge fear.

And we need to know that fear and misunderstanding is stunting the natural flow of relationships between people.

Again it’s important to think about the future, not the past.

If Muslims want a better climate in which to be received they can actually do things themselves to foster this climate:

·They should say loud and clear that violence and terrorism are not valid means of political expression – terrorism is murder. Say it without caveat. Muslims cannot afford to be defensive – and they should never justify murder dressed up as religious activity. You can never point to events in Iraq and think that offsets terror somewhere else.

·Muslims should join with others in highlighting the valuable role of tolerance in building a cohesive society that gives little room for people to feel alienated or excluded – or humiliated. The interfaith dialogue that is happening every week is exceptionally important.

·Muslims will need to expect that thoughtful, critical analysis is a function of a healthy liberal democracy. The consequence of accepting this proposition is that there may be some that criticise Islam – just like they do of Christianity or other religions.

·To receive understanding and tolerance, you need to extend it to others. You can’t call for tolerance and be anti-Semitic.

The other point worth bearing in mind is that not all Muslims dislike the United States.

While recent US foreign policy may have caused great concern for people here and abroad, I still believe the US can be a positive force, as occurred in my parents’ homeland, as occurred with the US pushing to include Turkey in the EU.

The US has a far better track record on democracy and human rights than a lot of other countries in the world.

Let’s face it, if it wasn’t for their intervention in Bosnia, we would never have had the Dayton Peace Accords. How many other Srebrenica’s would have occurred without the US standing up and telling Europe ‘enough is enough’?

The good news is – most Muslims accept these points.

The problem is that doesn’t quite make news like a cleric arguing the September 11 never happened, or that sending Muslims to university is bad.

Some media commentators invest huge belief in the notion that religious leaders will miraculously transform the opinion of their followers with a few sermons.

Personally, I think Imams should heed the Prime Minister’s calls to stamp out any sympathies that might exist for those people carrying out murder in the name of religion.

Having said that I think the Prime Minister could do more to denounce fear mongering and vilification of Muslims.

To keep saying that people from all faiths, loyal to this country and its dreams, have a place and should be embraced.

To say it’s not right for Muslim women to have to wipe someone else’s spit off their attire.

And the Prime Minister should say loud and clear that fear campaigns against Muslims in this country are un-Australian – especially those conducted during election campaigns.

And if I could be so bold to suggest that any Prime Ministerial address to the nation that talks about improving security in Australia could be strengthened by an including reference to these points.

From a wider perspective other pointers can be found on what should be done.

You need look no further than the incisive work released recently by Anthony Bubalo and Greg Fealy of the Lowy Institute here in Sydney. One of the things that stood out was their advice:

·To think about education and the war of ideas in broad terms – to fight the ideas that underpin terrorism. Adapting a Blairite proposition for current times, I think it’s important we are “Tough on terrorism – but also tough on the causes of Terrorism”.

Conclusion

As I said at the start there were a number of reasons why I decided it was important to speak today.

I mentioned the thoughts I dealt with the day after the election. But one more incident stands out – it’s one of the reasons I’m here today.

The day after the election my family came over to run through the events of the last 24 hours. As they were leaving my dad said “I’m sorry about the result”.

I thanked him but then he clarified: “No, I mean, I am sorry if who we are stopped you from winning.”

I told him straight away never to drop his face in shame for who he is. I don’t and I never will.

Elections come and go. There are winners. There are losers. Life moves on.

In the meantime, you hope that regardless of political opinion we can recognise the value of people from all walks of life who do good in the place they call home.

Law abiding citizens, who work hard, bringing up their children in a loving environment, silent but solid members of their communities.

They should never feel that have to apologise for who they are, where they come from or the fact they believe in God. In this day and age, faith in the face of cynicism is to be admired.

I could have made one of two choices after October 9 last year. I could have been resentful, nurtured humiliation, retreated into a simple ‘black/white’ view of Muslim relations in Australia.

But I chose a better way. The way that recognises that Australia is a great country.

A country that provides opportunity for self-improvement.

A country whose people are recognised as warm, friendly.

A place where if you’re loyal to your country, and want to do good things for it, your efforts and commitment will be welcomed. And they are.

I strongly believe that understanding can shine a powerful light into dark corners.

Right into those places where intolerance and fear drives people to do things that – in better, calmer times – they know cause nothing but pain and hurt.

I’m standing up for tolerance and understanding. I’m standing up because I can see I better future.

And that future does not hinge upon whether or not we elect Muslims to Australian Parliaments.

I thank you for your time.

(This is the full address of Ed Husic to the Sydney Institute on 19 October 2005. Ed Husic was the ALP Candidate for the Federal Seat of Greenway in Western Sydney for the 2004 Federal Election.)

Guess what! I’m an Australian …

2005-10-16T06:29:00.000-07:00

I have a message for Aunty Bronwyn and all the others of her generation. And that message is this.

I am an Australian. So is Walid Aly. So is Susan Carland.

There is no clash of civilisations going on with me or between me and others in this wide brown land. In reality, as my friend and colleague Walid Aly pointed out on the Compass program on ABC on Sunday night October 16, what we see is a clash of ignorance.

Terrorism thrives on hate. Hate thrives on ignorance. Just as a flame needs fuel from oxygen or coal or some other substance, hate also needs fuel. And the fastest fuel to light the flames of hate is ignorance.

I have known Walid and his wife Susan since 2002, the year they married. I’ve known other members of Walid’s family since 1995. These thoroughly Australian people were introduced to me by a movement called Young Muslims of Australia (YMA).

Walid and Susan are typical young Aussie Mossies. There is nothing un-Australian about Susan. In fact, probably the most un-Australian thing about Susan is the fact that her mum is a Kiwi.

Then again, so are the Finn brothers. So is one of Australia’s best Rugby League players, Nigel Vagana. And so is half the population of Byron Bay, including Russell Crowe.

Walid first introduced me to the world of media in any significant way. I always had friends at uni who were studying Media and Mass Communications. I’d done some community radio work. But it was Walid who encouraged me to write for the papers. Australian papers.

I am from Sydney. I’ve lived here all my life. Why shouldn’t I be writing for a Sydney audience? Why shouldn’t newspaper readers in Australia (and now New Zealand) be reading what I have to write?

And why should I allow fear and terrorism to dictate what I have to say? I was just as Australian before September 11 (New York), October 12 (Bali) and July 7 (London). The world may have changed, but I haven’t.

My best friend from St Andrews Cathedral School is still singing in the choir. His wife still speaks fluent English and Japanese. I still have friends (and a few enemies, it seems) in the Liberal Party. I still go out with friends to pubs and clubs (though in my case, intoxication is caused by fumes, not the real thing!).

And each time I go to Sydney’s CBD, I get scared some crazy terrorist will do something stupid. I get scared that Aussies will be victims. I get scared that I will land 6 feet under the ground, or perhaps in a hospital.

And if the new anti-terror laws are passed, I get scared that I might be subject to a “control order” jut because my skin is a little browner and I have a weird name few people can pronounce properly.

All this has the ability to make me incredibly depressed. Even more depressed than I am already. But after watching so many of my friends on the Compass program, I know I am not alone.

The largest single ethnic block in the Australian Muslim community are people under 40 and born in Australia. I missed out being born in Australia by around 5 months.

Like the First Fleeters, I came here on a boat (though mine was a bit more luxurious). But I have lived almost all my life in John Howard’s electorate of Bennelong. So if they want to send Muslims home, they’ll have to send me back to East Ryde.

I guess the most heartening thing is to watch young Aisha, daughter to Susan and Walid. She was shown on the Compass program giving thanks to her parents. And what were the words of this sweet 2-year old?

“Thank you maaate!”

After the most recent episode of the ABC Compass program, I wonder how people like Sophie Panopoulos and Bronwyn Bishop will have the face to appear in public and lecture us all about Australian values and a clash of cultures.

And if they don’t have the face, perhaps a generous Aussie Muslim woman can lend them a hijab. Or perhaps even a face veil!

iyusuf@sydneylawyers.com.au

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Aussie Sheiks and Byron Bay Gurus

2005-10-09T07:02:00.000-07:00

I know this sounds a little weird, but I really feel sorry for John Howard and Phillip Ruddock. They are trying their best to consult the Islamic communities. And all they have to work with is a bunch of incompetents.

The government has, in good faith, set up a consultative body so that it can gain an understanding of what Muslims at the grassroots think. It thinks it can rely on these people because they are, after all, the heads of peak leadership organisations.

If the government had to consult Catholics, it would be easy. Just ring up the Church. There is a hierarchy, a priesthood, a system of accrediting spiritual and lay leaders. Same in the Anglican and every other Church.

But in the Muslim community, there is no priesthood, no hierarchy. And if you believe what you saw on the Sunday program last weekend, no real systrem of accrediting religious figures.

That allows shonks and crooks to make all sorts of bombastic claims and then gain the confidence of a generation of young Muslim Aussies with no exposure to mainstream Islamic ideas.

Send Khalid Yasin to Indonesia and see if he lasts even 5 minutes. Genuine religious authorities will pull him apart and expose him in no time. Send him to Turkey, and authorities there will do the same. The story will be repeated in just about every Muslim country.

But in Australia, where there is no central authority, shonky sheiks can make more money than Byron Bay gurus.

Some years back, some of my friends tried an experiment. We wanted to see just how gullible some young Muslim kids are. I drafted and sent out an announcement about this famous Sheik who was visiting from Mali and who had done his PhD at the University of Khartoum in Sudan. I gave him the grand name of Sheik Muhiyuddin Abdul Majid El-Sumbluq. I said he would be visiting Australia, and that people needed to book in advance for a place in his classes.

I had inquiries from across the country from starry-eyed kids wanting to attend the Sheik’s classes. Sydney was abuzz with talk of the famous Sheik el-Sumbluq. Until I sent out an announcement about the Sheik’s scholarly wife.

Her name was Aishah Umm-Yasmin El-Sumsheila. By the time people realised what we were upto, my friends and I were rolling around on the floor.

Why do some young Aussie Mossies believe this nonsense? Muslim Australians don’t seem to have a good record when it comes to religious instruction. We have a range of people describing themselves as imams or sheiks or maulanas or using some other title.

Yet we have no system of accreditation for imams. It seems anyone can stand up and claim the mantle of Islamic scholarship. And if they speak even half-decent English and have some charisma, they can be believed and followed.

The Australian Muslim community is like the Byron Bay of the Islamic world. I could go to Byron Bay, set myself up in some cottage, wear a sari or some other funky dress and call myself “Sheik el-Sumbluq”. I could set up the Sumbluqiyya Sufi order, and thousands of Kiwi backpackers and hippies would pay $200 a session to be part of it all.

So why does this problem exist? Why do we have so many weirdos and wackos masquerading as sheiks? Are young Aussie Mossies all as high as a bunch of Byron Bay backpackers?

Recently, American Muslim Gary Edwards told a Muslim audience that we should insist people claiming scholarship showing and proving their qualifications when asked.

“If just having a beard and wearing a cap makes you a sheik, I know plenty of billygoats who could qualify!” Mr Edwards said.

This situation exists because most real and qualified imams cannot speak English and cannot communicate effectively with young people. Our most senior cleric, Sheik Hilaly, is still struggling with basic English. I could count the number of imams proficient in English on 2 hands.

So 300,000-plus Aussie Muslims, most of whom speak English as their first language, are having their spiritual needs officially serviced by imams who cannot speak their language. The result is the growth of an entire “black market” of preachers and charlatans setting up “centres” and “societies” led by charismatic English-speaking frauds.

I know one fellow who claims to be a Sheik and to have completed a degree from Saudi Arabia and to have authorities from prominent Yemeni scholars. He is allegedly the chaplain of 2 university campuses. But to this day, despite numerous requests, he has never shown anyone his qualifications.

If the Khalid Yasin fiasco proves anything, it is that Aussie Mossies need to get their act together. They need to urgently fund local kids to study religious sciences in reputable institutions overseas.

And by overseas, I don’t mean some crackpot seminary in Saudi Arabia. I mean a real institution in the UK or the United States or Malaysia. In an English-speaking environment with people who don’t carry irrelevant cultural baggage.

We need an accreditation system for Imams and Sheiks so that we get real scholars and not Byron Bay billygoats teaching and preaching in Aussie mosques.

The author is a Sydney lawyer who has acted for at least one Imam and four independent Muslim schools.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Bullying Australian communities out of their civil liberties

2005-10-07T21:21:00.000-07:00

Recently, the Government-appointed Muslim Community Reference Group (MCRG) held a joint press conference with Attorney General Phillip Ruddock.

Following a briefing by Mr Ruddock on the new laws, Group spokesman Dr Ameer Ali was quoted as stating that the Group unanimously supported the laws and would sell them to the Muslim community.

Within hours, the Islamic Council of Victoria issued a press release directly contradicting Dr Ali’s statements. The ICV Chair, Malcolm Thomas, also sits on the MCRG.

Further, a representative of the Alawi Muslim community, Ms Iktimal Hage-Ali, also contradicted Dr Ali by stating that the onus was on the government, not the Group, to sell the laws to the broader Muslim and non-Muslim communities.

Muslim online discussion groups have been running hot with condemnation of the position apparently adopted by the MCRG. Yet who is on this Group? Who do they represent? On what basis were they chosen? How representative are they of Aussie Muslim reality?

The government has an unenviable task in dealing with Muslim communities. Islam knows no priesthood or central hierarchy. One American Muslim stand-up comic, Azhar Usman, summed up the reality of Muslim communities across the western world.

“I was telling a friend about Islam. He asked me to stop talking. He said he is against organised religion. I told him that was fine and he could become a Muslim. We are the most disorganised religion in the world!”

Australia has at least 2 competing peak Muslim bodies. The Australian Federation of Islamic Councils is an umbrella body of state and territory Islamic councils, themselves umbrella bodies representing the management societies of various mosques.

Not all mosques have an Islamic society. Indeed, most people attending the mosque are not members of the governing mosque societies. Further, AFIC has a history of replacing and creating societies it does not like.

In New South Wales, the state with the largest number of Muslims, AFIC has created 2 dummy councils in the last 5 years.

Competing with AFIC is the mostly-Lebanese Darul Fatwa Islamic High Council of Australia. This council claims to speak authoritatively on behalf of Muslims. Yet its own religious ideology declares the majority of Muslim scholars to be “kafir” (infidels).

Further, the Darul Fatwa Council members have openly expressed their opposition of any assistance provided by Muslims to non-Muslim faiths. Members of the Council have attacked the writer for his role in lobbying on behalf of a Vietnamese Buddhist community having trouble with Bankstown Council in approving extensions to their temple. The reason for the opposition was the notion that Muslims should not help “idolaters”.

Now let’s look at the reality of Australian Muslims. The most recent study profiling Muslim Australians was carried out by Professor Abdullah Saeed and his team at the University of Melbourne in 2004.

The study was based on figures in the 2001 Census, showing almost half of Australia’s Muslims were born in Australia. The suburb with the highest concentration of Muslims in Australia was Auburn (37%), not Lakemba or Bankstown. The overwhelming majority of Muslims speak, read and write English fluently.

More than half of Australia’s Muslim community are aged below 40. Muslim Australians have been at the heart of mainstream Australia for over 150 years. Muslim involvement in Australia pre-dated European exploration and settlement.

Yet this Muslim reality is not reflected in the Government’s choice of people to sit on its reference group. Most were born outside of Australia. Most are aged over 40. Very few are women.

If the government were serious about consulting with Muslim Australians, it would have included those Australians making major contributions in business, politics, sport, academia, the arts and the professions. These are the real Aussie Mossies.

Yet the government is committed to treating this very indigenous faith community as just another “ethnic” or “migrant” phenomenon. For this reason, it has attempted to create a reference group that is unrepresentative and that will tow the line.

And as is often the case in national security issues, the Government is getting it all wrong. Whatever their public statements, prominent Reference Group members are telling Muslims that the current anti-terror laws are being forced upon the community.

In short, the Government is bullying Muslim Australians to sit down and shut up as their civil liberties are stripped away from them. The government is expecting the Reference Group to endorse laws that have not even been drafted. The Group members did not consist of a single lawyer, nor did they have the benefit of advice during and following Mr Ruddock’s briefing. Yet this is precisely the community the Government needs to have on side if it is to effectively fight the war against Islamist extremism.

The author is a Sydney lawyer who has advised peak Islamic bodies and Muslim independent schools. He is also an occasional lecturer in the School of Politics & International Relations at Macquarie University.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

For the love of Islam, fight the terrorists

2005-10-04T23:29:00.000-07:00

(Published in The New Zealand Herald, 04 October 2005)

Different reasons are given for the Bali terrorist attacks. Australian Prime Minister John Howard describes it as an attack on democratic Indonesia, an attempt to destabilise the country and punish it for adopting a more democratic model.

South Australian magistrate Brian Deegan, who lost his 22-year-old son Josh in the 2002 Bali bombing, says it was an attack on Australian foreign policy.

I have my own theory which does involve a short history lesson. I believe the Bali bombing was an attack on Indonesian Islam.

Some 700 years ago, Yemeni traders brought Islam to this part of the world, the centre of Southeast Asian trade.

The various indigenous merchants had no system of accounting and the Yemenis introduced the systems still in use today including resolving commercial disputes based upon sharia law. In Indonesia, when people think of sharia, they don't think of chopping hands and stoning adulterers. They think of banking and finance and trade law.

Most Yemeni traders came from a tribe known as the Bani Alawi, direct descendants of the Prophet Muhammad. In the towns and villages around Penang and Aceh, you will find more direct descendants of the Prophet than in Saudi Arabia.

And the People of the House (as Muslims refer to the Prophet's descendants) are known for certain qualities. They are scholarly. They are soft-hearted and compassionate. They are calm. They are spiritual. They inspire love, not hatred.

The Yemeni traders were Sufis who brought a kind of Islam that focuses on spiritual purification and social reform. Sufis work with people of all faiths in an effort to bring peace and prosperity to the world.

In New York, a Sufi imam named Feisal Abdul Rauf regularly hosts dinners with Jewish and Christian New Yorkers. In India, the poor and depressed of all faiths and no faith find refuge at the tombs of Sufi saints. Sufism is a grassroots religion in just about every Islamic country, including Afghanistan and Iraq.

The terrorists' version of Islam has no room for Sufis. The terrorist religion is about war, not peace. It is about hatred, not love. Sufis teach that you bring people closer to you and your faith through love and service to others. Terrorists teach that you convert people by killing them, by bringing tears to the eyes of their families and loved ones, by driving fear into their communities.

The terrorist vision of Islam is winning no friends in the world's largest Islamic community.

The latest bombing has taken place in the final week of the sacred Islamic month of Sha'ban. Orthodox Sunni Indonesians see this month as a time to prepare for the beginning of the sacred month of Ramadan.

Traditionally, the shedding of blood during Ramadan and its two preceding months is strictly forbidden. The terrorists have flouted this taboo which finds its source in the Koran, the scriptures regarded by millions of Indonesians as the literal word of God.

Terrorists bring out the worst in themselves and others. Orthodox Sufi Islam brought peace to this region of the world. Today, the terrorist ideology masquerading as Islam is bringing war and violence and tears to the region. Those who care about Islam should be at the forefront of fighting terror.

* Irfan Yusuf is a Sydney-based industrial lawyer and occasional lecturer in the Department of Politics at Macquarie University in Sydney.

Sufism Libs

2005-09-29T23:57:00.000-07:00

The other day, I visited the Dergahi Kotku, a small sufi hospice e located in Auburn. The hospice is a converted mansion which used to house x-ray, pathology and medical rooms. The local Naqshbandi Turks have converted the mansion into a small sufi centre, bookshop and classrooms.

I was accompanying Gary Edwards, an American sufi teacher who studied in Turkey for some 10 years. Also with us was one of the hospice instructors, Abdurrahman (I’ll refer to him simply as “Abdul” from now on).

Gary was quite tired, having just finished a weekend-long workshop teaching some 30 students about the various meanings and nuances of the most frequently-recited chapter of the Qur’an known as Sirat al-Fatiha. We have just finished dinner, and Gary was keen to pray and get some much-needed sleep.

We received a guided tour of the new hospice. The old hospice was located some 3 streets away, and had since been demolished to make way for a large shopping centre and unit development.

Gary’s host for the evening was Alf, a young Turkish Aussie who lived on a farm out in the sticks somewhere between Campbelltown and Penrith. Alf had spent much of his youth as a Buddhist, before being brought back to Islam by his Aussie Sri Lankan wife (who happened to have converted from Buddhism to Islam). When he is not project-managing huge multi-million dollar IT roll-outs, Alf can be found sitting with sufis and engaging in some internal cleansing.

Alf and I go back perhaps 10 years. Back in those days, we used to gather at Bonnyrigg Mosque with one of our good mates, a Naqshbandi imam now living in Melbourne. Some years back, Alf and I met up for coffee and decided that one of us should run for Parliament. It was the post-September 11 period, and we were sick of getting all jittery and nervous and defensive.

I was already thinking of throwing my hat into the ring for the Liberals in Reid, a federal seat that took in the Turkish heartland of Auburn. Alf encouraged me and promised to assist “whenever I could”.

In Alf’s case “whenever I could” basically meant full-time around-the-clock assistance. I have never seen anyone work so single-mindedly on a project. Alf was as convinced as I was that it was good for both of us for me to run. He insisted that we make a serious go of it.

At the time, I was living and practising behind the Naqshbandi bookshop located then at 59 Queen Street. My campaign treasurer was the travel agent next door, Ahmet. And Alf was the king of the campaign.

So where do the Naqshis fit into this? Well, their bookshop ended up being on the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald. My opponent was sitting member Laurie Ferguson, then Shadow Minister for Multicultural Affairs. My old mate Ross Cameron (then Federal MP for Parramatta) warned me about Laurie.

“Irfan, Laurie may look like a dill, but seriously he is no dill. Watch your back. Laurie likes to play hard. He’s a lovely guy socially, but politically he is an animal!” Rosco warned.

And within a few days, I found out what he meant. I got a call from a Sydney Morning Herald journalist Pilita Clark who said Laurie had made a complaint about my not living in the electorate and telling fibs to the electoral commission about where I lived. She asked me whether Laurie was telling the truth. My response to the journo was simple.

“Come and have a look for yourself.”

45 minutes later, she rang me again to tell me she was on her way. Alf and I quickly got the place as tidied up as we could without having a vacuum cleaner or even a broom.

Pilita was accompanied by a cameraman who seemed to enjoy the exotic surrounds of a very European bookshop. I posed for the camera in a variety of spots, including lounging like a beached whale on my mattress.

The next day, 24 October 2001, that image greeted readers of the Sydney Morning Herald. Months later, Senator Bill Heffernan was to describe the event as one of the highlights of the campaign.

“F#cking marvellous, Yusuf! You really showed the c#nts, didn’t you! Absolutely f#cking marvellous.”

Here are some classic excerpts from the article that put the sufi hospice on the front page of the election campaign …

“There is a thin rubber mattress on the floor. A red sleeping bag. A phone cord trailing across the drab carpet. A gym bag half-full of clothes, an outside toilet, no fridge, no chair and no table.

But this murky space at the back of a tiny Islamic bookshop in downtown Auburn is home, insists Irfan Yusuf, the Liberal Party's somewhat unconventional candidate for the western Sydney seat of Reid.

“Here it is,” he says, gesturing about the gloom. “I live here.”

Mr Yusuf's Labor opponent, the long-time member for Reid, Laurie Ferguson, is not so sure, however, and neither is the Australian Electoral Commission …

Lounging on his mattress, he challenged Mr Ferguson to come down and check things out for himself. “Laurie can come here any time, day or night. Just get him to ring me on the mobile first, because I'm usually at Mustafa's [the nearby kebab shop]. I'd be happy to introduce him to the Yusuf residence. And after that, we'll go over and have a look at his bedroom.”

Acknowledging his rudimentary surroundings, Mr Yusuf said: “I'm a bachelor.”
“Obviously when the better half comes along, she will be insisting on some improvements.” And the name of this other half? “There's a few options,” he said. “I still haven't figured out which one I'm going to take. That's what happens when you're not married.”

… Mr Yusuf said: “At the end of the day, what counts is how you relate to the people you are claiming to represent.”

“The guy's obviously desperate,” he said of Mr Ferguson, who won just under 72 per cent of the vote in the last federal election in 1998, making Reid one of the safest Labor seats in the country.”

Later, my old friend Emine, a waitress at Mustafas, told me how proud she was of me after reading the article.

“It shows you are just an ordinary guy, just like all the other ordinary people in Auburn.”

But the proudest people of all were my Naqshi brethren. They felt their 5 seconds of fame for many weeks as the incident was widely reported in the local and overseas Turkish press.

For the next few weeks, my poster was up across the wire fence that covered at least 5 blocks of Queen Street. It was later dubbed “The Great Wall of Irfan”.

But on this night, some 4 years later, Shaykh Gary Edwards and the rest of us were on our guided tour. Abdul showed Gaz an example of the technique being used to teach Arabic letters to the sufi novices.

Gary seemed more interested in what was on the back of the white plastic sheets. He turned one around and then looked in my general direction. He then showed me what he was looking at.

There was my mugshot surrounded by green and black lettering.

“We put these to good use. There is a whole pallet of them in the other room,” Abdul said after we completed the night prayers. Gary looked at me and Alf. We looked back and him and at Abdul. Within a few seconds, we were rolling on the floor in hysterics, laughing till our sides nearly split.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

FAIR Go

2005-09-27T22:03:00.000-07:00

The Forum of Australia’s Islamic Relations is a grassroots advocacy network. It consists largely of 2nd generation kids of migrants, mostly born in Australia. There are also a fair few Anglo-Australian Muslims involved in the network.

I have been a member of FAIR for some time now. The body was formed after its executive director, Kurandar Seyfi Seyit, finished work as media adviser to the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils Inc (AFIC). Seyfi (as he is known to most of us) was employed pursuant to a Living in Harmony grant furnished to AFIC by the Department of Immigration Multicultural & Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA).

FAIR’s major project is the newspaper Australia FAIR. Initially, the paper was of quite good quality, modelling itself on the Australian Muslim News (AMN) which Seyfi edited during his term at AFIC. The AMN was a quality paper with a leftish focus but with a good variety of articles and issues covered.

Australia FAIR is generally published on time each month. Its quality has diminished quite substantially, to the extent that it now resembles Green Left Weekly more than a serious community paper. It certainly cannot compare in quality and content to the Catholic Weekly or the Australian Jewish News.

Australia FAIR has lost many of its key writers, often due to unnecessary mistakes and blunders on the part of some of its editorial team. On a number of occasions, I have noticed my own work being lifted from other sources without any recognition of its source. Often my pieces have been edited without my approval, and on at least one occasion an offensive headline was placed on my article.

I have ceased writing for Australia FAIR after discovering that the paper still does not have standard defamation insurance. Given the editor’s propensity to lift pieces and edit them without my approval, I have also requested that he not reproduce anything of mine (including this article, though I doubt he would do that anyway).

In recent times, FAIR has done some excellent interfaith work. The “Goodness & Kindness Project” in which Seyfi is accompanied by a Jewish and Christian speaker in visits to schools across NSW has been a resounding success. Seyfi’s work has also been recognised in an award he received from the Daily Telegraph.

FAIR has also received positive media coverage, despite occasional stuff-ups and blunders (such as the phenomenally awful performance on ABC morning talkback some months back). FAIR has played a positive role in the current debate on internal Muslim reform, though it is questionable whether the FAIR director has consulted with executive members in this regard (in one e-mail sent to a number of yahoogroups, he acknowledged that FAIR did not operate on a consultative and democratic model).

FAIR has now chosen to enter the debate on the education of Imams. FAIR has come up with a proposal for a Fatiha Institute to be headed by American Imam Gary Edwards (also known as Naeem Abdul Wali) of the al-Kawthar Institute in Arizona. The Institute aims to educate imams and generate locally-trained imams using traditional methods of ijaza and sanad found in the Dars-i-Nizami system.

The Institute proposal was made public in a gathering at the Gazi Husrev Beg Mosque in Penshurst. Proposal notes were handed out to people attending the mosque for isha prayers. It appeared that neither the imam nor members of the mosque executive were aware of the proposal.

Imam Salih Mujalla is a respect scholar who completed his studies in Sarajevo and al-Azhar upto at least masters level. He has been an imam of the Bosnian community in Sydney for over 2 decades, and is respected by people across all Muslim communities. He appears regularly in local newspapers, and is an outspoken critic of all forms of religious extremism (including of the Muslim variety).

In Ottoman mosques, it is traditional for the Imam to control not just the service but all events taking place in the mosque. When the FAIR representatives appeared to take over the show following isha prayers, the imam could sense his executive members becoming tense. He therefore asked that the FAIR executive members cut short discussion of the Institute and allow their visiting guest Naeem Abdul Wali speak.

It is impossible to underestimate the damage done to FAIR’s image within the Bosnian community when FAIR’s director was seen behaving with the imam in a manner that could only be described as abrupt. In my opinion, his behaviour reflected poorly on FAIR, its membership and its projects.

There is no point leading a project to educate imams whilst behaving rudely toward a senior and respected imam in the process.

Members and others concerned about FAIR and community advocacy need to take control of their organisation. They need to ensure greater accountability. FAIR is an excellent organisation that does excellent work. Everyone makes mistakes, and I am no exception. But when mistakes are made, it is best to apologise.

In that respect, I think FAIR should send a letter to Imam Salih and apologise for any offence they may have caused. In doing so, FAIR will gain the respect and support of Imam Salih and the other Bosnian imams.

FAIR should and must play a role in contemporary debates on national security and community management. However, it is important that activists and hard workers like Seyfi are given a fair go by FAIR members and are not left to do all the work themselves. Seyfi deserves the support of his executive, and they should be consulted at all stages. Otherwise, FAIR will become just another typical Islamic association run like a personal fiefdom.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

PROFILE - Yasmin Khan - One of the PM's Mossies

2005-09-26T17:03:00.000-07:00

One of the many criticisms labelled at the PM’s recent summit with Muslim leaders in Canberra was the near-absence of Aussie Mossies – Muslim Australians born and brought up in Australia.

Indeed, the summit appeared to be dominated by middle aged migrant men, many of whom had few English language skills. Most of these men had held positions in various Muslim organisations, positions which enabled them to provide jobs to themselves and their family members.

It seems the PM’s favourite Muslims are the ethnic ones. But appearances can be deceiving. And quite a number of people at the summit did not fit into this category.

Amongst them is Yasmin Khan, a Muslim woman from Queensland. Yasmin’s family have lived in Queensland for over 120 years, and are now into their 5th generation. Ms Khan was born in a small town in Northern Queensland named Babinda, and grew up in and schooled in Innisfail, one hour south of Cairns.

I spoke to Yasmin Khan some days back, and asked her about her upbringing, the summit and Muslim community leadership in Brisbane and Australia.

Yasmin grew up in what was the only Muslim family in her small town. Like many Muslim Australian parents, Yasmin’s parents ensured she and her siblings had the best of both worlds.

“We kept our fasts whilst we attended school - local state school - wore traditional clothes - shalwar kameez - on traditional holidays - Eid etc. We lived a great existence experiencing the best of both worlds - we joined the guides and scouts, CWA, had jobs after school, played sport, but prayed our namaz, went outside to see if we can see the moon, celebrated Eid, enjoyed Christmas, grew up on Rafi songs as well as Abba and Sherbet.”

After completing Year 12, Yasmin worked for Australia Post and completed a number of technical and other courses at TAFE. She has also managed her own small business which she recently sold. She has also been involved in a variety of community activities including working as a volunteer announcer in community radio. Yasmin is definitely a graduate from the University of Life.

Ms Khan remembers being first informed of her invitation to the PM’s summit when she received a phone call from someone in the Department of Immigration. The initial phone call was a mere 5 days before the summit.

She did not have a chance to speak to the PM at any great length during the summit. And Ms Khan has some strong views about organisations represented at the summit. In relation to AFIC, Ms Khan had this to say.

“[L]ike some Islamic organisations, you have to wait until someone dies, before you get some fresh blood on there - and they are very protective of the organisation, very insular, very cliquey and very power hungry … they have no female representation - they have no representation from the majority of the Muslim population. I understand the need for a peak body - I'm just not sure that they are doing it right or have the right people involved.”

Yasmin used to sit on the school board of the Islamic School of Brisbane. She also is heavily involved in a new social work initiative called “I-Care". When asked about I-Care and its relation to the Sydney-based Mission of Hope, Ms Khan described the body as one which aimed to provide support services for Muslim families in crisis.

“[W]e can see the problems for families and we are offering solutions for them. There is no Muslim social worker in Brisbane working with the community, there is no where for women experiencing domestic violence to call - who understands her culture, her religion or her language. It is only a new organisation - newly formed and still going through submission stages for funding - but all indications at this stage are looking good.”

Yasmin’s views on representation come straight out of a textbook on representative liberal democracy. She says that the PM’s summit could not have representation of all Muslim Australians, and that hosting a truly representative summit would have required hiring out Bruce Stadium in Canberra.

“Anyone who is not invited is going to feel left out - but that seems to be half the problem in this country with the Muslims - it seems that if I am not telling my own story then no one else can tell it either. That is ludicrous - we are all Muslims - we should have similar issues - but we tend to think that the Iraqi, is going to be different to the Bosnian, or the Turk or the Pakistani, and that leads to half the problems we are having where everyone thinks ethnicity and not religion.”

And what role will the summit and the subsequent reference group play?

“Think of it as Parliament - all your ideas, thoughts, social attitudes etc are not going to be owned by the person representing your electorate in Parliament - but somebody in Parliament will have those ideas, thoughts, attitudes - it just means that you have to connect with who does and use them to the best advantage. That is what democracy is about - and that group at the summit is only a small representation - and I think the reference group is another small representation - but it is up to us to utilise the collective representation to get things done.”

Yasmin is critical of mainstream Muslim institutions and their lack of female representation. She describes Muslim organisational leadership in strong terms, saying “[t]hey are ultra conservative, ultra hypocritical and ultra stupid to say the least.”

To be continued …

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Dave, Sal, Ali, Lev, Abdul & Neuroscience – Some Ordinary Aussie Mossies

2005-09-24T03:13:00.000-07:00

Some days back, I was visiting a new Australian. Dave did not come to Australia on a boat, though a large number of his ancestors did in the years following 1788. Dave is from London, and some years back fell in love with Sal.

Dave and Sal are married and live within earshot of Sydney’s Gallipoli Mosque. Sal catches fraudsters for one of Australia’s major banks, From time to time, she also works as a freelance journalist. Dave hopes to return to studies in graphic design, and currently works as teaching assistant to a Sydney Imam.

Dave has a mate in Queensland who asked him to give me some feedback on this blog. The Queenslander Aussie Mossie said that I spent too much time focussing on the high-flyers. Instead, I should focus a little on ordinary Muslims. That way, readers can see just how extraordinarily ordinary most Muslims are.

So here goes.

Sal is a fitness freak. Last year, she ran in the City-to-Surf. As far as she knew, she was the only woman wearing a hijab.

“I wear hijab because I feel like it. And I don’t think it stops me from running in the City to Surf. It was weird, though. A lot of women were a little surprised to see me run so fast. They thought I must be a ghost or something, running past them in all-white.”

Dave was waiting for Sal at the finishing line. He was ever-so-proud.

“I’m glad it was her, not me! I wouldn’t have made the distance. At the finish line, I was shouting out to her. She just kept her focus on the line. I’d never seen her with such pink cheeks in my life!”

Dave works with Imam Abdul who spends a lot of time working with young Muslims in the Auburn area. Apart from being a Muslim chaplain at two university campuses, Imam Abdul is finishing his PhD. His thesis covers a range of disciplines, including history, sociology, demography and theology.

Dave helps Abdul by taking some of the teaching load from him down at the local sufi hospice. That way, Abdul can focus on finishing the thesis. Abdul teaches some 40 young boys how to read Qur’an.

Abdul grew up in Sydney. His father Ali was for some years imam of the Gallipoli Mosque. Ali was an extremely popular imam, especially with the more secular-minded Turks. He encouraged women to visit the mosque, even if they refused to wear the hijab. He also made time for the less observant Turkish Muslims, especially those in family crisis.

One of Ali’s parishioners is Lev who used to run a local pizza shop in the middle of Auburn. Lev told me about Ali’s major role in helping him cope with his mother.s death.

“I was very close to my mum. When she died, I was just completed stuffed. It was like I’d been hit by a cyclone. One day I went to the mosque. I was sitting in the corner like a stunned mullet. I see this guy dressed like a hoca [Turkish for imam] walking upto me. He sits down on the ground with me and starts talking about soccer. He’d seen me train some of the boys from the local Turkish soccer team.

“Ali Hoca was a legend. He never turned anyone away from the mosque. He was very stern with people who thought they were religious. Many of these people hated him. I often heard them complaining that Ali Hoca only spent time with alcoholics and uncovered women.

Ali Hoca brought so many people back to Islam. And I don’t mean some crappy straight-jacketed Islam. I mean the real Islam that shows compassion and accepts all people. Ali Hoca gave me a lot of peace”.

I asked Lev about Ali’s son Abdul.

“Mate, Abdul is just like his dad. Except Abdul is more mild-mannered and doesn’t have as good a recitation voice. But Abdul has many other good qualities.”

Abdul has been touching hearts for many years. Like all true sufis, his focus is on internal as well as external transformation. If you saw Abdul in the street, you wouldn’t think he was a hoca. He looks just like anyone else.

Abdul was instrumental in bringing Sal and Dave together. Abdul went into bat for them with their sceptical families and communities who could not imagine a Pommy bloke and a Arab chick getting together.

But don’t try praising Abdul about it. As usual, he is philosophical.

“Brother, Allah decided to give me this task. I was not best for the job, and I almost did not succeed. But Allah helped me and my friends along the way, and today they are married.”

Abdul then made one final comment.

“Irfan, when are you going to get married?”

I just smiled and daydreamt of neuroscience.

© Irfan Yusuf

Two Aussie Mossie Power Chix

2005-09-10T05:51:00.000-07:00

You don’t have to be a Muslim to be an Aussie Mossie. Elsewhere on this blog, I have written about my cousin and law clerk GG, as well as about the late Dean of Sydney Lance Shilton.

Tonight, I met up with two people who have become close friends. One I have known for over 12 years, the other for a mere 5 weeks. One was brought up in a Hindu family, the other regards herself as Buddhist.

Aruna is an actuary and currently works as a management consultant. She was born in KL, regards herself as a Hindu and lives in the CBD. Aruna is a power-chick with a mind full of amazing ideas. Yet at this stage of her life, Aruna is searching for herself. In the process, she is sharing her wisdom with whoever may care to listen.

Bridget was born in Christchurch. Her ancestry is pre-colonial Scottish. She regards herself as a Buddhist who is open to all sorts of ideas. Recently she attended a sufi retreat where she learnt about the various states of Islamic spirituality. Upon her finishing the retreat, I rewarded her with a copy of Imam Suhrawardy’s sufi treatise entitled “The Shape of Light”.

Like Aruna, Bridget works as a management consultant. Yet her real passion is music, a passion she had to leave following a nasty incident which left her unable to play her favourite instrument. As a result, she had to go back to university and learn new instruments for managing people.

Aruna and Bridget are business partners. But they are also partners in fun and good times. They see each other regularly and have deep discussions on politics, religion, spirituality, life, blokes and other contingencies. Often, I am the token male in their deeply feminine discussions.

So what makes these 2 women mossies? Aruna and Bridget share a passion for justice. They are not satisfied with living middle class educated existences. They have seen and reached the top of the corporate ladders. They have been involved in power, wealth and professional excellence. They have seen the big end of town.

Bridget spends 2 days a week working for various charitable organisations as a volunteer. Her involvement is not some feel-good middle class fantasy to soothe her soul while she takes a break from managing her portfolios. Bridget takes her compassion seriously.

For some people, spirituality involves a few visits to the Adyar Bookshop every year. They might read some pages of the latest work by the Dalai Lama. But for Aruna and Bridget, it’s all about soul. They practise what they preach, and are working on projects to show business how spiritual values are also profitable in the long run. Corporate spirituality is their mantra.

I see aspects in Islam in these 2 women that are hard to find in many Muslim women. I was brought up to believe that Islam is about managing one’s compassion. That means you have to have compassion in the first place. Once you have this, you need to channel the compassion in a way which does not eat you up like a vat of kainic acid.

I am learning how to channel compassion into everything I do. I am also learning that I need to find my calling, my purpose in life. I cannot afford to put out too many fires, or else I will get burnt.

These lessons I am learning from my two sisters in Islam, Aruna and Bridget. Both have learnt from difficult experiences that compassion has to be managed properly. Both have set me straight and showed me that I am sometimes in danger of being consumed by too many fires I am trying to extinguish.

One of the great blessings in life is to have good friends. A real friend is not a sycophant. A real friend says what needs to be said, regardless of who gets offended. Today Aruna told me straight that I had to stop trying to box up my feelings, that it was OK to express a bad mood. Bridget keeps telling me that I have to listen and not just talk. Thankfully, they scream these and other messages so loudly in my ears that I will never forget them.

And so I thank my Creator for blessing me with the company of two women who have surrendered to God. Their company makes me not just a better Muslim, but also a better man.

© Irfan Yusuf

Advice From My Aussie Sufi Teacher

2005-09-04T08:08:00.000-07:00

Tonight I had a reunion with one of my teachers. He is Australian of Turkish origin, and has lived in Australia since the mid-1980’s. For some years, he lived in Sydney and managed a small sufi bookshop. He was then appointed imam of a small mosque on the outskirts of Western Sydney.

The first time I met this imam, I was the master of ceremonies at a large Muslim festival held annually during Eid al-Fitr (Malays and Indonesians call it “Hari Raya”) to celebrate the end of the fasting month of Ramadan. The imam wanted to say a few words in Turkish. I was surrounded by numerous persons wishing to make announcements, and I ignored this Turkish man with poor English skills. He was patient with me.

Some years later, myself and a friend decided to start a small business importing and distributing English-language religious and devotional books to young Muslims. Our major customers were the new Muslim bookshops opening in Sydney and Melbourne. I met this imam at the bookshop, and he remembered me again. He could have complained about my rudeness at the festival, but he refrained.

Some years later, I went to a Muslim camp organised by a progressive Muslim youth group. I was a young lawyer and had fallen head-over-heels in love with a young Turkish girl who was studying law. I must have proposed to her 30 times over a period of 6 months. My Turkish friends told me that Turkish women keep saying no and rebuffing a boy to test how devoted he is. I took their advice to heart. One of my advisers was this imam, though he was in the background trying to set her up with someone else. He juggled and balanced the competing interests with enormous skill. He was a true diplomat.

I got over the Turkish lawyer and became infatuated with a Brazilian doctor I met on the internet. At the time, I was visiting this imam at his mosque with some friends. We would gather each Saturday night for a lesson and some zikr in the naqshbandi sufi style. This imam introduced me to a man from Turkey, a controversial history professor whose father-in-law dabbled in Turkish politics.

The imam used to lead us in zikr after the night prayer. Zikr is a kind of meditation that involves repetition of the names of God. In the Qur’an, God is given 99 names. Unlike its closest spiritual cousin (Judaism), Islam actively encourages its devotees to recite God’s names. Muslims name their children using these names. Worship and spirituality revolves around recognition and contemplation and osmosis of the meanings and characteristics reflected in these names.

I was corresponding with this Brazilian doctor, Adriana, for some 4 months. It was 1998, and I was a confident lawyer managing the Sydney office of a Melbourne law firm. My boss allowed me 2 weeks to go to Brazil and meet someone I hoped to be the love of my life.

Adriana was a huge fan of Sufism. She introduced me to Mevlana Jelaluddin Rumi. I told the imam about her fascination with Rumi, and he encouraged me to study Rumi. He also suggested I should consider becoming a devotee of the sufi path before leaving for Brazil.

On the morning of leaving for Brazil, I went to the dergah (sufi hospice) located in Queen Street Auburn. There, I met the imam. He knew I was leaving for Brazil. He and I joined the controversial history professor in zikr. I had seen this professor on numerous occasions, and was impressed with his demeanour which so resembled that of my own father (himself an academic).

I felt comfortable in the presence of Professor Cosan (pronounced “Joshan”). Remembering the words of the imam, I advised him that I was ready to swear allegiance to the Professor. As the Professor was getting ready to leave, the imam told him in Turkish of my intentions.

“He wants to be my murid [student]? Tell him I already consider him a murid. He needs no ceremony. Hoca [pronounced “hoja” and meaning “imam” in Turkish], give him the papers and teach him the wird [special zikr] of our tariqa [spiritual order].”

The imam gave me the wird and explained to me how to use it. For 6 or 7 months, I was regular in the wird. When I landed at Sao Paolo airport, I was reciting the wird. Each night at Aracatuba, after performing my isha prayer, I would perform the wird. I even showed Dr Adriana and her brother Fernando the wird.

Adriana and I did not join paths. She went off with a Lebanese Brazilian who had abandoned Islam for what he thought was a better life. He offered that better life to her and she accepted it. She left me. She was thousands of miles away. I could not handle the trauma. I was devastated and severely depressed. I dropped the wird.

But I never dropped my friendship with the imam. And he never lost faith in me. He knew I was erratic and sometimes arrogant. He knew I was loud and controversial. But he was patient with me. He was a true sufi, a living embodiment of Rumi.

Tonight, I saw him after perhaps 3 years. On previous visits to Melbourne, I would bump into him. Always, these were memorable visits. As was tonight’s visit.

The imam had been watching my media appearances on TV. He wanted me to speak on certain things. He said that I had to project a true Islamic image, that I had to raise the standard of the debate. And what was his advice? Here is my recollection …

“Brother Irfan, Muslims must speak the truth. But I see some imams speaking things that are against the sharia [religious law]. I see them justifying suicide bombing by Palestinians. Sharia is sharia. The sharia says that a Muslim must not kill innocent civilians. How can we justify killing innocent Israeli women and children?

“Brother Irfan, when the media asks you about suicide bombers, you must condemn them. You must condemn the people who flew the planes into the buildings on September 11. Even if the imams are against you, I will support you. And Allah will support you. You must stand up for the truth.

“Brother Irfan, you know that our late murshid, Professor Cosan, was not afraid to speak the truth even if many Turks and Muslims opposed him. If you are a true student of his, you must condemn the wrong and stand up for what is right.

“You must speak against suicide bombings. We are Muslims. We follow the Prophet of Allah who taught us to love all people. The Prophet used to inquire about the welfare and health of his Jewish neighbours. Today, some Palestinians are killing their Jewish neighbours. This action is haram [forbidden unde religious law].

“Do not allow your sympathy with Palestinians to cloud your vision. Sharia is Allah’s law, and we must not allow our emotions to affect our recognition of sharia. Our neighbours have rights over us. Jewish people have rights over us. If we kill their women and children, Allah will demand us to compensate for this on the Day of Judgment.

“Other Turkish Muslim cemats [pronounced “jemats” and meaning “congregations”] are trying to make excuses and nice statements in front of people. But Australian people are not stupid. They know when Muslims are being 2-faced. You must not be 2-faced. You must be firm.

“And you must also tell Muslims to stop their stupidity toward Israel. Why are we stupidly not recognising Israel’s existence? Does it matter what these undemocratic autocratic Muslim regimes think? These governments want us to hate Israel while they secretly do deals with Israel. But if Salahuddin [Saladin] were alive today, he would recognise Israel.

“Israel is weak. It relies on America. Why should we hate America? Look at us. We are Turks. Irfan, you are a Mughal Turk. Your ancestors were Turks. Do you know where we came from? From Mongolia. Our forefathers killed more Muslims than the Israelis and Americans could even dream of. But the Muslims of that time never hated us. And when we became Muslim, we took Islam to Europe and India.

“Brother Irfan, you are doing the right things and saying the right things. Now you must speak the truth. If Muslims do not recognise these truths, that is their problem. If Muslims want to support suicide bombings and terrorism and hating non-Muslims, that is their stupidity. Allah will continue to punish and humiliate them.

“Brother Irfan, if you are a true student and a true Muslim, you will speak what is right and best. You will tell Muslims to stop hating people. You will tell Muslims to stop justifying terrorism and saying one thing to non-Muslims while believing another thing in their hearts. You must remind Muslims of the sharia.

“Sharia does not teach us to kill innocent people. Sharia does not teach us to hate Jews or their state. Sharia does not teach us to hate Americans or Mongols or any other race. You cannot be a sufi without recognising and accepting the sharia. Brother Irfan, remind Muslim leaders and imams. Shame them in front of their fellow Australians.

“How embarrassing it is that non-Muslim Australians in the media and in politics promote sharia more than Muslim leaders and imams. How shameful this is. You must speak on these things when Allah gives you the chance. I will be watching you. But most importantly, Allah is watching you”.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

3AW Talkshow Host's Blog Promotes Genocide

2005-08-28T01:54:00.000-07:00

I have been following the blog of prominent Melbourne barrister Peter Faris QC for some time now. His blog interests me because it is a prime example of the kind of anti-Muslim rhetoric that leads many to commit hate crimes against Muslims.

Hate-speech is a dangerous phenomenon. In the present environment, with social tensions being played in the context of national security concerns, the worst scenario is one where particular ethnic and faith communities are made to feel marginalised.

The bin-Ladin’s of this world are busy trying to generate hatred of Western migrant Muslims toward their host communities. Extremists are also attempting to establish the existence of a giant anti-Muslim conspiracy in order to convince Muslims (both indigenous and migrant) to attack Western targets.

When influential and well-connected persons like Peter Faris QC preach anti-Muslim hatred, they assist the bin-Ladin cause. Peter Faris’ diatribe fuels the fires of hatred and suspicion against Muslim Australians.

What the bin-Ladin’s and the Faris’ of this world attempt is to identify what they see as the real agenda. Bin-Ladin claims that the real agenda of the West is to destroy Islam. Faris, Daniel Pipes and their cohorts claim that the real Muslim agenda is to destroy the West. One coin, two sides.

Perhaps even more interesting than Mr Faris’ own demented views are those of his supporters on the blog. Now we must remember that these views are not necessarily those of Mr Faris. However, Mr Faris does state at the top of each page of his blog:

“This is a public forum. I have no control over comments posted by others. I will delete inappropriate comments if they come to my notice.”

It is strange that the following comment by one “Gravelrash” has not been edited or removed from Faris’ blog. The comment is clearly in praise of Hitler’s final solution, and calls for a mass genocide to take place against Muslims.

This call is being made some 10 years after the Srebrenica massacre in which over 8,000 Muslim men and boys were hunted down, tortured and killed by Bosnian Serb “Scorpion” forces who filmed the entire event. That massacre was shown on the Channel 9 Sixty Minutes program on Australian television on Sunday 14 August 2005.

The Bosnian Serb leadership wanted to implement a Final Solution against Muslims in Bosnia. And many of Peter Faris’ allies wish to implement the same solution in Australia and across the world.

And so, at 9:37am on Wednesday 18 August 2005, the following response appears on the Faris blog. The comment is in response to a posting by Peter Faris entitled “Muslims must become Aussies now”. The comment of “Gravelrash" reads as follows:

“I think it’s time we stopped beating around the bush. Hitler had the right idea, wrong race. A time is coming when everyone will have to make a choice, and that time is soon. What side will you be on?”

These sentiments are reflected in an article by Daniel Pipes in which he states that the best way to deal with terrorism is to lynch Muslim communities anytime a terrorist incident occurs.

These sentiments are the Judeo-Christian version of al-Qaida rhetoric. Peter Faris and his supporters have become the Omrans and Abu Bakars of Anglo-Australia. Yet do we see tabloid programs like Today Tonight exposing these dangerous views? Do we read Piers Akerman, Andrew Bolt and other pseudo-conservative columnists attacking these dangerous sentiments?

No.

The Herald-Sun was quick to draw inferences from a survey it did of Imams in Melbourne. Will the Herald-Sun now expose Peter Faris and his blog as a force of anti-Australian hatred?

Australian conservatives must speak out against this kind of hate-speech. They must condemn the all-Aussie al-Qaida. Because if they stay silent, their silence will be interpreted as support for a final solution against Muslim Australians.

iyusuf@sydneylawyers.com.au

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Clearing Off Australian Schools

2005-08-24T18:04:00.000-07:00

“Why don’t your clerics learn to teach real Aussie values? What is the problem with your clerics? When are they going to learn English? When will your clerics stop being so radical? What is wrong with your clerics?”

These questions were put to me by a Canberra talkback host who is lucky to score double-figures in the ratings. And my response? What is wrong with my clerics?

“The problem with Islamic clerics is that they don’t exist.”

When Dr Nelson and others start talking about training imams and registering and licensing them as a means of de-radicalising young Muslims, he is showing how extraordinarily out of touch he is with the realities of Islamic cultural and religious education in Australia. Imams are not clerics. Islam has no priesthood.

Dr Nelson is out of touch with Muslim schools and communities. Which, for a future Prime Ministerial candidate of a nation to the south of the largest Islamic nation on the planet, is a real shame.

All Dr Nelson needs to do to solve this (next time he is in Canberra) is to drive down to Yarralumla and go to this white building across the road from the Indonesia embassy. There he can have a chat to a real-life imam.

Or perhaps he can jump in a cab and head down to Clive Steel Avenue in Monash and talk with some of the fantastic Aussie folk at the Canberra Islamic Centre.

Perhaps Dr Nelson could ask some people in his electorate about Muslims. He could ask my best mate from school, an Anglican chorister at St Andrews Cathedral. I am sure Dave could tell Brendan a thing or two about why Muslims shouldn’t be told to “clear off”.

Or perhaps Dr Nelson could ask my uncle Dr Khan, a former executive member of AFIC for many years, about the reality of being an imam.

These matters are within the good Doctor’s grasp. Perhaps when he was running for preselection for Bradfield in 1995/96 and I was on his preselection panel, he could have given me an opportunity to answer any questions on this area.

Dr Nelson has made some honest and genuine attempts to understand the realities of Aboriginal health. As a high-profile AMA president, he visited indigenous communities in outback Australia to get a first-hand look at how Aboriginal Australians were doing it tough.

Perhaps as education minister, Dr Nelson should visit all the Islamic independent schools and see how the staff and administration of these schools are doing it tough. I would be happy to offer him a guided tour of the three Islamic schools in Sydney that I acted for.

Rissalah College in Lakemba is a typical example of a struggling Islamic school. The bulk of their staff are non-Muslims, but I have not heard any complaints from parents about this. The college’s problems more stem from finding partner schools with whom to play sport.

With campuses in Auburn and Prestons (in Western Sydney), Sule College is officially a non-denominational school. They have ambitious plans but struggle with funding. A student from Sule College taught me the second stanza of the Australian national anthem, something I never learnt during my 10 years at St Andrews Cathedral School.

Nour al-Houda Islamic College has had to struggle from Day 1. Their struggle is not with Australian values – the Principal Silma Ihram was born in Australia – but with the managers of the Bankstown Airport site. Silma is all praise for the Federal and NSW Departments of Education.

When I ran as a federal Liberal candidate for the seat of Reid, NSW State Director Scott Morrison taught me an important lesson.

“Irf, never say anything you will have to make excuses for later on. The eyes of the electorate and potentially the eyes of Australia are on you. And before you know it, you might find yourself on the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald”.

Perhaps he should have also included the Canberra Times. But the point still remains. People in politics, whether candidates or Ministers of the Crown, have to measure their words carefully.

To tell a community that has been part of mainstream Australian life for over 150 years that they need to learn mainstream Australian values or “clear off” is just an indication of extraordinary ignorance, if not prejudice.

Aussie Mossies are here to stay. Just accept it. Or clear off!

iyusuf@sydneylawyers.com.au

© Irfan Yusuf

Bilal & Maha - A Couple of Aussie Mossies

2005-08-22T06:05:00.000-07:00

Today I spent some 3 hours locked up with some 100 others in a TV studio in Ultimo. We were part of a television audience on Andrew Denton’s popular talk show “Enough Rope”.

I have always been a fan of Andrew ever since I read him make the brave declaration “Zionism is just bullshit” during an interview with the Australian Jewish lifestyle magazine “New Moon”. Andrew speaks his mind and just doesn’t give a flying flock who gets offended. And rarely do people ever get offended since he is so funny about it.

Today, Andrew’s hosts were a couple I went to university with. In fact, I am honoured to say that they were my friends. Bilal (“Bill”) Mahmassani was secretary of the Macquarie University Muslim Students Association (MUMSA) when I was president. And when I was silly enough to join the Young Liberals, Bilal also signed up.

Bilal studied economics at Macquarie University where he met the love of his life. Today that love has become “she-who-must-be-obeyed” and is still known as Maha Shiyab (she will not change her surname, and he won’t even bother trying to convince her). I knew Maha before she wore a hijab (traditional Muslim headscarf, called a “tadung” in Malay Muslim cultures geographically closest to Australia).

Bilal and Maha were interviewed by Andrew in the shadow of rising talk of Muslims being seen as a threat to every atom and molecule in the universe. As Chicago-born Muslim funnyman Azhar Usman notes, Islam has always been presented as a synonym for cream cheese, having been historically portrayed as spread by sharp metallic objects.

Today, Muslims are viewed as being worthy of stoning (or should that be "Stoning"? As in the case of The Australian newspaper which allowed the near-xenophobic rant of a former National Party Sentaor to go to print but refused my submitted refutation) for not being prepared to assimilate.

Yeah, right. Try telling that to Bilal and Maha.

Bilal runs a small business. He also works and has completed studies in economics at both Bachelors and Masters level. Maha is similarly educated, though her specialty is in the area of education. When she is not looking after her 2 children and bossing Bilal around, Maha teaches at a public school in Canley Vale in Sydney’s south-west.

The interview had some classical highlights. There was Bilal’s admission that he ate fried lamb brains and tabouli to school, wondering all the while why his friends did not wish to share in his delicacy. Thankfully, he never offered this to me at university.

Maha spoke of getting abused while walking with Bilal a brief 10 minute walk to the hospital in Westmead when she was ready to give birth. On the way, she was almost run over twice by passing motorists.

Bilal spoke of his parents insisting he grow up and mix with children from non-Muslim backgrounds. He watched the video of Melbourne-based fanatic Abu Bakr who told the ABC’s 7:30 Report and expressed accurately the sentiments of all Australians regardless of religious or ethnic background.

“I can’t blame Australians for having hatred toward him. He came to this country seeking help and help was offered. He lives supported by Centrelink. And now he bites the hand that feeds him!”

At one stage in the interview, Bilal and Maha spoke about the frustration they have with Muslim leadership. Their views were particularly significant given the meeting that would take place in Canberra between Mr Howard and Muslim organisational leaders.

“They don’t represent us. They don’t know us and we don’t know them. They never consult us. I don’t see any polling … We need an injection of young Muslim people brought up in Australia.”

Bilal and Maha represent the best and brightest that Muslim Australia has to offer. They are young, hip, madly in love with each other (anyone who saw Maha continually holding Bilal’s arm could see that) and with Australia. These are the people who should have been invited to Canberra. These are the people John Howard should be talking to. These are the people who have every reason to defend Australia against terrorist attacks or indeed any other threat.

Bilal and Maha are proud. They are proud of their faith. They are proud of their marriage and of their family. They are proud of their country. They are true Australian Muslims. They are what one Anglo-Australian Muslim convert described 30 years ago as “Aussie Mossies”.

And having seen them go through university and struggle with their often difficult personal circumstances, I am proud to know them. And after watching them on national television, I am proud to be an Aussie Mossie.

(The author is a Sydney industrial lawyer and freelance writer who grew up in John Howard’s electorate and was endorsed Liberal candidate for the seat of Reid in the 2001 State Election. He is a columnist for OnlineOpinion.com.au and altmuslim.com.)

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Open Letter to Hon John Howard MHR, Prime Minister of Australia

2005-08-17T21:54:00.000-07:00

The Hon John Howard MHR
Prime Minister of Australia
Member for Bennelong
via e-mail

Dear Sir

My name is Irfan Yusuf. I was an endorsed Liberal Candidate in the 2001 elections in the seat of Reid, and managed a swing of 5.1% on a 2-party preferred basis.

My parents have lived in your electorate virtually since the day they moved to Australia permanently in 1970.

I understand you are holding a meeting with leaders from the Muslim faith-community. This is a welcome move.

I am, however, concerned as to noises being made by at least one peak body which wants the Federal Government to give it some kind of statutory powers to police Muslim Australians.

This would be a most unfortunate outcome. Indigenous Australians are still suffering as a result of the failure of the ATSIC model. We do not need an Islamic ATSIC.

Further, I am concerned as to exactly how representative some of these bodies are. I wonder at a national federation whose executive has not had a single female for over 20 years. I also wonder at a national body which appoints an unelected non-English speaking mufti to act as its adviser on youth affairs.

If we can learn any lesson from the London bombing, it is of the need to ensure that local Muslim Australian youth do not become guineapigs for radical elements. But when local Muslim organisational heads insist on ignoring and marginalising young Muslims, and when intelligent young Muslims like the Doureihi brothers (whom I know personally) can only find a voice in groups like Hizbut Tehrir, the government cannot and must not take for granted the representative capacity of peak bodies.

Mr Howard, you are the Prime Minister of all Australians. You are the PM of all Muslim Australians. We look to you to represent and protect our national interests. We are just as Australian as you. And we would request that you open your doors to all Muslim Australians.

Perhaps your colleagues in parliament could be encouraged to hold structured consultations with Muslim citizens in their electorates and states. Perhaps prominent Muslim Australians like Ahmed Fahour, Abdul Rizvi and John Ilhan could be invited to contribute.

Thank you for considering this letter. Naturally, we will all be watching events closely over the next few days.

I end with the traditional greeting - peace be with you and the mercy of God!

Your fellow Australian
Irfan Yusuf

John Stones the Aussie Mossie

2005-08-16T07:05:00.000-07:00

Some conservatives find it impossible to accept that non-Christian religions can teach values consistent with the allegedly Christian values of mainstream Australia. Former National Party Senator John Stone seems to be among them. He writes in The Australian on August 15 2005: “Our outstandingly successful wave of postwar immigration clearly passed that test. Equally clearly, Muslim immigrants more recently have not. Australians generally, I believe, have had enough of this.”

Perhaps Mr Stone has not spent much time with his old colleague, Tim Fischer. I will never forget seeing Mr Fischer addressing over 20,000 Muslim Australians at the Multicultural Eid Festival & Fair (MEFF) in 1996. At the time, he was leader of the National Party and would soon become Minister for Trade in the newly elected Howard Government.

Fischer was clearly of the view that Muslim Australians were an integral part of mainstream Australia. For some reason, John Stone disagrees with Fischer’s assessment. And given the shallowness of Mr Stone’s comments, it is clear he has not done his homework very well.

When speaking about Australians being sick of Muslim migrants, which Australians is Mr Stone referring to? Is he referring to those millions of Australians who continue to have accounts with the National Australia Bank even after a Muslim Australian was appointed as their CEO?

Or is he referring to millions of ARL and AFL fans who continue to watch the games notwithstanding the generous support given to both codes by Muslim Australian John Ilhan? Has Mr Stone read Mr Ilhan’s profile in the recent edition of the Australian Financial Review Magazine?

Ilhan is a mainstream Muslim and a mainstream Australian. The AFR Magazine writes that Ilhan “carries his Islamic faith with him everyday … applying what he sees as basic tenets of honesty and integrity to his business”.

And what are these basic tenets. First, there is “asking for forgiveness”. Then there is loving one’s neighbour as one loves one’s self. He won’t open an outlet next door to a competitor he knew, even if it be a former employee or a cousin.

Stone has clearly not read much about Muslim migration to Australia. Had he done so, he would have realised that Muslims have been dealing with Australia for longer than even European settlers.

Recently published research by Professor Abdullah Saeed of the University of Melbourne and funded by the Department of Immigration confirms that Muslim fishermen traded with Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders centuries before the first Europeans discovered New Holland. Indeed, outlines of Australia appeared on Arab maps daring back to the 12th century.

Former Islamic Council of Victoria Secretary Bilal Cleland, himself an Anglo-Australian with ancestry going back to the First Fleet, has written and published a history of Muslims in Australia. Cleland’s book covers the period from the Makassan fishermen referred to above and covers the period of post-war migration that included large numbers of Albanian and (then known as) Yugoslav Muslim migrants.

Cleland deals at length with the Cypriot and Turkish Muslims who arrived during the last decades of the White Australia Policy. The Turkish communities have by far the largest number of mosques and Islamic centres across Australia, including in regional cities and country towns.

Indeed, one Turkish sufi dervish (elder), Professor Mahmud Esad Cosan, is known to have established the first sufi hospices in regional NSW. Professor Cosan was killed in a car accident in February 2001 after opening a hospice in Dubbo.

Professor Cosan encouraged his students to leave the traditional ghettos of Auburn and Coburg and to settle in different cities and in country NSW. His example was followed decades before his call, and country towns such as Shepparton have long-established Muslim communities making major contributions to their local area.

I personally decided to throw my hat in the political ring, running as a conservative candidate in a safe Labor seat in 2001. I wanted to show people in the Reid electorate that a conservative Australian (even a Muslim Australian) could ably represent their interests. The 5.1% swing I achieved for Mr Howard on a 2-party preferred basis is proof that my vision was not a delusion.

I had Australians of all backgrounds handing out election material on polling booths for the Liberal Party. There were Australians of Turkish, Lebanese, Greek, Afghan, Bosnian, Serbian, Iraqi, Indian, Italian, Irish, Japanese and Anglo-Australian backgrounds.

Afghans and Iraqis opposed to mandatory detention still handed out material for me. Meanwhile, a close family friend and Aussie Muslim bureaucrat, Abdul Rizvi, continued to implement the policy of mandatory detention.

Australian Muslims are an integral part of mainstream Australia. If Mr Stone insists on marginalising them, perhaps he needs to assimilate more. Or maybe he just needs to get out more often.

The author is a Sydney industrial lawyer, a naqshbandi sufi Muslim and was endorsed Liberal candidate for the seat of Reid in the 2001 federal election.

Going Green Across the Tasman

2005-08-14T18:53:00.000-07:00

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=466&ObjectID=10340734

Opinion

Irfan Yusuf: Preacher's message one of destruction
15.08.05

Abdur Raheem Green has been banned from entering Australia, but he is addressing groups in New Zealand as part of the Islamic Awareness Week organised by the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand.

Green is a London Muslim preacher. He has no formal theological qualifications, and is not regarded as a Muslim scholar.

He is, however, a charismatic figure and frequently engages in debates with representatives of other faiths.

I first saw Green address a crowd of some 300 Muslim students in Sydney in the late 1990s. He was giving a speech on the responsibilities of Muslims towards missionary work.

I recall him speaking to the audience about how calling people to Islam is not calling them towards a particular group or legal tradition or sufi order. I was not troubled by this.

What did trouble me, however, was what he said outside the hall. Green was poking fun at an international Indian-based Sufi group known as the "Tabligh Jemaat" (literally translated as "Missionary Group").

The TJ are popular among sub-Continental and Fijian-Indian Sunni Muslims, and focus their attention on the "greater jihad" of cleansing and purifying the heart.

I distinctly recall Green lambasting the TJ for spending their time eating curry and speaking in Urdu. His comments had clear racial overtones.

I challenged him over what he said. It was then I discovered who Green really was and what he represented.

Green is part of a minority so small it could not even be regarded as a sect. He belongs to the "Salafi", an offshoot of a small fringe sect known as the "Wahhabis".

The Salafi strain includes elements from the benign to the outright dangerous. Osama bin Laden belongs to the Salafi strain. But so do most Saudi religious authorities.

The various Salafi strains have a number of common features. Salafis take an anthropomorphic view of many of God's attributes.

For instance, when the Koran speaks of God's hands, most Muslims take this metaphorically. But Salafis insist God literally has two hands. They regard anyone who rejects this view as "kafir" (infidel).

As a result, Salafis regard most Sunni Muslims as kafir. But it isn't just Sunnis that Salafis reject. Salafis reject Shia Muslims as kafir.

And their worst venom is reserved for Sufi Muslims (both Sunni and Shia).

The Sufi tradition is the spiritual tradition of mainstream Islam. Sufis such as Rumi have inspired millions, including prominent spiritual figures such as Mahatma Gandhi and Deepak Chopra.

Sufi traders from the Prophet's descendants (known as the "Bani Alawi" clan) in Yemen took Islam to places today known as Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore.

Descendants of these tribes can still be found, and common surnames (or Malay abbreviations) suggest their ancestry.

But Salafis regard many Sufi teachings as outside Islam. One of Green's fellow Salafi preachers, an African-American named Dawud Adib, once told an audience at Melbourne University that a prominent Sufi text written by Imam Ghazali (known in Europe as "Algazel") was worth less than a mosquito wing.

Because the Salafis reject mainstream Islam, they are regarded as being on the very edge of the Muslim fringe. It is unusual that someone from this strain should be invited by a mainstream Muslim body.

On his previous visits to Australia, Green has not only been promoting his fringe Salafi strain of Islam. He has also been preaching a most destructive view of education.

Green told shocked female audiences that it was "haram" (forbidden under religious law) for women to attend mainstream universities.

Women make up more than half the Muslim communities in Australia and New Zealand. They are among the most educated and talented members of the community.

In Australia, the first textbook on Islamic law to be published by a mainstream Australian legal publisher was written by Jamila Hussain, an Anglo-Australian Muslim female law lecturer.

One of the most popular books on Australian Muslim history, Caravanserais, was penned by Haneefa Dean.

In recent times, three Muslim women have published books on their experiences growing up in Australia. Lawyer Randa Abdel-Fattah has written Does My Head Look Big In This? And two journalists, Taghred Chandab and Nadia Jamal, have teamed up to write The Glory Garage: Growing up Lebanese Muslim in Australia.

Around 12 months ago, I met someone at a political function. She noticed I was not drinking. She asked if I was Muslim, before telling me that her late father (whom she never met) was Muslim.

I asked her what she worked as. "I'm a research scientist", she responded. I immediately remarked, "Yet another exceptionally educated Muslim female!". We've been good friends ever since.

These Muslim women are more representative of mainstream Muslim opinion in Australia and New Zealand than Abdur Raheem Green. Had they followed his prescription and decided not to pursue tertiary studies, they would never have written books or published scientific papers.

Green has been invited to New Zealand as part of Islamic Awareness Week. He claims to have moderated his views. But if his past comments are anything to go by, one wonders what sort of Islam he will make New Zealanders aware of.

* Irfan Yusuf is a Sydney industrial lawyer who has acted for a number of Muslim organisations and Muslim independent schools in Sydney. He follows a Naqshbandi sufi order based in Turkey.

An Open Letter to Peter Faris QC

2005-08-13T07:45:00.000-07:00

Mr Peter Faris QC
Barrister-at-Law

Dear Colleague,

I am writing to you concerning your blog located at …

http://www.farisqc.observationdeck.org/

I gave read your CV. I am impressed by your contributions to Aboriginal rights, ro community legal centres and to law enforcement. I note you were a chair of a national crime-fighting body.

You have been a champion of the oppressed, of victims of crime and of those unable to afford all the benefits of legal representation without outside assistance. Further, your crusade against white collar crime has been exemplary. You are one of the few voices in the profession to openly attack the inconsistencies in the treatment and prosecution of white collar criminals.

Sadly, your comments on issues pertaining to national security are not in this productive and sensible league. Instead of enlightening your readers on the real threats to national security, you are demonising 400,000 Australians of a particular faith-community at the heart of Australian life.

I have frequently visited your blog. I read headlines such as “Muslims must become Aussies now”. Further, your 10 or so points on “Defending Australia” are designed to incite hatred and violence against Muslim Australians.

I note that you currently have a contract as a radio announcer with 3AW. I wonder whether your station management are aware of the comments you have made on your blog. I wonder if your advertisers and sponsors are aware of the contents of your blog.

I encourage you to put your views on Muslims to some of the advertisers and sponsors of 3AW and its affiliate stations. Perhaps you could invite John Ilhan or Ahmed Fahour to comment on your blog. Or perhaps you could invite other prominent Muslim Australians for their views.

Your views on immigration and citizenship are particularly interesting. I wonder if senior Department of Immigration, Multicultural & Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA) bureaucrats such as Mr Abdul Rizvi would agree with your sentiments.

We live in a free country. You are free to say and write what you wish. But as a Queens Counsel, you have certain ethical obligations to the legal profession and the community.

I would humbly submit that the contents of your blog are inconsistent with your ethical and professional obligations.

I encourage you to reconsider your views on these matters. I welcome your response and am happy to discuss the matter with you face-to-face, including in the media. I would be happy to appear with you on, for example, the ABC 7:30 Report, Lateline or the Today Show. We can have a frank expression of views, and we can let viewers decide.

I look forward to your response. Please feel free to contact me via e-mail at the following address …

iyusuf@sydneylawyers.com.au

Yours faithfully,
Irfan Yusuf., BEc, LLB (Macq), GradDipLP (UTS)
Barrister & Solicitor

Schoolboy Jihad Lessons from Sheik Fehmi

2005-08-12T21:43:00.000-07:00

When I was 16 years old, I attended my first national Muslim youth camp at Harrietville in Victoria. The camp was organised by the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC), the peak Muslim representative body of Australia.

At this camp, I met young Muslims from across Australia. They were from all different parts of the world. I learnt that you could have blonde hair and blue eyes and still be Muslim. I met Muslims from Europe, the Middle East, the Indian sub-continent and south-east Asia.

Our teacher was a Melbourne Imam named Sheik Fehmi. He spoke fluent English, and had read widely. He was used to dealing with young people, and had attended at least 15 previous camps.

Sheik Fehmi was often asked questions about jihad. In those days, some young Muslims were keen to join the Afghan resistance effort which was sponsored by the Reagan Administration with the support of the Australian government.

His answers were always the same. He would quote from 2 sayings of the Prophet Muhammad.

One young man approached the Prophet wanting permission to fight in the Muslim army to defend the Prophet’s city. The Prophet asked the boy 2 questions. “Do you have elderly parents who need you to look after them? Do you have your parent’s permission?”

The boy replied that he had elderly parents who needed him. The Prophet then said: “Look after them. That will be your jihad.”

Sheik Fehmi also frequently told us of a scene on the Day of Judgment painted by the Prophet. On that day, one of the first persons to be brought for judgment would be a martyr, someone who had fought and died for God. The martyr would be dragged into hell. Why? Because he fought to be a hero and so that people would glorify him.

So there you have it. This is what mainstream Muslim Australians are taught. That martyrdom is no one-way ticket to paradise. And that you cannot go to fight if you have elderly parents. And that you need parents’ permission before fighting.

Which parent in their right mind would allow their son or daughter to blow themselves up and kill others in the process? Which parent would be happy to see their child commit suicide?

Generally, it is people suffering from depression and other mental illnesses who commit suicide. People who have not received the right medical attention. Suicide is one of the greatest sins, not just in Islam but in just about every religion on earth.

Sadly, suicide cults exist in every faith. Christianity has had its fair share, including the notorious Rev Jim Jones of Guyana. The Tamil Tigers were masters of suicide bombing, sometimes justifying it using Hindu texts. And such cults now exist among Muslims.

No religion teaches kids to kill themselves. Only fringe extremists teach this. And its results are tragic. The people of London saw this on 7 July. The people of Baghdad see it almost everyday.

And I pray to God that the people of Sydney and Melbourne and Canberra and Christchurch and Dunedin and every inch of Australia and New Zealand never see this scourge appear on their shores.

Some months back, I read a Palestinian father’s plea to the non-religious Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade. He asked the leaders of the brigade why his son had to die. “Why don’t you ever send you’re your children to die? Why do your children live in luxury while I will never get to enjoy seeing my grandchildren?”

One Sydney Islamic bookshop owner recently told me that his biggest seller was a book on baby names. Muslim Australians are more interested in finding names for their new-borns. They are more interested in bringing life to this earth. But terrorists want young Muslims to kill themselves and others.

iyusuf@sydneylawyers.com.au

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

My Straw Poll on Aussie Terrorist Video

2005-08-10T19:29:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, the HUN (as friends south of the border call the “Herald-Sun”) did a straw poll of 12 imams to see how many of them thought Usama bin Ladin did it.

No, I am not talking about sex. 12 imams were asked about UBL and September 11. Most of them said words to the effect of “Shit! How the f#ck should I know?”

Also, yesterday, we were greeted with the prospect of a home-grown terrorist telling us that if we keep killing people in Philistine, we can expect to be killed.

I thought I would take my own straw poll. I asked 12 people (mostly Aussie Mossies and their friends) what they thought of the dude. My survey question was quite probing, and went something like this:

“Wadya reckon of that Aussie al-Qaida dude?”

The responses were quite interesting but not all that surprising. I am no demographer, but I reckon my sample was probably a bigger reflection of reality than the HUN’s.

First, I asked my distant cousin who works in an office in town as a professional power-chick. She was the first subject of my poll.

“Mate, that guy, I swear, he is just wrong. Like, what a fruitcake! Where did they get him from? I mean, I could’ve done a better acting job!”

Her dad works in the same office. He is a high-powered corporate type with a thick Punjaboriginal accent.

(Punjaboriginal is a derivation of 2 accents – stereotypical indigenous Australian and Pubjabi. Punjabi + Aboriginal = Pubjaboriginal!)

“Look I never vaaatch Chanil Nan. Too busy reading Finaaanshul Ruviooh!”

I then got a call from London. Well, not exactly. David has just moved from London, and lives under the shadow of Auburn’s Gallipoli Mosque. He’s married to an Aussie Mossie lass. I put the question to him.

“Seriously, that guy reminded me of Ali-G.”

Later, I joined an Aussie Hindu friend of mine, her partner and some friends for dinner. As usual, everyone was drinking wine except me. And as always, I was getting drunk on fumes! So in this inebriated state, I thought I would pop the question to this drop-dead-gorgeous Tamil babe. Her response?

“I thought I saw that guy in the Life of Brian.”

Her partner, the lucky English bastard, was somewhat more conservative.

“He is certainly no Tony Blair.”

As the night wore on, I received a call from my clerk. She had just woken up after being up all night and then off to uni. I popped the question to her (though admittedly with some amendments).

“No, I wasn’t in bloody Afghanistan! I was doing my bloody assignment. Have you been sniffing wine again?”

As the aroma of wine flowed more freely up my nostrils, the subject turned to my rocky lovelife. In my case, that involves making fun of people with “exsunts” from Dunedin. I was just waiting for my sweet Kiwi to call me so I could pop the question to her. I can just imagine her answer.

“No, look, Urfen. I hev told yoo I kennot bay your gilfrund et thus stage. Yoh know hioo much I hate ut win you git drunk on fumes! I keep tilling you - stuck to the orange jose!! Call me win yo are sober. End thet tirrurust dude locks like sumthung eoot of a bed Montay Pythun movay!!”

Ah, the sorrow of unrequited love!

Instead of my pretty Kiki, I had to put up with a comparatively less physically attractive male lawyer mate from uni. Now this bloke is so right wing, he would make a certain ABC Board member look like Che Guevera. At the same time, he is very conscientious with his work.

“Irf, as if I have the time to watch the Today Show in the morning. I only watch it to catch a glimpse of your ugly brown face on the tele.”

This morning, I called my old schoolmate, a chorister and hard-core Anglican. His wife is sick of having me around to watch comedy channel on their Fox-TV. And she just shakes her head as she watches her husband and his best man behave like schoolboys as we recite lines from the Naked Gun series.

“Yeah, I saw that bloke. Looks like a case for Frank Drebbin. He looks like something you’d watch on the Naked Gun. I’m more worried about those Melbourne sheiks.”

I couldn’t help but agree with him.

Finally, I thought I had better ask a representative of tomorrow’s Australia. I showed my 8-year-old nephew the video and asked what he thought of the Aussie terrorist.

“Mamoo [Urdu for "uncle"], that guy isn’t for real.”

Looks like my cousin makes more sense some Sydney talkback callers. But given some of the attitudes attributed to Victorian Imams, I can understand why they would be scared.

A Faith at the Heart of Mainstream Australia

2005-08-04T06:47:00.000-07:00

Muslims have had a presence in Australia which pre-dates European settlement. Makkasan fishermen regularly sailed into Australian waters and traded with indigenous communities across northern Australia. The broad outline of Australia appeared on Arab maps dating back over 800 years.

Following European settlement, Muslims were instrumental in opening up outback Australia. Burke and Wills may have perished in the outback, but their Afghan trackers survived. Afghan and Indian Muslims helped lay telegraph lines which formed the basis of our state borders. Their work has been honoured in a train named the “Ghan” which follows the traditional Afghan cameleer route from Adelaide to Alice Springs.

In many regional and country towns, you will meet Australians with surnames such as “Khan” and “Baluch”. The Mayor of Woomera was often quoted as speaking against Afghan refugees in detention, perhaps forgetting that her surname suggested Afghan ancestry of her own.

The White Australia policy could not keep Muslims out of Australia. Large communities of Muslims from Albania and the former Yugoslavia entered Australia following the Second World War. Later, Muslims from Cyprus and Turkey migrated. Many of these communities have completely assimilated into Australian society, whilst maintaining their distinctive European Muslim identity.

This point became abundantly clear to me once when I had to meet a non-Muslim friend at Auburn RSL for lunch on a Friday. In doing so, I had to miss the Friday prayer. I expected not to be caught out for my sin.

How wrong I was. By 2:30pm, there were at least 50 Turkish Muslim men playing the pokies or enjoying a schooner of VB at the bar. One came up to me and asked me in Turkish: “Young man, why weren’t you at the mosque?”. He then asked if I wanted a VB or Tooheys.

In recent times, with attention focussed on Muslim communities as a result of terrorist attacks and irresponsible rants of some local sheiks, many have presumed that Muslims have become invisible and are not condemning terror enough. Many look to caricatured imams or community leaders as evidence of Muslim silence.

Muslims are invisible. They have settled in so well that it is hard to know exactly who is Muslim. Like most Australians, Muslims don’t talk about religion or politics at the dinner table or to work colleagues.

One of my proudest moments in the last few weeks was to see John Ilhan, managing director of Crazy Johns Telecommunications, speaking about how his Muslim faith affects his business. John was one of a number of leading Australian business figures profiled by the Australian Financial Review magazine in a special feature on faith and business,

I showed the magazine article to a friend of mine. There was John Ilhan, standing in the water with his trousers rolled up, telling readers about how his faith affects his dealings with competitors. I felt as proud as punch. My friend was confused.

“When did Crazy John convert?”, my friend asked. It was only after googling Ilhan that my friend believed me when I told him that John comes from a Turkish Muslim family.

John Ilhan is a man at the heart of Australian life. His company sponsors football teams from 2 major codes. His advertisements are some of the most popular and entertaining on TV.

John Ilhan is Australian. He is Muslim. So is Ahmed Fahour, a senior executive of the National Australia Bank. So is Abdul Rizvi, a senior bureaucrat from the Department of Immigration, a man at the centre of implementing mandatory detention policy.

Muslims are at the heart of Australian life. Islam is an Australian faith. To speak of Judeo-Christian culture is mythical. Really, we should be speaking of a broader conservative or Abrahamic culture encompassing the 3 major monotheistic faiths and incorporating features of other faiths (Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism etc).

Islam is part of the Australian landscape. Islam is here to stay. Australian Islam pre-dates European settlement. Those who try to marginalise Muslims and Islam are rowing against the tide and without a paddle.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

GG - An Aussie Catholic Presumed Mossie Terrorist

2005-08-02T09:28:00.000-07:00

She is of mixed ethnic background. Her mother is Indian, her dad Irish Catholic. She grew up in the nation’s capital and attended a private school. When she was a toddler, she would crawl after her mum, trying to copy everything she did. As a result, her relatives gave her the nickname “GG” (in Hindi, it means "Yes Yes"). And that is what I call her as well.

GG works as a law clerk. She's also completing her nursing degree at university. Each day, she walks from her home to the railway station and catches the train to uni. It is a 20 minute walk followed by a 10 minute train ride. She attends lectures and tutorials, following which she goes to the library or catches a bus to the legal office where she works part-time.

GG is your typical aussie girl. She likes going out with friends. She drinks a fair bit. She has a boyfriend. She enjoys her music and has perhaps Sydney’s largest CD library in her flat. I intend buying her 2 ipods for her birthday so that she can save all her music (at least 30,000 songs!) in an easily accessible format.

You would think someone like GG has nothing to fear from increased security measures arising from the war on terror. Think again.

“I think I will stop using a backpack to uni on the train. They might arrest me”, she told me after watching Lateline on ABC. The story concerned a new ethnic profiling system police in London are using to track possible terrorists. Persons fitting a certain profile (typically Pakistani, Middle Eastern or African) will be subject to random checks. So what does this have to do with GG?

If I were to introduce you to GG, you would understand why she is worried. GG’s problem is that, for reasons beyond her understanding, she fits the profile of a terrorist. And she feels terrified.

GG has olive-coloured skin. Her hair is black with brown streaks. She could be Pakistani, Iranian, Arab or Turkish. She might even be Indonesian or Malay. She “looks” Muslim.

When GG catches the train, she gets strange looks. Once or twice she has been heckled and told to go back to Lebanon. She is terrified of what would happen to her if a terrorist attack occurred in Sydney.

GG is frightened. She is afraid purely because of how she looks. Her appearance is the result of factors beyond her control. She has to suffer because her Indian mum married an Anglo-Australian man all those years ago.

What sort of environment makes a girl born in Canberra Hospital, an old girl of an exclusive Canberra school feel like a foreigner and a terror suspect in her own country?

It may sound unbelievable, but GG is even more terrified than I am. She lives alone, and has been forced to have an Anglo-Australian friend stay with her. She is frightened just to go to university. She is afraid she might get attacked physically and not just verbally.

Why does GG feel less Australian than her Anglo friends? It is simply the assumptions people make when they see her. Yet she could just as easily be an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. Not that this would make her feel safer.

When the war on terror leads to people being terrorised because of how they look, victory is being handed to the terrorists on a silver platter. In New York, following the September 11 attacks, an Indian man was the first suspect to be arrested. Another Indian man was shot dead. Both wore turbans. Both had dark or olive-coloured skin. Neither were Muslim.

When one reads the columns of tabloid xenophobes like Andrew Bolt or the blogs of allegedly educated people like Peter Faris QC, one can sense the growing hate against anyone perceived to be somehow linked to Islam. Even if a person merely “looks” Muslim, they can be turned into a target. The Bolts and Faris’ of this world are programming their readers to hate anyone presumed Muslim. Sadly, many of those targeted by this hatred are in no way related to Islam.

When we use the war against terrorism as a means of discrimination and curtailing civil liberties, we might as well declare Usama bin Ladin to be our Attorney-General. Because the policies and procedures that drive people like GG to feel terrorised in their own country are the type that al-Qaida want to see implemented.

(The author is a Sydney industrial lawyer and has been friends with GG since 1997.)

© Irfan Yusuf

I Will Remember

2005-07-30T18:26:00.000-07:00

When I cross the road in busy morning traffic on the way to work, I will remember you. When I watch the TV news and see busy traffic in Baghdad or London being blown to bits, I will remember you.

When I see your name’s followers behaving like fools, I will remember you. When I see your name’s followers attacking you and justifying your senseless murder, I will remember you.

When I read allegedly conservative columnists and commentators on the bus to work lambasting your name’s message, I will remember you. When I read of your name being used as an adjective for terror, I will remember you.

When I listen to radio shock jocks in the car on the way to work attacking your name and its followers, I will remember you. When I see politicians repeatedly legislating your name on a list of proscribed organisations sponsoring terror, I will remember you.

When I see read of your institutions being closed down, of your people being harassed and deported and their books being burnt and banned, I will remember you. When I see their civil liberties being trampled, I will remember you.

When I see your followers frowning and crying and complaining and shouting discrimination instead of understanding why you died, I will remember you. And when I see those who hate your name clapping and cheering on the sidelines as another Holocaust potentially begins, I will remember you.

When I join the queues of those facing compulsory registration or detention or even deportation, I will remember you. When they send me back to where I came from (a prison camp in East Ryde?), I will remember you.

When I see images of Italians in Australia or Japanese in America interned, I will remember you. When I read prominent Melbourne QC’s calling for your name’s family to be interned, I will remember you.

When I hear shock jocks telling me your name’s family to assimilate, I will remember you. When I listen to respected legal academics complain about the negative presence of people resembling you, I will remember you.

When I see the best and brightest of your name’s family hesitate to come forward and save your name from being hijacked by terrorists, I will remember you. When I see those who claim to belong to your name defending your killers, I will remember you.

I promise I will remember you. I promise I will not allow you to have died in vain. But I have already broken my promise. And so have those claiming to hate your killers.

I have not spoken out against those hijacking your name in order to kill you. I have not spoken out and acted against those who use your name to justify their extremism or their loopy ideological sickness.

And those claiming to hate your killers will end up hating you and your name. They will hate your name and tell others to hate your name. For their real enemy is not your killers. Their real enemy is your name.

They will blame your name. They will attack and terrorise your name. While true followers of your name will play the pipes of peace, your name’s enemies with speak and write and lobby and deat the drums and blow the (Daniel) Pipes of war.

They won’t remember you. They are too busy attacking you and me and others from our family. But I will try to remember you.

For you are Islam. You are true Islam. You are the true martyr. You are the true victim.

You are Islam. Shahara Islam. You are a woman of peace. Your family is named after peace. May you rest in peace.

When I remember you, it will remind me of my Creator. Because my Creator promises me in the Qur’an that if I remember “Him” then “He” will remember me. And since you remembered “Him”, you are now being kept alive and sustained by “Him”.

“Say not of those who die on God’s cause that they are dead. No! Indeed they are alive and are being sustained by their Lord. But you perceive it not.”

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Muslims 'must resist' Iraq occupation

2005-07-27T22:04:00.000-07:00

July 28, 2005 - 10:54AM

The Australian arm of a radical group accused of links to the London bombings says Muslims have a duty to resist the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

While condemning suicide bombings, the Australian spokesman for the group Hizb ut-Tahrir said fighting against such occupations was expected of followers of Islam.

Wassim Doureihi also said the situations in London and Iraq were very different.

"London is one reality, Iraq is an occupied land, Afghanistan is an occupied land and its inhabitants have a right and have a duty under Islam to resist that occupation," he said during a forum of Australian Muslim leaders convened by the Nine Network's Today show.

"No one is condoning what is happening in London or New York, but what we know for sure is that there is an (occupation) which America has brought to the people of Iraq, and the people of Iraq have to resist that occupation."

Another participant in the forum, lawyer Irfan Yusuf, disagreed.

"The thing that makes London different is London, like Sydney and other western cities, these are cities that have actually invited and encouraged tolerance and multiculturalism," he said.

"When you attack a city like London, you're really attacking the world."

Faikah Behardin, from the Muslim Women's Lobby, warned against oversimplifying the debate.
"The argument is far too complex to be reduced to just absolutes," she said.

But Mr Doureihi said the insurgency in Iraq, which has been marked by a huge death toll from suicide bombings, has to be debated "in its correct context".

"The reality is, there is a global struggle taking place which is ideological in nature, that is capitalist states led by America today have the international balance of power in their hands," he said.

"They will not accept any rival to come and alter that balance in any way and Islam, as an ideology, represents an alternative to the capitalist way of life and it's within this context that we have to discuss the matters of Iraq."

He said in the wake of terrorist attacks such as London, Muslims feel they are being asked to apologise for their religion.

"And they feel the pressure," Mr Doureihi said.

"The entire debate has been skewed to an argument over the identity of the perpetrators and the motivation of the perpetrators, but no one is discussing the circumstances that give rise to these conditions."

His comments follow Prime Minister John Howard's call this week for Muslim leaders to speak out against extremist elements of the faith.

Mr Howard has singled out Melbourne firebrand cleric Mohammed Omran for describing terrorist leader Osama bin Laden as a "good man" and saying the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on America and the recent London bombings were the work of Americans.

Hizb ut-Tahrir, a network formed in 1952 to fight for an Islamic Sharia political system, is believed to be under investigation by the British Home Office for having links to one of the London bombers.

Mr Doureihi says the British arm of the Islamic group has denied having anything to do with the attack.

Australian Federation of Islamic Councils chief executive Amjad Mehboob this week wrote to Muslim leaders and clerics asking them to preach against terrorism and promote peace.

Mr Mehboob said he had received positive responses to the move, but Mr Yusuf said the letter should have been sent immediately after the London bombings three weeks ago.

"It's 20 days too late and it doesn't go towards addressing the legitimate concerns which mainstream Australians have, including myself, about genuine security issues," he said.

AAP

(First published in the Sydney Morning Herald)

Aussies Of All Faiths Lambasted By 60 Minutes Show

2005-07-24T06:43:00.000-07:00

Channel 9’s popular and high-rating “60 Minutes” program had a special story on Islam in Australia and Europe. The reporter was Peter Overton. The aim of the program appeared to be an attempt to reach some conclusion on what role (if any) Muslims could play in western liberal democracies.

I watched the program at my best mate’s house. My friend is a devout Anglican. We became friends in Year 5 when we were at St Andrews Cathedral School. He is without a doubt my closest friend. I was best man at his wedding. When I tie the knot, no doubt he will be my best man.

Both of us were shocked at what we saw on the TV. Representing Australian Islam was Mohammad Omran, a fringe leader of the local branch of the charismatic salafite cult. Omran has been at the centre of controversy for many years in Muslim communities due to his heterodox pronouncements and his declarations that mainstream Sufi and Shia Muslims are outside the pale of Islam.

I was disgusted that mainstream Australians like myself, “Crazy” John Ilhan, a senior DIMIA bureaucrat, numerous deans of university faculties, elute sportspeople, at least 40 Sydney solicitors and barristers and 400,000 other Muslim Australians would be represented by one man very much on the fringe.

My best mate and his wife were even more disgusted. They accused the program of being unfair and biased toward Christians.

Huh? The program was casting aspersions on Muslims. What do Christians have to do with it?

“What the hell is that nutcase Danny Nalliah on the show? He doesn’t represent Christians. He is just a charismatic lunatic”, said my host.

“I guess they will be showing a sumo wrestler as representing me”, remarked his petite Japanese Australian wife.

What particularly disgusted both of us was the suggestion that Muslims somehow regard it as sinful to have Christian friends. And we were not alone. I am sure the hundreds of thousands of Australians watching the show would have been confused.

Relations between Muslim and non-Muslim Australians have always been excellent. Muslims are at the heart of mainstream Australian life. I saw this on Saturday afternoon at Leichhardt Oval. I saw Lebanese Muslim girls with headscarves cheering on their respective teams.

I saw mobile phones being used everywhere. Who knows how many were purchased from Crazy Johns. And who knows how much money Crazy John has pumped into major Australian football codes.

I did not check the wallets of the 20,000-plus strong crowd, but I am sure quite a few had cards from the National Australia Bank. I have not seen a rush of Australians rushing to shut their accounts and switch banks because of the appointment of a young Aussie (who happens to be of Muslim background) as their CEO. Nor did reluctant investors rush to Citibank when he resigned his position there to join the NAB.

The bulk of my clients are non-Muslims. They have seen me appear on TV and heard me on radio. And they congratulated me on my performances, even if some disagreed with what I said. The only criticism I received was from one client who said: “I sure bloody hope you talk like that with the judge when we get to hearing!”

If Islam forbade us all from having non-Muslims as friends, how could we function in this society? And how does it explain why the Prophet Muhammad ordered many of his followers to seek the protection of a Christian king in Abyssinia when they were being oppressed in their home town in Arabia? How does it explain why Saladdin, who fought the crusaders, appointed a Jewish rabbi as one of his advisers and as Chief Medical Officer of his army?

The 60 Minutes story was simplistic and inaccurate. It centralised the trivial and trivialised the central. It insulted the intelligence of both Christian and Muslim viewers, allowing only the most extreme views on both sides to be heard. It seemed to upset my Christian friends more than it did me.

Danny Nalliah does not represent Australian Christians. Mohammad Omran or some African-American chap does not represent Australian Muslims. And no sumo wrestler will ever represent by best mate’s wife. Perhaps Channel 9 should leave religious affairs to serious experts. Or at least allow a range of views to be represented and not just those on the fringe.

(iyusuf@sydneylawyers.com.au)

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Open Letter To Bob Carr & John Brogden

2005-07-20T11:08:00.000-07:00

Hon. Bob Carr, MLA
Premier of NSW

Hon. John Brogden, MLA
Leader of the Opposition

Dear Sirs,

I am taking this difficult step of writing to you about a matter which concerns all the people of NSW.

It is the sad and sorry performance of Muslim community leaders in Sydney. Following the London bombings, Muslim leaders in Sydney and at a national level have failed to show true and proper leadership.

We have a national body which refuses to listen to ordinary Muslim Australians. It has yet to make a coherent statement in response to the genuine fears which Australians of all faiths and ethnic backgrounds share.

We have three (3) Islamic councils in NSW which are fighting with each other. The original Islamic Council of NSW has not placed any comment on its website on the London bombing. Over 90% of programs on its radio station are in Arabic, a language most Muslim Sydney-siders do not understand.

The Supreme Islamic Council of NSW does not even have a website. The Muslim Council of NSW does not have a functioning e-mail address.

Muslim Sydney-siders feel lost and abandoned by their leaders. Our fears and those of our non-Muslim friends and colleagues and neighbours are being ignored.

If, God forbid, a terrorist attack does happen in Sydney, I have little doubt Muslims will be among the dead and wounded. I also have little doubt that Muslim families will be grieving.

I also have little doubt that Muslims (and anyone deemed to be Muslim, such as Arab Christians, orthodox Jews and Sikhs) will be blamed and attacked.

Should such an unfortunate event take place, I am sorry to say that my community leaders will be helpless to articulate my views.

When the terrorists hit Istanbul, the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC) issued a press release in which they described Istanbul as the capital of Turkey. Turks represent one of the largest ethnic groups in the Sydney Muslim community. Their national body could not even consult them before issuing a press release. AFIC could not even get the name of Turkey’s capital city right.

Then there is the issue of Mufti Sheik Taj Hilali. We love and respect the Sheik, but we have no idea on what basis he was appointed as mufti. We are also alarmed that he is not provided by AFIC with adequate resources for him to perform his duties. Indeed, no one quite knows what the Sheik’s duties are.

AFIC will not spend money on providing Muslim Australians with a properly resourced religious leader. But they will spend tens of thousands of dollars on frivolous litigation in an effort to impose dummy Islamic councils on Muslim New South Welshmen.

I am writing to you because you are the leaders of all the people of NSW. You are more representative of mainstream Australian Muslim opinion than their peak NSW and Federal bodies. I implore you to place pressure on these bodies to become more democratic, more consultative and more relevant to the needs of Muslim Australians.

I also implore you to call upon Muslim Australians to take responsibility for the statements and actions (or lack thereof) of their peak bodies. We would like to see all peak bodies act as responsibly and sensibly as the democratic and progressive Islamic Council of Victoria and the Canberra Islamic Centre.

I hope you consider this sincere plea from an ordinary “Aussie Mossie” who has had enough of ‘unrepresentative swill’ speaking on his behalf.

Yours faithfully

IRFAN YUSUF

Reluctant Advocates - Thoughts of a Frustrated Mossie

2005-07-18T16:47:00.000-07:00

I have been practising law since June 1994. Prior to that, I have held various advocacy roles. In 1993, I was elected to the Macquarie University Students Council. Prior to that, I was on the executive committees of 2 university clubs. I have also been on the executive of other community and youth groups.

Am I asking for a medal? Should I get one? No thanks.

In 1985, I joined a group called the Islamic Youth Association. I was elected to its executive in 1989/90. During that time, I started to get involved in community advocacy. And at most steps of the way, I felt very lonely.

Muslim Australians are hopeless advocates for themselves. Most advocates have little idea of what they are saying. They don’t have their fingers on the pulse of mainstream thinking. They don’t bother to immerse themselves in media, think tanks, publications, etc. And they don’t even bother finding out what the Muslim communities think.

Most Aussie Muslim activists advocate for Islam, not Muslims. They ignore the views of Muslims. They focus, instead, on what they think Islam is all about.

And that often means they exclude the views and sentiments of anyone they regard as being outside the pale of Islam or whose views are deemed unworthy of consideration. And so we see persons advocating for Muslims but who ignore the views of Shia Muslims, Sufi Muslims, women and anyone who speaks a language they do not understand (usually English).

Community advocacy amongst Muslim Australians tends to be the domain of the unemployed and the unemployable. It is frequently carried out by organisational leadership consisting largely of people about as representative of Muslims as the Simpsons are of mainstream America. And sadly, these advocates frequently behave like cartoon characters.

I remember the first time I had a letter to the editor published in a major newspaper. It was the Sydney Morning Herald. It was 1990. I read an article about some Ahmadi group. Attached to the text of the article was a rather amusing cartoon reflecting popular perceptions about jihad.

I was a young activist kid with little experience but plenty of enthusiasm. I was also quite seriously depressed, largely due to family and personal issues. I could see no articulate response, and I could not talk to anyone about media issues. So I took matters into my own hands and write a rather emotive letter which was probably completely over-the-top.

Well, the letter got published. My dad hit the roof. His reasoning?

“Why do you have to stick your neck out and write these things? There are people who receive funding from governments to do this sort of work. You are still studying. Why get embroiled in controversy? Why rock the boat? Do you want to be unemployable?”

My father’s response really troubled me. I asked him whether he thought my sentiments were objectionable.

“Look, I understand why you are doing this. If you want to help Muslims, study hard and become the best lawyer in Sydney. When you get to the top, then you can help people more effectively.”

I was confused and resentful.

“Dad, should I get to where you are right now? You are a senior academic who is well respected. People value your judgment. But you never speak about these issues. Why not?”

I learnt very quickly that you never answer back to the son of a Mughal crown prosecutor.

What made things even more frustrating was when my father managed to get a senior community member to talk to me. This fellow was a senior health administrator and general surgeon. He was also the Vice President of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils.

“Irfan, beta. You are like my son. You cannot afford to write about these things now. Wait until you get on your feet. If you start writing now, people will cut you down.”

It is always easier to show cheek to one’s uncle than one’s father.

“Uncle, you are the VP of AFIC. Why doesn’t AFIC ever respond to anything? Why don’t I see you at the forefront of responding to the media?”

That was some 15 years ago. Not much has changed. I still ask my uncle the same question. And he still has no answer.

So now I am on my feet. I have a legal practice, political connections, the ability to string a sentence or two together. But my health is not the best. I suffered Litigator Burnout Syndrome (LBS) and had to take 18 months off in 2002. I am still suffering from 9/11 Syndrome, trying to do many things at once and feeling like time is running out for me and Muslims in general.

I cop plenty of flack from people for what I do, say and write. Many Muslims think that I should not be hanging communal laundry on the “kuffar line”, as if I am not a Sydney-sider and as if Sydney papers are not my newspapers. Many say that I am going too hard, that I ride shot-gun too much.

I agree with them. But I ask them a simple question. “When are you going to get off your backside and do something?”

Am I the only reluctant advocate? Am I the only one doing hours of unpaid work to improve the image of a people who deserve a bad image? It seems not.

There are others like me. One prominent example is Keysar Trad.

I mention Keysar because I am one of his fiercest critics. I don’t think Keysar has the ability or flair to do much of what he does. But then I stop and think – who else is there to do what he does if he drops dead tomorrow?

Who will interpret for our non-English speaking mufti? Who will advise the mufti? Who will follow debates and discussions in the press? Who will represent and articulate on Lebanese and broader Muslim issues?

Keysar has built up a ton of contacts among journalists and newspaper editors. He performs a thankless task and gets few cheers from the community he tries to defend.

Keysar is no idiot. He was a senior Commonwealth public servant. He speaks relatively good English. And he has been shafted and stabbed by his community (sometimes almost literally) on numerous occasions.

Keysar has a family and has personal commitments. So why does he do what he does? Why does he place his neck on the chopping block? Because like me, he knows what it is like to have to explain to your colleagues at work what some crackpot said yesterday on the news. And like me, he sees Muslim organisational leadership as completely incompetent.

Recently, he was shafted by the Lebanese Moslems Association. He set up his own organisation, and now rides shotgun like me. It is probably the best thing that has happened to him. Now he can speak and act freely and on his terms. He is responsible if he stuffs up.

Some people wish Keysar and I would just go away. But we advocate because no one else does it in Sydney. I would love to move down south and live under the shadow of Malcolm Thomas and the Islamic Council of Victoria. That way, if anything hot was happening, I could get on the phone to Waleed or Rowan or Asad or Malcolm or Ramzi or Shireen or anyone else. And I am confident they can deal with the issue.

I cannot do that in NSW. Even though we have 3 Islamic councils here, as well as AFIC headquarters, their cadres have proven completely irrelevant and incapable.

So I will continue to do hours of unpaid advocacy work whilst AFIC applies for more “Living In Harmony” grants from the Department of Immigration, Multicultural & Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA) for the purposes of improving the image of Islam in Australia. But will AFIC ever invite me to assist? Or was that a pig I saw flying outside my window?

Muslim organisations are incompetent when it comes to advocacy. Any peak body that appoints a non-English speaker to act as “mufti” and then provides him with nil resources is an organisation that has no moral right to lead Muslim Australians. But who will speak out when the tongues of AFIC and the 3 Islamic pizza councils are tied?

Hence I again spend an hour writing these lines. I hope my hour’s investment was worth it. I hope other individuals are prepared to pick up where I am potentially leaving off. Because right now I am very reluctant to advocate for Muslims any further. Keysar will still be here. But Keysar is a better man than I.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

NSW Muslim Leadership - Halal Pizza With Extra Cheese

2005-07-15T19:43:00.000-07:00

“These guys couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery.”

These magical words of wisdom appeared some 15 years ago in the now-defunct Australian Muslim Times. They were used to describe the Islamic Council of NSW. The editorial was written by an Anglo-Australian journalist and scholar now based at Beirut’s Daily Star newspaper. Sadly, since he penned these words, not much has changed.

Muslim community leadership in Australia models Australian government. But it is a government whose citizens hardly feel its existence. Following the London bombings, no Muslim peak bodies based in Sydney said a word. For any sensible comment, Sydney Muslims had to look south to the sensible words of the Islamic Council of Victoria.

Most Australians don’t have a clue who is really in charge of Muslim Australian affairs. And guess what. Most Aussie Mossies don’t have a clue either.

Since more Australian Muslims read this newspaper than anything Muslim peak bodies produce, I might as well tell them about who speaks for them.

You have local governments consisting of mosque governing bodies. The local bodies come together to form a State Council. Each State and Territory Council sends representatives to a national umbrella body called the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (or AFIC).

But if you walk down Auburn Street Auburn and ask people what they know about AFIC, they will probably guess that it is the name of a new chocolate bar. Cadbury Afic. Creamy dark chocolate filled with extra nuts.

Those Muslims in the-know regard AFIC and its constituent bodies (again, with the exception of Victoria’s Islamic Council) as a joke. When terrorists struck Istanbul, AFIC sent out a press release expressing sorrow that terrorists had targeted the capital of Turkey.

Turks are perhaps the largest and most established Muslim ethnic groups in Australia. And many of my Turkish friends almost fell off their chairs when they read the press release. They did not know whether to laugh or cry at the incompetence of this national body. And in case anyone is still wondering, Ankara is the capital of Turkey.

AFIC is a fairly well-to-do body. It spends its money on various projects of crucial importance to Muslim Australians. One such project has been creating Islamic Councils in NSW.

AFIC has been embroiled in legal tussles with the original Islamic Council of NSW. Following lengthy court action, AFIC created a new entity called the Supreme Islamic Council of NSW. Then fire broke out between the 2 bodies, and AFIC announced the creation of a 3rd entity known as the Muslim Council of NSW.

But to many Aussie Mossies watching this circus, it all tastes like last night’s pizza. The Supreme Council followed by what is jokingly referred to as the Super-Supreme Council. One Aussie Muslim friend of mine coined the phrase “the pizza councils”. The name has stuck. Yes, we Muslims have a sense of humour.

But after the London bombing, we can no longer afford to laugh. Because if the IRA had been responsible for London, you would have seen Cardinal Pell, the Pope and every catholic bishop and priest on the TV and radio condemning the affair. And Londoners and Aussies would understand that IRA terror has no relation to mainstream Catholicism.

Aussies, both Muslim and otherwise, are looking to Muslim leaders for some answers and reassurance. Yet little is forthcoming (again, apart from Victoria). The national body that declared Istanbul the capital of Turkey appears to have not yet found London on the map. And that forces individuals like myself in Sydney to deal with the issue alone.

So if you are wondering why Muslims are silent over London, it has nothing to do with your Muslim neighbour or family doctor or solicitor or bank manager. It is the fault of the peak bodies that claim to represent Muslim Australians.

And so when Muslims are harassed and maligned and insulted and suffer discrimination, they can feel proud of the fact that their peak bodies will sell their sentiments less effectively than a pork sandwich seller outside the mosque.

(The author is a Sydney lawyer who has represented Muslim community bodies and independent schools in constitutional and industrial matters.)

Irreverent Words From Irrelevant Imams

2005-07-13T22:03:00.000-07:00

Feiz Mohamed stands up in front of 1,000 people at Bankstown Town Hall and declares that women are eligible for rape if they dress a certain way. Weeks later, he repeats the same message on national television.

Mohammed Omran declares on national television that Usama bin Ladin is innocent. He ignores a huge body of evidence including bin Ladin’s own admissions and the research and interviews of at least one senior investigative journalist from Al Jazeera.

These two imams have certain things in common. They both belong to a fringe salafist strain of Islam, one rejected by both mainstream Sunni and Shia Muslims. They both studied at the same university in Saudi Arabia. And they both have small followings.

Omran is lucky to get a few hundred attend his Friday prayer service in the inner northern suburbs of Melbourne. Far greater numbers attend mainstream mosques, including the Islamic Council of Victoria headquarters in Melbourne CBD and the Naqshbandi Sufi mosque at Coburg.

After making his comments about dress and rape, the bulk of the females in Feiz Mohamed’s audience walked out. Indeed, he was not the main act at this Muslim gig. He was just the supporting act to a prominent and respected African-American scholar.

Feiz Mohamed’s 1,000 people could hardly be compared to the 5,000 that attend the Auburn Gallipoli Mosque each Friday, taking an hour out of their lunch time. It fades into insignificance compared to the 30,000-plus who attend the annual Multicultural Eid Festival & Fair (MEFF) at the Fairfield Showground each year at the end of Ramadan.

These two imams use inflammatory speech in a desperate bid to gain an audience. They have to shout just to be heard. And thankfully, they are generally ignored.

When young Aussie Mossies want to hear lectures, they would prefer to download the speeches of Americans like Hamza Yusuf Hanson or Poms like Tim Winter. The last major Islamic scholar to attend Sydney, Dr Jamal Badawi from Canada, had much larger crowds showing up to his talks.

So why are Feiz Mohamed and Mohammed Omran so often interviewed and quoted? Why do some journalists hang off every word these people say?

Perhaps it is more to do with the fact that this pair represent the typical caricature of a beady-eyed nasty terror-loving types. The sort of fellows you’d more likely find on the wrong side of Team America than in downtown Sydney or Melbourne.

As a result of their antics, most Australians don’t associate Muslim communities with the mainstream. The articulate Malcolm Thomas (Chairman of the Islamic Council of Victoria) is not enough to convince the doubting tabloid Thomases to change their image of Aussie Mossies.

In the UK, the story is slightly different. The BBC frequently hosts Tim Winter, a softly-spoken Cambridge scholar. In the United States, President Bush had the good sense to be photographed with the well-spoken Greek-American Hamza Yusuf Hanson immediately after September 11.

On my iPod, I have a range of music, from Van Halen to Paul Kelly. And I also have a set of lectures downloaded from the website of an American sufi whose in-laws live in Brisbane. Sheik Nuh Keller lives in Jordan, is a translator and scholar of both classical Islamic sciences and the less religious science of commercial fishing. He and his students publish a high quality quarterly journal Islamica that could teach mainstream Australian magazine editors here a thing or two.

These scholars have written and spoken against terrorism and against separatist attitudes that breed terrorism. Imam Hamza Yusuf Hanson told Muslim Britons in 2001 that those people who did not like English culture and traditions should leave England and live in a Muslim country.

These are the voices of mainstream Muslim communities across the Western World. They work together, and have established institutions, thinktanks and publications. And they all have a sense of humour.

This brings me to another thing these scholars have in common. They are huge fans of the Chicago Muslim stand-up comic Azhar Usman. In his latest release entitled “Allah Made Me Funny!”, Usman asks his audience: “Why do people blame me for 9/11? What makes you think I am responsible for 9/11? 7-Eleven maybe. But 9/11?”

(The author is a Sydney Lawyer and a huge fan of Azhar Usman.)

© Irfan Yusuf, 2005.

A Message To Sydney Muslims

2005-07-08T08:36:00.000-07:00

She works at Circular Quay. Each day, she travels to work by train. She is a young mother, a Chartered Accountant, one of many Sydney professionals who uses the beleaguered Sydney rail network.

Tonight, as I was sitting in her lounge room watching news from London, she said words that must surely resonate with the thoughts and fears of millions of other Sydney-siders.

“When will my turn come?”

Her fears were echoed by her husband.

“These damned terrorists are making me very edgy”, he said as we watched images of the blown-up London bus.

Across Australia, people are frightened. They have heard of al-Qaida and Jemaah Islamiah, of Usama bin Ladin and Abu Bakar Bashir. They also have heard of local Muslims appearing on TV making strange statements, of sheiks appearing (with or without interpreters) and speaking strange alien ideas of holy war and rape.

Their image of Muslim Australians is the image of an alien community. And who is to blame for this image?

I am to blame. I blame myself. And I blame all the other educated Muslims working in professions, in business and academia. I blame all those Muslims who have spent all these years hiding their faith from their fellow citizens. And special blame rests with migrant Muslims.

In terms of country of birth, the largest block of Muslims are those born in Australia. I missed out on being part of that block by 5 months. But I have only ever held an Australian passport.

For me, growing up in suburban Ryde, Islam was always a cultural phenomenon. In my cultural universe, Muslims had to be Indian or Pakistani or Fiji-Indian or Bangladeshi. My school captain at St Andrews Cathedral School, the son of an Anglican Minister from Pakistan, was Muslim. Every year, I would go to the houses of our Hindu family friends and celebrate Deevali, a festival I presumed to be Islamic.

For many migrant Muslims, Islam is a cultural construct. Many insist on their alien cultural artefacts which have little relation to the faith and indeed often contradict Islamic teachings.

Muslims have for years insisted on marginalising themselves, on being different and on protecting their rights to be different. Muslim communities have spent thousands of dollars on legal fees battling councils for the right to build mosques of a certain cultural design.

Yet when the early Muslims spread far and wide, they modelled their mosques on local architectural tastes. In China, one can find a mosque dating to within 300 years of the passing of the Prophet. From its external appearance, the mosque looks like any Chinese pagoda.

Ironically, so many of the mosque designs the subject of appeals in the planning courts are based on the designs of Byzantine churches encountered in Syria and Egypt by the early Muslims. And so we have the absurd picture of nominal Christians opposing nominal Muslims building a mosque based on a design regarded as traditionally Muslim but is in fact Byzantine Christian!

During his recent tour of Australia, Cambridge Muslim scholar Tim Winter mentioned a mosque built by the early English Muslims. The mosque was modelled on a typical hall of an English Church. In one corner of the mosque was an organ which was used to play religious music. Muslim evangelism consisted of public gatherings where people would attend the mosque for tea and scones whilst a Muslim parishioner played the latest tunes on the mosque organ.

Yet if one were to suggest this strategy to Australian migrant Muslims, one would be dismissed as an innovator.

We choose to be different. Yet we never explain why we are different, and why our differences should be viewed as harmless. And much of this is caused by the fact that we ourselves do not know why we do what we do.

For instance, why do some Muslim men (typically Punjabi medical doctors) insist on their wives wearing shalwar kameez or saris whilst the men wear safari suits? Why do Muslims take different days off work for the same festival? Why don’t many mosque imams learn English? Why do some Muslim women shake hands with men and others don’t?

I am not saying that Muslims should not have a distinct identity. But why do we insist on a separate identity yet refuse to share this with our fellow citizens?

If we continue to marginalise ourselves without communicating the harmless nature of our customs, we will continue to be objects of suspicion and resentment. If we continue to refuse sharing the things that we value – our customs, ethics and ideals – then one day we might find material things fellow citizens value and share with us being taken away from us.

Our fellow citizens are frightened. Their reactions are natural. They are looking to us to alleviate their fears. We, too, are frightened. If a bomb goes off in Circular Quay in Sydney’s Central Business District, Muslim workers and professionals will be among the victims. Just as over 20% of the victims on September 11 2001 were Muslim. Now is the time for us to open our ears and hearts to our fellow citizens, to reduce the barriers, to come out of our cultural closets and to embrace our brothers and sisters in citizenship and humanity.

If we do not de-marginalise ourselves now, we will be double-victims should Sydney become the target of terrorists. We will be mourning our dead and injured. And we will be accused of complicity with the terrorists.

And when this happens, my good friends mentioned at the beginning of this article will also be doubly victims. After all, they are Muslim Australians.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Imam With A New York State Of Mind

2005-07-03T19:59:00.000-07:00

On September 11 2001, New Yorkers awoke to see the ugly face of humanity burning and tearing down one of their most famous landmarks.

Terror, mass murder, suicidal mania, religious extremism. Call it what you like. For New Yorkers of all backgrounds, indeed for all Americans, the enemy was clear. And it was overseas.

The terrorist attacks on New York were the work of foreign extremists. Sadly, ordinary Americans of various faiths with little connection to those responsible were attacked.

The main suspect was one Saudi dissident named Usama bin Ladin. Clothed in a white gown, sporting a beard and turban, bin Ladin became the object of American hatred. And the first suspect taken into custody had his photo splashed across the front page of Sydney tabloid, the Daily Telegraph.

The headline was “First Arrest”. The man had his head bowed and was wearing a blue turban. He had brown skin and a beard. He sort-of looked like Usama. One of his co-religionists was attacked and killed by an angry American. Both men were presumed Islamic extremists.

Yet both men were Sikhs.

A few days later, news spread of another suspect. The young American medical intern was suspected of involvement in the attacks. The young man lived in New York and worked near the World Trade Centre. Various news outlets showed his photograph, and speculation was mounting of American Muslim involvement.

Eventually, the young doctor was cleared. It turned out that the young man on his way to work when he heard on the radio about the attacks. He rushed to the scene and was assisting paramedics in treating survivors when one of the towers fell. Within minutes, the young doctor was killed by falling debris.

He gave his life to assist the dying before joining them in death. And to his family’s dismay, he was never honoured in the martyr’s rollcall. Instead, he was labelled as a terrorist.

There are so many stories of Muslim Americans blamed and accused. Not to mention those presumed to be Muslim. Yet Muslim Americans continued their pursuit of mainstream American life. Including their religious leaders.

Two American Imams stood out in the post-September 11 period. One was of Greek extraction, the other Egyptian. Imam Hamza Yusuf Hanson lives in California and is a resident scholar at the Zaytuna Institute, a Muslim thinktank. He was invited to the White House by President Bush immediately after the attacks. He also addressed numerous American and international media outlets and was widely interviewed and quoted in the mainstream media. The other was Imam Feisal.

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is resident scholar (Imam) of Masjid al-Farah, located a few streets away from the World Trade Centre. He has held this post since 1983. He also delivers lectures in churches and synagogues, and has been involved in inter-faith dialogue since the 1970’s.

Imam Feisal visited Australia last year at the invitation of Premier Bob Carr, who had met him in New York some months earlier. Mr Carr was impressed with Imam Feisal’s approach to religious and broader issues, and particularly with the Imam’s preparedness to join his fellow Muslim Americans and embrace mainsteam American life.

Australians of all faiths have been searching in vain for sensible coherent Muslim voices amongst local religious scholars. Few current spokespeople for Australian Islam have been able to provide such a voice, at least certainly not in Sydney.

It is, therefore, little wonder that educated Muslims and non-Muslims across the community flocked to Imam Feisal’s talks in Sydney, many travelling from interstate and New Zealand. Imam Feisal’s books are found in homes and offices of Muslim professionals and students across the country.

The Imam’s latest release is a book entitled “What’s Right With Islam Is What’s Right With America”. The book repeats many of the themes the Imam discussed in a lecture at the Adelaide Town Hall on Monday 29 May 2004 entitled “Bridging the Chasm: Islam and Australia”, a lecture in which the Imam quotes from William Blake and at least one Talmudic scholar as well as from the Qur’an.

Muslim Australians can appreciate the Imam’s embrace of Western culture and institutions as being almost perfectly compatible with Muslim beliefs. Liberal democracy has provided Muslims with greater freedom to practise and teach their faith than even exists in many Muslim countries. Australian Imams can deliver sermons without having to pass them by an official government censor. Muslim communities are encouraged to establish schools and receive generous funding packages from state and federal governments to do so.

Muslim Australians are resentful of a small minority of extremists making loud incoherent noises and selling strange and hate-filled books. Muslim Australians are also resentful of being judged by the words and deeds of such extremists. We wish we had more local imams who could speak with the fluency and sufi vision of Imam Feisal.

Messenger to the Mufti

2005-07-01T21:06:00.000-07:00

I am a lawyer. But some lawyers really embarrass me, talking nonsense about legalising torture.

I am also a Liberal. In 2001, I ran as a Liberal candidate in the seat of Reid. Western suburbs Aussies delivered me a swing of 5.1% on a 2-party preferred basis. But when Young Liberal President Alex Hawke opens his mouth, I cringe.

I also come from a Muslim background. My parents are from Delhi in India. I have lived in John Howard’s electorate for as long as I can remember. I also spent time living in the electorates of Paul Keating and Laurie Ferguson, regarded as Aussie Muslim heartlands.

Yet everytime something happens concerning Muslims, I see a sincere but scruffy-looking volunteer on TV saying things I find embarrassing.

Am I talking about the man they call “Mufti”? No. In his efforts to free Douglas Wood, Sheik Hilali has earned the respect of mainstream Australia, including his many Muslim critics (such as myself).

What worries me, however, is his former spokesman and adviser.

I have been involved in Muslim community affairs since 1985. Keysar Trad has been involved for perhaps a similar amount of time. I cannot question his sincerity. He gains no personal benefit from spending time acting as Shaykh Hilali’s interpreter and adviser. If anything, he cops plenty of flack.

Keysar fills a vacuum. He volunteers his services because Sheik Hilali’s employer, the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC), refuses to provide the Sheik with the resources he needs to do the job. And Sheik Hilali’s time is taken up with resolving matrimonial disputes and mediating between competing factions.

Keysar tries his best. He is not a qualified or accredited translator or interpreter. If Sheik Hilali ever had to go to court, Keysar could not act as translator.

I once met Cardinal Pell at a lecture he gave to the Centre for Independent Studies. I was impressed with his speech. I asked him when we could arrange a meeting for him with the Mufti. Cardinal Pell referred me to his assistant, a similarly polished and well-spoken young man.

Sheik Hilali is not provided with such an assistant. He also is not given a chance to learn English. And like most imams, he is paid peanuts despite working long hours.

All he has to assist is a volunteer unaccredited translator. Is it any wonder he gets such bad press?

I was baffled when Keysar Trad made defamatory remarks about Stephen Hopper, former lawyer for Mamdouh Habib. Keysar took credit for setting Habib up with his good friend and then fellow executive member of the Lebanese Moslems Association, Adam Houda. Keysar claimed Habib would now receive “proper legal representation”. But Keysar has no legal training and is not in a position to question the credentials of either Hopper or Houda. Now neither Hopper nor Houda act for Habib.

I was equally baffled when Keysar once described the role of Mufti as akin to “Archbishop” and “Governor-General” of Muslims. Sorry, Keysar. I like Shaykh Hilali. But my Governor-General if Michael Jeffries. And we don’t have priests in Islam.

So why do journalists keep going to Keysar? Simple. No one else is prepared or has the time to speak. Muslims are too busy being mainstream Australians. They are too busy running medical and legal practices, lecturing at universities, managing Australia’s largest financial institutions and telecommunications companies or studying at TAFE and university.

Also, the media knows Keysar. Over the years, he has developed a string of contacts. Despite having no journalistic expertise, Keysar has networked the media. Most Muslim leaders are too busy networking with lawyers to fight their crazy battles against each other. The only time Muslim leaders approach the media is to badmouth each other.

What is the solution? Simple. Australian Mossies (as we often call ourselves) have to speak out. We cannot rely on our self-appointed leaders to do the talking. And we have no right to cringe and complain when someone like Keysar volunteers.

If we don’t have the time, we have to make it. Just as I have today. And now I have to get back to my clients.

(This article was submitted to the Daily Telegraph. Despite assurances that it would be printed unedited, an edited version was printed in the 30 June 2005 edition. Readers can compare the 2 versions and decide for themselves.)

An Anglican Mossie

2005-06-27T09:43:00.000-07:00

The word “Muslim” literally means someone who surrenders to God. Part of this surrender involves accepting God’s knowledge is superior to one’s own. I learnt an important aspect of this from a spiritual figure who left his mark on the lives and souls of thousands.

Am I talking about a Shaykh? An Imam? A sufi?

Yes, he was a Shaykh in that he was quite elderly at the time. He has now deceased.

He was an Imam in that he led a congregation. In fact, he was the leader of one of Sydney’s largest religious congregations.

In many ways, he was a sufi. He had a deep consciousness of God and a profound spiritual presence which was felt by all who were fortunate enough to meet him.

He was also an Anglican minister. But not just any Anglican minister. He was the Dean of Sydney.

Dean Lance Shilton passed away peacefully on March 12, 1998. I first met him as a student at St Andrews Cathedral School in 1980. He was a regular feature at Chapel services, and a regular visitor to the school.

The Dean was also involved in an evangelical venture in which he invited members of the public to ask questions. These sessions were held outside the entrance of the Cathedral in the Town Hall Square. All sorts of curly and unusual questions would be thrown at the Dean, and he would patiently deal with all of them.

It was at one such session that myself and a few Ahmed Deedat enthusiasts gathered after completing our Friday prayers at the Surry Hills Mosque. I prepared a lengthy question which I thought was a refutation of just about every Christian doctrine under the sun. The monologue ran into a whole 2 pages. I am too embarrassed to reproduce bits of it here as it will reflect on the immaturity I suffered from at the time. We are all embarrassed when the follies of our youth are mentioned.

To his credit, the Dean read out the entire question. He tried to answer it all, but admitted he did not have the time. He also made a startling admission. He said he simply did not know all the answers.

I thought I had won the battle. But Dean Shilton went onto explain how all of us could win the war.

“Look, I don’t know all the answers. But neither does anyone else here. None of us knows everything. We cannot possibly have knowledge of everything. But what counts is not to know all the answers. What really counts is to know the Person Who knows all the answers. And that means knowing God.”

I challenge any of the 1.2 billion Muslims across the globe to find a single error in the above-quoted sentiments. Just one.

These words have stayed with me ever since then. They were a defining moment, a profound religious experience comparable to other similar experiences.

God has blessed me with many amazing experiences.

In 1985, I was a 16 year old schoolboy who would get up in the middle of the night and pray for God to change the mind of a young girl I had met on the train. Within 3 months, she wrote me a letter saying she loved me. I was enchanted and my adolescent romance took me to new spiritual heights.

(Sadly, 3 months later, our parents stage-managed our separation. Such is life!)

In 1998, I was an idealistic 28 year old who travelled to Brazil and performed a conversion ceremony for a young female doctor. We hoped to have the ceremony done in a mosque, but could find no mosque in her home town of Aracatuba. We therefore had to settle for a building that looked the most like a mosque. It turned out to be the shopping centre! It was the only building with a dome.

In 2004, I was a burnt-out 35 year old lawyer who felt on the fringes of Ramadan, suffering from an illness and needing medication in regular intervals. Fasting was impossible. I then met a friend who told me of her late father who was Muslim and whom she had never met. I wrote about that conversation in a Muslim magazine. She read my article, and at 2am she sent me a delightful text message that lifted my spirit amd corroded through my cynicism.

These 3 incidents represented profound spiritual moments in my almost 36 years on this planet. And my conversation with the Rev Canon Dr Lancelot Rupert Shilton on that fateful Friday in 1986 will also be counted among those experiences in my closing submissions on the Day of Judgment.

Lance Shilton was instrumental in changing and refining my faith and my perceptions of Christianity and Islam. His patience and softly-spoken manner helped a young firebrand like myself to calm down and listen for a change. He really was a true reflection of the saying attributed to Jesus: “Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth”.

The meek may not inherit political power, but they certainly can win the hearts of all people. And as an Anglican Minister, as Dean of Sydney and as a humble soldier of Christ, Lance Shilton won the heart of at least one Muslim.

(The author is a Sydney lawyer and a a proud Old Boy of St Andrews Cathedral School.)

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

Wonder Woman Takes On The Nimby's

2005-06-19T02:01:00.000-07:00

When I was still at school, my entire family used to spend our Sunday nights munching on mum’s curries and watching 60 Minutes. I was not used to hot chillies or tabloid journalism. It was hard to tell in those days whether the curry or the stories were hotter.

It was on one such night that I saw Silma for the first time. She and her family were struggling to establish a small school in Greenacre. Her children were young. Her daughter Hanifa was a baby at the time, and the school was operating above a Pakistani restaurant in Canterbury.

The 60 Minutes story showed a whole group of neighbours telling Silma to go back to where she came from. Which I guess, in Silma’s case, means Methodist Ladies College. The neighbours were opposing the establishment of this school and were to become known as the “Nimby brigade” (where Nimby means “Not in my backyard”).

That story fired me up. I was an instant convert to the Silma school. And on Saturday 18 June 2005, as part of the audience at the Sydney Film Festival, I again became a convert.

After passing my driving test, I started visiting the Al Noori Muslim Primary School, the subject of Silma’s first struggle. In fact, I was a fairly frequent visitor. Those were the days of nascent Muslim activism, a time when I was still finding my feet in the basket-case community. Hanifa was walking by that stage.

Later, one of my siblings fell ill. She was unable to work but found an instant welcome at the Greenacre school. Her illness was handled with such grace and sensitivity, and to this day she remembers those healing days with prayers and praise for Silma.

This woman is one of my Aussie Muslim super-heroes. If Wonder Woman ever replaced her tights with loose-fitting clothes and a head-scarf, she could be one of 2 persons in my eyes. She could be the Virgin Mary. Or she could be Silma Ihram. (I would have mentioned Khadija, the Prophet’s wife, except that she passed away before the hijab was legislated).

Silma’s struggles with Al Noori came to an end. She moved on in life. Some had written her off as a spent force. Even I was tempted to do so, especially after seeing posters and flyers of her new school project at Condell Park.

But you can never write off Silma. And so it was with amazement that she invited me to see the school. “Irfan, can you act as our solicitor?”. It was an offer a young Revesby lawyer couldn’t refuse.

That would be the first of many visits on my part to the Bankstown Airport site which was to be the scene of the litigation which forms the subject of the documentary “Silma’s School”.

I had to move on from Revesby, and my career took various twists and turns. Silma followed those twists, and frequently gave me advice along the way. Her decency and integrity became most apparent to me when I spoke to her in 1999. She knew I was acting for her ex-partner in his struggles with their first school project. She never said a word of criticism even when her allies at the same school were attacking my professionalism. Her refusal to join in those attacks spoke volumes.

Then in June 2002, I fell seriously ill. I rang up the Law Society and asked for a manager to be appointed. I was hospitalised and was forced to take some 15 months off. During this difficult period, I was the subject of much innuendo and gossip from former Muslim clients who were alleging all sorts of fantastically fictional things.

During my recovery, a Nigerian friend of mine was visiting Australia. He needed some work experience and also an outlet for his unique form of cultural sensitivity training. One day he said to me: “Irfy! Man! Stop wasting your time on the bloody internet and come and join me this weekend.. We are running a TTC [train the trainers course – his title for the cultural sensitivity courses] at Silma’s school.”

I drove my friend Nurudeen to Condell Park, to the school I had last visited as a young solicitor. The first person to greet us was Hanifa. She was much taller, and I did not recognise her.

“Nuru, who was that?”, I asked the TTC Guru.

“Man, that was Hanifa”, he responded.

“What the … sheesh she has grown since I last saw her!”

“When was that?”, the husky Nigerian asked.

I pondered on the point and answered: “Mate, I can’t remember. It seems like donkeys years”.

Nuru started teaching and lecturing. I sat there with the books at the bookstore. Silma came upto me. I was a bit embarrassed given all the rumours that were flying around. My illness and the rumours had given my self-esteem a pounding.

With some people, when they see a dog down on the ground, they kick the poor bastard. Silma is not one of them. She looked me up and down and said: “Brother Irfan, it’s so good to see you well again. You’ve lost weight”.

I felt embarrassed and started to make up explanations and excuses to answer the allegations and accusations and lies and stories. Silma would not hear a word of it.

“Brother, let them talk. Your sins are going onto their record. Thank Allah and be happy.”

Imagine my happiness some 3 years later when I first heard I had managed to score a ticket to see Silma’s school. I waited at the box office for my good friend (and former teacher at Silma’s school) Seyfi to hand over my ticket. I walked downstairs into the State Theatre. It was here that I had last seen Elvis Costello, one of my favourite musicians. But as I walked into the theatre, I could see a theatre much more packed than the Costello crowd. It seemed Silma’s tunes were proving much more popular.

This article was supposed to be a review of the documentary film “Silma’s School”. I guess I will have to write a separate review. I guess the best way to describe the documentary is that it is a summary of the struggles of a woman who has touched the lives of so many people. A woman who can generate passionate loyalty and bring together people from all different backgrounds.

Perhaps the best review of the film was made on after its screening. The Director asked if any students were present to speak about Silma. Up stood a tall, young woman dressed in a graceful headscarf. She was finding it hard to hold back the tears. So was I.

“I just wanted to say that I am a student of Nour al-Houda Islamic College. And I am also Silma’s daughter. Mum, you are a legend. We all love you so much!”

It was Hanifa. She grew up with the struggle. Perhaps more than all of us put together, she has been touched by Silma’s school.

Silma, you are a wonder woman. Your struggle against Nimby’s of all faiths has touched the lives of just about ever Muslim activist in Sydney. Your spirit and your faith have also radiated to Melbourne, Adelaide and across the Tasman. It is time to have your day in the sun. We loved the movie. But we did not need a movie to appreciate your contribution.

Winning Hearts at the Heart of Controversy

2005-06-15T03:18:00.000-07:00

In Egypt, he was known as Tag al-Moulk Abdallah. After moving to Lebanon, Tag became Taj. And during the early 1980’s when a Sydney Lebanese Muslim community needed an Imam, the Mufti of Lebanon recommended this Egyptian-born Shaykh known as Tajeddine el-Hilali.

The man we now know as the Mufti of Australia had a rocky start to his time down under. He entered a divided congregation which had expelled its previous imam after allegations of fraud and dipping into Friday collections.

In an era when expatriate Arab communities maintained close ties with Arab governments, and when petrodollars were used to manipulate Muslim minority communities, it was not surprising to see Arab politics behind Shaykh Taj’s entry into the fray of the Imam Ali ben Abi Taleb Mosque in Sydney’s Arab heartland of Lakemba. Shaykh Taj was then associated with the Libyan Islamic Dawah Society. The man he replaced was closely associated with religious and political authorities of Iraq.

Shaykh Taj’s past frequently had an awful habit of catching up with him. His verbal indiscretions are still raised by critics. In 1988, he gave a lecture to a group of Muslim students at a seminar entitled “Jihad-Intifada, the Struggle for Palestine”. I recall attending that lecture, and complaining to the organisers that they had not bothered to have video cameras recording the speeches.

I also recall 6 months later seeing a local Jewish leader holding a copy of a video recording of the Shaykh’s speech. How did he get hold of that when no video was taken?

It seems that a person associated with the pro-Saudi faction attended the lecture with a camera hidden in a briefcase. Since then, media reports of the Shaykh consistently make reference to his 1988 comments in which he is alleged to have said that “Jewish people control the world using money, pornography and corruption”.

The Shaykh’s inability to communicate fluently in English has also been a problem. He has had to rely on a succession of translators and interpreters, few of whom were qualified to perform the role effectively.

Shaykh Taj rose to prominence when the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC), an umbrella body representing various state Islamic councils, appointed him to the position of Mufti. The position was created at the recommendation of the office of the then acting Prime Minister Paul Keating. Some excuse was needed to formalise the Shaykh’s immigration status by awarding him permanent residency (roughly the equivalent of a green card in Australia), a decision the Government took on 29 June 1993.

The attitudes displayed by many neo-Con writers in Australia are aptly displayed by neo-Con wannabe, Dr Gerard Henderson of the Sydney Institute. Before having his column unceremoniously removed from the prestigious Melbourne Age newspaper, Henderson wrote this scathing article on March 9 2004. The same article was also published in the Sydney Morning Herald under the provocative headline “Think murder and then call it poetry”.

The writer wrote a response which was published as a letter to the editor on March 10 of the Sydney Morning Herald as follows:

Lost in translation

The day Gerard Henderson can show me a qualification in Arabic language and literature is the day I will take his assessment of what constitutes Arabic poetry seriously ("Think murder and then call it poetry", Herald, March 9). Then again, the day the Mufti learns to speak English is the day most Aussie Muslims may consider recognising him as having any authority in political and foreign policy matters.

I. Yusuf, Sydney, March 9.

But in recent times, the Shaykh has blown Henderson, myself and other critics away with an extraordinary act of courage. Despite his advanced years and poor health (he has had at least one heart bypass operation), the Shaykh responded favourably to a call from the family of Australian hostage Douglas Wood.

The Wood family visited Shaykh Hilali at the Imam Ali ben Abi Taleb Mosque in early May 2005 seeking his assistance. The choice of Hilali was an obvious one for the family to make. Australian intelligence and foreign affairs establishment have little understanding of the Iraqi situation, notwithstanding the continued deployment of Australian troops to Iraq. What few contacts they have in the country are probably the types whose very involvement could lead to Mr Wood’s execution.

If Mr Wood’s kidnappers have any religious inclinations, it would be with the Sunni school. Shaykh Hilali has a well-publicised history of advocacy on behalf of Sunni communities across the Arab world. He is also highly respected in Muslim circles of all denominations. His Arabic is flawless. He is also a charismatic figure, capable of gaining almost instant appeal to Arab audiences.

It is little wonder, therefore, that the Australian government approached the Shaykh secretly for assistance. Yet government allies in the media and some elements of the Jewish community have been at the forefront of a continued ferocious attack on the Shaykh, digging up comments he made in 1988. In doing so, they have been risking the Shaykh’s mission and the life of a fellow Australian. One can hardly expect the hostage-takers to take the Shaykh seriously when they read pro-Government columnists in Australia attacking the Shaykh’s credibility.

Of course, all this neo-Conservative sabre-rattling must have been awful for the Wood family. It soon ended, perhaps after the publication of this article in the Sydney Morning Herald concerning a meeting between the Attorney General and some Muslim community figures in Sydney on how best to have Mr Wood released.

Some Iraqi Australians such as law academic Hossein Esmaeili have made more balanced assessments of the situation.

Meanwhile, most Australians have watched in admiration as an Australian religious leader announces that he is prepared to risk his life and fly to a war zone to free another Australian. Perhaps an apt way to end this would be to quote one of these Australians whose letter to the editor was published in the Sydney Morning Herald on March 21, 2005 …

Whatever the outcome of his endeavours on behalf of Douglas Wood, Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly has shown himself to be a man of faith, hope and charity. There will be detractors standing on the safe ground of their alternative views of the world. However, the sheik has seen an opportunity to be of service to an endangered Australian, his own community and Australia at large.

Richard Manning

____________________

POSTSCRIPT: The Australian Foreign Minister has just announced that Mr Wood has been released following an operation by Iraqi security forces. He paid tribute to Shaykh Hilali and the entire Australian Islamic community, commenting that Australia’s multiculturalism has again been shown to be one of its strengths.

The Wood family have also released a statement. Wood family spokesman Neil Smail thanked the Australian government, Australian officials and agencies in Iraq and Shaykh Hilali. “The family are most grateful for his efforts … He was not well himself and put himself in considerable personal danger”, Mr Smail told reporters.

It remains to be seen if Shaykh Hilali’s critics will make any comment.

© Irfan Yusuf 2005

A Legend In Two Sports

2005-06-08T07:54:00.000-07:00

Anthony "Choc" Mundine is one of Australia's sporting legends. He comes from a family of sportsmen and activists. Anthony started out as a champion player of the Australian football code known as "Rugby League". He played for a prominent Sydney team known as the 'St George Dragons'.

Anthony is also an Aboriginal Australian. He is fiercely proud of his indigenous heritage. In indigenous circles, Anthony is looked upon as an example for youth from this enormously disadvantaged community.

Some years back, whilst still playing at St George, Anthony met a die-hard St George supporter. Khoder Nasser comes from a Lebanese Muslim family who have lived in Australia for generations. His father was a former president of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, a peak national Muslim community body.

I first met Khoder in 1985 at a Muslim youth camp organised by the Federation. Khoder was always a loud and loutish sort of guy. He had a passion for the St George Rugly League team and for the British rock band Queen. Khoder had memorised the names of all St George players and the lyrics of just about every Queen song.

Khoder also had a passion for Islam. He read the Autobiography of Malcolm X at least 10 times. He was also a huge fan of boxing legend Muhammad Ali.

As Khoder and Choc became close friends, the topic of religion inevitably entered their conversations. Khoder introuced Choc to Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali. The boxing background of Choc's own family must have attracted him to the legendary Cassius Clay. His passion for black rights must have endeared him to the activism and confidence of Malek Shahbazz.

Choc made a decision. He wanted to be a Muslim. He proclaimed his shahada at the Imam Ali Ben Abi Taleb Mosque at Lakemba in south western Sydney. It happened all of a sudden. Even Khoder was taken by surprise.

Since then, it has been a roller coaster ride. Both Mundine and Nasser have big mouths and are not afraid to use them - much to their detriment.

I was never a huge fan of Mundine after his comments on the September 11 terrorist attacks. I thought he had been hanging around with the South Hurstville Salafites for too long. his rhetoric was becoming dangerous.

But then one night I saw him fight. And since then, I have become a choc-a-holic. Reproduced below is an article I wrote after watching Mundine fight on the evening of 8 June 2005 ...

___________________

The Night I Became A Choc-a-holic

It was 8:30pm. I had decided to call it a night early after a long day of reading about other people’s legal problems. I had hardly closed my eyes when the blasted mobile rang.

“Get your ass down here! Choc’s fighting, and my brother can’t make it tonight.”

The voice was unmistakable. My friend Carter is perhaps the only Bankstown “Leb” who plays cricket. He prides himself on being skippier than the skips. But when Choc fights, Carter becomes a “brudder”.

And tonight he was determined to drag me out of my comfortable bed to watch someone I hardly had much enthusiasm for.

Anthony Mundine was a superb footballer, even if he played for the wrong team (sorry, I’m a Bulldogs supporter). But after he switched to boxing, I lost interest. Boxing is not a sport for Sensitive New-Age Industrial Lawyers (SNAILs).

I read Mundine’s sad attempt at an autobiography. I could see why it did not win him the Nobel prize for literature.

Mundine’s verbal antics also made me a bit sceptical. I’ve known Mundine’s manager (Abdullah Khoder) for over 20 years. We first met at a Muslim youth camp. “Abs” (as we like to call him) was always a bit over-the-top. Sadly, his heart of gold was often badly disguised by loud ranting.

So as I waited for the NRMA man to heat up my car, I made sure I packed my iPod. I was prepared for what I thought would be a boring night. And as I waited for Carter to bring my ticket, I saw police cars everywhere. They had their eyes firmly fixed on me.

Why me? OK, so I have tanned skin. But that has more to do with watching too many Bollywood movies and eating too many potato-filled samosas as a child. Why stare at me for?

I peered through the windows and could see people of all shades and colours running up stairs and into doors. Carter arrived and forced me to run up 2 flights of stairs with him. As I entered the packed hall, it was clear that this was not a hall ready to cheer for Mary Donaldson’s adopted country.

I had my iPod ready, and tuned it to AC/DC. As my ears were shaking all night long, I saw The Man himself floating like a butterfly across the ring. Opposite him was Mikkel Kessler, WBA super-middleweight champion.

Mundine (or “Choc”, as his family affectionately nicknamed him as a tribute to his childhood passion for chocolate) may have been floating like a butterfly, but he did not quite have the sting of a bee. By the first 4 rounds, it seemed this would be easy for Kessler.

My iPod then moved my ears onto the Baby Animals. Listening to hard rock in a crowd of thousands screaming at a boxing match has a strangely surreal feeling.

“mundine’s goin down”, I SMSed by my cousin. Like me, she’s not a huge fan of Choc. And like most nurses, she is no fan of boxing.

I must have jumped the gun because I suddenly could only see the backs of people’s heads. I switched off the iPod and stood up to see Choc giving Kessler the worst bee-stings he has probably had for years.

And it was at that moment that the entire crowd could see Choc’s huge heart placing itself at the heart of the fight. This was cardiac boxing at its best. Before long, I joined the chorus of “Go Choc! Go Choc!”.

I looked around and saw an enormously mixed crowd. This wasn’t a Country Road affair like the Rugby World Cup final. This was a night for all races and classes and sizes and nationalities.

Choc continued to fight hard. Someone sitting near me mentioned Choc’s wobbly legs. My eyes were firmly fixed on Choc’s fists and arms which had not a sign of wobble.

Choc fought to the bitter end. We cheered for him. Out of nowhere arose a Danish flag. The result was announced, much closer than we thought. Then amongst all the confusion in the ring, one man held up a familiar flag. The whole crowd cheered on the Aboriginal flag. Tonight was a night for all Australians in the crowd to experience some Black Pride.

Driving home, I turned to Stan Zemanek. He was on the phone to “Abs”, Choc’s manager. “Oh no, is this going to be other Sheik Feiz incident?”, I thought to myself. But Abs summed the situation up perfectly. “Choc fought with enormous heart. We are all so proud of him. It may seem weird to hear the manager of a defeated boxer sounding proud. But for Choc to come so close to victory shows he is a boxing hero”. Or words to that effect.

I guess the ARL will have to wait a few more years for Choc’s return. In the meantime, this reluctant SNAIL has become a confirmed choc-a-holic.

(Irfan Yusuf likes to think of himself as a Sensitive New-Age Industrial Lawyer.)

On Martin's Passing

2005-06-05T22:07:00.000-07:00

What sort of background would you guess the most popular Islamic biographical author of the past 50 years would have? Which biographical work on the life of the Prophet Muhammad (peace & blessings of God be upon him) would you guess be read by more Aussie Muslims than any other? And what would the name of this author be?

Read on and be thoroughly surprised ...

May 12 was a sad day for Muslims. Across the world, followers of the Prophet Muhammad (peace & blessings of God be upon him) mourned the passing of one of the 20th century's greatest scholars of classical Islam. This shaykh, known to his Muslim readership as Abu Bakr Siraj ad-Din, wrote one of the definitive books on the life of the Prophet Muhammad. He also wrote 11 other books, including one defiantly titled “Ancient Beliefs and Modern Superstitions”.

I remember first hearing about Shaykh Abu Bakr in the mid-1980's. One of my father’s good friends mentioned the shaykh and praised his biographical work on the Prophet. Some years later, I bought a set of some 20 tapes of lectures by an American Imam named Hamza Yusuf Hanson. The lectures were based on a study of the shaykh’s biographical work.

I joined millions of Muslims around the world in mourning the death of Shaykh Abu Bakr. Yet hardly any western newspaper mentioned his passing. It was as if the event went unnoticed. Britain’s left-leaning The Guardian newspaper did publish a short obituary. Much of the material for this article has been taken from that obituary, penned by British author Gai Eaton.

Apart from The Guardian, The Independent and the New York Times, I am not aware of any other western newspaper which mentioned his passing. Yet this humble shaykh was undoubtedly one of the most influential spiritual figures in the Muslim world.

So who was this mysterious shaykh that most Muslims have heard of and most non-Muslims seem to ignore? Was this Shaykh Abu Bakr the leader of a terrorist outfit from Indonesia or Iraq? Was he a nasty beedy-eyed chap of Middle Eastern appearance who gave speeches in rolling Arabic?

Shaykh Abu Bakr was born on January 24, 1909. He was born in a place called Burnage in Lancashire, far away from the Middle East. His parents christened him Martin. His family name was Lings. Out of respect for the deceased and those who mourn him, I will refer to him simply as “the shaykh” (the term shaykh commonly used as a title for spiritual elders).

The shaykh spent his early years in the United States before returning to England where he attended Clifton College in Bristol. He was head prefect at this exclusive English private school (or public school for any UK readers).

The shaykh’s tertiary studies commenced at Magdalen College in Oxford. He studied English, and became a close friend of the famous CS Lewis. In 1935, the shaykh taught English courses in Lithuania.

In 1940, during the early years of the Second World War, the shaykh travelled to Egypt to visit a friend who lectured in Cairo. As fate would have it, the shaykh’s friend died in a motor accident, and the shaykh was offered the teaching post. He stayed in Egypt until the early 1950’s.

At this time, Gamal Abdel Nasser came to power and whipped up nationalist frenzy among young Egyptian students. Three of the shaykh’s colleagues were killed. The shaykh and his other British colleagues were summarily dismissed. After 17 years of living in a village at the foot of the Pyramids, the shaykh and his wife Lesley Smalley returned to England.

The post-war period was one of economic downturn for England and the rest of Europe. Work was hard to come by, and the shaykh was left with little to do but to resume his studies. He followed up his BA in Arabic studies with a PhD thesis on the life of Algerian sufi Ahmed al-Alawi. His wife, a physiotherapist, returned to work.

In 1954, the shaykh found employment at the British Museum as assistant keeper of Oriental printed books and manuscripts. He held this position for some 3 decades, and the quiet reclusive work situation allowed the shaykh to enter his most productive period of writing.

In 1983, the shaykh published his best-known work. Muhammad: His Life Based On the Earliest Sources is regarded as a masterpiece of English and Islamic scholarship. Millions of copies have been sold across the world, and a copy can be found in just about any Muslim household where English is spoken.

Apart from writing and reading, the shaykh was an avid gardener. His home in Kent was a place where plants and flowers from across the world bloomed. The shaykh was also passionate about Shakespeare, carrying on a passion he had developed whilst teaching in Egypt, where his students under his direction would perform a Shakespeare play each year. During the mid-1990’s the shaykh wrote a book on the spiritual side of Shakespeare’s work. He was honoured by the Prince of Wales, who wrote a forward to the book.

Shaykh Martin’s books have been translated into over a dozen languages. The UK-based newspaper, The Independent, described Shaykh Martin as “one of the most eloquent and serene Western voices in the Islamic world”. The British Muslim magazine Q-News carries on its website photos of the shaykh delivering a series of lecture on Shakespeare and Islam in November 2004 at the Globe Theatre, the place where Shakespeare first made a name for himself.

Some readers will find it strange that Muslims would mourn the passing of someone who, by all accounts, might be considered little more than just another eccentric English academic. Yet the fact remains that Western and European scholarship forms an essential part of the corpus of Islamic discourse. When Muslims think of travel writing, two names immediately come to mind One is Michael Wolfe, the other William Dalrymple. Only one is known to be a Muslim.

The Imam Hamza Yusuf Hanson is an American Muslim of Greek heritage. Another Greek Muslim of British Heritage, Yusuf Islam, has made an outstanding contribution to Islamic musical expression, just as he did when he was known as Cat Stevens. He has teamed up with musicians, Muslim and non-Muslim, from such far away places as Turkey, South Africa and Malaysia.

In the fields of spirituality (tasawwuf) and legal sciences (fiqh), it would be impossible to speak of 20th century developments without mentioning the name of an American by the name of Nuh Ha Mim Keller. And in Australia, the only published textbook on Islamic law has been written by Jamila Hussain, an anglo-Australian Muslim lady teaching at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS).

All of these writers and scholars and artists, including Shaykh Martin Lings, are proof that the modern Muslim mind has allowed itself to be open to influences from all cultures. As the Prophet himself is quoted as saying: "Knowledge is the lost property of the believer. Let him take possession of it regardless of where it is found".

Muslims respected Martin Lings notwithstanding the humiliation he received at the hands of a popular Muslim political figure like Gamal Abdel Nasser. The passing of a scion of British aristocracy, a former head student at an English public school, a Shakespearean scholar and an avid gardener brought together Muslims to pray for his soul in mosques and homes across the world, from Sarajevo to Sydney and from Oslo to Cape Town. May God bless and honour Shaykh Martin with the highest station of paradise. May God provide comfort to the shaykh's family and loved ones and to the millions of Muslims who mourn his passing.

(Irfan Yusuf is a Sydney lawyer and a proud owner of a copy of Martin Lings’ biography of the Prophet Muhammad. The book is available at the Andalus Bookstore in Sydney or by visiting their website at www.andalus.com.au.)

Muslim Australians - A New Study

2005-05-23T02:26:00.000-07:00

Abdullah Saeed and his team at the University of Melbourne have put together a superb booklet entitled "Muslim Australians - Their Beliefs, Practices And Institutions". The book is some 80 pages long and introduces the fundamental beliefs, practices and institutions of Islam as it exists in Australia.

The book is written for high school students and for persons with little exposure to Islamic literature. Aussie Mossies can also benefit from gaining an understanding of their community and its interactions with the broader community.

And many of our pre-conceived notions about Muslims are dealt plenty of blows by this study. It stunned me that Auburn in central Sydney has a higher proportion of its population as Muslim than Lakemba or Bankstown, with some 33% of the population being of Muslim background.

This is a superb initiative, and you can pick up your free copy by clicking here ...

http://www.amf.net.au/PDF/religionCulturalDiversity/Resource_Manual.pdf

Prayers For A Shaykh And A Hostage

2005-05-21T20:31:00.000-07:00

Douglas Wood is an Australian engineer working for an American company in Iraq. He has been kidnapped by a group claiming to be acting in the interests of the Iraqi people and their independence.

I wish I knew how kidnapping an Australian serves the interests of Iraqi people. Yes, I know our government has sent troops to Iraq. In doing so, it has ignored the wishes of millions of Australians who oppose the war.

Australians of all races and religions and political persuasions oppose the war and the occupation. Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus. And Muslims like me. Leftists, Labor voters and Liberals (small and big “L”). And Conservatives like me.

But the troops are there now. Saddam is in custody. Iraqis have the chance to re-build their country. Independence is their right. But how will it be achieved by kidnapping an Australian engineer?

Kidnappings and harming civilian workers will do little to help us convince our countrymen to oppose continuing occupation.

Kidnappers who claim to be acting for Islam should be asked to show one verse from the Qur’an (the Muslim scripture) or one hadith (reported saying of the Prophet) which supports their actions.

The Qur’an never taught us to hate others. It never taught us to attack those who are trying to help re-build shattered lives.

The Qur’an taught us to pray for others and for peace. Islam is an Arabic word that literally means peace. Yet I don’t see much peace being evidenced in the actions of the kidnappers.

I do, however, find peace of mind knowing that Australian Muslims are doing something for a fellow Australian. The Imam of a major Sydney Mosque, Shaykh Tajeddine el-Hilaly, is leading a team of negotiators seeking to secure the release of Douglas Wood.

Sh Hilaly is an elderly man with severe health complications. His home life is not the best. His mosque committee (known by the name of the “Lebanese Moslems Association”) are always embroiled in disputation. He himself cannot solve things within the association as his Egyptian background makes him ineligible to join (the organisation refuses membership to persons unable to secure a Lebanese passport).

Sh Hilaly has been criticised in the past (especially by Muslims) for not being able to communicate fluently in English and for making irresponsible remarks. Some 16 years ago, he was reported as saying that Jewish people use sex, pornography and other social ills to control the world. He was threatened with deportation, and it was only when a special position (the Office of Mufti of Australia) was created for him that the government of the day spared him from deportation.

Yet now the hopes of millions of Australians are in the hands of this controversial imam. The family of Douglas Wood have asked him to seek their brother’s release. They have even offered to make a substantial donation to an Iraqi charity (see the family website: http://www.thewoodfamily.info/).

Perhaps the views of most Australians are expressed by a letter to the editor published in the Sydney Morning Herald on 20 May 2005. Richard Manning wrote to the paper the following words:

Whatever the outcome of his endeavours on behalf of Douglas Wood, Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly has shown himself to be a man of faith, hope and charity. There will be detractors standing on the safe ground of their alternative views of the world. However, the sheik has seen an opportunity to be of service to an endangered Australian, his own community and Australia at large.

The shaykh is an elderly man with a heart condition who has dropped all his domestic and community duties to travel into a war zone and attempt to seek the freedom of an Australian non-Muslim civilian hostage. He is risking his life. Yet some neo-Conservative commentators keep harping on about comments he made 16 years ago, and accusing him of being an extremist (whatever that word means).

But now is no time for polemics. Now is a time for contemplation and prayer. None of us would want our family member to be caught up in a war zone, either as a hostage or negotiator.

So I guess it is time for me to pray for Douglas, my Presbhyterian Christian brother and a fellow Australian. At the same time, I pray for another fellow Australian, Shaykh Tajeddine el-Hilaly.

God, you created men and women in a state of freedom from impurities. Grant your servant, Douglas Wood, freedom from all impurities of heart and mind. Grant the prayers of his family and friends who pray for his liberty.

God, you control the hearts of all men and women. Change the hearts of those keeping Douglas in captivity. Guide them to understand that kidnapping innocent civilians achieves nothing for the cause of Iraqi freedom.

God, make fluent the speech of your noble servant Tajeddine. Enable him to complete his mission successfully. Grant him good health and a long life. Enable him to do a deed which will silence his critics and increase him and them in wisdom.

God, enable the efforts to free Douglas Wood to be a cause for all Australians, regardless of denomination, to come closer together and to reach an even greater understanding than what they presently have. Enable this experience to bring this nation closer together, to make it an example for the world.

Lord, hear our prayer for the sake of Your Beloved Messiah Isa bin Maryam (Jesus the Son of Mary) alayhis salam (upon whom be peace) and for the sake of your Chosen One (Mustafa), Muhammad (peace & blessings of God be upon him) and his noble Ahl (households). Amen! Amin!

© Irfan Yusuf 2005