Charlie Hebdo and the Hysteria of Islamists

Once again, the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo has fallen foul of the Islamists by publishing cartoons of Mohammed, leading to the usual threats and security alerts that attend any slight to the fragile sensibilities of ‘the devout’. This is not the first time that it has been targeted, for back in November last year its decision to publish a special issue entitled Charia Hebdo which contained many cartoons of its ‘guest editor’ Mohammed, led to its offices being firebombed. Both incidents highlight a phenomenon first generated by the Danish Jyllands-Posten furore and its publication of a number of Mohammed cartoons in 2005.

Charlie Hebdo published a fresh set of cartoons this week as a response to the violently febrile reaction to the ‘Innocence of Muslims’ film that has been witnessed across much of the Muslim world and amongst some Muslims resident in European states. These reactions serve to illustrate the ugly domineering impulse that lies at the heart of Islamic doctrine, and it is of course crucial that we tackle this challenge in an appropriately robust fashion: we must not cave in to Islamist threats, and their demands to restrict freedom of speech and expression in our nations; blasphemy is no offence.

In Germany, the Pro-Deutschland movement has expressed its desire to publicly screen the ‘Innocence of Muslims’, causing some disquiet amongst the German authorities and sections of the media that have wheeled out the usual demonising ‘racist’ and ‘far-right’ labels to apply to the group. In Russia, Communications Minister Nikolai Nikiforov called for Google to block Russian web access to the film’s Youtube site, threatening to curtail its freedom to operate in the country from November if it failed to do so. Rostelekom, one of Russia’s biggest internet providers, blocked access to Youtube in a number of Russian regions last night, and Yaroslav Nilov, Chairman of the Duma Committee on Social and Religious Organisations, has called upon the Ministry of Culture to ban screenings of the film in Russia on the basis that this would constitute “incitement to religious hatred.” He noted that Russia had a Muslim population of 20 million. The reaction of these influential Russian politicians seems to have been born out of a combination of a desire to appeal to the growing number of Muslim voters in the country, and of fear.

It is time that mainstream broadcasters and politicians in Britain and other European nations stopped pretending that these violent outbursts, threats and intolerance are not connected to Islamic doctrine, which is incompatible with a modern, civilised political and social worldview. In our countries, Muslims should not only be seen to respect our right to freedom of speech and expression and to acknowledge the supremacy of secular law, but they should also give active support to these principles. If not, then they should give serious consideration as to where they ought to live: is it to be here, or somewhere more conducive to their mental and cultural universe, such as their ancestral familial homeland(s)? The recent violent reactions to the ‘Innocence of Muslims’, the Charlie Hebdo cartoons and Tom Holland’s ‘Islam: The Untold Story’, have followed swiftly upon the anniversary of 9/11, which makes it apparent that all of these attacks upon freedom of expression are part of a wider Islamist political agenda.

Given this reality, how can anyone still give credence to what is printed in the pages of The Guardian upon such matters? That paper, and the BBC, to name but two influential players in the mass media, ought to offer us an explanation as to why they have systematically distorted reporting about Islamic issues so as to provide Islamic doctrine with a veneer of respectability, helping to embed it within our country and to facilitate its spread. We never wanted it, and we certainly do not need it. Now is as good a time as any to make this fact crystal clear.

Charlie Hebdo's latest cover

 

Moscow Eid: Video, Pictures and Russian Reactions

The video and pictures below illustrate the disruption to the daily life of the Russian capital that has become a familiar part of each Eid in recent years. Once again, thousands of Muslims have blocked streets with their prayers and 3,000 additional police were laid on to ensure that all passed off peacefully. Russia Today reported that:

Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulated Russian Muslims on the eve of the holiday, wishing them welfare, health, and success in good deeds. Putin said that by their "fruitful" activity, Muslim organizations are making a significant contribution to the preservation and development of Russia's national and cultural traditions.

Many members of the public in Britain and elsewhere who have no direct experience of Russia or who do not understand Russian harbour the misapprehension that Putin is some species of Russian ethno-nationalist. He is not. Putin is an opportunist statist, willing to use whichever elements of ideology – including some trappings of nationalism – for the benefit of himself and his supportive clique of oligarchs. Given this, he has no misgivings about treating with Islam, even with literalist interpretations of it as promoted by Putin loyalist and Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov. Russia under Putin is therefore no bulwark against the Islamisation of European societies, although ordinary ethnic Russians – non-Muslims – are alarmed by what is happening to the demography of Moscow and the country at large.

Yesterday, it was announced that an agreement had been reached to construct a 60,000-capacity mosque on the outskirts of Moscow, but today, new demands have been made by the Council of Russian Muftis, calling for the building of a mosque in each of Moscow’s administrative districts. This would of course have a dramatic impact upon Moscow’s character and symbolise its accelerating Islamisation, a fact not lost upon ordinary Russians.

The comment thread attached to the article dealing with this announcement in today’s edition of Izvestia makes for interesting reading, providing as it does an insight into the thoughts of Russian readers. I have translated a number of these below that reveal a deep sense of unease amongst many ethnic Russians about the Islamisation that is being brought about by inefficient immigration legislation and Russia’s own version of multiculturalism. Some readers of a sensitive nature may find elements of what is reproduced not to their taste, but I have not bowdlerised the translations, and nor should it be taken that I necessarily agree with all of the sentiments expressed. Reaction to the announcement regarding the proposed mosque-building programme was uniformly negative. For those of you who read Russian, some screengrabs of the comment section appear after the video and pictures.The full thread can be accessed here.

Russian readers express their opinions on Islam in Moscow

Igor Kaftailov: “Russia needs to be cleansed of the Muslim plague, and no more mosques built. But our filthy venal authorities of course, will lick the backsides of the muftis all the same.”

Tamara Sheverdina: “That was also precisely WHY the BYZANTINE EMPIRE collapsed . . . Now Constantinople is in the hands of the Turks . . . And everything started out just as now . . . The Muslim religion is false and bloody.”

Russkii Ivanov: “This is just as in the Russian fairytale: “There was a hare with a little wooden cottage, and a fox with one of ice . . .” In Soviet times there was STRICT regulation of the movement of the slit-eyes [by which he presumably refers to Central Asians] from one place to another. Everything was regulated, therefore we lived NORMALLY.”

V.P.P. – V.P.P. – “Move the capital of the Muslims from Kazan to Moscow and the Kremlin! And the capital of the Orthodox ETHNIC RUSSIANS from Moscow to the Kazan Kremlin, together with the President and the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation!”

Alexander Lv: “For the whole of their existence, the ethnic Russians have struggled with the consequences of the Tatar-Mongol yoke, and here we now find the Judases are prepared to lay themselves down before the Muslims again. Today, even the NTV News started not with an Orthodox but with a Muslim celebration. I would sooner hear Russian bad language on the street than incomprehensible Muslim babble.”

Sergei Avramov: “Muscovites must come out and organise protests against the building of mosques. We must understand, that the Muslim yoke is being placed Moscow. Ethnic Russians must show the guests who is the master in the home, and show them their place. If our authorities do not wish to allow this, then there has to be a problem for them. Ethnic Russians – we need to organise ourselves, change those in power and defend our historical roots. Yet, under the pretext of tolerance we are abandoned to the enemies of the Russian people.”

Petr Petrov: “If we wait and nothing changes then perhaps it will be too late. We are supporting not the ethnic Russian citizens who founded the state, but foreigners.” 

To Monin: “We ethnic Russian folk must oppose the penetration of Muslims into our society.”

Iurii Shchekin: “But in the mosques we shall rear pigs, then they will be useful :-)”.

To Monin: “We - the ethnic Russian folk - must become a single force, capable of resisting the influx of Muslims into our SACRED RUS’.”

Muslims pray in Moscow's Prospekt Mira

Cossacks ride on Paris!

Cossack Commemoration

Two hundred years ago such an announcement would have been dreaded following the savaging of Napoleon’s Grande Armée by Russian arms and General Winter, but today, this news betokens not forthcoming acts of bloody vengeance, but something of a cultural exchange in commemoration of the bicentennial of Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow. Itar-Tass reports that a detachment of 23 riders, all descendants of Don Cossacks who had harried Napoleon’s troops during their hellish retreat, yesterday set out from Moscow dressed in replica uniforms from the 1812 campaign and mounted on steeds of the appropriate Don Cossack breed, renowned for their endurance and ability to travel long distances. These days the breed is rare, but it is hoped that this commemorative event will help to secure its future.

According to Itar-Tass, the cavalry tour is a purely “socio-cultural undertaking which possesses neither a political nor an economic goal.” The role of the state is said to have been confined to lending some organisational assistance, whereas the tour itself has been funded through private donations.

Along the Cossacks’ route, which will take the riders through western Russia, Belarus, Poland, Lithuania, Germany and France, there will be a series of conferences, roundtables, seminars and concerts, with the detachment even being accompanied by a “mobile museum”. The climax will come at Fontainebleau, where a celebration concert and charitable auction will be held, with the latter disposing of the horses themselves. For the horses’ sake, it is to be hoped that the French gastronomic predilection for a certain type of meat will not on this occasion be a determining factor in the auction.

It is doubtful that on this occasion the visiting Cossacks will have any linguistic impact, although it is said of their ancestors that they did lend a word to the French language with which you may be familiar: “bistro” from the Russian “bystro” – quickly. Legend has it that occupying Russian troops banged their Parisian tables with impatience yelling “Bystro, bystro!” in their anxiety to be fed, and from thence it is said to have entered the French language. Although the etymology is disputed, the story possesses a certain charm.

The defeat of Napoleon plays a central role in Russia's national narrative, his invasion being just one of many from the West which over the centuries included the Teutonic Knights, the Poles, the Swedes, the French, the Germans and the Austrians. This historical experience, and the devastation wreaked by many of these invasions, has etched itself deeply into the Russian national psyche, hence what to us seems like an alarmist response by the Russians to American plans to site anti-ballistic missile defences in Poland. As for the riders, the video below shows their departure from Moscow yesterday. They have a long ride ahead of them.

Cossack Revival

Before you fall into the error of thinking that these contemporary Cossacks are little more than a Russian equivalent of the Sealed Knot, think again. Since the late Soviet period, repressed Cossack identities have re-emerged in different parts of Russia and in neighbouring states such as Ukraine and Kazakhstan where their hosts possessed traditional territories. In the main, with the notable exception of Ukraine that possesses its own Cossack tradition which forms an integral part of its national identity and myth (it would argue with some credibility that its Cossacks were the originals), Cossacks see themselves as a distinct branch of the Russian people, or a “sub-ethnos” in the parlance of Russian ethnographers.

Since the late 1980s Cossack revivalism has led to the creation of a variety of Cossack organisations, some have which have sought a contemporary role for themselves analogous to that of their late-tsarist predecessors as servitors of the state and guardians of its borderlands. Earlier this month Izvestia announced that Aleksandr Tkachev, Governor of the Kuban, wishes to use Cossacks to help tackle illegal immigration to the region emanating from the northern (predominantly Muslim) Caucasus that he believes could lead to regional destabilisation and interethnic conflict. He remarked that currently the region was about 80% ethnic Russian with ethnic minorities making up the remainder, but drew attention to the parallel of Kosovo which although once majority Serb (he made the gaffe of referring to Serbs as Croats) now possessed an overwhelming Albanian majority. He is determined to nip the demographic crisis in the bad to ensure that the Russians do not share the same fate, and he sees the Cossacks as playing a very active and central role in this. It would seem therefore, that the Cossacks should no longer be regarded as just another historical curiosity.

Cossacks leave Moscow for Paris

Russian Horsemen Ride to Paris on Anniversary of... by tvnportal