Islamophobia
Week at US Campuses: Spreading Hatred under the
Guise of Patriotism
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
CA
Borrowing
from President Bush’s terminology ‘Islamo-Fascists,’
a notorious band of ultra-right wing Arabphobes
and Islamophobes is embarked on a new project
to spread fear and hatred under the guise of patriotism
and freedom.
Packaged as “Islamo-Fascist Awareness Week,”
David Horowitz, a neo-conservative polemicist,
is leading the Arab/Muslim-bashing efforts at
campuses across the nation.
In the past, David Horowitz, the self-appointed
chief of the new campus thought police, has organized
witch-hunts against progressive academics and
attempted to introduce legislation to enforce
“codes of conduct” that would silence
“left-wing” voices on campus. This
time his target of the Oct. 22-26 Islamo-Fascist
Week were Islam and Arabs/Muslims.
Horowitz asks students participating in the campaign
to disseminate presentations, such as “The
Islamic Mein Kampf,” (meaning the Qur’an).
He also tries to connect Islam with fascism and
Arabs and Muslims with Nazis. He proclaimed that
Palestinians are the “quintessential Islamo-Fascists”
and that their cause is “genocidal.”
Horowitz’s personal website is home to comments
such as, “There is no distinction in the
American Muslim community between peaceful Muslims
and jihadists,” and, “Put a complete
stop to Muslim immigration, and find creative
ways to deport all Muslim non-citizens. These
two measures would be accompanied by the creation
of an environment where the practice of Islam
is made not easy but difficult.”
Tellingly, Horowitz’s mission is not much
different than another Islamophobe group known
with the acronym SANE: the Society of Americans
for National Existence that seeks to banish Islam
from the US by making "adherence to Islam"
punishable by 20 years in prison. It also seeks
a ban on Muslim immigration to the US.
A petition from the so-called David Horowitz Freedom
Center demands that “students and faculty...declare
their allegiances: either to fighting our terrorist
adversaries or failing to take action to stop
our enemies.” In a throwback to McCarthyism,
right-wing students are encouraged to issue press
releases condemning those who refused to sign.
It means either you are with us or with our enemy.
But just who are the “Islamic fascists?
According to Horowitz’s FrontPage magazine,
they include the Muslim Student Association, which
has chapters on hundreds of US campuses -- and
the Council on American Islamic Relations, which
advocates for civil rights and tracks hate crimes
against Arabs and Muslims.
As part of the "Islamo-Fascism Week,"
Horowitz visited Princeton University, New Jersey
, on Oct. 16, the last day of Eid al-Fitr, the
holy Muslim holiday celebrating the end of the
month of Ramadan. Interestingly, due to his less-than-gleaming
reputation, the event had to be kept somewhat
of a secret.
In his tirade against Muslims he persistently
connected the religion of over 1.5 billion people
to fascism, lumping together a diverse array of
ethnic and political groups by using terms such
as "Islamic Nazis," "barbarians"
and "Islamo-fascism." Alarmingly, Horowitz
made the claim that groups like al Qaeda and Hamas
are comparable to American organizations such
as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)
and the Muslim Students Association (MSA).
Perhaps unknowingly, Horowitz negated his own
claims by citing an inaccurate and selective history
of the Middle East. He denied that the Arab-Israeli
conflict centers on the issue of land and state
and insisted that no Palestinian lands had ever
been annexed. He also made the apocalyptic statement
that Christians in the Middle East are "vanishing,"
a startling claim considering the existence of
over 8 million Coptic Christian Egyptians, 1.4
million Lebanese Christians and 300,000 Christians
in the West Bank.
There is a collection of people that Horowitz
has recruited to speak for Islamophobia week.
Ann Coulter is one. After September 11, she was
fired from her job at the highly conservative
National Review for her comment that the US “should
invade [Muslim] countries, kill their leaders
and convert them to Christianity.” In 2004,
on Fox’s Hannity and Colmes, Coulter reiterated
her stance. When asked if she would still “like
to convert these people all to Christianity,”
Coulter replied, “The ones that we haven’t
killed, yes.” “So no one should be
Muslim?” Alan Colmes asked. “They
should all be Christian?” Coulter replied,
“That would be a good start, yes.”
Other luminaries include Rick Santorum, a former
US Senator, who has compared homosexuality to
incest; Robert Spencer who claims Islam is "the
world's most intolerant religion"; and noted
anti-Arab commentator and Islamophobe Daniel Pipes
who once said that "Palestinians are a miserable
people…and they deserve to be."
Some other well-known Islamophobist speakers are
Dennis Prager, Sean Hannity and Wafa Sultan. More
intellectual takes will come from such neo-conservative
icons of Middle East policy as Michael Ledeen
who seeks to apply Machiavellian principles to
the modern world: if we win, everyone will judge
our methods to have been appropriate; if we lose,
they will despise us. Strike decisively, get it
over with quickly. The diplomats will always say
that we can achieve our goals with a little bit
of nastiness and a whole lot of talking, but they
are wrong. It is better to be feared than loved.
Surely such a notorious lineup of racist, bigoted,
Islamophobic, anti-Semitic and Machiavellian speakers
will serve not to educate but to promote hatred
and spread misinformation and lies.
Let us not forget that these are the same lies
that have lead, and continue to lead, to hate
crimes and attacks against minorities including
African-Americans, Jews, Muslims, homosexuals,
and others based on stereotypes.
Events such as Islamophobia week do not seek to
further the discussion in a peaceful manner, but
rather contribute to the prejudicial anger and
hatred targeted against Arabs and Muslims in the
US. The post-9/11 America has seen a dramatic
increase in hate crimes against Arabs and Muslims
or those perceived to be so. It has already been
well-documented that the Arab-American and Muslim-American
communities and anyone perceived to be a member
of the communities have been the targets of hate
crimes and discrimination. The FBI has reported
that such crimes increased by a reported 1,600
percent after the horrific terrorist acts of Sept.
11.
For a sign of how easily rhetoric about the Middle
East can escalate, consider George Washington
University, where authorities discovered hundreds
of posters last week that said: “Hate Muslims?
So do we!” A “typical Muslim”
is then portrayed, with features identified such
as “venom from mouth” and “suicide
vest.”
Surely this event is a celebration of hate speech
and intolerance in order to promote hate and bigotry.
It will be an opportunity to Arab/Muslim-bashing
under the auspices of “fighting terrorism.”
(Abdus Sattar Ghazali is the Executive Editor
of the online magazine American Muslim Perspective:
www.amperspective.com email: asghazali@gmail.com)
