Woolwich Attacks: Reflection on the roles of Muslim Community, British Media and British Government

I apologise for the unnecessarily long post, I  tried to covere the following points. please read on.

• What Happened so far   
• Do the attacks needs to be apologise for and condemned? and by Whom?
• Media double standard
• Humanity of the Victim
• The perpetrators: ‘Insane’ or ‘Criminal’  or ‘confused’ 
• How can we help those ‘confused’ people?
• Foreign Policy and definition of '' Terrorism''

Our hearts and thoughts with the victim of Woolwich horrific attack and his family. It is obvious that attackers are psychopaths and insane people driven by criminal mind-set. Being a soldier will make the loss bigger in the eyes of many. However, it is an human soul that we lost here as other humans we lose all around the world everyday due to wars, poverty, crimes, etc.

What Happened so far

I haven’t yet expressed my anger and discontentment with the Woolwich murder. After the aftermath I guess it is right time to comment now. Well as all other killings and murders, I am always angry and against such horrific killings no matter who the killer is and who the victim is or how the incident took place.

The backlash that is happening now from EDL, riots,etc. The list below is compiled by a friend of mine about what happened since Woolwich attacks(up to time of writing). Sky news reported 140 attacks on Muslims in the last 2 days.

1.Within hours of the Woolwich murder 3 mosques in Kent were attacked
2. A Zaynabiyyah Mosque in Milton Keynes was petrol bombed (Reported by BBC)
3. A Mosque in Liverpool was defaced with a Swastika and 'EDL' graffiti
4. A Man was arrested in Kent waiting outside with a knife waiting for the Muslims to finish their prayer(http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-22634548)
5. A woman had her hijab ripped off yesterday in Fulham and sought refuge in the nearest Mosque (unconfirmed)
6. A Muslim woman in Bolton was attacked.

7. In Cardiff bacon was left in front of a mosque (http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/bacon-left-entrance-cardiff-mosque-400752)
8. THOUSANDS of tweets posted expressing Islamophobia, many calling for Muslims to be kicked out of the country or killed.

Retaliation is no good when it is based on non-sense. Judging an act of insanity from individuals by a group is the same as what the first action was.  As those two Muslims attackers do not represent Islam and Muslim community as well as EDL do not represent all the British people. What EDL is doing is an irrational response to mind-illness killing done by individuals and it should not be responded to with another violence and attacks.

Do the attacks needs to be apologise for and condemned? and by Whom? 

Obviously, this attack will be condemned by most of the rational people in the world. Such heinous killing should always be condemned; well all killings should be condemned. So the question that arises is why those condemning now don’t condemn the killings that passes by every day in the streets of the UK. Are those victims less humane than the soldier victim of Woolwich?. There are loads of killing in all sorts of horrendous and abuse happening and the victims are also human beings. This is said with all sympathy and prayers for the lost soldier and for his family.

As we noticed that most Muslims organisations and leaders hurried to condemn the attacks and apologise. I believe there is no need to distance Islam's true teachings from the individual who attacked the soldier. I find this continuous apologetic act as a clarification and it does create a perception that Muslims are inferior.

Islam and those killings are distant to each other and hence there is nothing to apologise for. Islam and what media call ‘terrorism‘ or ' killings' are not related. Obviously, without going into giving evidences, those acts are inherently opposed to Islam. So why Muslims need to re-affirm this by apologising.

After all who has done the attack does not belong to the civilised rational Muslims citizens who live their lives normally and work to sustain their families in peace and do not harm others. If someone in another faith done a murder do that faith group need to apologize. No. If there is condemnations,everyone should condemn and apologise, the whole UK citizens. Isn’t the responsibility of citizens of this country to ensure that law and order prevails and fellow citizens live in peace without fear.

  

Obviously, there is no religion that encourages people to be kill people. There will be always attackers who find a hanger to attribute their horrific actions to, whether it is religion, teachings of a particular ideology, particular party or movement.

Everyone in London/elsewhere/UK/around the world you need to understand that anybody can be a psychopath... It doesn't matter what colour or religion you are ANYBODY can be a complete Insane upon society if he/she really is. The race/ethnicity that the attacker belongs to is IRRELEVANT.

Media double standard
For example, a couple of weeks back a 75 year old Muslim man was stabbed to death outside a Mosque in Small Heath, Birmingham. But how many of us heard about this incident? very few. [see article here http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/may/02/birmingham-murder-racially-motivated-police ] also [see article herehttp://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/small-heath-murder-police-fear-1866269] . This is because media did not give it the attention.

Also have anyone heard about the Afghan boy stabbed to death by a British soldier his [see article http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/defence/8933193/British-soldier-jailed-for-stabbing-10-year-old-Afghan-boy.html]. One, two, No. one?

So has the media reported such’ killings’attacks. Has those committing it been looked at in the media under the prism of security, terrorism, danger to society? Has their religion been mentioned? Media reporting is obviously biased and there is a trend here.  According to the definition of ‘terrorism’ it is an act of violence against civilians or not in a battlefield. Hence media should report above attacks.

Humanity of the Victim

We all noticed the British media focus on the soldier victim of Woolwich. He is a human been and his family deserve to be comforted like any other family that lost someone. However the murdered soldier has been more 'humanised' and projected as 'worthy' via numerous family appeals, family interviews and presence in the news. We see the flowers and wreaths laid out in his memory. Imagine the public could see the same humanising process for one victim of war, bombed around the world, one child killed in the drone strikes? Aren’t hey humans too.All humans are worthy.

The perpetrators: ‘Insane’ or ‘Criminal’  or ‘Confused’

Let’s leave the word ‘Terrorism’ aside for now. I have issues with the terms 'radicalization' and 'criminals' .The following is a result of some discussion with a group of Muslims and non-Muslims. The Muslims in the group don’t believe the word 'radicalization' is an appropriate term for the definition which usually follows it. ISLAM SIMPLY CANNOT BE RADICALISED. Islam can only be mutilated and misinterpreted and Quran verses taken out of context. The purity, peaceful message of Islam cannot simply be radicalised otherwise it would suggest fault within it as a concept.

‘ISLAM  اسلام’=’PEACE’

‘MUSLIM مسلم ’=’SOMEONE SUBMITTING TO THE WILL OF ALLAH,SOMEONE WHO SURRENDER TO INSTRUCTIONS OF ALLAH’

 

There are 3 types of people in this planet Earth:

11-      Peaceful (rational) people

22-      Criminal (rational ) people

33-      Irrational (Insane= sadistically psychotic)

*Peaceful (rational) people are defined as those who cares about other fellow people (citizens) and only work hard to make a living for themselves and their families in ways that follow the law and order of the country they live in without harming other fellow citizens

*Criminal (rational) are defined as those who are mentally fit, has human rationale. They want also to make a living but are not that concerned if they harm other fellow citizens. Criminal CHOOSE to do something unlawful.

 *Irrational (Insane= sadistically psychotic ) are a group who have some form of mental instability. I believe the attackers of the Woolwich soldier are in this type of people.

I use the word ‘confused’ rather than ‘radicalized’ for the reasons describe above.

How can we help those ‘confused’ people?

I believe the responsibility of sorting what's happening now out and ‘confusion’ in all forms is a shared responsibility between British Muslim community and British government and British Media. Obviously, the violent actions are wrong and cannot be justifiable at all. Those committing current wave of violence (recent and previous attacks) had made it clear that they are motivated by the UK foreign policy in Muslim countries. However, due to their ignorance and lack of means to protest in a democratic way, they tend to those horrific things. In other words those crazy, psychopath people doing those attacks have been demonised and the media is playing a big role in demonising them.

Up to here, the 3 players have their hands dirty.

1.     The British Muslims community are not doing enough to spread awareness and teaching young Muslims that that violence is not the solution, rather democratic ways of making their voice heard.

1)Muslim community leaders has ' washed their hands' of these people in need of help. Essentially we need to pull them out to right path. Education can help, but I still feel that those ''confused'' people are mostly educated. They are also normal Muslims but are usually but not dissolved in the main stream of 99% of moderate Muslims. So I think it is a leadership issue. The solution is around having a firm Muslim leadership that instills political engagement, leadership and debate those issues among Muslims. Then have a plan to influence the British media as it also has a role in confusing those people more by demonising Muslims more and more.

2  2) British Media for demonising Muslims;

3    3)UK government foreign policy is not equitable and has been intrusive and killed thousands civilians in several Muslim countries and also not ethical;

Looking at 3 sides, the British Muslims community role is the biggest. However, cooperation with British media and government should take another level and British media and British government need to be aware that their way of picturing Muslims in the prism of violence is contributing to this wave of violence, demonisation and anger among young Muslims.

Foreign Policy and definition of '' Terrorism''

Britain's vicious occupations abroad cannot be ignored. It has a role to play in what’s happening now. The British government foreign policy needs to be more equitable.  Please read report by a British army soldier here [http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/may/23/woolwich-attack-british-foreign-policy-role]

Also see[http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/may/23/woolwich-attack-terrorism-blowback] in which Glenn Greenwald(from Guardian) has argued he argued that the term is too highly politicized and propagandized to have any coherent definition — that it "pack(s) the political, cultural and emotional punch" that few words can, and thus, we should be weary of its use. "Put another way, the term at this point seems to have no function other than propagandistically and legally legitimizing the violence of western states against Muslims while legitimizing any and all violence done in return to those states," he wrote, after soliciting thoughts about the term's definition on Twitter.

Thanks for reading :)

Hassan Hamdoun

25 May 2013  2:30 AM