PakAlumni Worldwide: The Global Social Network
The Global Social Network
2017: The Year Islamophobia Went Mainstream
Islamophobia is no longer extreme; the year 2017 saw it go mainstream in Europe, India, the United States and several other parts of the world.
Openly Islamophobic Donald J. Trump was inaugurated as president of the United States in 2017. India's largest state of Uttar Pradesh elected rabidly anti-Muslim chief minister Yogi Adiyanath who was hand-picked by Muslim-hating Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2017. Neo-Nazis made significant electoral gains with their anti-Islam rhetoric in several European nations while Burma and Israel continued to get away with the murder of innocent Muslim civilians in 2017.
These alarming trends are reminiscent of the rise of Nazi Party led by Germany's Adolf Hitler who brought disaster to Europe and the rest of the world less than a century ago.
Trump's Muslim Ban:
The year of Islamophobia began in earnest on January 20, 2017 with the inauguration of President Donald J. Trump who called for "total and complete shutdown" of Muslims entering the United States during his successful electoral campaign. Among the first executive orders he signed was a "Muslim Ban" from seven predominantly Muslim countries.
Then came an avalanche of a large number of Islamophobic tweets and retweets from Trump's twitter account. Some recent Trump retweets were of tweets from Britain First's Jayda Fransen. These tweets and retweets were swiftly denounced by top British and Dutch officials. Trump did not apologize.
Trump developed a pattern of using terror attacks to tweet against Muslims while ignoring similar or worse terror attacks by others.
Trump closed the year with recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital, a recognition that prior US administrations had withheld pending negotiations and final settlement of the issues between Israelis and Palestinians.
Hindu Nazis in India:
Yogi Adiyanath, known for his highly inflammatory anti-Muslim rhetoric, was hand-picked by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to head India's most populous state of Uttar Pradesh.
Yogi wants to "install statues of Goddess Gauri, Ganesh and Nandi in every mosque”. Before his election, he said, “If one Hindu is killed, we won’t go to the police, we’ll kill 10 Muslims”. He endorsed the beef lynching of Indian Muslim Mohammad Akhlaque and demanded that the victim's family be charged with cow slaughter.
In an op ed titled "Hitler's Hindus: The Rise and Rise of India's Nazi-Loving Nationalists" published by leading Israeli newspaper Haaretz, author Shrenik Rao has raised alarm bells about "large and growing community of Indian Hindu Nazis, who are digitally connected to neo-Nazi counterparts across the world".
Rao talks about Nagpur, a town he describes as the "epicenter of Hindu Nationalism", where he found ‘Hitler’s Den’ pool parlor "that shocked me on a round-India trip 10 years ago was no outlier. Admiration for Nazism – often reframed with a genocidal hatred for Muslims – is rampant in the Hindu nationalist camp, which has never been as mainstream as it is now".
Hindu nationalists in India have a long history of admiration for the Nazi leader, including his "Final Solution". In his book "We" (1939), Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar, the leader of the Hindu Nationalist RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) wrote, "To keep up the purity of the Race and its culture, Germany shocked the world by her purging the country of the Semitic races -- the Jews. Race pride at its highest has been manifested here. Germany has also shown how well-nigh impossible it is for races and cultures, having differences going to the root, to be assimilated into one united whole, a good lesson for us in Hindusthan to learn and profit by."
Golwalkar, considered the founder of the Hindu Nationalist movement in India, saw Islam and Muslims as enemies. He said: “Ever since that evil day, when Moslems first landed in Hindusthan, right up to the present moment, the Hindu Nation has been gallantly fighting to shake off the despoilers".
Islamophobia in Europe:
Dutch expert Cas Mudde, an associate professor at the University of Georgia summed up the rise of Islamophobes in Europe well when he said: "The far right in Europe is more popular today than it was at any time in postwar history".
Alternative für Deutschland (AFD), a modern re-incarnation of Hitler's Nazi Party, stunned the world by becoming the third largest party in German Bundestag in 2017.
Last year, AFD's anti-Islam policies replaced its anti-EU focus with the slogan “Islam is not a part of Germany” emerging from the party’s spring 2017 conference.
In Austria, far-right Freedom Party candidate Sebastian Kurz was recently elected chancellor on the party's anti-Islam platform.
Earlier in 2017, the Dutch anti-Islam Freedom Party of Geert Wilders became the second largest force in parliament.
The French National Front (FN) of Marine Le Pen received nearly 34 percent of votes in the May 2017 presidential run-off that was won by Emmanuel Macron.
Neo-Nazis and Hindu Nazis on Social Media:
The advent and growth of online social media have enabled a large and growing community of Indian Hindu Nazis connected to neo-Nazi counterparts in Europe and America. This came to light a few years ago when the Norwegian white supremacist terrorist Anders Behring Breivik's manifesto against the "Islamization of Western Europe" was heavily influenced by the kind of anti-Muslim rhetoric which is typical of the Nazi-loving Hindu Nationalists like late Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar (1906-1973), and his present-day Sangh Parivar followers and sympathizers in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who currently rule several Indian states. This Hindutva rhetoric which infected Breivik has been spreading like a virus on the Internet, particularly on many of the well-known Islamophobic hate sites that have sprouted up in Europe and America in recent years. In fact, much of the Breivik manifesto is cut-and-pastes of anti-Muslim blog posts and columns that validated his worldview.
"It is essential that the European and Indian resistance movements learn from each other and cooperate as much as possible. Our goals are more or less identical," Breivick wrote in his manifesto. The Christian Science Monitor has reported that "in the case of India, there is significant overlap between Breivik’s rhetoric and strains of Hindu nationalism – or Hindutva – on the question of coexistence with Muslims. Human rights monitors have long decried such rhetoric in India for creating a milieu for communal violence, and the Norway incidents are prompting calls here to confront the issue."
Indian Textbooks Praise Nazis:
Adulation for for Hitler has found its way into Indian textbooks to influence young impressionable minds. Here's how Rao describes it:
In 2004, when now-Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was the Chief Minister of Gujarat, school textbooks published by the Gujarat State Board portrayed Hitler as a hero, and glorified fascism.
The tenth-grade social studies textbook had chapters entitled "Hitler, the Supremo," and "Internal Achievements of Nazism." The section on the "Ideology of Nazism" reads: "Hitler lent dignity and prestige to the German government. He adopted the policy of opposition towards the Jewish people and advocated the supremacy of the German race." The tenth-grade social studies textbook, published by the state of Tamil Nadu in 2011 (with multiple revised editions until 2017) includes chapters glorifying Hitler, praising his "inspiring leadership," "achievements" and how the Nazis "glorified the German state" so, "to maintain a German race with Nordic elements, [Hitler] ordered the Jews to be persecuted."
Mein Kampf has also gone mainstream, becoming a "must-read" management strategy book for India’s business school students. Professors teaching strategy lecture about how a short, depressed man in prison made a goal of taking over the world and built a strategy to achieve it.
Modi and Trump:
Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India has built his entire political career on the intense hatred of Muslims. US President Donald Trump built his successful presidential campaign on Islamophobia and xenophobia. That's what the two men have in common.
Just as white racists form the core of Trump's support base in America, the Modi phenomenon in India has been fueled by Hindu Nationalists whose leaders have praised Adolph Hitler for his hatred of Jews.
M.S. Golwalkar, a Hindu Nationalist who Mr. Modi has described as "worthy of worship" wrote the following about Muslims in his book "We":
"Ever since that evil day, when Moslems first landed in Hindustan, right up to the present moment, the Hindu Nation has been gallantly fighting on to take on these despoilers. The Race Spirit has been awakening.”
"To keep up the purity of the Race and its culture, Germany shocked the world by her purging the country of the Semitic races -- the Jews. Race pride at its highest has been manifested here. Germany has also shown how well-nigh impossible it is for races and cultures, having differences going to the root, to be assimilated into one united whole, a good lesson for us in Hindusthan to learn and profit by."
Summary:
The simultaneous rise of Neo Nazis in the West and the Hindu Nazis in India represents a very serious and growing threat to world peace. Their combined menace can lead to a devastating third world war with nuclear weapons if these trends are not halted and reversed soon. I hope good sense prevails among the voters in these countries to pull the world back from the brink of human catastrophe.
Related Links:
A Conversation With White Nationalist Jared Taylor on Race in America
Lynchistan: India is the Lynching Capital of the World
Anders Breivik: Islamophobia in Europe and India
Hindutva: The Legacy of the British Raj
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Comment by Riaz Haq on January 21, 2022 at 11:42am
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Juan E Mendez, the first #UN Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, on the #genocide call against #India’s #Muslims: ‘UNSC should step in to protect Indian minorities’ #Islamophobia #Hindutva #Modi https://aje.io/mv3b8t via @AJEnglish
Dozens of Hindu religious leaders and politicians gathered last month for a meeting in Haridwar, a prominent pilgrimage site for Hindus in the northern Uttarakhand state, where multiple speakers called on the community to arm themselves for a genocide against the Muslim minority.
“Even if just 100 of us become soldiers and kill two million of them, we will be victorious,” Sadhvi Annapurna Maa of the far-right Hindu Mahasabha (Grand Assembly of Hindus) told a cheering crowd at the event.
The videos of the meeting went viral on social media, sparking outrage and prompting calls for the arrest of those who openly called for the killings. In the month since, two speakers have been arrested while others roam free as the police say they are investigating the matter.
Meanwhile, experts have raised an alarm. During a congressional briefing in the United States, Professor Gregory Stanton, the founder of Genocide Watch, warned in unambiguous words that a “genocide could very well happen in India”.
In August last year, Stanton, who has modelled 10 Stages of Genocide, put India on the 8th stage, i.e. persecution of a community. The remaining two stages are extermination and denial.
Juan E Mendez is the first United Nations Special Adviser on Prevention of Genocide (2004-2007), appointed by then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. He also served as the president and commissioner of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and as the UN Special Rapporteur on torture. Currently, he is a professor of human rights law at the American University in Washington, DC.
Mendez has termed the situation in India, home to 200 million Muslims, “dangerous” and “deeply disturbing”. Al Jazeera spoke to him about the explicit calls for genocide against the minority and what the international community, including the UN, can do to prevent it.
Juan E Mendez: I see them with a lot of concern, especially in the context where there have been decades of hostility towards the minority communities. The calls for active violence are much more dangerous and part of the equation, and particularly in this context, it could lead to some people taking those calls seriously, acting on them, and provoking others, too.
In this case, I would look for the worse, which is noting that these speeches were made by non-state actors, i.e. people who claim to represent their ethnic group, who act as if it is protected speech and under freedom of expression, like if it was just an opinion.
After all, making calls for killing millions in any legal context is a crime, the crime of threats at the very least. And so, if there is no appropriate response to it by the government, then I think the international community needs to demand action to limit the possible effects of speech of that sort.
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Expert warns of impending ‘genocide’ of Muslims in India
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/1/16/expert-warns-of-possible-g...
Stanton said genocide was not an event but a process and drew parallels between the policies pursued by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the discriminatory policies of Myanmar’s government against Rohingya Muslims in 2017.
Among the policies he cited were the revocation of the special autonomous status of Indian-administered Kashmir in 2019 – which stripped Kashmiris of the special autonomy they had for seven decades – and the Citizenship Amendment Act the same year, which granted citizenship to religious minorities but excluded Muslims.
Stanton, a former lecturer in genocide studies and prevention at the George Mason University in Virginia, said he feared a similar scenario to Myanmar, where the Rohingya were first legally declared non-citizens and then expelled through violence and genocide.
“What we are now facing is a very similar kind of a plot,” he said.
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Opinion | Ukraine news coverage exposes racist biases in Western media - The Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/02/28/ukraine-coverage...
By H.A. Hellyer
February 28, 2022 at 12:42 p.m. EST
H.A. Hellyer, a Carnegie Endowment for International Peace scholar, is a senior fellow at the Royal United Services Institute and Cambridge University.
“This double standard is so evident in how we as Westerners engage in intl relations…we dehumanize non-White populations, diminishing their importance, and that leads to one thing: the degrading of their right to live in dignity.”
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“This isn’t a place, with all due respect, like Iraq or Afghanistan, that has seen conflict raging for decades,” Charlie D’Agata, a CBS correspondent in Kyiv, told his colleagues back in the studio. “You know, this is a relatively civilized, relatively European — I have to choose those words carefully, too — city where you wouldn’t expect that or hope that it’s going to happen.”
Putin’s criminal invasion of Ukraine has generated an inspiring wave of solidarity around the world, but for many — especially non-White observers — it has been impossible to tune out the racist biases in Western media and politics.
D’Agata’s comments generated a swift backlash — and he was quick to apologize — but he was hardly the only one. A commentator on a French news program said, “We’re not talking about Syrians fleeing bombs of the Syrian regime backed by Putin; we’re talking about Europeans leaving in cars that look like ours to save their lives.” On the BBC, a former deputy prosecutor general of Ukraine declared, “It’s very emotional for me because I see European people with blue eyes and blond hair ... being killed every day.” Even an Al Jazeera anchor said, “These are not obviously refugees trying to get away from areas in the Middle East,” while an ITV News reporter said, “Now the unthinkable has happened to them, and this is not a developing, Third World nation; this is Europe.”
British pundit Daniel Hannan joined the chorus in the Telegraph. “They seem so like us. That is what makes it so shocking. War is no longer something visited upon impoverished and remote populations. It can happen to anyone,” he wrote.
The implication for anyone reading or watching — particularly anyone with ties to a nation that has also seen foreign intervention, conflict, sanctions and mass migration — is clear: It’s much worse when White Europeans suffer than when it’s Arabs or other non-White people. Yemenis, Iraqis, Nigerians, Libyans, Afghans, Palestinians, Syrians, Hondurans — well, they are used to it.
The insults went beyond media coverage. A French politician said Ukrainian refugees represent “high-quality immigration.” The Bulgarian prime minister said Ukrainian refugees are “intelligent, they are educated. ... This is not the refugee wave we have been used to, people we were not sure about their identity, people with unclear pasts, who could have been even terrorists.”
It’s as if, in our anger and horror at the scenes of Russia’s aggression, we are incapable of recognizing a simple fact: We’ve seen this before.
A Vanity Fair special correspondent denied precisely that in a tweet: “This is arguably the first war we’ve seen (actually seen in real-time) take place in the age of social media, and all of these heart-wrenching images make Russia look utterly terrible.”
The tweet was erased — like the experiences of many who have documented the horrors of war in recent decades on social media and beyond.
Putin’s military also intervened ferociously in Syria, backing a murderous regime. That war unleashed a level of mass death, suffering, destruction and displacement not yet seen in Ukraine — but the West’s response was far less empathetic. The same can be said of the U.S. invasions and military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq; the catastrophic Saudi-led war in Yemen; the Israeli occupation of the Palestinians.
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Religious Divide in #Bangalore #Karnataka will destroy #India's #tech industry, says #Indian corporate leader Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw. She was referring to reports of #Muslim vendors being kept out of temple towns and festivals. #BJP #Hindutva #Islamophobia https://www.freepressjournal.in/india/biocon-chief-kiran-mazumdar-s...
Bengaluru: A prominent voice from the corporate sector and executive chairperson of Biocon Ltd, Dr Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, has raised a red flag over the “growing religious divide” in Karnataka and expressed fear that it may affect the IT-BT sector too.
In a series of tweets, she raised a red flag over hardline Hindutva groups to keep out Muslim traders from temple festivals in Karnataka and urged Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai to resolve the “growing religious divide” in the state and warned that the country’s “global leadership” in tech and biotech was at stake.
“Karnataka has always forged inclusive economic development and we must not allow such communal exclusion — if IT/BT became communal it would destroy our global leadership,” wrote Shaw, who heads Asia’s leading biopharmaceuticals enterprise,” she tweeted, tagging Bommai and added: “Please resolve this growing religious divide.”
In a subsequent tweet, she posted: “Our CM is a very progressive leader. I am sure he will resolve this issue soon.”
She was referring to reports on how Muslim vendors were being kept out of several temple towns and festivals. Several temple committees organising the festivals, especially in the communally sensitive coastal districts, have been obeying the warning issued by the hardline Hindu groups. Some, however, have expressed dismay over the curbs and say these would hit long-standing social relations. The curbs came after Muslim groups organised a bandh against the hijab ban ruling by the Karnataka High Court.
However, the state government, in an official statement in the state legislature, said the restrictions on non-Hindus conducting business within the premises of temples is as per a rule introduced in 2002 under the Karnataka Hindu Religious Institutions and Charitable Endowments Act, 1997. This rule, many vendors say, has now been weaponised to keep them out of business.
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Why #Christians are trying to cancel ‘Ms. Marvel’? Why are they upset about a young #Muslim girl when a Norse God had four movies and appeared in every Avengers film? #Pakistani-#American #MsMarvel #Islamophobia https://wegotthiscovered.com/tv/why-christians-are-trying-to-cancel...
Phase Four of the Disney MCU has introduced us to new and diverse characters from different backgrounds. But it seems that Christian groups are against the new Ms. Marvel show for *checks notes* being Muslim.
TikTok user frankdomenic has noticed that the new Disney Plus show is being review bombed on IMDb. As of writing, the show currently has an average rating of 6.4 out of 10 stars on the website. This TikToker theorized that the show would have received a higher rating if it wasn’t being bombed by “racists”.
The TikToker theorized that the cause of the review bomb was because of a private Facebook group called “Christians Against Ms. Marvel”. According to their about page, this group believes that Ms. Marvel is “the biggest slap in the face” for conservative Christians and that Carol Danvers should be the face of the show. Their goal is to get the show canceled as they believe that there will no longer be more “white straight Christian characters”.
Ms Marvel might be the biggest slap in the face for conservative Christians to date!!! Disney has decided that the face of this franchise should not be Carol Danvers but should instead be a gay Muslim. no more straight Christian characters from Marvel. those days are over. please join us as we let Disney know that we will not BE CANCELLED!!!
It seems like these people have not seen or read Ms. Marvel as the show clearly dictates that Ms. Marvel and Captain Marvel are two different characters. Even the show indicates that Kamala Khan looks up to Carol Danvers. These “Christians” should be flattered. Also, Kamala Khan is not (at least not yet confirmed) to be a gay character. Just because a pride shirt appeared in the show doesn’t mean she’s automatically gay.
Also, why are they upset about a young Muslim girl when a Norse God had four movies and appeared in every Avengers film? If these are truly “conservative” Christians, shouldn’t they be up in arms against that too, especially if they remember the first commandment? One TikToker noticed this and FrankDomenic gave a possible reason as to why Thor gets a pass.
MCU fans mocked the Facebook group after the page was shared on social media. Some believed it was just a troll page while others, especially Christians, said that they enjoyed the show.
So far, more people praised the show than the ones who gave negative ratings. And hopefully, by episode 2, more people will appreciate the show. Also, it’s 2022 guys, let others be represented on the big screen.
Episode 1 of Ms. Marvel is now out on Disney Plus and new episodes come out each week on Wednesday.
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#Meta execs told #HumanRights groups they wouldn’t release full #India #HateSpeech study for their own security. An earlier 2020 study concluded that #Hindutva groups support violence against #Muslims, #minorities & should be banned from #Facebook https://www.wsj.com/articles/meta-officials-cite-security-concerns-... via @WSJ
Executives at Meta Platforms Inc. META 5.36%▲ privately told rights groups that security concerns prevented them from releasing details of its investigation into hate speech on its services in India, according to audio recordings heard by The Wall Street Journal.
Meta, the parent company of Facebook, in July released a four-page summary of a human-rights impact assessment on India, its biggest market by users, where it has faced accusations of failing to adequately police hate speech against religious minorities. The India summary was part of the company’s first global human-rights report. The 83-page global report offers detailed findings of some previous investigations; it included only general descriptions of its India assessment, which disappointed some rights advocates.
“This is not the report that the human-rights team at Meta wanted to publish, we wanted to be able to publish more,” Iain Levine, a Meta senior human-rights adviser, said during private online briefings with rights groups in late July after the summary was released, according to the recordings.
“A decision was made at the highest levels of the company based upon both internal and external advice that it was not possible to do so for security reasons,” he said.
The company said at the time of the report’s release that it wouldn’t publish the full India assessment. It also said United Nations guidelines for companies reporting on human-rights issues caution against releasing details that could imperil stakeholders, a term that generally refers to people such as staff and external researchers involved in the reporting process.
Representatives from the rights groups contended in their meeting with Meta executives that the company wasn’t being transparent in its human-rights efforts, that it appeared not to take the undertaking seriously and that the groups had participated in good faith only to see Meta bury the findings, according to the recordings.
The fact that Meta isn’t releasing the full assessment is “a slap in my face and my people’s face who have endured so much hate speech on this platform,” said a person in the briefing who identified herself as an Indian Muslim researcher, according to the recordings. “We want a release of this report—now,” she said.
Mr. Levine and Miranda Sissons, Meta’s human-rights director, said they understood those complaints and wished they had been able to release more details, according to the recordings.
The executives said during the briefings that the effort represented an important first step in Meta addressing human-rights concerns. They said the summary was written after consulting the guidance on human-rights impact assessments for digital companies from the Danish Institute for Human Rights.
“This is the beginning of a reporting process where I think no activist, no human-rights defender of any kind would ever think that any of the work any company, or probably any entity, that is done is good enough and this team would agree,” Ms. Sissons said in one briefing, the recordings show.
Mr. Levine, who worked for more than three decades for global human-rights groups before joining Meta in 2020, told attendees of the briefings that 120 people at Meta reviewed the report, and that it was approved by president of global affairs Nick Clegg and chief legal officer Jennifer Newstead.
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#Indian #Muslim woman's rapists were sentenced to life in prison. Now they’re free, and she’s in hiding. #BilkisBano was just 21 years old & pregnant when she was gang-raped by a mob that killed 14 of her family members, incl her 3-year-old daughter. #Modi https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/17/asia/india-bilkis-bano-rape-gujarat-...
Standing in a row outside the gates of Godhra remand center in Gujarat, western India, the 11 middle-aged men could have been mistaken for visiting dignitaries receiving sweets and blessings from local admirers.
In reality, they were part of a 2002 Hindu mob who had just been released after serving 14 years of life sentences for one of the most heinous crimes in India’s recent history.
Since their release in August – on India’s Independence Day – the men have scattered across the country.
But there’s one person who can never escape the repercussions of the attack 20 years ago – Bilkis Bano, who was just 21 years old and pregnant when she was gang-raped by a mob that killed 14 of her family members, including her 3-year-old daughter.
Bano was too distraught to speak about the men’s release, but issued a statement through her lawyer, saying she hadn’t been consulted about the decision and it had “shaken” her faith in justice. “My sorrow and my wavering faith is not for myself alone but for every woman who is struggling for justice in the courts,” the statement said.
The recommendation to free the men was made by an advisory panel appointed by the Gujarat government, led by Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Critics say the decision was tainted by politics, misogyny and religious discrimination, and exposes what they see as the hypocrisy of BJP leaders who claim to support gender equality and women’s rights. Some lawmakers and activists have petitioned the Supreme Court for the men to be rearrested.
“The concept of Article 15 where there will be no discrimination in the Constitution on the basis of sex or religion or gender has just been thrown out the window,” said one of the petitioners, Mahua Moitra, a lawmaker from the All India Trinamool Congress party.
Some lawmakers said the decision had political overtones, coming just four months before the BJP hopes to secure re-election in the Gujarat state elections.
Subhashini Ali, a former parliamentarian and vice president of the All India Democratic Women’s Association, who has filed a separate petition in the Supreme Court, said if the intent was to polarize voters, it had failed. “For the first time, I’m finding that even BJP supporters are not supporting what they’ve done,” she said.
The Gujarat and central governments did not respond to requests for comment.
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#BilkisBano: #India PM #Modi's government okayed her rapists' release despite opposition from a court and federal prosecutors. Convicts were part of a #Hindu mob that attacked Bilkis Bano and her family during 2002 anti-#Muslim riots in #Gujarat. #BJP https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-62574247
The government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi approved the premature release of 11 men who were convicted for the gangrape of a pregnant Muslim woman and murder of 14 members of her family, including her three-year-old daughter, according to a court document.
The convicts were part of a Hindu mob that attacked Bilkis Bano and her family during the 2002 anti-Muslim riots in the western state of Gujarat.
The release of the men, who were serving life sentences for rape and murder, and the heroes' welcome they were accorded had caused global outrage.
Many were especially aghast as the convicts had walked free on 15 August - the day India was celebrating its independence day and just hours after Mr Modi had given a speech asking citizens to respect women.
A viral video showed the men lined up outside the Godhra jail while relatives gave them sweets and touched their feet to show respect.
State officials at the time said a government panel had approved the application for remission as the men - first convicted by a trial court in 2008 - had spent more than 14 years in jail, and after considering other factors such as their age and good behaviour in prison.
But on Monday, the Gujarat government submitted a document in the Supreme Court revealing that they had sought the federal government's approval - which was granted by the home ministry, led by Amit Shah, in July.
The approval had come despite opposition from a court and federal prosecutors who had said they should not be "released prematurely and no leniency may be shown" to them as their crime was "heinous, grave and serious".
The top court is hearing several petitions challenging the convicts' release.
Days after her attackers were freed, Bilkis Bano issued a statement calling the decision to free the men "unjust" and said it had "shaken" her faith in justice.
"When I heard that the convicts who had devastated my family and life had walked free, I was bereft of words. I am still numb," she said.
"How can justice for any woman end like this? I trusted the highest courts in our land. I trusted the system, and I was learning slowly to live with my trauma. The release of these convicts has taken from me my peace and shaken my faith in justice," she wrote, appealing to the Gujarat government to "undo this harm" and "give me back my right to live without fear and in peace".
The decision had caused massive outrage in India. It was criticised by opposition parties, activists and several journalists, who said it discriminated against India's minority Muslims. Attacks on the community have risen sharply since the BJP formed the federal government in 2014.
More than 6,000 activists, historians and citizens issued a statement urging the Supreme Court to revoke the early release of the convicts, describing it as a "grave miscarriage of justice".
Many also pointed out that the release was in contravention of guidelines issued by both the federal government and the Gujarat state government - both say that rape and murder convicts cannot be granted remission. Life terms in these crimes are usually served until death in India.
The biggest setback from the state government's decision has been for Bilkis Bano and her family.
The anger and despondence of the family is easy to understand considering the magnitude of the crime and the protracted battle they had to fight for justice.
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In the U.S. and Western Europe, people say they accept Muslims, but opinions are divided on Islam
BY NEHA SAHGAL AND BESHEER MOHAMED
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/08/in-the-u-s-and-wes...
The vast majority of people across 15 countries in Western Europe and in the United States say they would be willing to accept Muslims as neighbors. Slightly lower shares on both sides of the Atlantic say they would be willing to accept a Muslim as a family member.
At the same time, there is no consensus on whether Islam fits into these societies. Across Western Europe, people are split on Islam’s compatibility with their country’s culture and values, according to a 2017 Pew Research Center survey. And in the U.S., public opinion remains about evenly divided on whether Islam is part of mainstream American society and if Islam is compatible with democracy, according to a 2017 poll.
The vast majority of non-Muslim Americans (89%) say they would be willing to accept Muslims as neighbors, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. The same survey finds that most people (79%) say they would be willing to accept Muslims as members of their family.
In Western Europe, most people also say they would be willing to accept Muslim neighbors. However, Europeans are less likely than Americans to say they would be willing to accept Muslims as family members. While about two-thirds of non-Muslim French people (66%) say they would accept a Muslim in their family, just over half of British (53%), Austrian (54%) and German (55%) adults say this. Italians are the least likely in Europe to say they would be willing to accept a Muslim family member (43%).
Surveys in both the U.S. and Western Europe were conducted on the telephone, and due to the tendency of some respondents to give socially acceptable responses, may overstate the share of people willing to accept others (also known as social desirability bias).
In both the U.S. and Europe, the surveys find higher acceptance of Muslims among those with more education. In the U.S., for example, 86% of adults with a college degree would be willing to accept a Muslim into their family; among Americans without a college degree, this share falls to 75%. Similarly, in Germany, a majority of those with a college education (67%) say they would be willing to accept a Muslim in their family, compared with roughly half (52%) among those without one. The same pattern is present in other countries, such as the UK (71% vs. 44%) and Austria (67% vs. 51%).
On both sides of the Atlantic, attitudes toward Muslims are tied to politics, even after taking education, age and other demographic factors into account. In Western Europe, those who lean toward the right of the European political spectrum have less accepting views than those who lean toward the left. Likewise, in the U.S., those who identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party are more likely than Republicans and Republican leaners to say they would be willing to accept a Muslim family member (88% vs. 67%). Still, majorities among both Democrats and Republicans say they would be willing to accept Muslims in their lives. Additional analysis of how other demographic factors (such as religion) are correlated with these kinds of attitudes in Europe can be found here.
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Qatar hosting the World Cup highlights Western double standards
Is this truly about human rights, or is it that Western pundits can’t stomach the idea that an Arab Middle East country will host the World Cup?
by Ayman Mohyeldin
https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/amp/rcna57891
From the moment Qatar won the bid to host the 2022 World Cup, there have been criticisms surrounding its capacity and deservedness to hold the event. And rightfully so; any country that plans to welcome people from around the world for a globally important affair should be subject to intense scrutiny.
But what has played out over the past several years, and intensified in the final few months before the World Cup’s Sunday premiere, reveals the depths of Western prejudice, performative moral outrage and, perhaps most significantly, gross double standards.
A barrage of negative and quite frankly racist commentary about the tiny Persian Gulf nation has included headlines suggesting that fans who were celebrating the buildup to the tournament were paid to appear, because they were South Asians. A French outlet published a cartoon depicting the Qatari national team as terrorists. The list goes on.
But is this debate truly about migrant workers’ rights and human rights, or is it that European countries and Western pundits, who view themselves as the traditional gatekeepers of global soccer, can’t stomach the idea that an Arab Middle Eastern country will host such a venerable event?
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Piers Morgan
@piersmorgan
Yes, and we tortured innocent Iraqi civilians when we illegally invaded that country. Britain’s in no position to play the moral superiority card vs Qatar.
https://twitter.com/piersmorgan/status/1594274105309945856?s=20&...
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#Fifa President Gianni Infantino:"I am European. For what we have been doing for 3,000 years around the world, we should be apologizing for the next 3,000 years before giving moral lessons" #soccer #football #Colonialism #slavery #Qatar #alcoholban https://www.npr.org/2022/11/19/1137962269/fifa-president-gianni-inf...
DOHA, Qatar — FIFA president Gianni Infantino used his opening press conference before the start of the monthlong World Cup to deliver a blistering tirade at the West for continued criticism of host country Qatar and its human rights record.
For an hour, Infantino lectured the international press assembled at the Qatar National Convention Centre and then took questions for 45 minutes. In lengthy, and at times angry remarks, Infantino blasted the criticism of Qatar and FIFA.
"I am European. For what we have been doing for 3,000 years around the world, we should be apologizing for the next 3,000 years before giving moral lessons," he said.
He furthered the defense by saying, "Today I feel Qatari. Today I feel Arab. Today I feel African. Today I feel gay. Today I feel disabled. Today I feel a migrant worker."
Infantino said he has difficulties understanding the criticism and called it hypocrisy. "We have to invest in helping these people, in education and to give them a better future and more hope. We should all educate ourselves, many things are not perfect, but reform and change takes time."
Since FIFA chose Qatar to stage this tournament in 2010, soccer's governing body and the host country have endured withering criticism. It's the first time a Middle Eastern country has hosted a World Cup. A report released this month from the London-based rights group Equidem said the migrant laborers who built the World Cup stadiums worked long hours and under harsh conditions. The report said they were subjected to discrimination, wage theft and other abuses.
Infantino's news conference comes a day after FIFA and Qatar announced that the sale of beer would be banned at the eight stadiums. FIFA said the decision would ensure "the stadiums and surrounding areas provide an enjoyable, respectful and pleasant experience for all fans."
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