BERLIN — Tareq Alaows was hoping to become the first Syrian refugee to win a seat in Germany’s parliament when the country goes to the polls in September.

Speaking to NPR in February after announcing his candidacy with the Green Party, the 31-year-old lawyer and human rights activist from Damascus was full of ambition to help make Germany a better place.

“From my own experience as an asylum-seeker, I know that Germany needs to improve its integration policies, because they impact everyone, not just refugees,” he said. “I want to effect change for everyone in Germany.”

When Alaows fled the war in Syria in 2015, he thought he was leaving the threat of violence behind him. “The whole reason I came to Europe was so that I could live in safety and with dignity,” he said.

That has not come to pass. Citing death threats and a racist offensive against him and people close to him, Alaows withdrew his candidacy to represent the constituency of Oberhausen, in North Rhine-Westphalia state, in parliament on March 30.

The intolerance and intimidation Alaows faces have been widely condemned but are nothing new for Muslim and nonwhite public figures, or for politicians who openly support refugees. His dramatic campaign ending follows a rise of ethnic discrimination and violence in Germany in recent years, according to the government’s Federal Anti-Discrimination Agency.

“We have a problem with racism”

Lamya Kaddor, at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2016, is running to represent a Duisburg district in September’s election as a Green Party candidate. She was born in Germany to parents who came from Syria decades ago. Alexander Koerner/Getty Images for Brigitte

Alaows is not currently talking to the press, although he has spoken to Green Party candidate Lamya Kaddor.

“I wasn’t surprised by the threats and abuse pitted at Tareq, but I think he was,” Kaddor said. “We have a problem with racism in this country, and not just with far-right extremists. Racism is widespread, even in the middle of society.”

Kaddor, who is running to represent a Duisburg district in the September election, said she too faces racism daily. She was born in Germany to parents who came from Syria several decades ago. She vows she won’t let intimidation stop her election campaign.

“I’m used to a certain level of hatred and hostility. It doesn’t scare me anymore,” Kaddor said. “But it’s frightening for Tareq, who’s experiencing such vehement racist abuse for the first time.”

Like Kaddor, journalist Ferda Ataman was saddened but not surprised by Alaows’ decision.

“Being the target of racist abuse and threats myself, I fully understand why Tareq Alaows has stepped down,” said Ataman, who was born in Germany after her parents emigrated from Turkey. “But it’s very bitter news. Effectively, he’s unable to take part in our democratic process, which is a damning verdict on our society.”

Ataman, who wrote the book Ich bin von hier. Hört auf zu fragen! (I’m From Here. Stop Asking!), is the director of Neue deutsche Medienmacher, an organization that advocates for diversity in the media and politics and offers support to journalists facing racist threats. She said they have a long way to go.

The post Germany Grapples With Racism After Threats Derail Refugee’s Candidacy For Parliament first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

In her latest Fox News appearance, the president’s daughter-in-law expressed some curious opinions about the relative seriousness of crises throughout German history.

Lara Trump earned her place in Trumpworld via her marriage to the president’s son Eric, but she has since proven herself to be as useful to her father-in-law’s political aspirations as any of his children thanks to her fluency in his favorite medium: cable television.

A former Inside Edition producer, Lara quickly put her talents to work hosting Real News Update, a weekly webcast in which she applies a cheerfully Trumpian filter to the week’s biggest stories. (In her book Born Trump, Emily Jane Fox recounts how Donald paid little attention to his daughter-in-law until she emerged as one of his best campaign surrogates. “Have you watched her? She is great,” a friend remembered him saying.) With Ivanka and Jared in the West Wing and Don Jr. and Eric running the family business, Lara has emerged as a go-to choice for Fox News bookers who want to treat their audience to a real live member of the first family.

On Thursday morning, Lara made an appearance alongside Fox Business Network personality Stuart Varney in order to discuss a “crisis at the border.” Over the requisite scary-looking B-roll of migrants traveling through Mexico, Varney remarked that the footage reminded him of German chancellor Angela Merkel’s 2015 decision to admit approximately 1.1 million refugees, many of whom were fleeing the still-ongoing Syrian civil war, into the country. “Catastrophic,” he called it. In the strongest possible terms, Lara agreed.

Here are some facts about that particular influx of asylum-seekers, according to a team of researchers who surveyed German citizens about their attitudes towards their new neighbors: Even though most respondents remain skeptical about the prospect of living near refugees, they report holding “strong humanitarian views” and express empathy for those displaced by armed conflict—especially families with children. Notwithstanding these disheartening strains of Islamophobia and NIMBY-ism, the researchers found “no widespread perception that Germany was undergoing a ‘refugee crisis'” of the type often reported in right-wing media outlets. The team also learned that Germans who had actually gotten to know refugees were likeliest to welcome more refugees into their communities.

Bobby Lewis@revrrlewis

Source: https://www.gq.com/story/lara-trump-on-refugees-in-germany-goes-poorly

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Pope Francis has made dialogue with Islam a cornerstone of his papacy, which began in 2013, and visited several countries with large Muslim populations.

In February he will become the first pontiff to go to the Arabian Peninsula when he visits the United Arab Emirates. He is scheduled to travel to Morocco in March.

Here is a recap of some of his other trips to meet Muslims.

– Jordan, Palestinian territories, Israel –

In May 2014 Pope Francis receives a warm welcome in Jordan’s capital Amman from King Abdullah II and meets with Syrian refugees.

Pope Francis prays at Israel’s separation barrier with the West Bank at Bethlehem in 2014

A day later he begins a pilgrimage to the Holy Land at Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, stopping off for a silent prayer at the controversial separation wall erected by the Israelis.

Francis also visits some of the most sacred sites in Islam and Judaism, including the Al-Aqsa mosque compound and the Western Wall.

– Albania –

In September the same year he visits Albania where he praises the peaceful coexistence of its Catholics, Orthodox Christians and Muslims, labelling it “a precious gift to the country”.

Francis says it is especially important “in these times where an authentic religious spirit is being perverted and where religious differences are being distorted”.

– Turkey –

In November 2014 he travels to Turkey where there is a comparatively tiny Christian community — just 80,000 among about 75 million Muslims.

In Istanbul’s famous Blue Mosque, Francis clasps his hands in prayer alongside a senior Islamic cleric, a gesture of fraternity with Islam similar to that of his predecessor, Benedict XVI, in the same place eight years before.

While the pope defends the alliance of religions against terrorism, the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, responds by issuing a strong warning about “seriously and rapidly” rising Islamophobia in the world.

– Central Africa –

Pope Francis in Central African Republic in 2015, when he called for peace between Christians and Muslims

In November 2015 Pope Francis is given a rapturous welcome in the Central African Republic, a country plagued by sectarian violence.

During his 26 hours there, he visits a mosque in Bangui’s flashpoint PK5 Muslim neighbourhood where he says Christians and Muslims are “brothers”.

“Together, we must say no to hatred, to revenge and to violence,” he says.

Among the crowd are several Muslims from PK5 wearing T-shirts bearing the pope’s image.

– Azerbaijan –

In October 2016 the pontiff makes a brief visit to mainly Muslim Azerbaijan, a volatile ex-Soviet Caucasus region.

There he praises the “benefits of multiculturalism and of the necessary complementary of cultures” where the different religions practice “mutual collaboration and respect”.

– Egypt –

A poster welcomes Pope Francis to Egypt in 2017

In April 2017 Francis pays the second papal visit to Egypt of modern times, 17 years after that of pope John Paul II.

In a country where 10 percent of the population of 92 million is Coptic Christian, he says “true faith” depends on “the culture of encounter, dialogue, respect and fraternity.”

He visits Al-Azhar university, one of the Muslim world’s leading religious authorities with whom the Vatican’s ties soured in 2006 when Benedict XVI made a speech in which he was seen as linking Islam to violence.

– Myanmar and Bangladesh –

In December 2017, during a visit to Bangladesh, the pope asks for “forgiveness” from Muslim Rohingya refugees who have fled persecution in neighbouring Myanmar in their hundreds of thousands.

“In the name of all those who have persecuted you, who have harmed you, in the face of the world’s indifference, I ask for your forgiveness,” he says after meeting 16 Rohingya refugees.

The pontiff had just made a four-day visit to Myanmar where he called on Buddhist clergy to conquer “prejudice and hatred”, without explicitly referring to the Rohingyas.

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/afp/article-6652101/Pope-Francis-reaching-Muslims.html

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Protesters take part in a march against Islamophobia in Brussels in 2014 (AFP)

BRUSSELS – European academics and policymakers came together at the European Parliament in Brussels on Wednesday to launch what they describe as a “toolkit” to tackle Islamophobia across the continent.

The report, based on research in eight countries including the UK, France and Germany, said it had identified a “worsening environment of Islamophobia” in which Muslims faced a “new and acceptable hostility… in many spheres of everyday life”.

“This is an issue that is poisoning our societies in the European Union and putting barriers between our communities,” said Jean Lambert, a Green Party member of the European Parliament (MEP) representing London, during the opening of the conference in Belgium.

Long present across the continent, the report highlights how Islamophobia has been further bolstered in the past decade, tied to the rise of far-right and anti-immigration movements in many European countries, the “War on Terror” both within and outside Europe, and the refugee crisis.

Recent examples included former British foreign secretary Boris Johnson’s newspaper column last month in which he compared niqab-wearing women to ‘letterboxes’.

In France, a veiled student union leader was publicly chastised for a televised appearance and caricatured as a monkey by a prominent satirical outlet; in Germany, stories in the media about alleged roving bands of rapist refugees stoked panic; while several countries across Europe have passed so-called “burqa bans“, restricting the wearing of niqabs and Muslim veils in public spaces.

While countering such a wave of xenophobia and racism towards Muslim citizens and residents of Europe might seem like a herculean task, the authors of the “Counter Islamophobia Kit” briefing paper say it is a necessity.

“A worsening environment of Islamophobia was identified with respect to media content, political discourse and experiences of discrimination indicating the new and increasingly acceptable hostility against Muslims in many spheres of everyday life,” the report warned.

European academics led by the University of Leeds, in conjunction with NGOs and activists, explored the various drivers of Islamophobia in eight European countries – the United Kingdom, France, Belgium, Germany, Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary and Portugal – as well as the efforts to foster counter-narratives to Islamophobia in each country.

“The project has revealed the vast expansiveness of Islamophobia, the fact that it permeates so many elements of our lives and of society,” Amina Easat-Daas, project officer for the Counter Islamophobia Kit, told Middle East Eye.

“We want to challenge the narratives that exist, to contextualize them and emphasize their normalcy, their everyday nature, and also highlight the brilliant contributions many Muslims are making in society. “

Local variations of Islamophobia

While Islamophobia in most countries was strongly associated with the perception of Muslims constituting a “threat to security” and “a threat to local, national and European identity”, local culture and history has informed the way Islamophobia has been formulated.

While there is ample documentation of France’s instrumentalization of its national conception of laïcité – secularism – to target its Muslim citizens for being visibly unsecular, in Portugal, the history of the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula from the Moors in the Middle Ages has fed local narratives of civilisational struggle and fears of a Muslim “invasion”.

In Greece, the report said, some Islamophobic discourses raised the spectre of Turkey using refugees to expand its control across the Aegean – as refugees and Muslims become conflated identities in the public psyche.

Meanwhile, in countries such as Hungary that have served as a transit point for many asylum seekers attempting to reach western Europe, the narrative of Muslim as potential terrorists remain strong, with Prime Minister Viktor Orban telling Germany’s Bild newspaper: “We don’t see these people as Muslim refugees. We see them as Muslim invaders.”

Yet the most publicised recent “terrorism” conviction in the country involved an asylum seeker prosecuted earlier this month for throwing stones at police officers.

Even in countries like the United Kingdom, which have a long history of diversity, long-standing Muslim populations find themselves the target of hatred in the wake of attacks claimed by Islamic State group.

There is an urgent need to recognize Islamophobia as a form of racism

– Luis Manuel Hernandez Aguilar, German researcher 

“The UK used to pride itself in its diversity, but that discourse is no longer there,” said Arzu Merali, the head researcher for the Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) in the UK, during Wednesday’s conference, describing how a generalized discourse targeting Muslims in schools or streets also culminates in “targeted legislation” which solidifies “the idea of Muslims as non-citizens”.

“It sounds pretty dramatic, but this is the kind of scenario we are facing in the UK today,” Merali said.

“There is an urgent need to recognize Islamophobia as a form of racism,” Luis Manuel Hernandez Aguilar, IHRC researcher in Germany said during Wednesday’s conference, pointing to “how easily Islamophobia moves between everyday life and politics” when Islamophobia “is not officially recognized as a form of discrimination”.

In Germany, Aguilar said, racist tropes have enforced the idea that “being a Muslim means being a problem”.

While Easat-Daas highlighted the differences between each country in the study, she expressed concern about France’s status as a “barometer” – and trailblazer – of Islamophobia in Europe.

“I worry that (France) is a potential leader, that it signposts that this is acceptable. Its laws set precedence, I worry that French policies set precedence,” she told MEE. “When you see the French ‘loi anti-niqab’ and how that then plays out in different framings, in Belgium first, and then further and further, I’m worried that it’s gaining credence and an image of legitimacy.”

Countering toxic narratives

In the face of mounting hateful discourse and actions promoted by public figures, media, and ordinary citizens, sometimes with deadly consequences, the Counter Islamophobia Toolkit highlights initiatives that seek to counter prevalent toxic narratives about Islam.

The report cast some doubts on the effectiveness of reactive condemnations of attacks committed by Muslim individuals and efforts to distance them from the broader Muslim community as still falling within a narrative of “securitisation” of Muslims in all aspects of their lives, and fostering the expectation that all Muslims must condemn any negative acts committed by one of their co-religionists.

Many efforts across the continent have sought to demystify Islam to non-Muslim European citizens, such as the Parle-moi d’Islam videos explaining aspects of the religion.

Muslims attend a Friday prayer on 23 September 2016 at the Budapest Mosque and headquarters of the Organisation of Muslims in Hungary. (AFP)

Key to combating Islamophobia, the report says, is the “normalization” of Muslims – showing them as individuals with the same lives and aspirations as others, as in the Human Library in the Czech Republic, and highlighting food, fashion and culture as points of human connection between Muslims and non-Muslims.

In some cases, approaches to fight Islamophobia might appear counter-intuitive – as in Greece, where some efforts actually leaned on prevailing Christianity in the Mediterranean country to promote “Conservative anti-nationalist narratives and Christian ecumenical ideals such as peace, hospitality and care towards the vulnerable, especially towards refugees”.

Part of the efforts to counter Islamophobia, Easat-Daas said, include recognizing the phenomenon as not simply exclusive to right-wing movements.

“I would argue that (Islamophobia) is not exclusive to the right wing, but rather something that you can see across the political spectrum,” she said. “It shouldn’t be acceptable political discourse to stigmatize or to speak on behalf of other people – which is often something we see in liberal Islamophobia.”

Legal shortfalls

While the burden of fighting against Islamophobia seems to mainly fall on the shoulders of civil society in Europe as hateful discourse has become further normalized in the political and governmental sphere, the report highlights the role played by the European legal system – and its shortfalls.

“There is limited engagement of European human rights law with the best legal practices to counter Islamophobia in individual EU member states,” the report reads. “As a result, the forms that both judicial intervention and legal measures, including positive measures, could take in order to effectively counter Islamophobia remain unclear.”

The report goes on to criticise the European Court of Human Rights for its “rigidity” in ruling on cases of alleged state Islamophobia which it said had shifted “the burden of proof away from the state and onto the applicants who should then prove that the restrictions against their right to freedom of religion are disproportionate”.

The brief nonetheless welcomed efforts by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in passing a number of non-binding resolutions analyzing and defining Islamophobia, highlighting it as a necessary step towards tackling the problem.

Islamophobia is a challenge to the continuation of a particular type of European democratic project, and that’s why I think it should be taken seriously, and not just in relation to the defense of Muslim communities, but in defense of the kind of world we want to live in

– Salman Sayyid, University of Leeds

The Parliamentary Assembly had been largely successful, it said in spelling out “different cultural, historical and socioeconomic elements that constitute Islamophobia”.

But it said there was a “striking contrast between the nuance and complexity of those soft-law instruments and the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, where there is almost complete lack of references to Islamophobia and no distinctive legal response to the phenomenon”.

Sajjad Karim, a Conservative Party MEP representing northwest England, raised the alarm on Wednesday about Islamophobia across European nations, highlighting concerns that it had begun “seeping through to the European (Union) level” and could further worsen with the eventual election of more populists to the European Parliament in 2019 – which could lead to a EU Parliament “held ransom by those extremes”.

“Now we are in a fight, and in a matter of months from now… there is an issue of self-interest for every European,” Karim said.

Salman Sayyid, professor of social theory and decolonial thought at the University of Leeds, said during Wednesday’s conference that the fight against Islamophobia has a larger mandate than the protection of one specific religious community.

“Islamophobia is a challenge to the continuation of a particular type of European democratic project, and that’s why I think it should be taken seriously, and not just in relation to the defense of Muslim communities, but in defense of the kind of world we want to live in.”

Source: https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/islamophobia-europe-uk-france-belgium-toolkit-islam-muslims-racism-670535899

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“I’m really concerned,” said Raed Saleh, parliamentary leader for Berlin’s Social Democratic Party. “I can see how Islamophobia is being stirred up, to a degree that I never would have thought possible 10 years ago.”

Saleh is a practicing Muslim. He’s also a role model when it comes to interfaith dialogue. Together with Berlin’s Jewish community, he wants to rebuild a synagogue that was destroyed by the Nazis 80 years ago, on the border between the city districts of Kreuzberg and Neukölln.

The recent attacks on mosques, and the anti-Islam comments made by Germany’s new interior minister, Horst Seehofer, show how painstaking this dialogue is. “The attacks on the mosques are unacceptable. An attack on a mosque, a synagogue, or a church is always an attack on society as a whole,” Saleh told DW.

Hate crimes on the rise

Generally, crime rates are going down in Germany, with the number of criminal violations in many states sinking to a historic low last year. But at the same time, the number of politically motivated crimes is increasing.

Saleh: ‘An attack on a mosque, a synagogue, or a church is always an attack on society as a whole’

According to the Interior Ministry, the number of recorded incidents classed as hate crimes increased from 3,770 to 10,751 between 2010 and 2016. The increase is particularly marked in the “religious and foreign ideology” category.

Politically motivated crimes stemming from conflicts abroad also increased in the same time period from 120 to 404 cases. The number of religiously motivated crimes jumped from 248 to 1,516 cases.

Although the final nationwide figures for 2017 haven’t been released yet, a look at the data published so far by individual states — including Hesse, Baden-Württemberg, Saxony, Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Berlin and Rhineland Palatinate — shows that this polarizing trend is set to continue.

Religious institutions under police protection

Will mosques and synagogues in Germany need police protection in future? Does the country generally need greater protection to ensure religious freedom? The answer is mixed.

Read more: Are Germany’s anti-racism initiatives achieving enough?

“It’s not possible to station a police officer in front of every mosque or every Turkish cultural center,” said Yunus Ulusoy of the Center for Turkish Studies and Integration Research. Resources simply can’t stretch to cover the over 2,000 mosques in Germany, he explained.

Experts at the Amadeu Antonio Foundation, which works to combat right-wing extremism, racism and anti-Semitism, take a similar view. “Given the latest attacks in mosques, I would say that they do need stronger police protection,” said spokesman Robert Lüdecke, adding that police presence alone cannot solve the underlying security problem.

Lüdecke and Ulusoy both stress the need for greater cooperation between the associations that represent immigrants and security officials. “The Islamic associations have made it very clear that they want their voices to be heard, especially given these latest arson attacks,” said Lüdecke, adding that barely anyone has bothered to get in touch and ask the members of these communities if they still feel safe.

Germany in recent years has seen an increase in racism and politically motivated violence

Lack of empathy

Ulusoy said he also frequently hears from immigrants or visible minorities that they feel the police don’t take their concerns seriously. “What bothers the community is the lack of empathy from other members of the public,” he said.

“If the kinds of attacks we’re seeing on mosques were affecting other groups, there would be a very different discussion happening in Germany,” Ulusoy added. “That’s the claim I hear often from the Turkish community.”

Memet Kilic, who serves on the board of the federal council on integration, says he’s had exactly that experience. A few years ago, the Green Party politician from Heidelberg and his son began receiving death threats from a former member of the integration council. “The police treated the threats as an internal affair. They advised me to file a private lawsuit for libel, even though I’d been receiving death threats. In that moment, I felt like the state had abandoned me.”

More judges and police

Kilic warned against underestimating the threat of political conflicts within the Turkish community, or the danger of foreign conflicts spilling over into diaspora communities in Germany. “Security officials should not just brush these things off or dismiss them as foreign, and therefore irrelevant. Otherwise, we risk being surprised by developments that we can no longer control.”

However, it seems that such warnings are now being heard by politicians at the federal level. The new government’s coalition contract stipulates the creation of 2,000 new judgeships at both state and federal courts. Police forces are also slated for a technical and financial upgrade, in addition to the hiring of some 15,000 new police officers.

Nonetheless, Kilic is appealing to the police for neutrality when investigating cases, and to “not be fearful of being branded an Islamophobe.”

“As a state governed by the rule of law, we have to set an example and punish those who violate our laws,” he said, adding that the liberal associations should also be rewarded.

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Source: http://www.dw.com/en/germanys-immigrant-community-calls-for-better-state-support/a-43091136

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