Tribune Take: Rising Islamophobia in the US & the Irvine 11
Zarrar Khuhro, editor T-Magazine, takes us through the story that got little coverage from the international and local American press as well.
Khuhro discusses the guilty verdict handed down to eleven University of California students charged with violating the Israeli ambassador's right to free speech. He points to the novelty of the decision, since heckling to protest the US president Obama of former vice-president doesn't land you in jail, but eleven Muslim students heckling an Israeli ambassador sure does.
Read Zarrar Khuhro’s articles here.
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So called liberals, ridiculing muslims and their governments should hang their faces in shame...
It should also be noted that the same DA pursued charges against 19 students for a different demonstration at the same university very close to the same time as the Oren incident. Their protest was about fee hikes.
http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2010/12/ucirvineproteststudentscha.php
"Let’s face it – Israel is a “sacred cow” in America and anybody who lifts an evil eye towards it is punished and freedom of expression and constitutional rights go out of the window. Total hypocrisy by America and naked bias for Israel. Israel is now running America and for this reason it cannot be trusted as an “honest broker” by Muslims and Arabs. One country – strong textIsrael is at the heart of America’s foreign policy. America’s foreign policy is centered on Israel first. Israel is truly an extension of America now."
Israel is not an extension of the USA, it is the other way around. We are Israel's bend over boys.
We as a nation must move to stop the targeting of Muslims in our nation and the casting of anything Arab or Muslim as a smear. It is truly un-American to behave in this manner. The Irvine 11 did nothing wrong. The conviction of them is yet another chip in all of our freedoms and a sure-enuf example of Israel-dominance over our courts and Israel-orchestrated erosion of America's rights, liberties and our very being.
If you support Israel, you are supporting racism, genocide and everything evil that our Fathers fought against not only during our revolution, but also during WWII. Shame on anyone who has forgotten those lessons.
Embracing hatred equates with the rejection of American and Human values.
@Khan:
"US offers liberty, justice, and freedom of speech to everyone.* *Except if you are a Muslim."
I don't think you are too familiar with the UC Irvine campus or the First Amdnt if you think this way.
The MSU has invited many speakers to share their perspective from Mohammed al-Asi, Addul Alim Musa, Abdul Malik Ali (every year from 2001 to 2010 at least once) and people who aren't Muslim but are invited by the MSU to speak like Norman Finkelstein (a couple times), George Galloway, the parents of Rachel Corrie, Cynthia McKinney and many more. People on the campus see many speakers who speak out against Israel.
The students in this case were wrong. They were not exercising protected rights of free speech. Inside lecture halls while someone is giving a presentation are not free speech zones.
They should have protested outside in a free speech area or waited for the question and answer segment and asked tough questions. They should have written a rebutal to Oren's lecture points and sent it to the local news and student paper. They should not have planned to try to shut down the presentation through repeated disruptions.
@rehmat:
Rehmat is correct. If one looks at the evidence of the case they would see the goals of the students were to shut down the presentation and prevent Oren from saying whatever he wanted on the campus.
Their clearly state goal was not to make one or two interuptions like other cases cited.
When Daniel Pipes spoke on the same campus, the MSU made one loud interuption and left. They got their message across but did not prevent others from hearing the presentation. The university did not punish them and there were no charges.
In the Oren case, the students were wrong to prevent a speaker invited to the campus from speaking and being heard. And the Muslim Student Union acted inappropriately in coordinating this and in misrepresenting its involvement to University officials.
The University was correct in disciplining the students in this case. Was the university disclipine sufficient? Reasonable people can disagree on this one. The charges were not based on the content of their speech.
@Amna: So what you're essentially saying is that we are what we are and we'll stay that way. Pakistan may not be the universal champion of human rights but they certainly do believe that they are the last bastion of Fortress Islam. When a criminal is punished abroad and if he happens to be a Muslim, it is Islamophobia. The puritanical twist to the religion is at odds with what the Muslim world really is. The concept of the "true Muslim" is but a myth. I hope Muslims one day realize this and get over their persecution complex.
@Umer: You can see few non-Muslims being ill-treated in Pakistan but you cannot see the killing and abusing of several hundred thousand Muslims in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kashmir, Palestine, Bosnia, Kashmir etc. etc.
Barack Obama's unpopularity is rising and currently according to polls Americans would favour a republican president instead of democrats. These republican presidential candidates hate Muslims and many people in america hate Obama because of his middle name Hussain and the fact that his father was Muslim. There are many kind, tolerant and caring people in the US but at the same time there is lots of Islamophobia in the US.
No matter how many times America tells others to be tolerant but here we see that in their own justice system failing them. This amazing revelation of grave injustices for Islam, in the supposedly the most 'democratic' country, is wrong. We should be strong to not compare and thus justify the wrong as right. The heart wrenching episode has been a done a number of times and the world should know about it. Irvine 11 should be redeemed and be admired for their strength to fight for their rights.
Lets face it - Israel is a "sacred cow" in America and anybody who lifts an evil eye towards it is punished and freedom of expression and constitutional rights go out of the window. Total hypocrisy by America and naked bias for Israel. Israel is now running America and for this reason it cannot be trusted as an "honest broker" by Muslims and Arabs. One country - Israel is at the heart of America's foreign policy. America's foreign policy is centered on Israel first. Israel is truly an extension of America now.
@Umer: First, you are using a 'straw man' to dismiss the case of Irvin 11, which is a fallacy in itself not an argument. Second, you must have missed the 'Burn a Quran Day' in US.
US offers liberty, justice, and freedom of speech to everyone.*
*Except if you are a Muslim.
The "Irvine 11" were not just heckling, which is allowed without being prosecuted... but did not stop their heckling to the point that the speaker just could not speak. So this is beyond 'heckling' but a disturbance of the peace, as the judgement indicated.
@Amna: Pls read my three ‘How to’ books titled – ‘How to play victim card’, How to nurture hatred & persecution complex for own failures” and “How to eat the hand that feeds you”.
there is no blasphemy law which is used to slaughter muslims also when people convert to islam they are not killed for being apostates. More apt title would be rising fascism or judeophobia in islamic nations.
P.S: No muslim would want to live like a dhimmi but he wants all kafirs to live as dhimmis.
The auithor says that this case was not covered by the mainstream media but in fact it was. http://www.myfoxla.com/dpp/news/local/verdict-reached-in-irvine-11-trial-20110922
The author contends that the charges brought agianst the students were that of preventing Israel ambassador's free speech. Again incorrect. There were misdemeanor charges pressed against the students conspiracy to disturb a meeting and one misdemeanor count of disturbing a meeting. Wagner the prosecutor argued that the rules of the meeting were spelled out when the students were admonished after the first couple of interruptions by UCI professor Mark Petracca and UCI Chancellor Michael Drake. Wagner had to prove to jurors that the students were aware of the rules, conspired to break them
This article also implies that action was taken against these people due to them being Muslim. But the fact is that anti-Jew statements have landed many White Americans in trouble too. So this victim mentality needs to stop.
So3 aspects of what is mentioned in the video are incorrect: 1. The case was not picked up by national media because it was. Anyone can find out by gogling the term Irvine 11. 2. The basis of the case was free specch of Israel ambassador - it was not the charge was disrupting a public meeting 3. The defendants were singled out becaue they were Muslims. False. Anti Jew statements by White Americans too have landed them in trouble.
1.2.
Americans hate Muslims. poor Obama spent the first two years of his presidency pleading with Americans that he wan not a Muslim.
Lol! What about anti-Americanism and anti-non Muslimism in Pakistan? Muslims are safe in the US, unlike non-Muslims in Pakistan.
@Umer: We all accept that Pakistan has a problem. Things are not okay in Pakistan, and Pakistan does not act like the universal champion of freedom, human rights and justice.
So, the point is not to compare Pakistan with the United States. It the United States hypocrisy that is in discussion here. Muslims are being treated with a bias for no other reason then being Muslim...
Why cant people just condemn what is wrong without always resorting to the rather mundane and overused tu quoques?
What is wrong in America is wrong regardless of how things are in Pakistan. And vice versa.
@Umer: perferct reply. Pls read my three 'How to' books titled - 'How to play victim card', How to nurture hatred & persecution complex for own failures" and "How to eat the hand that feeds you".
What increasing intolerance and Islamophobia in the United States? Are they burning mosques and Muslims like churches and Christians are burnt in Pakistan? On most days even more Muslim get killed in Pakistan than anywhere else in sectarian feuds etc.
"Non-Tribune Take" Rising US-o-phobia, West-o-phobia, Non-Muslim-World-o-phobia, India-MFN-status-o-phobia in Pakistan.
Good point. So many people understand so little of Islam that they think it can be a spiritual matter only between a person and his or her chosen god. But heckling by some American or international students in an American university against an Israeli visitor is a matter of Islam, fundamentally.
Please do your part to expose Islamophobia wherever you see it.
Now the liberals will be hiding some where!!!