Years Before Now They Don't Talk About Him Like This-"The conversion to Islam of Malcolm X is the wrong model for young black men" What Has Changed?

Last Saturday marks the 50th anniversary of the death of one of my heroes, known to most of us as Malcolm X - the black, assassinated civil rights leader.

He was a complex man – so complex that even to call him Malcolm X is to present only a partial picture of him. In his 40 years he was Malcolm Little, the Harlem street hustler; then he was Malcolm X, the black civil rights spokesman for the Nation of Islam. And when he died he was El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, the convert to Sunni Islam.

He was admirable in that even after he came to public prominence, he maintained his tendency to discard religious or political identities when newly acquired knowledge showed previously voiced beliefs to be ill-founded. It leaves us to wonder what other changes his curious mind might have undergone had he lived a longer life.

In 1992, the eponymous Spike Lee film introduced his story to newer generations. His well-known conversion in prison and his repudiation of his Western surname is in part responsible for the fact that Islam is the fastest growing religion among blacks in the UK.

Many black converts go on to practice Islam in a peaceful way but, others – as evidenced most dramatically in the cases of Germaine Lindsay, Richard Reid, Michael Adebowale, Michael Adeboloja and Brusthorn Ziamani – have other ideas.

The Islamist element of Malcolm X’s legacy mystifies many. Why, fifty years on, do so many disgruntled black people still opt for the dominant religion of the Middle East and North Africa? Why Islam rather than Buddhism or Hinduism? If a more self-reflecting religious identity is the aim, why not a faith that offers a black messiah – such as Rastafarianism?

In his popular autobiography, Malcolm X puts the Christian faith of most blacks in the US down to the "white, Christian slave master injecting his religion into this Negro." Later he states that "America needs to understand Islam because this is the one religion that erases from its society the race problem."

Thomas Hagan struggles with police after assassinating Malcolm X 

Given his acute sense of historical grievance, it is fair to assume that prior to his conversion to Sunni Islam, Malcolm X’s deprived upbringing and the parochial Western education available to most of us, would have made him unaware of historical facts such as the "Zanj" slave rebellion as far back as the 9th century – in Basra, in what is now modern day Iraq.

He would not have had access to the work of the 13th century writer, Ibn Battuta, and learned of the contempt in which even Islamic scholars held the black people of Africa, so apparent in their writings as they reported on the Islamic raiders venturing south as they had for centuries, in quest of young black women to rape and press into unpaid service as concubines and well-built black men to castrate and press into unpaid service as eunuch guards for their harems.

He would not have had the chance to learn that the idea of trading black slaves had in all likelihood been introduced to 16th century Europeans by Muslim slavers, who by then had a head start of almost a millennia in the ungodly practice.

If by the 1960s Malcolm X had been vexed at the glacial pace of improving race relations in the US, you wonder what he would have made of the fact that, when he set foot on Saudi Arabian soil for his Islamic holy pilgrimage in 1964, his Wahhabi hosts had only abolished slavery a mere couple of years earlier.

Given his lifelong tendency towards intellectual self-refinement, it is fair to assume that Malcolm X might have made further alterations to his world view had he lived long enough to learn of these facts.

Fifty years on, a justice system that respects the dignity of all citizens will provide the best means to safeguard blacks from the anger that causes alienation and leads to what is now called Islamic radicalisation. But as we work towards this improved system, it would benefit blacks in temporary crisis to have a fuller and more accurate narrative in mind when faced with superficially plausible arguments by those seeking to enlist their disenchantment to their dubious causes.

US Muslims speak about their place in America

President Barack Obama has argued the U.S. has one thing going for it that Europe doesn't: a tradition of warmly embracing its immigrants, including Muslims. Muslims living across the U.S. respond to his comments:

"Muslims have been here maybe since the inception of this country. The Muslim-American history is rooted even in the forefathers. President Jefferson had a copy of the Holy Quran." — Jaylani Hussein, executive director of the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, who believes "American Muslims here feel maybe more integrated" than in Europe.

"American Muslims have been fortunate to live well in the U.S. based on our constitutional freedoms. In European countries, Muslims are made to feel as the other or the outsider. ... Still, American Muslims have not been spared from prejudice and discrimination in the last 15 years." — Teacher Debbie Almontaser, founding principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy, an Arab-themed public school in New York.Video: Do Muslim No Go Zones Exist Within USA?

"Yes, America has issues of racism and bigotry. ... I'm not saying that doesn't exist but there's a different level of fear and hate and unknown" in Europe. — Marium Mohiuddin, freelance communications consultant, Los Angeles.

"I personally believe American Muslims have integrated just fine throughout U.S. history, but there will be ongoing challenges in addressing issues of what happens when young people are attacked personally because of the way they dress or what they believe. ... Our communities have been attacked, and they continue to be attacked." — Shams Ghoneim, vice president of the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa, in Iowa City.

"For being a Muslim American growing up in America, I really don't feel a part of it. ... I feel like we don't get a chance to come out into the public." — Student Jamila Nasser, Dearborn, Michigan.

Associated Press writers Jeff Karoub in Detroit, Steve Karnowski in Minneapolis, Verena Dobnik in New York, Gillian Flaccus in Los Angeles and Kourtney Liepelt in Des Moines, Iowa, contributed to this report.

Obama tells Muslims: don't let Isis hijack your religion and identity

Islamic State does not speak for you and ‘we are not at war with Islam’, declares US president at counter-extremism summit

Muslims in the US and around the world have a responsibility to fight the idea that terrorist groups like Islamic State speak for them, Barack Obama has declared in his most direct remarks yet about any link between Islam and violent extremism.

“We are not at war with Islam,” Obama said. “We are at war with people who have perverted Islam.”

In the first of two speeches to a counter-extremism summit in Washington, the president reiterated his determination to avoid letting the agenda become characterised as a battle against Islam, saying this would be playing into the hands of Isis and other terrorist groups.

“They propagate the notion that America, and the west generally, is at war with Islam; that’s how they recruit, that’s how they try to radicalise young people,” he said.

“Just as leaders like myself reject the notion that terrorists like Isil genuinely represent Islam, Muslim leaders need to do more to discredit the notion that our nations are determined to suppress Islam.”

For weeks the Obama administration has sidestepped the question of whether deadly terror attacks in Paris and other western cities amount to “Islamic extremism”, wary of offending a major world religion or lending credibility to the “war on terror” waged by George Bush.

But as he hosted the summit at the White House, the president said some in Muslim communities had bought into the notion that Islam was incompatible with tolerance and modern life.

While putting the blame on Isis and similar groups — Obama said the militants masqueraded as religious leaders but were really terrorists — the president also appealed directly to prominent Muslims to do more to distance themselves from brutal ideologies, calling it the duty of all to “speak up very clearly” in opposition to violence against innocent people.

Obama acknowledged it was a touchy subject but insisted it was critical to tackle the issue “head-on”.

“We can’t shy away from these discussions,” he said. “And too often folks are understandably sensitive about addressing some of these root issues, but we have to talk about them honestly and clearly.”

The president differentiated militant groups from the “billion Muslims who reject their ideology”. Isis was killing far more Muslims than non-Muslims, he said, and called for the world community to elevate the voices of those who “saw the truth” after being radicalised temporarily.

Obama acknowledged many Muslims in the US had a suspicion of government and police and felt they were unfairly targeted – confounding efforts to strengthen co-operation between law enforcement and Muslim communities. He praised Muslims who have served the US and other capacities for generations.

“Of course that’s the story extremists and terrorists don’t want the world to know: Muslims succeeding and thriving in America,” Obama said. “Because when that truth is known it exposes their propaganda as the lie that it is.”

Obama has long tried to shift his administration’s terror rhetoric away from what he saw as the hyperbolic terminology used by his predecessor, George Bush, particularly Bush’s declaration in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks that the US was engaged in a “war on terror”.

On Wednesday Obama said: “If we’re going to prevent people from being susceptible to the false promises of extremism, then the international community has to offer something better and the United States intends to do its part.”

Issuing such a direct challenge to Muslims to disown the ideology of extremist groups marked a clear departure from the restrained, cautious language Obama and his aides have used to describe the situation in the past.

In the days after last month’s shootings at a satirical French newspaper that had caricatured the prophet Muhammad, Obama avoided calling the attack an example of “Islamic extremism” and instead opted for the more generic “violent extremism”. Recently the White House also struggled to explain whether the US believed the Afghan Taliban to be a terrorist organisation.

The refusal to directly assess any Islamic role in the terrifying scenes playing out in Europe, the Middle East and Africa has drawn criticism from those who say Obama has prioritised political correctness over a frank acknowledgement of reality. National security hawks, in particular, have argued that Obama’s counterterrorism strategy couldn’t possibly be successful if the president was unable or unwilling to confront the true nature of the threat.

Yet the argument over terminology has increasingly become a distraction, including this week as Obama gathered law enforcement officials, Muslim leaders and lawmakers for a three-day summit on violent extremism.

Obama echoed the concern over the killings in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, though he did not directly address the question of the murderer’s motive, preferring to emphasise the solidarity of other Americans.

“Most recently, with the brutal murders in Chapel Hill of three young Muslim Americans, many Muslim Americans are worried and afraid and I want to be as clear as I can be: as Americans of all faiths and backgrounds, we stand with you in grief and we offer our love and we offer our support,” he said.

Obama is due to speak again on Thursday when delegates from about 65 countries gather for the summit’s closing session at the state department.

Obama: Islam not responsible for terrorism

President Obama on Wednesday said that Islam was not to blame for the spread of terrorism, dismissing calls for him to link such violence to so-called Muslim extremism.

“We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with people who have perverted Islam,” Obama said at the White House’s summit on countering “violent extremism.”

“No religion is responsible for terrorism,” the president said. “People are responsible for violence and terrorism."

Obama has been roundly criticized for not using the phrase “Islamic extremism,” as detractors accuse him of downplaying the religious motivations behind a spate of recent terrorist attacks.

The president directly addressed the simmering controversy over what he sees as the root cause for the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. But he said such criticism failed to reflect the complexities of the factors responsible for the growth of so-called violent extremism — and he insisted that terrorist leaders were eager to convince young people that the West was “at war” with Islam.

“We must never accept the premise that they put forward because it is a lie,” Obama said. “They are not religious leaders, they are terrorists.

“By violent extremism, we don’t just mean the terrorists that are killing people,” the president explained. “We mean the ideologies. There is no one profile of a violent extremist or terrorist.”

However, Obama did call on Muslim leaders to do more to discredit the idea that the United States was anti-Islam.

The White House argues that the Islamic State can’t be stopped through military means alone, saying that leaders must keep the terrorist organization from recruiting new members.

Much of Obama's speech on Wednesday focused on Muslims living in the United States. He argued that the assimilation of American Muslims would limit the prevalence of homegrown terrorists, which has been particularly problematic throughout Europe.

The president focused on the three deaths of Muslim students near the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill last week, saying the incident stoked the fear of many Americans who practice Islam.

"Many Muslim Americans are worried and afraid," Obama said. "We stand with you in your grief and we offer our love.

Credit to Brian Hughes

 

American Sniper film 'encourages violence against Muslims', says Iran's supreme leader

Iran's supreme leader has criticised the film "American Sniper" and said that it encourages violence against Muslims.

State-run newspaper IRAN Farsi published the comments by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei amid renewed criticism of the West by its leader over a contested nuclear programme.

Although the newspaper quoted Khamenei as saying he had not watched the film, he said he had heard about its plot.

American Sniper is directed by Clint Eastwood and stars Bradley Cooper as US Navy SEAL marksman Chris Kyle, who, with 160 confirmed kills, is considered the most lethal sniper in American military history.

"The movie 'Sniper' that is made by Hollywood encourages a Christian or non-Muslim youngster to harass and offend the Muslims as far as they could," the newspaper quoted Khamenei as saying.

The leader allegedly made the comments while meeting representatives of Iranian religious minorities in the country's parliament three weeks ago. The newspaper did not explain why it was publishing the comments so late after the meeting.

"American Sniper" has collected more than $300 million at the box office in North America since its release in December 2014. The film has not been released in Iran, where Khamenei has final say in all state matters.

In the US, the film has also been condemned by liberals who have questioned the admitted pleasure that Chris Kyle took in killing and dehumanising Iraqis.

Abed Ayoub, one of the leading advocates for Arab-Americans, hit out at the lack of coverage received by the fatal Chapel Hill shooting of three young Muslims in north Carolina and described American Sniper as "the turning point" in the rise of Islamophobia in the US.

Ayoub, who is the legal director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), said the film industry, US government and right-wing political commentators all had a role to play in the recent surge in anti-Arab and anti-Muslim sentiment.

Credit to AP