PETALING JAYA: A distinguished Turkish scholar has warned that the persevering with war in Gaza might alienate even reasonable Muslims, jeopardising their position in combatting Islamophobia and constructing bridges with the non-Muslim group.
Mustafa Akyol mentioned the war, which he labelled one of many worst modern-day mass atrocities, is prone to additionally breed extra extremism and gasoline militant teams.
It could even give start to extra radical ones, he warned.
Akyol mentioned the carnage in Gaza coupled with Western indifference would drive away Muslims who share Western liberal democracy values.
“It is certainly laborious to not be appalled by the double requirements that many Western governments, politicians and public figures have proven up to now months.
“While they rightly condemned the atrocities that focused Israeli civilians, they’ve closed their eyes to a a lot bigger scale of atrocities that focus on Palestinian civilians.”
Akyol mentioned the war in Gaza, sparked by the Oct 7 assault by Hamas on Israel, has inadvertently contributed to the rise in Islamophobia which can in flip set off an adversarial response within the Muslim world.
“Islamophobia, particularly when it creates violence and oppression in opposition to Muslims, convinces some Muslims that ‘they (the Islamophobes) hate us, so we should always hate them, too’.”
Such a response would solely assist extremist teams comparable to ISIS or Al-Qaeda to instil enmity amongst Muslims in opposition to all “infidels”, which they could outline to incorporate Muslims who reject such militancy.
“Fanaticism on one aspect solely empowers fanaticism on the opposite. It is a vicious cycle which one can see in lots of confrontations world wide, together with the Arab-Israeli battle. We ought to all attempt to finish them, not gasoline them.”
Freedom of expression to counter Islamophobes
Akyol, creator of the award-winning e book “Islam with out extremes: a Muslim case for liberty”, mentioned one solution to counter Islamophobes was by citing the identical excuse utilized by those that insult the religion, specifically, freedom of expression.
He mentioned this allowed Putrajaya to distribute copies of the Quran in Sweden in response to an incident final 12 months which sparked outrage in a number of Muslim nations and noticed Iraq expel the Swedish ambassador.
Muslim nations even filed a movement with the United Nations human rights physique, calling on nations to assessment legal guidelines which will “impede the prevention and prosecution of acts and advocacy of spiritual hatred”.
Akyol recommended Malaysia’s choice to distribute a million copies of the Quran in Sweden, and the same initiative by Kuwait.
However, he mentioned Muslims ought to word that each nations had been capable of perform such Islamic missionary work in Sweden within the identify of freedom of expression.
“Instead of interesting to Western governments to ban insults in opposition to Islam, as Muslims typically do, we should always use freedom of expression to precise ourselves and our faith higher.”
