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Toronto Star - June 10, 2006
Congregations urged to take responsibility for
influencing young minds
But some Muslim Canadians upset by backlash following last week's arrests
BY HEBA ALY, SURYA BHATTACHARYA AND THULASI SRIKANTHAN
Imams across the GTA urged families and communities to take more responsibility for shaping the minds of young Muslims, following the arrest of 17 young men and boys on terrorism-related charges last Friday.
In Mississauga, North York and Scarborough, they spoke to thousands gathered for Friday afternoon prayers, some addressing concerns about backlash, others urging the community to have faith in the Canadian justice system to provide a fair trial.
"There is nothing wrong in saying we failed our youth," said Imam Munir El-Kassen at the Toronto and Region Islamic Congregation in North York. "We did not fail them intentionally, but our community was in a formative stage and our youth searching to fill the vacuum within received wrong advice and training.
"We should be more careful in controlling the youth in the public domain — not everybody should be allowed to talk or lead the youth. They are the most vulnerable."
Imam Husain Patel, at the Islamic Foundation of Toronto in Scarborough — where several of those accused prayed in the past — echoed that sentiment.
According to Statistics Canada, there were 579,640 Muslims in Canada in 2001 — a figure projected to rise to about 780,000 by this year.
"It will be a very small minority if they are found guilty," said Mohamed Elmasry, president of the Canadian Islamic Congress, who joined the prayers at North York.
He added that this was not the time for political rhetoric about different kinds of Islamic values.
But Muslim Canadians at two of the three mosques the Toronto Star visited expressed how troubled and angry they were about the backlash that followed last week's arrests.
"Every time there are big headlines with Muslims in it, then you are guilty by association," said Omniya Hussein at the Scarborough mosque.
The International Muslims Organization mosque in Rexdale was vandalized last Sunday, with 28 large windows and the main entrance smashed.
Two police officers from Toronto's 31 Division spoke at the TARIC mosque in North York, assuring members that patrols were being stepped up to prevent any more such incidents.
"You can't just go after a race or religion because one person does something," said Jahangir Patel, 23, a congregant at the Islamic Centre of Canada mosque in Mississauga.
He was referring to an incident in which one woman allegedly beat up another woman who was wearing a hijab at a mall.
Alluding to global issues such as the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, Patel and cleric Ahmad Kutty both said that while such concerns are upsetting to Muslims, they are not excuses to be reactionary or resort to violence.
They urged young people to find better ways of expressing dissatisfaction, through dialogue with imams or other community leaders.
"This is our country. We should protect it," said Amal Al-Sadek, among the congregants who gathered outside the Mississauga mosque. "For ourselves, fellow citizens, and generations to come."
All three imams were critical of comments made by Prime Minister Stephen Harper following the arrests, which suggested that Canada is a target "because of who we are and how we live, our society, our diversity and our values — values such as freedom, democracy and the rule of law."
They pointed out that Muslim values are Canadian values, and that Muslims who choose to live here cherish those ideals.
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1149889810923&call_pageid=970599119419
CTV.CA – June 11, 2006
Muslim leaders want 'radical elements' removed
Muslim religious leaders promise to report any suspicious behaviour from their followers to authorities and abide by a zero-tolerance policy against preaching hatred in the wake of last week's terror arrests.
Leaders representing more than 30 mosques and Muslim organizations throughout Canada gathered in Toronto on Saturday to deliver the message -- and remind Canadians not to discriminate against Muslims.
The leaders admitted there are pockets of radical fundamentalists within their community who believe in violence, but said co-operation by the Muslim community led to the arrests of 17 terror suspects.
The alleged bombing plot in southern Ontario was a wakeup call to Muslims, leaders said.
"They were sleeping and didn't realize it was a real issue," said Ahmed Amiruddin, who taught at a Mississauga mosque where some of the accused men worshipped.
"They would sometimes appear in the mosque with military fatigues, and there's more than one witness for this. Many people have seen them," he said.
"The only thing that concerned me is they tried to shut themselves out to anything we tried to preach to them," added Asad Dean of the Canadian Council of Ahl Sunnah wal Jamaah.
"Canadian youth of Muslim faith have been unduly influenced by radical thought," said Yasmin Ratansi, a Liberal MP.
The alleged ringleader, 43-year-old Qayyum Abdul Jamal, was a role model for teenagers at the Al-Rahman Islamic Centre in Mississauga, which was also attended by six of the other terror suspects.
"Let's make sure that we take a second look at who we are allowing to come and preach, what books are allowed into our centres," said Dean.
"We will have to become more vigilant as well in the Muslim community, that if we see any signs of this that we immediately pay attention and take action to address this issue."
The Council of Ahl Sunna wal Jamaah (CCAS) blamed the Toronto terror plot, as well of terror attacks in London and Madrid, on a small minority of Muslims who subscribe to a "vile doctrine of literalistic ideology."
The group emphasized the "vast majority" of Canadian Muslims follow a moderate form of Islam.
"The (CCAS) is convinced that the time has come for Muslim Canadians to adopt a different approach in view of the reality it now finds itself in,'' said spokesman Akbar Khan.
Liberal MP Wajid Khan said he is tired of hearing Muslim speakers emphasizing that Islam is not to blame for the arrests.
"Nobody is saying it is (Islam)," he said. "Why are we talking about these 17 people based on faith?
"Let's not take the temperature up so high," he said. "There is an issue and we have to address it as a nation."
At a Saturday night speech in Toronto to Indo-Canadian business leaders, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said terror threats must not divide Canadians.
"Let us never forget that such people today, as in the past, make use of symbols of culture and religion but represent neither," he said.
"They represent nothing but hatred."
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060609/muslim_leaders_060610/20060610?hub=TopStories
Vancouver Sun – June 10, 2006
Young and Muslim in British Colombia
They feel positive about their place in Canadian society,
but say their religion is unfairly put on trial
BY Nicholas Read
When Abdul-Rehman Malik tries to decipher why 17 young men might want to blow up Parliament and the CN Tower, the word, "certainties" comes to mind.
"The kind of literalist theology that gives certainties about your place in the world, your place with God and your place in the after-life," Malik says. "That's what these kids are looking for -- they're looking for certainties."
Not that he's certain the 17 young men arrested on charges of terrorism last weekend in Toronto did anything wrong. He wants to make that clear, too. He understands that a person is innocent until proven guilty.
"Let's watch this process very carefully," he says in a telephone interview from the U.K. "I remain completely skeptical until there's more evidence that they actually did something. The RCMP and CSIS don't have a good track record when it comes to this kind of thing, and I'd like to know what kind of involvement the Minister of Public Safety [Stockwell Day] had."
However, living in London where terrorism is real, Malik, a Canadian Muslim and co-editor with his wife, Fareena Alam, of Muslim magazine Q-News, can speak with some knowledge of what drives young people to extremism.
He's studied the phenomenon as a teacher and journalist, and he's seen it on his own streets and subways.
What confounds Alam is that the experience of young Muslims living in Britain and Europe is so different from that of young Muslims living in Canada. Because, while Muslims in Britain do feel disenfranchised from mainstream society -- and with good reason, she adds -- Canadian Muslims feel very much a part of it.
"I find that Canadian Muslims are much more comfortable in their skin than European Muslims are," Alam said. "There's much less antagonism between the state and young Muslims than there is here. [Young Muslims in Canada] are very confident about their Muslim identity. That's why the arrest of these 17 boys is such a shock."
Malik agrees -- up to a point. But to him the arrests weren't quite as shocking. He taught one of the accused, Admad Mustafa Ghany, a 21-year-old student from McMaster University, when the latter was a student at Erindale High School in Mississauga, and, while he doesn't condone terrorism or violence, he believes he can understand why young people are drawn to simple extremes.
Malik doesn't want to say too much about Ghany while Ghany is under arrest, but he describes him as a bright, passionate and committed young man who took a sincere interest in the world. In other words, he was exactly the kind of young man who might be moved to want to do something momentous if he thought it was for a good cause.
"I think the beginning of this, the kernel of this, is seeing injustice," Malik says. "Seeing your nation [of Islam] involved in unjust conflicts.
"The [U.S. President George] Bush vision of the world and the [Osama] bin Laden vision of the world aren't too far apart. And when you fall into that them-and-us vision of the world, some people start thinking 'How do we inflict on others what was inflicted upon us? How do we make a statement?' Because that's what terrorism is about, making statements."
"When I was young and we were going through university, the idea of martyrdom and the way of God was our highest goal. It was something to aspire to. Those were real feelings. I can understand that. I can understand how someone who is completely normal who feels the pain and injustice in the world, might start to wonder 'What am I doing in my middle-class life? I should be doing something.'
"The danger is that you just need to pervert that sentiment and twist it a little bit, and you can see how it might become internal. Suddenly, you begin to see the enemy around you."
Alam speaks of "ummah," the notion of Islam as a collective body, and that when one part of the body suffers, all of it hurts.
Most of the time that's a noble sentiment, she says, but sometimes it can place a terrible burden on the shoulders of young Muslim men in particular. And instead of going out to help the poor in their own communities the way they should, Alam says, a few can be led astray into believing that terrorism is an answer.
Hasan Alam, 23, Ammar Zaidi, 20, Ladan Dazavallow, 21, and Erin Shevchuk, 21, recognize the concept of ummah too, but they don't understand it that way. All of them are young, Canadian, Muslim and politically aware, and they can't begin to conceive what might drive someone to want to commit acts of terrorism.
Their own experience of being a Muslim in Canada is exactly as Alam has observed it: uniformly positive and free of discrimination.
Once, says Shevchuk, a man asked at her place of employment why she wore a head scarf -- "he was pretty emotional about it," she says -- but that's all.
"Otherwise, I've never had any problems. Everyone has been nice to me."
They believe they have the same scholastic and employment opportunities as anyone else their age, that they are free to practise their religion in any way they wish, and that despite what the media have said about Muslims being persecuted after the attacks on New York and Washington in September 2001, they have never experienced anything of the kind.
What does confuse them, however -- all of them appear careful never to use the word, "angry" -- is that when terrorist attacks like the ones on New York, Madrid and London are reported, as well as the arrests last weekend in Toronto, the media always put Islam on trial as well.
And that, they say, is unfair.
"In my 23 years of being a Muslim, I've never heard a word of violence preached in my mosque," says Alam, who just graduated with a degree in political science from Simon Fraser University. "I've never come across a Muslim who's said these words, but when we turn on the news or open a newspaper, that's all we see."
Islam, they all agree, is a religion of peace and understanding, not violence and hatred.
That conviction was echoed by the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations and other prominent Muslim associations in a statement Thursday: "Terrorism is antithetical to Muslim belief and is a perversion of its teachings. Terrorism is a global issue, not a Muslim problem. And we, as Canadian Muslims, stand firm in our denunciation of this gross ideology."
Maybe so, says Malik, but the teachings of Islam, like those of Christianity or any major religion, are open to interpretation. People can and do read into the Koran what they wish, he says.
(In October 2004, Vancouver Sheik Younus Kathrada was alleged to have preached in favour of an Islamic holy war against non-Muslims, and referred to Jews as "the brothers of monkeys and swine" at the Dar al-Madinah Islamic Society mosque on Fraser Street. He also was alleged to have posted his comments on the Internet.)
Malik also believes it is naive of people like Alam and his friends to suggest that terrorism of the kind seen in the U.S. and Europe is only about politics.
"This is about politics mixed with a dangerous kind of religion," he says. "The terrorists who are out there explicitly use religion to justify and mobilize their violence. That's the truth. There are Islamic terrorists out there. There are Muslims who justify their acts of terrorism through religion."
Alam acknowledges that, but still takes issue with the media's focus on Islam as a breeding ground for terrorism. It is nothing of the kind, he says.
"I denounce as a Muslim all forms of terrorism. But as a Muslim and a Canadian too, I want to be portrayed in the right way. I don't want to be twisted around and have my faith twisted around."
When Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols blew up the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City in 1995, no one put Christianity on trial, Alam says.
"We know that every culture and faith has these elements, but people don't focus on the Christian identity. But when it comes to Islam, people always focus on this one identity."
Derryl MacLean, an Islamicist and associate professor of history at Simon Fraser University, has sympathy for that view. Especially in B.C. where, he says, Muslims have participated in, and contributed to, a multicultural society in a way they haven't anywhere else -- even Ontario and Quebec.
"What you have here are Muslims being positively engaged with their society and participating in the construction of a common good," MacLean says. "And I believe that tradition is stronger in B.C. than it is anywhere else."
And contrary to what people thought 10 or 20 years ago, that doesn't mean young Muslims are jettisoning Islam and its traditions.
"What this is, is a very dynamic interest in the definition of Islam," MacLean says. "They are asking 'What are the philosophical foundations of Islam that we can use to make a modern kind of Islam that allows us to have an identity?'"
But because of recent history, he adds, they do feel "set upon."
"Because you're a Muslim, you need to constantly show you're a good Muslim, not a bad Muslim. I don't think Sikhs have to do that, or Hindus. And certainly not Lutherans or Catholics."
For Alam, the events of Sept. 11, 2001 caused him not to be defensive about Islam, but to be curious about it.
"Prior to 9/11, I wasn't that in touch with my faith. After 9/11, after all the media headlines defacing Islam, I felt challenged as a Muslim to go out there and pick up the Koran and learn about my religion. That was the positive side of it.
"The negative side is that once you see the truth for yourself, and you see what's said in the media and all the discourse about Islam oppressing women and supporting terrorism, it presents a lot of work in the sense that you have to go out and try to defend your faith."
"As a Canadian born and raised here, all of a sudden I had to defend myself, and that was a new experience for me."
Alam says he does know of some Muslims who, after 9/11, retreated from their religion. "If their name was Mohammed, they changed it to Moe," he says. But many others, he says, took the same path he did.
Shevchuk, a liberal arts student at Langara College, converted to Islam after 9/11. Before then, she said, she didn't know anything about the faith.
"But one of my co-workers was Muslim, and I started reading about Islam, and everything I read made sense to me," she says.
Now, as a practising Muslim who wears a head scarf, Shevchuk feels "sad" when she hears how Muslims are portrayed in the media.
"It's hurting Canadian Muslims," she says. "It's breeding more tension and misconceptions. It makes it harder for the vast majority of Muslims to lead peaceful lives."
Dazavallow, a student of kinesiology, at SFU, says she's pleased whenever anyone asks about her religion. And she doesn't interpret that interest as suspicion or mistrust.
"I know why people ask. Most of the time it's because they really want to know, and their eagerness to know is healthy," Dazavallow says. "Muslims are a part of Canada, and I think it's healthy that people ask me about my faith, and I explain it."
Only Zaidi, a third-year student in electronic engineering, confesses to ever feeling hassled by such questions.
"It causes you frustration and confusion," he says. "People are always coming to you to explain the actions of others. In that sense, it's confusing. Jews and Christians don't have to explain themselves, but Muslims do."
Asgar Hussain, president of the Muslim Youth Centre in Surrey, reports a similar frustration among young Muslims he speaks to. He says many of them aren't nearly as positive about their place in society as Alam, Shevchuk and Dazavallow.
Prior to 9/11, Hussain says, Muslims were invisible in the sense that no one pointed a finger at them. Now, he says, there is discrimination.
Muslim girls tell him they are ridiculed for wearing head scarves, and, at a conference of young Muslims at Kwantlen College last month, some participants said they believe they were passed over for jobs because of their faith.
"They said people look at them," said conference organizer Shawkat Hasan. "They didn't look before, but now they do. That's disturbing to them. They are bothered by that."
"They are Canadians, but they are a minority, and some of them don't feel they have the same rights as the majority. They feel they are being pushed away, that they are the bad guys. They are being pointed out from the community when they consider themselves part of that community."
Hasan said politics and Canada's war in Afghanistan were not discussed at the conference, but he believes young Muslims are concerned about it. "And as parents and leaders, we should address some of those concerns," he said.
Where Malik does agree with the young Muslims interviewed for this piece is that Muslims drawn to terrorism are outside the mainstream, both of society and Islam.
"These people are opting out," he says. "They're not connecting with their elders or with mosques or with the traditions of Muslim life. They're blazing a new trail."
But for teenagers with little to look forward to -- as many young Muslims in the U.K. and throughout Europe are, he says -- a path of instant redemption through violence can seem attractive.
"Where is life going? What kind of future are you going to have? What about the faith? What about serving God? You want paradise? Here's paradise now."
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=a3a39331-a9ac-4778-8cc9-cb449a54380c
The Global Mail - June 10, 2006
THE TERROR RAIDS: HUMAN RIGHTS
Groups recall past high-profile terrorism
cases that fell apart
BY BILL CURRY
OTTAWA -- The flood of newspaper headlines and TV reports detailing the alleged terrorist plots to attack Parliament Hill and other key buildings has some lawyers and human-rights advocates urging the public to think skeptically in light of recent history.
Twice since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Canada's security forces have claimed to have busted domestic terror cells that were aiming to destroy some of these same high-profile targets -- only to have the cases fall apart without any charges laid.
Three years ago, the arrests of 19 Pakistani men in Toronto in an investigation known as Project Thread provoked similar headlines to those of recent days.
Federal lawyers suggested the men were a sleeper cell for al-Qaeda that had taken an interest in the Pickering nuclear facility and the measurements of the CN Tower. Yet an immigration adjudicator dismissed the case against them within days.
"I think it's important for us to learn from the past and be wary," said Amina Sherazee, who represented three of the Project Thread targets.
Last year, testimony at the public inquiry into Maher Arar's deportation to Syria, where he and other Canadian targets say they were tortured, exposed problems with a CSIS and RCMP investigation of an alleged Ottawa-based terrorist cell.
Anonymous leaks to U.S. and Canadian media originally suggested the men were planning to attack the U.S. embassy and other key Ottawa sites such as the Parliament Buildings.
Two other men with links to Mr. Arar were also targets of the investigation. Abdullah Almalki and Ahmad El Maati ended up in the same Syrian jail, and no charges have ever been laid against them.
During the inquiry, Mr. Arar's lawyers said the leaked allegations were based on confessions made under torture in Syria.
Meanwhile, the case against Mr. El Maati, according to anonymous reports repeated around the world, was largely based on a "terrorist map" found in a truck he was driving across the Canada-U.S. border that showed places in Ottawa such as the Parliament Buildings and the U.S. embassy.
But The Globe and Mail reported last fall that the map with numbered buildings on it was a common federal government handout to assist delivery truck drivers.
Mr. El Maati's lawyer, Barbara Jackman, says it appears Canada's security forces targeted him and others based on their skin colour and filled in the blanks to build a case.
"I think what led to Mr. El Maati being tortured was that map," said Ms. Jackman, who will be before the Supreme Court this month fighting the legality of the government's use of security certificates to detain terror suspects without charges.
"If that map had been found in the truck of an Italian-Canadian driver, there wouldn't have been a plot developed out of it."
Alex Neve, the secretary-general of Amnesty International Canada, followed the Arar hearings closely and said the example of the map is the most obvious reason to be skeptical of terror accusations.
"On the face of it, there's the possibility of some pretty shocking shortcomings in how police interpreted and dealt with the famous mimeographed map that served as the basis for the allegations that he was the mastermind of plans to mount a bombing campaign of key targets in Ottawa," he said.
"There certainly have been concerns about the quality of investigations."
Ziyaad Mia of the Canadian Muslim Lawyers Association said rumours circulating about the 17 recently arrested males in Toronto put their right to a fair trial at risk. He also expressed concern that individuals who are freed after facing accusations of terrorism, such as the Project Thread men and Mr. Arar, will forever be ostracized both socially and professionally.
"The government needs to be very careful and very precise when it charges people under these very serious charges," Mr. Mia said. "Certainly with national security, you could have a huge disaster on your hands and I appreciate that, but the other side is the human consequence is devastating."
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20060610.TERRORCIVILN10/TPStory/National
The Record Opinion - June 10, 2006
Reaching out to Muslims in Canada
To be Muslim in Canada at this moment in the nation's history is to face several indisputable and daunting challenges.
It means belonging to a minority of 750,000 people immersed in a vaster sea of 32 million non-Muslims, many of whom have little knowledge and more than a few suspicions of the Islamic faith. It means living in the West but belonging to a group some analysts say is ensnared in a "clash of civilizations'' with the West. And, as of this week, it means being part of the same faith group as 17 men who stand charged with plotting to commit heinous terrorist attacks against Canadian targets.
In the face of such challenges, a group of Muslim leaders has taken a courageous step. They have called for help in confronting the small number of extremists that are part of their community. And they have called for help, not only from Canada's political leaders but from Canadian society at large.
It was gratifying to hear this plea for assistance from groups such as the Islamic Social Services Association, the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Canadian Muslim Civil Liberties Association. They did not try to gloss over or minimize the problem before us all. They explicitly recognized that all is not well in their community, that some Muslims are, for a variety of reasons, susceptible to dangerously radical views. And they deliberately reached out to the rest of the country, asking for a hand, on behalf of themselves and their children, to help Muslims better integrate into Canadian society. They deserve that hand.
Canada is an incredible country that has embarked upon an incredible experiment. In a world that is too often divided by boundaries of race, religion, ethnicity and politics, Canada has erected a welcoming beacon that shines out to all humanity. The signal from that beacon is that you can be of any race, religion, ethnic background or political persuasion and find a safe and respected home here. There is a word that describes this philosophy, a philosophy that is the cornerstone for the nation: It is multiculturalism.
Multiculturalism recognizes Canada's past as well as its present and future. It celebrates the astonishing diversity of the Canadian people. It enshrines the virtues of acceptance and tolerance as the cement that binds together the various pieces of the Canadian mosaic. But it also defends the time-honoured Canadian traditions -- our democratic political institutions, our Charter of Rights and Freedoms, our rule of law and the collective heritage of countless Canadian generations -- that make Canada so much more than simply the sum of many, many parts.
To be Canadian means more than just holding a Canadian passport or paying taxes to Ottawa. It means choosing and upholding a certain way of life. To move to Canada involves more than a change of address or taking a room in a new hotel. It means moving into an entirely new home. It means accepting the reasonable demands of Canadian citizenship and it means being accepted by the people around you. The Islamic leaders who called for help this week recognize all this. They are here. They are Muslim. They are Canadian. It is time for everyone to recognize them in all these ways.
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