The London killings are a tragedy, but legislation on Islamophobia is still a bad idea.
The attack on Madiha Salman and her husband Salman Afzaal, his mother and their two children, is a crime and a tragedy. The perpetrator should be punished and his motives and actions investigated. But the incident should not be used to advance the political agenda of the Islamists, which is to create a panic about Islamophobia, control what can be said on social media, and quell any criticism of Islam.
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On the night of Sunday, June 6, a family of five, out for an evening stroll, were waiting on a sidewalk in London, Ontario, for the light to change, when they were rammed by a pick-up truck driven by 21-year-old Nathanial Veltman. The parents were killed along with their 15-year-old daughter and the man's 74-year-old mother; their 9-year-old son survived and remains in hospital. The family was Muslim and, without revealing details, police say they believe the attack was premeditated and motivated by hate.
Unsurprisingly, calls for the government to take action against Islamophobia were nearly instantaneous, and a petition was soon launched through change.org to make June 6 a National Day Against Islamophobia, reminiscent of the calls to so designate January 29 following the shootings in a Quebec City mosque in 2017.
Regardless of the tragedies of the targeted anti-Muslim shooting in Quebec City, and the presumed targeted recent murders in London, a National Day Against Islamophobia remains a bad idea. "Islamophobia" is a political term that was created to deliberately conflate discrimination or violence against Muslims with criticism of Islam. Violence against anyone is illegal, while criticism of any religion or ideology is protected by free speech. But such free speech doesn't sit well with many Muslims, who believe that criticism of Islam, the Koran, or the Prophet Mohammad should be designated as hate speech and subject to penalties. Consequently, the "Islamophobia" drum was being beaten for many years before any deadly attacks against Muslims occurred in Canada. As early as 2010 (and possibly before), efforts were being made to advance political and social awareness of so-called Islamophobia. As reported by Samer Majzoub of the Canadian Muslim Forum in a HuffPost article of 2016, in 2010, the CMF "led a community delegation to the House of Commons in Ottawa Hill. The objective of that parliamentary day was to create awareness and shed more light to the legislators over the notion of Islamophobia..." Several directors of the CMF, including Majzoub, have been linked to people or organizations associated with the Muslim Brotherhood.
Political efforts regarding "Islamophobia" have been successful, both in terms of getting it into the general consciousness and inducing the government to do something about it. Islamophobia is touted as one of the world's great evils in Canadian schools, colleges, universities, and other institutions, not least those associated with government. The passage of Motion M-103 ("Systemic Racism and Religious Discrimination") by the Parliament of Canada in March, 2017, was a major victory for Islamists. It led to a parliamentary committee created to study it, and the disbursement of millions of dollars to the National Council of Canadian Muslims and other organizations. The NCCM was formerly known as CAIR-Canada and was created as a chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). In 2008, CAIR was found to be an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror trial in Texas.
The passage of Motion M-103 was orchestrated by the Muslim Association of Canada, an affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood. (Although the MAC's website currently denies any affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood in its FAQ section, that same section has a Q&A on the MB's founder Hassan al-Banna. Previous incarnations of MAC's website presented the organization as a disciple of al-Banna, and a past-president, Wael Haddara, was one of the principal advisers to then Muslim Brotherhood head and president of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi, in 2012 to 2013.) Motion M-103 was based on a petition (e-411) that Samer Majzoub had initiated in June, 2016. It is Majzoub who led the Canadian Muslim Forum delegation on Islamophobia to Parliament in 2010. In celebrating the passage of Petition e-411, Majzoub wrote: "next step is for the federal government to set up policies and orientations to address and deal profoundly at all levels, social, economical, and political, with Islamophobia symptoms that present themselves strongly in our society." That is the real purpose of Motion M-103.
The clearly political impetus behind "anti-Islamophobia" initiatives should lead sober-minded legislators to think twice about passing motions and laws based on this term. Unfortunately, in their eagerness to show their allegiance to the mantra of diversity, equity, and inclusion, our leaders have been more than eager to jump on the Islamophobia bandwagon, thereby rendering themselves the useful tools of the Islamists. While the many documented killings and other violence by Muslims against the "kuffar" or infidels in the name of jihad are almost always attributed to mental illness or the activity of "lone wolves," the spectre of "white supremacism," "far-right extremism" is raised whenever a crime is committed by a white person against a non-white, especially when it is directed against Muslims, when the predictable calls for action and legislation to counter Islamophobia are invoked. And so it is that, contrary to all the evidence available, the Government of Canada has declared the Proud Boys to be a terrorist group, while the Muslim Brotherhood has escaped that designation, despite being labelled as such in a number of countries, including Muslim countries.
There are no calls to fight "kuffar-ophobia" when Muslims kill in the name of their religion, as did the killers of Nathan Cirillo on Parliament Hill and Patrice Vincent in St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu. Our leaders did not make a public display of their grieving, nor raise their voices against "online hate," when Reese Fallon and Julianna Kozis were killed, and 13 others injured, by a Muslim shooter in Toronto. The death of Merissa Shen in Vancouver, who was killed by a Syrian refugee, did not raise concerns about the online spread of Islamic hate. Even the mere (alleged) cutting of the hijab of a schoolgirl in Toronto, which turned out to be a hoax, led to a national story, with the mayor of Toronto, the premier of Ontario, and the prime minister swiftly and publicly condemning the attack. The actual unprovoked attack on an elderly woman in Windsor, Ontario, who was beaten so savagely by a Muslim man that the surgeon who treated her said of her injuries, "The worst skull fractures I've seen in my 12 years here in Windsor," received scarce media attention outside of Windsor, nor was there a very public expression of concern by any of our leaders. Sara Anne Widholm died in obscurity after being in a coma for over a year.
The attack on Madiha Salman and her husband Salman
Afzaal, his mother and their two children, is a crime and a tragedy. The
perpetrator should be punished and his motives and actions investigated. But
the incident should not be used to advance the political agenda of the
Islamists, which is to create a panic about Islamophobia, control what can be
said on social media, and quell any criticism of Islam.
Madelaine Weld
June 11, 2021