Posted on 12/07/2004 11:37:26 AM PST by kattracks
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 7 (Reuters) - Countering a surge in anti-Islamic bigotry requires urgent action by Muslims as well as non-Muslims, governments, the media and educators, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on Tuesday.Muslims must condemn and isolate extremists who target and kill civilians in the name of their religion and governments must make good on commitments to protect Muslims from discrimination, Annan told a seminar on Islam and intolerance at U.N. headquarters.
At the same time, others must recognize that anti-Western feelings of some Muslims have been fed by a history of colonialism and domination by the West and fanned by unresolved conflicts in the Middle East, Chechnya and the former Yugoslavia, he said.
"The reaction to such events can be visceral, bringing an almost personal sense of affront. But we should remember that these are political reactions -- disagreements with specific policies. All too often, they are mistaken for an Islamic reaction against Western values, sparking an anti-Islamic backlash," he said.
Annan's comments came during a day-long U.N. seminar on "Islamophobia," the second on combating religious intolerance. The first, on anti-Semitism, took place in June.
"When a new word enters the language, it is often the result of a scientific advance or a diverting fad. But when the world is compelled to coin a new term to take account of increasingly widespread bigotry, that is a sad and troubling development. Such is the case with Islamophobia," Annan said.
While the roots of intolerance toward Islam dated back centuries, a recent resurgence has been fed by rising tensions between the Islamic world and West, flawed media stereotypes and expanding Muslim immigration to new corners of the world, speakers said.
It is inevitable that different cultures would have their differences while living in close proximity, but "that cannot justify demonization, or the deliberate use of fear for political purposes," he said.
"Islam should not be judged by the acts of extremists who deliberately target and kill civilians. The few give a bad name to the many, and this is unfair," Annan said.
"Muslims themselves, especially, should speak out, as so many did following the 11 September attacks on the United States, and show a commitment to isolate those who preach or practice violence and to make it clear that these are unacceptable distortions of Islam," he said.
Should be Islamo-fascism.
Too bad Annan has been a practicing member in good standing.
Let's face it, Annan and his third world UN "diplomats" and support staff think of the UN in the US as an islamic beachhead. Now that he has no defence of his scandalous regime he's launching this defense of islam as a smokescreen to rally his sopport and delay his ouster. Muslims are intolerant of others and that's their birthright, but when the rest of us dare to mention their intolerance and hatred, why thats's bigotry. Kofi isn't just cluless, he's totally indoctrinated and sympathetic to the islamic mindset. This is Kofi's cynical act to play peacemaker to people who only want peace when their real agenda is unmasked, and when they are outnumbered.
Stoned to death... why Europe is starting to lose its faith in Islam
Perhaps they've got a few million barrels of oil for the Stalinist thug.
When is he going to address religious oppression of non-muslims in Saudi Arabia???
What a bigot.
Maybe if they were denouncing the muslims who DO commit these acts (rather than trying to justify it as a "response" to "American imperialism")...
Maybe if they were helping to shut down radical mosques and clerics who ARE financing and training terrorists...
The silence is deafening.
I can accept the existence of the false religion of Islam(Mohammed's cult rewritten from the JudeoChristian Bible) where they worship a big meteor but I can't accept the POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY which is also called Islam (Islamonazism it what it should be called, it is a supremist theory which casts people into 3 legal classes with different rights, permits making slaves of non-muslims seized in HOLY war, and has concepts like "Muslim Terroritories").
Perhaps if Muslims stopped slaughtering infidels...
Stop sending out smoke screens Kofi and produce the 21 plus billions of Dollars you and your gang of thieves have stolen.
Distortions of Islam? You don't need to look very hard to find that the of Islamic terrorists don't have to distort the teachings of Islam to come to their conclusions. It's pretty much spelled right out there for them to use... "smite the necks", "destroy nonbelievers", "ransom nonbelievers", etc, etc, etc...
Who the hell wrote that headline?
Main Entry: pho·bia
Pronunciation: 'fO-bE-&
Function: noun
Etymology: -phobia
: an exaggerated usually inexplicable and illogical fear of a particular object, class of objects, or situation
The way I see it, there is absolutely NOTHING "illogical" or "inexplicable" about fearing a religion such as "Islam". It is a very cult-like "religion" in which the killing and punishment (usually by death, but also by pillaging, rape and enslavement) of non-believers is not only permissable, but it is COMMANDED in the scriptures of the faith.
As a non-believer, I would think that it would be only natural to have some amount of fear regarding such a religion - especially when the representatives of said religion speak out on a daily basis of their intent to spread their faith to the entire world.
Islam the religion doesn't scare me as much as Islam the political system.
We don't tolerate Nazism and shouldn't tolerate Communism either.
Islam the religion is of no consequence to me so long as nobody demand that I convert to it or accept their God as MY God. I am of the firm belief that the Islamic God "Allah" is NOT the same as the God of the Bible and New Testament and the more I learn of Islam the more convinced of this I become.
The political system is definitely scary...and I agree with what you said earlier in referring to it as "Islamonaziism".
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