How Kosovo Created its Own Liberal Islam

Standpoint ^ | July 2008 | MICHAEL J. TOTTEN

[forkinsocket]

On February 17, 2008, Kosovo declared independence from Serbia. Some are concerned about what NATO, the United Nations, and the European Union have nurtured there since the military and humanitarian intervention in 1999. James Jatras, a U.S.-based advocate for the Serbian Orthodox Community, put it bluntly last year when he said Kosovo was a “a beachhead into the rest of Europe” for “radical Muslims” and “terrorist elements.” It’s an assertion without evidence. “We’ve been here for so long,” said United States Army Sergeant Zachary Gore in Eastern Kosovo, “and not seen any evidence of it, that we’ve reached the assumption that it is not a viable threat.”

Nine in 10 of Kosovo’s citizens are ethnic Albanians, and more than 90 per cent of them are at least nominal Muslims. Most are so thoroughly modern and secularised that moderate doesn’t quite say it. The only word that can fairly describe Islam as practiced by the majority of Albanian Muslims is liberal. No nation can be entirely free of extremists, but Kosovo is one of the least religiously extreme Muslim-majority countries on Earth. Radical Islamists aren’t there in significant numbers now, and they aren’t likely to be in the future. Some places may be fertile ground for radicalism in the future, but Kosovo isn’t one of them for many of the same reasons that Christian theocracy isn’t coming to Western Europe.

I arrived here shortly after the declaration of independence, and the first thing I looked for – as always when I visit a Muslim-majority country – was the treatment and status of women.

Women who dress with their hair, ankles, and sometimes even faces showing in places like Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Taliban-controlled parts of Afghanistan are often beaten or worse.

In Kosovo, by contrast, almost all women, even in small villages, dress like women in the rest of Europe. Streets, cafés, restaurants, and bars are not all-male affairs as they are in much of the Islamic world, where women spend almost all their lives behind walls. If it weren’t for the occasional mosque minaret on the skyline, there is little visible evidence that Kosovo is a Muslim-majority country at all. Kosovo looks, feels, and is European.

A small number of well-heeled Islamic extremists from the Gulf states have moved into Kosovo to rebuild damaged mosques and transform liberal Balkan Islam into the more severe version found in the deserts of Saudi Arabia. They’ve had a small amount of success with a similar project in nearby Bosnia, but they’re meeting stiffer resistance from Kosovo’s religious community as well as from secular citizens.

“We are working very hard to stop these kinds of movements,” said Professor Xhabir Hamiti, of the Islamic studies department at the University of Pristina. “These kinds of movements are dangerous for all nations, for all faiths, for all religions. We are Muslims, but we think the European way. I am a Muslim, I am a scholar, I know how to deal with Islam in my country. There is no need for Arabs to come here. I have no need for their suggestions, no need for their explanations. We created our Islam ourselves here, and we can continue our Islam with our own minds.”

It would be wrong to suggest Kosovo has no Islamists at all, but in the last election in late 2007, the country’s single Islamic party gained only 1.7 per cent of the vote. Kosovo is not the Middle East, and Albanians are not Arabs. The majority converted to Islam relatively recently under Turkish Ottoman rule, and Albanian culture was first solidly Christian. “We Albanians,” Dom Lush Gjergji recently wrote, “descendants of the Illyrians, are Christians from the time of the Apostles… Without Christianity there would be no Albanian people, language, culture, or traditions… Albanians consider Christianity their patrimony, their spiritual and cultural inheritance.” Gjergji is a Catholic priest, but I heard similar comments from many who self-identify as Muslims. “Albanian people are not very religious,” said Agron Rezniqi, of the Friendship Association between Kosovo and Israel “We come from Catholicism, and for that, we are not such strong Muslims.”

Perhaps the best evidence available that Albanian Muslims, in both Kosovo and Albania proper, differ radically from their Arab world counterparts is their relationship with Jews and with Israel. Jews in Albania had an almost 100 per cent survival rate during the Nazi occupation. The country was known as a safe haven where Jews could find protection under the noses of the German authorities. According to Dan Michman, chief historian at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, there were three times as many Jews in Albania at the end of the Second World War as there were at the beginning.

Both Albania and Kosovo have excellent relations with Israel, and Israelis are more than welcome to travel and even live among Albanians. An Israeli from Tel Aviv named Shachar Caspi opened a bakery and a bistro bar in Pristina. “Nobody has given me any problems or been against Israel,” he told me. “[Kosovars] had good relations with Jewish people even back in the old days. And nobody here is radical. On the contrary, people are very warm, they are very nice, they have taken Islam to a beautiful place, not to a violent place. When they hear I am Israeli, the way they react, they react very warmly.”

Much of the angst about Kosovo’s alleged radicalism centres on the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), an organisation that no longer even exists.

It was a short-lived guerrilla movement that rose up against Slobodan Milosevic’s régime, first to fight for independence from an apartheid-like system, and later as a defence against mass murder and ethnic-cleansing. The KLA was always thoroughly secular and in no way resembled a Balkan Hamas or Hezbollah.

Its leaders also distinguished themselves from their Bosnian counterparts when they flatly refused assistance from Arabic mujahideen who wanted to fight a holy war there against Serbs. Albanians don’t fight religious wars, not against themselves, and not against others.

There has been no fighting or even tension between Muslim and Christian Albanians, only between Serbs and Albanians.

The danger in Kosovo isn’t that international peace keepers are nurturing a jihad state. Rather, a premature withdrawal may lead to a resumption of the fighting between Serbs and Albanians that they moved in to stop in the first place.

[BabaYaga]

Illyria = Illyada

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6bWfm8GysE

lol

[MarMema]

for the extremists, independence is a base for international trade in drugs, women, for human and goods smuggling of every kind and the long-term expansion of their power into all areas inhabited by Albanians in Macedonia, southern Serbia, in Montenegro

In the immediate aftermath, Albanian revenge attacks, arson, killing, abduction and intimidation drove 200,000 Serbs out of Kosovo. But 80,000-100,000 stayed on, many in north Mitrovica but many others in enclaves surrounded by Albanian communities

[MarMema]

How did we get our own little Albanian mafia here on FR?

[MarMema]

Santino Sonny Corleone

Since Jun 28, 2008

gee, new to FR, are you?

[LjubivojeRadosavljevic]

It's interesting how Dio looks to someone like 'Joe' for "help." :-)

[Bokababe]

"It's interesting how Dio looks to someone like 'Joe' for "help." :-)"

That's because Dio has Joe convinced that "all Serbs are communists who hate Catholics"

If that weren't so pathetically wrong, it would almost be funny.

[kronos77]

Human traficing have to do with Albanian mafia, and ‘pro-western’ govt. of Serbia that was posted by very-own US.

[Bokababe]

"But anyway, tell me, how do drugs move from Kosovo to Europe since only Albanians are drug dealers."

I don't know, I am an American and not a drug dealer. You are the Albanian with supposed inside drug-trafficking info. So tell me -- how do they move? How do they ship?

Gee, I hope the DEA is listening to this! ;)

[Santino Sonny Corleone]

there were not 300,000 Serbs there. In 1991, the Serbian government site states that there were 194,000 which makes sense given the quoted 90% Albanian majority. Unless they brought 100,000 settlers from Krajina. Many, especially criminals who helped the Serbian soldiers, loaded up cars with stolen goods and left before Albanians got back. Northern Mitrovica only has about 40-60,000 people.

Regarding crime in the Balkans and Eastern Europe you should read this; Called Crime without Frontiers and see how the Russians sold most of the weapons to fight the Serbs.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/11/books/11book.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/mcmafia-crime-without-frontiers-by-misha-glenny-804285.html
http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/politicsphilosophyandsociety/0,,2271281,00.html

No one was more of a gangster’s paradise than Serbia: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1003770.stm

[Santino Sonny Corleone]

“Gee, I hope the DEA is listening to this! ;) “

They know already. Serbs and Montengrins and all their neighbors help. The gangsters get along great.

[LjubivojeRadosavljevic]

If that weren't so pathetically wrong, it would almost be funny.

I know...but "everybody knows Joe." :-)

[Santino Sonny Corleone]

“Total and complete moronic revisionist history BS you spout there speedo. What —did you take a crash course from Ankara U?”

So tell us Eleni, what your Church’s relationship with the Ottomans? The sure do hate “Turks” now.

Your version first, and then we’ll post someone else’s version. http://www.lib.msu.edu/sowards/balkan/lecture6.html

How much land and property do they own? Who gave it to them since Christians weren’t supposed to own land? Did they ever return the land “donated” by Christians back then, to fool the Sultan? In Greece too they own 370,000 acres, second largest landowners after the state.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE4DD1F3FF937A35757C0A961948260

Dot not blame me for reminding you. Lastly, you should give Albanians their credit for helping you get liberated, just as you should thank the world powers. The “Greek” revolution was called a “purely Shkypitarian [Albanian], not a Hellenic Revolution” and for a good reason. The fustanella, your national costume is Albanian as well. And, Suliotet, those Christian Albanians, were with Ali Pasha fighting the Sultan till the end.

This Encyclopedia put it best: “It was an Albanian who led the Greeks in the War of Independence, and again an Albanian who commanded the Turkish troops sent to quell the rebellion.” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01253b.htm
The world powers decided what side won, yet now you hate the western world. They liberated you from the Ottomans, protected you for a long time after, liberated you from the Nazis, saved you from the communists, the Marshall Plan and later EU who pumped in tens of billions to make the new “Greeks” prosperous. And of course sided with after each war to grow your territory.

Before telling but “Arvanites hate Albanians now,” read this:
http://www.greekhelsinki.gr/english/reports/arvanites.html

we know that propganda and the need to “prove their Greeknes” does take a toll over 200 years.

[Santino Sonny Corleone]

Eleni,
once again. Let’s not talk about origins. The only thing the new “Greeks” have is their religion, yet they all think that blood from Leonidas flows in their veins. What do you think those Anatolians exchanged for “Turks” were? Let’s not talk about the Albanians, Vlachs and Slavs back home.

It’s that little secret everyone makes believe they don’t know since you have “no minorities” (other than those defined by the Treaty of Lusane).

DNA does not usually lie and I posted the results.

[FormerLib]

Either you are dumb as a doorknob or worse...

If you remember the multiply-banned poster formerly known as Ronly Bonly Jones, you'd realize that you just insulted all the doorknobs in the world.

Don't worry, his arrogance combined with his brutally-limited intellect will result in yet another ban.

[montyspython]

Albanian criminal apologist alert.

How much money do you guys make on white girls sold in Western European countries hmmm?

[eleni121]

brutally-limited intellect ...poor door knobs

---

LOL...I know....he is another in the line of propagandists....The mafioso's thought processes astound in their ridiculousness...but then we've seen it before.

[Santino Sonny Corleone]

If it were for money, I'd be spreading propaganda about the "jihadi, white-slavery, narco-state." For all the press here, Albanians are peons compared to the Russian, Bulagarin and Serbian mafia.

So I could get paid by then, by your church and your state. Three times as much. I might even get a Vojovoda title like Seselj, marry a pop-princess like Arkan the hero, or be compared to Krajl Marko like Radovan Karadzic was by your current Patriarch:



"'We are grateful to Jovanka Karadzic for giving birth to an immortal Serb hero,' Bishop Amfilohije Radovic said in May. He led the funeral ceremony for Mr Karadzic's mother, who died in Niksic at the age of 83. "

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20050704/ai_n14682919

And I almost forgot: I could also get a St Dionysys order medal from the Greek Orthodox Church and be called "one of the most prominent sons of our Lord Jesus Christ working for peace" like Karadzic was called by them.

How's the weather in Srbinje

[montyspython]

So, how much do you get for one white girl? Is it more lucrative than heroin trafficking or is defrauding the US government the next business venture for Albanian criminality?

[Tailgunner Joe]

You don't get it.

Russia is part of Eurabia. Russia is more muslim than France. Russia has millions of muslims citizens and even has Chechen terrorists in the Russian army occupying the territory of the Christian Georgians. Russia builds jihadist muslim Iran nuclear reactors while at the same time Russia persecutes and terrorizes their Christian neighbors just like in Soviet times. Russia is Islam's best friend. Russia is the source of the Islamic threat and the enemy of all humanity.

[Santino Sonny Corleone]

Joe, no offense, but it’s you who doesn’t get it.

They are still upset over the 4th crusade. This “Islam” talk is whitewash, they think that the West threatens them more and that’s why they side with Russia and Russia sides with them, blindly. If Islam was a threat, Russia would not give Iran nukes. They are 1 year away, and without Russia they would have never had them. Syria is also armed by Russia. Milosevic armed and trained Saddam’s army before US bombed them.

If you look into their propaganda most of it’s against the “Western values,” and always involves conspiracies by the Pope and “others” to destroy Eastern Orthodoxy. Just ask them what they really think of protestants or catholics.