Posted on 01/11/2002 12:27:36 PM PST by PotPan
Extract from the Rocca Report October 2001
SOUTH AFRICA MOVES CLOSER TO MUSLIMS The challenge US President George Bush threw down was: “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.” Clearly, a lot of South Africans are not with America! South Africa’s statement on US attacks on Afghanistan came nearly two days after they began. “This was a long diplomatic pause which served to underscore government’s hesitant support for the strikes,” reported Jonathan Katzenellenbogen (Business Day 12/10/2001). “To those versed in the language of diplomacy, the statement was almost a statement of concern about the attacks rather than an expression of support. The remarks of former cabinet minister Pallo Jordan in ANC Today that the events of September 11 were the comeuppance for the US for fighting Communism, may have no diplomatic standing, but could have done SA damage in Washington.” South Africa’s statement received a cool response from the US embassy in Pretoria.
Simon Barber (Business Day 10/10/2001) had earlier taken up the same theme. He quoted Jordan’s statement: “Anticommunism, they (the Americans) are discovering today, is a double-edged sword. While its keen blade helped sweep away what President Reagan once called ‘the evil empire’, on its backswing it returned as a guillotine to wreak terrible havoc in the very citadels of US power.” Jordan’s statement reinforces a broader perception that “the ANC government just isn’t serious about the threat Al-Qaeda and its ilk represents to values the ANC claims to hold dear,” said Barber. “The sense within the Bush administration is that SA’s official response to the events of September 11 has been adequate, nothing more. … But lacking has been much in the way of moral or political support for the war President George Bush has declared on the perpetrators and those who harbour them.”
South Africa had applied for observer status of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Aziz Pahad announced on 4/10/2001. The 56-nation grouping represents 1.2 billion Muslims and seeks to promote Muslim interests. “We assert our utter rejection of these attacks (on Afghanistan),” said Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, current president of the OIC and emir of Qatar, when he opened an emergency meeting of the organisation in Doha, Qatar, on 10/10/2001.
South Africa’s decision, just three weeks after the terror attacks in America, to join the world’s biggest Muslim body, has major implications. Should South Africa, for example, now be considered a Muslim state, even though 74.1 percent of its people identified themselves as Christians in the 1996 census, and only 1.36 percent as Muslims?
While the official position of the South African government on the US/Taliban conflict is barely adequate, there are clear indications of a growing anti-American spirit among grassroots groups and individuals within the tripartite alliance. Representatives of the ANC Youth League, the SA Communist Party and the SA Students Congress delivered anti-American and anti-Israeli speeches to students at Wits University at the culmination of a march organised by the Union of Muslim Students Association on 27/9/2001. A slogan read “The Army of Muhammad is Coming”. A motion moved by Rev Motlalepula Chabaku, an ANC member of the National Council of Provinces, called on the council to “gravely observe the growing intimidation of God’s people throughout the world” by terrorist threats by the United States. Her motion, moved on 28/9/2001, noted that “God’s people” were getting killed in the Middle East and urged “the US to desist from this callous action and to rather fight ideas of terrorism with alternative ideas that turn enemies into friends.”
“We are duty-bound and prepared for war against America and its allies irrespective of what South African laws say,” Suleiman Selebi, a Johannesburg-based da’ee (propagator of Islam) told the Mail & Guardian (12/10/2001). An attack on any Muslim state is by proxy an affront to all Muslims, and must necessarily be supported by all adherents of the religion. There are widespread reports of “jihad training camps” operating on South African soil priming recruits to go to Afghanistan to fight against the US. “Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Aziz Pahad, said local groups conscripting Muslims to fight abroad would face the full might of the law,” the weekly said. “In terms of the Foreign Military Assistance Act of 1998, no South African citizen or permanent resident may offer or attempt to render military assistance to any foreign state or organ of state - unless authorised to do so by the National Conventional Arms Control Committee. … The Cape Town-based Muslim Judicial Council this week scoffed at the government’s warnings, saying the government did not have the legislative power to proscribe the movement or activities of South African Muslims.”
The USA/British attack on Afghanistan is the worst form of terrorism and injustice, hence it endorses who the real terrorist are,” Sheikh Ebrahim Gabriels, chairman of the Muslim Judicial Council (MJC), said on 8/10/2001. About 5 000 protestors opposed to the military strikes on Afghanistan, organised by Cosatu, the MJC and the Western Province Council of Churches, marched to the US embassy in Cape Town on 11/10/2001. Many carried Palestinian flags and a few marchers wore T-shirts supporting Osama Bin Laden. Pagad (People Against Gangsterism and Drugs) sent a message of support. Muslims Against Illegitimate Leaders claimed to have signed up more than 1 000 people to go to Afghanistan to fight. Qibla has also called for volunteers. Qibla and Pagad (Roca Report nos 96, 92) have been identified by the US State Department as “terrorist organisations” with potential or real links to al-Qaeda.
The MJC represents the imams at 90 percent of Western Cape mosques, said Carol Paton (Sunday Times 14/10/2001). However, it is no less devout than “extremists” in its literal acceptance of the Koran. “We understand that we are not in an Islamic state,” said MJC secretary, Sheikh Achmat Sedick. “We follow the Constitution, but where it departs from the Koran we set it aside or challenge it - on matters like abortion and homosexuality. In that way we are on a par with other religious groupings. … While a violent response (to American bombing) should be avoided at all costs within SA, the council considered it legitimate for Muslims to join the Afghans in their fight.”
“The father of Cape Town’s own special brand of extremism is Achmat Cassiem [Roca Report no 117], also the leader of Qibla,” she continued. “He has hit out at those who said they don’t want war and has been quoted as saying that the US is Satan and the Muslims must respond to the call for a jihad. After the September 11 attacks, Cassiem spoke on Radio 786 - a radical Muslim community station - for 20 minutes, glorifying the concept of martyrdom which, he said, is an ‘obligation’. Its ‘objective was to do maximum damage to the oppressor’.”
“Being mostly of Malay origin, most Cape Muslim priests acquired their religious training in Saudi Arabia or Kuwait,” explained Paton. “Those from Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape are largely of Indian descent and would have been more likely to attend religious schools in Pakistan - bringing them closer to the influence of the Taliban.” Moderation has been carefully fostered by “progressives” in Cape Town’s mainstream Muslim community, like Ebrahim Rasool, the ANC provincial leader. The aim has been to build unity under the MJC’s leadership, according to Paton. “We have seen the emergence of an activist-orientated MJC, who understood that the ulama (religious leaders) needed to give leadership theologically and socially or that space would be taken by extremists,” said Rasool.
“When Pagad emerged, it adopted similar approaches to those of Qibla,” said Paton. “As the ulama moved to isolate Pagad, and the state began cracking down on Pagad’s G-force - cells of underground extremists - Rasool dealt Pagad another blow. At a secret meeting at the Waterfront in early 1999, he gathered 50 Muslim leaders together and persuaded them to preach a joint sermon condemning Pagad. This meeting signalled Pagad’s end.”
I'm seeing this smug, almost overtly pro-Communist statement more and more lately.
More on the convergence between far-left radicalism and Muslim extremism.
And why should they? They have nothing in common with a developed country like the U.S. At the breath taking rate that they’re transgressing through time in terms of development, I’m sure that when posed with a choice of the two sides, they would clearly identify with the stone age taliban.
But lacking has been much in the way of moral or political support for the war
Indeed! Peculiarly absent from out coalition is the presence of the mighty South African Army and the moral support of their wonderful people that we as Americans so desperately crave. Give me a break. These idiots better wake up and realize who needs who here. No one rattles the tin cup like the South Africans.
Owl_Eagle
”Guns Before Butter.”
Of course they're Communist, that is their justification to seize the productive capacity of the nation which they did nothing to create. Their rude wakeup will be to see how quickly they regress into a third world nation status which is how they are now conducting themselves.
Who cares what these losers think or say? They can't even keep their infra-structure running. What harm or help could they possibly provide?
This is a clarification that should be asked of the muslims in America.
If you lie when you take the oath to become a citizen, can your citizenship be revoked? Does anyone know?
One vlook at Islamic countries answers that question.... Where would you want vto live???
I intend to make sure, for the sake of my children, that they do not succeed.
It is important to realize that when they are confronted with irrefutable history (documents) their only recourse is emotionalism...rabble-rousing. This may give them a momentary advantage but it is quickly exhausted, then people begin to ask...OK, what happened? What happened is documented...the causes, the effects...this causes people to JUDGE on reality.
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