The Chronikler

Though Muslims don't need minarets to worship, the Swiss vote to ban them is a troubling sign of mounting intolerance.

Alongside the crescent, the minaret is one of the most instantly recognisable symbols of Islam. However, it's only functional purpose – to call worshippers to pray – has, in the modern age, become obsolete. And even then, it is not absolutely necessary, as attested to by the earliest mosques which did not have minarets.

That is why, at face value, the Swiss referendum on whether to ban minarets, especially since there are only four of them in the entire country, as Tariq Ramadan points out, seems superficial and pointless. In fact, when my wife first heard the news she wondered whether the Swiss didn't have anything more important to go to the ballot box for.

Preposterous as the whole campaign is, especially given that Zurich's oldest minaret is so much a part of the cityscape that most passers-by don't even notice it, it does carry certain ominous undertones.

Although mosques don't need minarets to function and Muslims don't need them to worship, the Swiss decision – by a majority of 57% – to ban their construction carries enormous symbolic significance. Ironically, it even came on the weekend in which Muslims were celebrating one of their holiest festivals, Eid al-Adha.

To be clear, Muslims in Switzerland are still legally entitled to practise their faith. However, the message this vote sends is one that undermines the principle of religious freedom. The Swiss are effectively saying that, even if Muslims have the legal right to gather together for communal prayer, mainstream society wants them to be invisible.

In addition, one can't help thinking that for one of the main sponsors of the referendum, the far-right and populist Swiss People's Party (SVP), the heart of the issue is not so much minarets, but Muslims themselves. If it were up to them, I suspect, they would much rather ban Islam than minarets – but fortunately the law would never allow them to organise such a vote and Swiss voters don't fear Muslims enough to go that far – judging by some of the statements members of the party made in the run-up to the vote.

For example, the SVP's Ulrich Schlüer described the minaret as "a symbol of political power, a prelude to the introduction of sharia law". In this, the SVP is like far-right parties across Europe who subscribe to the preposterous notion of the imminent emergence of a "Eurabia", a myth I've deconstructed before.

As a sign of the deeper hatred upon which this ban is built – and a foretaste of things to come if we do not address the issue of intercommunal relations in Europe urgently – anti-Muslim politicians in other parts of Europe are already jumping on the Swiss bandwagon.

The party of the infamous Geert Wilders – who has already called unsuccessfully for the banning of the Qur'an – has demanded a similar referendum to be carried out in the Netherlands.

Mario Borghezio of Italy's Northern League also called for a vote in Italy, surreally suggesting that: "The flag of a courageous Switzerland which wants to remain Christian is flying over a near-Islamised Europe."

Unsurprisingly, the Swiss decision has not gone down well in Arab and Muslim countries. But I offer a similar observation to the one I made at the time of the German hijab murder controversy: troubling and Islamophobic as this vote is, millions of Swiss and other Europeans also find it reprehensible. In addition, it is not a sign that European Muslims are being persecuted. In fact, the Muslim minority in most of Europe enjoys more freedom of faith and conscience than minorities in many Muslim countries.

Nevertheless, the vote does fill me with foreboding. If matters are left unchecked, then European Muslims could well one day, become an oppressed or persecuted minority, and the artificial divide between western and Muslim countries could widen until it becomes an unbridgeable chasm.

We like to take pride in the fact that we live in the most tolerant times ever. But there were periods in Europe's history where Christianity and Islam actually may have co-existed more harmoniously than they do today. An interesting example of this was Sicily, under both Arab and Norman rule.

On the eve of the Swiss minaret referendum, our son, who is of mixed Arab and European background, was born. Although we are sceptical of religion, intend to give him a secular upbringing and let the choice of belief system be his when he comes of age, I hope that by the time Iskander is an adult, he will be able to live comfortably and proudly with his multicultural heritage and not be discriminated against because of it.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 1 December 2009. Read the related discussion.

While justice can never resurrect the fallen, it can lay them to rest in dignity and help their loved ones better come to terms with their loss.

In the case of Marwa al-Sherbini, the 31-year-old Egyptian pharmacist who was brutally murdered in a German courtroom this summer, the life sentence handed down by a Dresden court to her racist murderer should help ease tensions surrounding the case, which seems to have been hijacked for political point scoring.

First, let me be clear. This was an ugly and disgusting crime and caused the untimely death of an intelligent mother whose loss has undoubtedly left a huge hole in the lives of her husband and her three-year-old son. Her murderer, Alexander (or Axel) Wiens, a 28-year-old German of Russian origin, was certainly a racist and Islamophobe of the first order whose blind, irrational hatred of Muslims is frighteningly common in far-right circles.

But it was the extent and fury of the reaction in Egypt that astounded me. Although it is understandable that public sympathy for al-Sherbini – whose story is set to be turned into a film – and a certain amount of anger would pour out, I was shocked by the fact that she became popularly known as "the martyr of terrorism" and her case was used by some to claim that European Muslims were a "persecuted" minority and Europe was irredeemably Islamophobic.

Rising anti-German sentiment in Egypt even led to calls for sanctions against Germany. For example, the Egyptian Pharmacists' Association, of which al-Sherbini was a member, unfairly called for a boycott of German drugs.

While this over-reaction probably has some roots in the very real discrimination some Muslims face in Europe and the popular anger at US-led western intervention in places like Iraq, and the heavy human toll this has inflicted, Egyptians should not have allowed the actions of a tiny minority to lead them to make unfair generalisations.

As fellow Cif commentator Nesrine Malik said at the time: "Muslims (me included) constantly protest that the actions of a few extremists should not be allowed to denigrate Islam and its adherents as a whole – but this is exactly what they are doing themselves in connection with Europeans and the actions of Axel W."

At the time of the murder, I was struck by the ironic parallel between the one-sided self-righteous indignation being expressed by some conservative Egyptian Muslims and the almost identical brand of righteous anger targeted at Muslims by the European far right.

For example, many Egyptians pointed to western prejudice against the hijab and how it was prohibited in government institutions by some European states, such as France, as examples of this alleged persecution. "But what about Muslim prejudice against bare heads?" I asked in an article at the time. "In the interest of fairness, why aren't more Muslims openly outraged by attempts to force women to wear the headscarf against their will, as in Saudi Arabia?"

In Egypt, few protests are raised when the mutaween, the Saudi morality police, routinely arrest and beat Saudi women who are out alone or not wearing a headscarf. In an extreme manifestation of their puritanical attitude, they even caused, in 2002, the death of 15 schoolgirls who were not allowed to flee a burning building because they were not dressed in decent Islamic fashion.

In addition, while European Muslims can and do face discrimination, this Egyptian criticism overlooks the fact that Muslims often have more freedom of conscience in Europe than they do in Egypt, and that non-Muslims can also be the victims of enormous prejudice in Egypt.

Copts have to deal with a lot of unofficial and even some institutionalised discrimination in Egypt, as I highlighted in a recent article.

On hearing that the German courts had given the murderer the stiffest possible sentence – life, without eligibility for early release – my first reaction was that this should help restore shaken confidence, though there have been some complaints that the sentence was too lenient.

Some of the people interviewed on al-Jazeera last night and posting on newspaper message boards today expressed the view that Wiens should have been tried in Egypt and sentenced to death. They are obviously unaware of European laws banning the extradition of suspects to countries where they may face capital punishment.

But the verdict has generally gone down well. For instance, Egypt's ambassador to Germany welcomed the court's ruling, while the independent al-Dostour newspaper called it a "victory for justice". This should demonstrate to the doubters that, though there may be racist and Islamophobic Germans and Europeans, discrimination against Muslims is not universal nor is it generally institutionalised.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 12 November 2009. Read the related discussion.

Muslims in Europe are secretly amassing an arsenal of the deadliest in biological weaponry: the demographic time bomb. The first phase of the Muslim invasion – or should I say reinvasion – of Europe has already begun with the deployment of an expeditionary force of womb-men: a fearsome army of mutant ninja warriors whose function is to go forth and multiply. Their turbo-charged and perhaps even genetically modified uteruses mass produce the deadly biological agent which is currently being stockpiled in Muslim homes across the continent.

And their mission: to create Eurabia – or, better said, since many European Muslims are not Arabs, to turn the EU into the European Umma. Having been driven out of Europe once and unable to reconquer it through force of arms, those crafty and cunning Muslims are back to do it through the Trojan horse of immigration and reproduction.

Some dismiss this demographic time bomb as being far-fetched and as fantastical as Saddam Hussein's non-existent arsenal of WMD, but yet another smoking gun has been found in the Netherlands. Troubling evidence has emerged that Muhammad has become the most popular boy's name in the country's four biggest cities. And a similar situation is emerging in other European urban centres.

In fact, five centuries after the reconquest of Granada, that last Muslim stronghold, Eurabia has established its first de facto capital in Rotterdam.

And when the number of Muhammads and other assorted Mohammedans become a majority over the coming century – as the great Bernard Lewis warned – they will form an army of mujahideen of Talibanesque horror which will subjugate the natives and make them live as second-class dhimmis under sharia law.

As far-fetched conspiracy theories go, the Eurabia myth is one of the most persistent and dangerous of recent years – and the Daily Telegraph fanned the controversy this month with its claims that it had carried out an investigation which revealed that the EU's Muslim population would jump from the current 4-5% to an improbable 20% by 2050.

The six-paragraph article gives no indication of how the projections were arrived at, nor the assumptions upon which they were based. In fact, as the BBC pointed out in a piece debunking a popular YouTube hit on 'Muslim Demographics', population projection is an inexact science. It cites, as an example, the projections made in the 1930s that the UK's population would fall to 20 million by the end of the 20th century.

Most projections that foresee a massive increase in Europe's Muslim population are based on certain assumptions which are hard to justify. They assume that recent immigration trends will continue indefinitely for decades to come, but this is unlikely as Europe continuously raises the immigration bar for non-EU citizens, and it is not far-fetched to expect that many European countries may call a halt to immigration or draw their future immigrants from certain more 'desirable' countries.

The projections also assume that European Muslims will continue to have a significantly higher fertility rate than the population at large. But evidence suggests that the fertility rates of Muslim women are gradually converging with those of the wider population. And there are signs that the fertility rate among the white population of some European countries, such as France, is recovering.

So, given that the only hard facts we can be sure of is that a small minority of about 4% of the EU's population is Muslim, why is this fear of a coming Eurabia so strong in certain quarters? Many of the biggest proponents of the Muslim demographic time bomb myth are cheerleaders of and apologists for US imperialism in the Middle East, such as Bat Y'eor and Bernard Lewis.

Some Europeans, particularly from conservative and Christian circles and the intolerant wing of liberalism, have fallen for the myth for a variety of reasons. One is the relatively rapid shift in western Europe towards multicultural, multi-ethnic and multi-religious societies in recent decades, which has caused a certain sense of alienation and insecurity, especially for those whose economic security has been undermined by neo-liberal economics and globalisation.

Other reasons are the massive lifestyle and social changes. These have caused distress for traditionalists and people who still identify themselves as Christian: they have seen their religion die a slow death, while Islam seems to go from strength to strength.

Then, there is the plain old fear stoked by the overexposure given to the most intolerant Islamic fringe groups and individuals. Certainly, there are some European Muslims who want to live according to sharia and there is even a lunatic fringe who would like to see Europe incorporated into some fantastical global caliphate.

But Muslims in Europe are not some unified, monolithic force. Not only are they ethnically diverse and from communities that are not the greatest fans of each other – consider the animosity between Moroccans and Algerians, for example – they are also as varied ideologically as the rest of the population.

Although Muslims tend to be more religious and conservative than the rest of society, there are also plenty of secular, non-practising, cultural and even non-believing Muslims. In addition, it is impossible to tell what kind of identities future European Muslims will have, but I suspect that the future cultural fault lines in Europe will not run along traditional religious lines, but will pit believers against non-believers, creating a kind unity of purpose between conservative Muslims and Christians intent on preserving faith in a 'Godless Europe'.

While Eurabia is a fantasy, Europe is almost certainly going to become more diverse in the future, and so a debate is worth having about how to adapt to this reality and what constitutes citizenship in an increasingly mobile world.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 21 August 2009. Read the related discussion.

In a series of recent articles, Brian Whitaker explored the role of Islam in Arab politics, the decline of secularism and what can be done to reinvigorate it. He describes how "the decline of Muslim secularism reflects the rise of Islamism and the more generalised religious revival that has swept across the Middle East since the 1960s".

I agree with the basic outline of this analysis, but would hazard to say that secularism is far from dead. It continues to make gains, albeit disguised for modesty's sake under an Islamic veil or pious beard.

In fact, there has been a trend over the past century which has seen many Muslim societies go from thinly veiling their traditional Islamic character in modern western cultural clothes, to dressing up their internalised modernism and increasingly secular reality in a reassuring and personalised Islamic garb.

The Secular party (later known as al-Wafd or Delegation) Whitaker refers to in his article, which was established in the interwar years to guide the struggle for Egyptian independence, provides an interesting case in point. He observes that today no one "would be foolhardy enough to set up a political party with such a name or platform".

Perhaps many Arab and Muslim secularists, on the back foot, do shy away from an overtly secular label nowadays. But, with the exception of the Muslim Brotherhood, pretty much all the main parties in Egypt – left, right and centrist – are secular in nature.

However, the original Wafd and Egypt's experiment with 'liberal democracy', viewed from nearly a century on, represent a deceptive mirage of modernity and secularism. The Wafd, and most of the other parties, were aristocratic and elitist in nature and had little connection with common people, while the Egyptian parliament was more like a 'salon democracy' because its power was massively curtailed by the British, on the one side, and the king, on the other.

In fact, most of the politicians of the time who enjoyed democratic or popular appeal were exiled by the British to places such as Malta or Ceylon, or were sidelined or removed through palace intrigues. Nevertheless, many Egyptians, inspired by the Europhile thinkers of the so-called Egyptian renaissance, continued to believe in the liberating possibilities of democracy and secularism. The failure of this toothless democratic experiment to empower the Egyptian people planted the seedsofa widespread cynicism: today, these abstractions are seen as little more than hollow words bandied about by imperial powers or self-serving political elites.

Despite these inauspicious beginnings, modern secularism was to see its star soar in the 1950s and 1960s before it began to fizzle out in the late 1970s. Egypt's revolutionary president Gamal Abdel Nasser did more than any other person both to give Arab secularism mass appeal and sow the seeds of its demise. His personal charisma, progressive ideas, unwavering belief in modernity and desire for social justice propelled socialism and secularism out of the wings of Egyptian and Arab politics and straight on to centre stage.

However, his and his successors' failure to hand over power to the people, their corruption, their failure to deliver on their promises and their ruthless persecution of the secular opposition empowered the Islamists and wonthem many converts, especially following the crushing defeat of 1967. In addition, despite being aggressively secular, the post-revolutionary Egyptian regime preferred to ignore or repress, rather than challenge, the ideas of the Islamic reactionary rearguard, which gave Islamists a powerful weapon.

Although the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups have, since the late 1970s, Islamised the political landscape, they have also been secularised by the die-hard socialists and liberals who refused to roll over. In addition, the secular ideas of the past few decades have put down deep roots in society that the Islamists are incapable of reversing.

The more progressive wing of the Brotherhood is gradually evolving into something akin to the Christian Democrat tradition in Europe: conservative and culturally Islamic, but increasingly pluralistic. A small sign of the changing times is that the Brotherhood not only takes the presence of women in the public arena more or less for granted, something it was once adamantly opposed to, it even fields some female candidates in parliamentary elections.

There are growing signs that the appeal of Islamism is on the wane, as Egyptians realise that the Muslim Brotherhood, beyond declaring that the Quran is their "constitution" and "Islam is the solution", have no real political programme of their own. In addition, the ugly reality of the modern theocracies and their failure to revive the 'golden age' of Islam are shattering many people's illusions about political Islam.

The struggle between 'secularism' and 'Islamism', which is almost as old as Islam itself, has been a long and bitter one, and has revolved around challenging the omnipotent temporal power of the caliph, sultan, king or president from the clashing vantage point of rationality and faith.

This conflict's modern vestige was personifed memorably by the Egyptian Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz in his Cairo trilogy as the standoff between two radical brothers, Ahmed (the communist) and Abdel-Moneim (the Muslim Brother), both of whom wind up in jail for opposing the tyranny of the status quo.

In my next piece, I will consider ways of advancing progressive secularism and overcoming the powerful "God veto" of religious conservatives.

This column appeared in The Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free section on 16 April 2009. Read the related discussion.