I am re-editing the article at the moment, some parts might be not in a flow.
The death of Marwa al-Sherbini, who was stabbed in a German appeal court for being a Muslim has sparked international debatd on whether Europeans are islamophobic?
Nesrine Malik defends Europeans in a piece in the Guardian, she says that the incident should not be blown at of proportion. She says that the murderer was a right-wing extremists and is as much in the minority as Muslim extremists.
A 32-year-old Egyptian woman named Marwa al-Sherbini was fatally stabbed to death in a court in Dresden, Germany, the BBC reports.
Before the incident happened, Ms Sherbini had been giving evidence against her killer, Alex W during an appeal hearing, as he insulted on her religion and called her “terrorist”.
Alex W, 28, was reportedly a Russian man with a deep hatred of Muslims.
On the appeal hearing day, he leapt across the courtroom, and stabbed Ms Sherbini 18 times in front of her husband and her son, the BBC has learnt.
The killing has sparked anger in Egypt and the Arab world.
The Egyptian media expressed their outrage, asking how the incident was allowed to happen, and dubbed Ms Sherbini “the martyr of the Hijab”, in reference to her Islamic headscarf.
The BBC said the German government was criticised for its muted reaction by Egyptians.
However, German government spokesman Thomas Steg defended the government’s reaction, saying Germany had “not been silent”, and the early details about the case had not been sufficiently clear for “spontaneous reaction”.
He added: “This is an abhorrent deed, one that has left us all dismayed and shocked.”
Mr Steg went on saying the Chancellor Merkel would discuss the incident with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak during G8 summit in Italy.
Amr Moussa, the Egyptian Secretary-General of the Arab League, called the incident a “totally unjustified hate crime”, according to the BBC.
However, even the anger over the killing is understandable, but are Muslims right to say they are targeted in Europe? Nesrine Malik, a Sudanese-born writer and commentator wrote to the Guardian on 7 July.
She asked “Is Europe really Islamophobic?”
She wrote the outcry has sparked calls for severing links with Germany, and the murder was committed by a reported neo-Nazi in the country.
However, this fact does little to temper a perception that Muslims are the targets of racial hatred.
The Arab world even declares a “world hijab day” to honour Marwa’s memory.
An article for the Huffington Post on 6 July, called “European Islamophobia a Creeping Threat: Alaysis”.
Firas al-Atraqchi, the author states “given the racism many Muslims endure in Europe, the murder of an Egyptian woman because she wore a hijab should not be dismissed as the act of a lone man who many are now calling insane”.
Firas went on saying “today, Muslims in Europe are seen as existing outside of a democratic culture”, and for centuries “Islam was rejected as a fundamental religion and seen as a direct challenge to Christianity”.
According to Nesrine Malik, the sensationalist coverage of Muslims and their perpetrated crimes contributed to a creeping normalisation of language and discourse.
Both of them may spill over into xenophobic incidents where Islamophobia servers as a vehicle for racism.
When moral/economic/social panic comes, people are looking for someone to blame and apparently, Muslims are sometimes seen as a viable option.
However, Nesrine argues it is too exaggerated to create an image of comprehensive, conspiratorial, and institutional discrimination against Muslims in Europe.
Muslims, includes herself, constantly protest the actions of a few extremists that should not be allowed to denigrate Islam and its adherents as a whole.
Unfortunately, this is exactly what Muslims are doing for themselves in connection with Europeans and the actions of Axel W, Nesrine commented.
More ironically, Nesrine went on saying Marwa al-Sherbini was stabbed in the court appealing against Axel W’s insult on her.
The German authority was clearly not complacent about the incident, and it is the court’s earlier verdict that provoked the attacker’s wrath.
From the incident, Ms Sherbini was empowered enough to bring a case against Axel W and received official support in doing so.
The Muslim row was also triggered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who publicly spoke out against Muslim women wearing of the burka, reported on the BBC in June.
No comments:
Post a Comment