John L. Esposito: A Global War on
Christians in the Muslim World?
16 March 2012By Juan Cole
Religious minorities in the Muslim world today,
constitutionally entitled in many countries to
equality of citizenship and religious freedom,
increasingly fear the erosion of those rights — and
with good reason. Inter-religious and inter-communal
tensions and conflicts from Nigeria and Egypt and
Sudan, to Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh,
Malaysia and Indonesia have raised major concerns
about deteriorating rights and security for religious
minorities in Muslim countries. Conflicts have varied,
from acts of discrimination, to forms of violence
escalating to murder, and the destruction of villages,
churches and mosques.
In the 21st century, Muslims are strongly challenged
to move beyond older notions of "tolerance" or
"co-existence" to a higher level of religious
pluralism based on mutual understanding and respect.
Regrettably, a significant number of Muslims, like
many ultra conservative and fundamentalist Christians,
Jews and Hindus are not pluralistic but rather
strongly exclusivist in their attitudes toward other
faiths and even co-believers with whom they disagree.
Reform will not, however, result from exaggerated
claims and alarmist and incendiary language such as
that of Ayan Hirsi Ali in in a recent a Newsweek cover
story, reprinted in The Daily Beast.
Hirsi Ali warns of a "global war" and "rising
genocide," "a spontaneous expression of anti-Christian
animus by Muslims that transcends cultures, regions,
and ethnicities" and thus "the fate of Christianity —
and ultimately of all religious minorities — in the
Islamic world is at stake."
Hirsi Ali's account, for surely it is not an analysis,
mixes facts with fiction, distorting the nature and
magnitude of the problem. It fails to distinguish
between the acts of a dangerous and deadly minority of
religious extremists or fanatics and mainstream
society. The relevant data is readily available.
Nigeria is not a "majority-Muslim" country of 160
million people with a 40 percent Christian minority"
as she claims (and as do militant Islamists). Experts
have long described the population as roughly equal
and a recent Pew Forum study reports that Christians
hold a slight majority with 50.8 percent of the
population.
Boko Haram, is indeed a group of religious fanatics
who have terrorized and slaughtered Christians and
burned down their churches, but they remain an
extremist minority and do not represent the majority
of Nigerians who reject their actions and anti-Western
rhetoric. Gallup data finds that a majority of
Nigerians (60 percent) "reject the anti-Western
rhetoric" of Boko Haram.
Curiously, Hirsi Ali chooses not to mention that in
the Jos Central plateau area both Christian and Muslim
militias have attacked each other and destroyed
mosques and churches.
Another example of failing to provide the full facts
and context is the Maspero massacre. Coptic Christians
have a real set of grievances that have to be
addressed: attacks on churches, resulting in church
destruction and death and injuries, the failure of
police to respond to attacks, and a history of
discrimination when it comes to building new churches
and in employment.
Hirsi Ali rightly attributes the genesis for the
assault against Christians to the Egyptian security
forces. Although some militant Egyptian Muslims did in
fact join the violence against Christians, she
overlooks the fact that increasingly Christians have
been joined by many Muslim Egyptians in calling for
this discrimination and backlash to be addressed.
Thus, she fails to mention the many Muslims marched in
solidarity with the Christians against the security
forces and were also injured as a Reuters article
dated Oct. 14, 2011 reported: "At least 2,000 people
rallied in Cairo on Friday in a show of unity between
Muslims and Christians and to express anger at the
ruling military council after 25 people died when a
protest by Coptic Christians led to clashes with the
army."
She also fails to recognize the continuing state
violence in Egypt against activists and protestors
regardless of their faith.
Thousands of Muslims turned up in droves outside
churches around the country for the Coptic Christmas
Eve mass, in solidarity with a beleaguered Coptic
community offering their bodies, and lives, as "human
shields," making a pledge to collectively fight the
threat of Islamic militants and build an Egypt free
from sectarian strife: "Egypt's Muslims attend Coptic
Christmas mass, serving as "human shields."
Ali also points to the "flight" of Christians from the
Middle East as proof of widespread persecution.
According to Gallup surveys in Lebanon, however,
Muslims are slightly more likely than their Christian
counterparts to want to flee the country permanently
and for Muslim and Christian alike the reason they
give is primarily economic.
More problematic and deceptive is Hirsi Ali's charge
that: "What has often been described as a civil war is
in practice the Sudanese government's sustained
persecution of religious minorities. This persecution
culminated in the infamous genocide in Darfur that
began in 2003." Sudan has certainly been a
battleground for decades, but to say that Darfur is an
example of the Muslim-Christian genocide is flat out
wrong. The black African victims in Darfur were almost
exclusively Muslim. The killers were Arab Sudanese
Muslims (janjaweed) who murdered black Sudanese
Muslims.
Addressing the issue of religious freedom requires
greater global awareness and a concerted effort by
governments, religious leaders, academics and human
rights organizations, as well as curricula reform in
many seminary and university religion courses
(particularly comparative religion courses), to
counter religious exclusivism by instilling more
pluralistic and tolerant visions and values in the
next generation of imams, priests, scholars and the
general public. However, when lives are at stake and
the safety and security of all citizens threatened,
accurate and data driven analysis is crucial.
Inflammatory statements and unsubstantiated
generalizations exacerbate the problem, risk more
strife or even violence and do little to contribute to
finding a solution.
©
EsinIslam.Com
Add Comments