Hindu Nationalism Popular at both ends of US Politics
By Francesca Chubb-Confer and Andrew Kunze|
JUNE 29, Last week, American journalists reported on Indian
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's extravagant Washington
welcome by the Biden administration with fascination,
bemusement, and concern. The New York Times reported on the
guest list for the state dinner, as well as Modi's
participation in a yoga session at the United Nations.
Others focused on the prospect of a US-Indian alliance in
opposition to China. However, there's a far more complex
story to be told here about the religious dimensions of the
Modi-Biden (and by extension, India-US) relationship. This
is a story that demands attention from scholars of American
religions, Hinduism, and Islam, traditions not often
considered together but whose mutual imbrications have
shaped one another historically and ever more so today. The
globalized religious politics swirling around the Modi state
visit in particular and US-India relations more generally
have generated troubling connections between two strains of
right-wing extremists: white Christian nationalism and Hindu
nationalism, or Hindutva, of which Modi's Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP) government is the leading proponent. A
fundamental stance that both defines these groups and brings
them together is their virulent Islamophobia.
Thus, an unsettling contradiction around the Modi visit
occasionally cropped up in the coverage: how could Biden,
who pledged to re-center human rights in American foreign
policy, give such a lavish and legitimizing embrace to Modi,
whose Hindu Nationalist politics and record of anti-Muslim
violence led to his ban from the US in 2005? Modi's
increasingly authoritarian crackdowns on freedom of speech
and the press have human rights watchdogs deeply concerned
about the future of democracy in India. At least some
members of Congress boycotted Modi's speech to the special
joint session on the basis of these concerns. As Maya
Jasanoff, professor of history at Harvard, put it in a
recent op-ed, "armed with a sharp-edged doctrine of Hindu
nationalism, Mr. Modi has presided over the nation's
broadest assault on democracy, civil society, and minority
rights in at least 40 years."
While the Biden administration is eager to demonstrate its
distance from Trump-era policies in some ways, its
solicitation of Modi is not among them. Consider American
media coverage of an event called "Howdy, Modi!" in Houston,
Texas, a joint political rally for Trump and Modi in the
run-up to the 2020 presidential election. American
journalists told a fascinating, if straightforward story:
nationalists of a feather fly together. Trump and Modi
filled a stadium with a 50,000-person crowd of mostly South
Asian Americans and their thunderous applause. The scene
encapsulated how much a supremacist project like Trump's
white Christian nationalism and Modi's Hindutva, or
masculine Hindu nationalism, had in common.
In the post-9/11 era, the specter of terrorism has been
leveraged by Republicans and Democrats alike to pass
damaging policies like Trump's infamous "Muslim Ban,"
"Countering Violent Extremism" or CVE programs, and
continued violence overseas towards Muslim communities
caught at the wrong end of American empire. In India,
similar approaches have seriously escalated in the past few
years, from an amendment essentially creating a religious
test for Indian citizenship, to vigilante violence in the
name of "cow protection" or preventing "love jihad," to
bulldozing Muslim homes and businesses, to literally erasing
India's Muslim history from school textbooks. In neither the
US nor India is Islamophobic rhetoric purely
rhetorical—it results in very real, and in India often
quite public, violence. The threat of anti-Muslim genocide
in India has been identified as increasingly likely.
This kind of dangerous rhetoric is hardly limited to India,
either—last year, anti-Muslim symbols appeared at a
community parade in Edison, New Jersey, and violence broke
out between Hindu and Muslim communities in Leicester,
England. Around the global Hindu diaspora, there is
widespread support for Hindutva (lit. "Hindu-ness"), the
political ideology of India as essentially and eternally a
Hindu nation, to the exclusion of other religions, mostly
(but not exclusively) Islam. This should not surprise
scholars of religion and globalization. Religious
diasporas—Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist—very
often become strong supporters of religious nationalism back
in the homeland, usually nostalgically romanticized as a
place where traditions are dominant and pure. In the last
decade, the South Asian population in the US has grown to
about three million, or one percent of the country's
population. At the same time, Hindu Americans (not to be
conflated with South Asian Americans) have become key
economic, political, and religious supporters for Hindutva
in India.
American liberals, including Biden Democrats, may
unwittingly support such diasporic religious nationalism.
American multicultural approaches to religious diversity,
popular among liberals, can often platform Hindu nationalist
sympathizers. The sociologist of religion Prema Kurien has
argued that American multiculturalism expects each culture
or religion to put forward spokesmen (and they usually are
men) to represent their perspective. The trouble is, of
course, that all religions contain tremendous internal
diversity, and Hinduism particularly so, with no founder,
single scripture or text, single deity, or so forth.
However, American public discourse is allergic to nuance,
and "model minority" politics still runs amok. So even
well-intentioned advocates of multiculturalism seek a
figurehead for American Hindus, which amplifies the voices
of Hindu Nationalists and their religious sympathizers, the
main group attempting to unify and standardize Hinduism
globally. The embrace of Hindu identity as grounds for
activism by Hindutva groups in the US can contribute to a
sense of pride and belonging for Hindu Americans in a
culture often hostile to non-Christian faiths, but at the
cost of promoting violence against religious minorities in
South Asia and beyond.
Modi's rhetoric during his White House visit gestured toward
this affinity with an anti-colonial veneer. He celebrated in
his speech to Congress that India, for the first time in one
thousand years, was free of "foreign rule." The reference
here was not only to British imperialism, whose presence in
the subcontinent in the form of the East India Company began
in the mid-eighteenth century, but to the Mughal Empire and
the Delhi Sultanate, Islamic empires that ruled over swaths
of South Asia from the thirteenth to the mid-nineteenth
centuries. The phrase "foreign rule" does a lot of work
here: conflating a post-colonial critique with a common
Islamophobic trope in India that understands Indian Muslims
as "foreign" (i.e., with origins and sympathies lying
outside of and against the Indian state), and oppressive
(i.e., a threat to Hindus). This kind of religious
chauvinism masquerading as anti-colonial advocacy has
unfortunately gained traction to a certain extent in the US,
with "Hinduphobia" claimed as a response to activists
working for Dalit rights (those outside of the caste
system), women's, and queer rights among North American and
global Hindus. Even a recent academic conference on Hindu
nationalism was targeted for harassment and subjected to
violent threats.
Support for Hindu nationalism is widespread in the western
diaspora, which both ends of the American political spectrum
enable, in their own ways. The Trump Republicans get there
through Islamophobic nationalism, and Biden Democrats get
there through multiculturalism and diplomacy. From a
religious studies perspective, we should not be surprised
when globalization creates strange religio-political
bedfellows.
Editorial
Yazidis and BBC
Analysis by
Kaukab Siddique, PhD
BBC is usually quite strict in its reporting on events in
the Muslim world.
However when it comes to stories about the Islamic State
(ISIS), BBC seems to indulge in blatantly fake reports which
simply abandon all standards of editorial honesty and kicks
out all levels of credibility.
The latest BBC blunder is about a Yazidi woman whose name,
supposedly, is Bahar. She claims that she was kept as a
slave by ISIS and beaten and raped.
Of course we are not told the name of the fighter who
enslaved her and where.
Bahar's story is based on "I believe", and "I remember..."
kind of terminology. No evidence at all.
Where did it happen? and then we are told a long story
about how she escaped. None of it is supported by any
evidence. It seems to be a copy of the old story about Iran,
"Not without my daughter" when Iran was the enemy.
How could BBC get away with this fairy tale?
One good and "easy" reason is that the Islamic State cannot
answer. It is constantly being bombed and raided by the
united air forces of the USA, Britain and the rest of NATO
plus Iran and Shia militias.. In fact the only paragraph in
the BBC story which sounds correct is that ISIS was
constantly being bombed but it is very brief.
The writer of this fairy tale is Rachel (Jew or Jewish?)
BBC does not remember that a couple of years back about
90,000 Yazidis were air lifted to Europe from Iraq.
Yazidis are not an oppressed minority. They are the most
westernized group in Iraq. They have cell phones and any one
of them could have used it to report the threats from ISIS.
Why did Yazidis not report their tragedy when it was
supposedly happening?
Last year BBC was claiming that ISIS is beheading people in
Mozambique till the government there itself stated that
nothing like that had happened.
Pakistan
Imam of Red Mosque attacked in Islamabad.
July 4
Government agents attacked Maulana Abdul Aziz when he was
driving to give the khutba in the Red Mosque.
He fought back but was injured as were his 2 security
guards. He is elderly and his glasses fell off in the fight.
The agents drew their guns but he drew his gun and shot
back, The agents fled.
[Maulana Abdul Aziz has considerable support in Islamabad
which worries the regime.
He is also supported by a large group of militant Islamic
women, the biggest in the country.]
The regime claims that he praised the TTP.
Jamaate Islami organized rallies in all cities to condemn
the desecration of the Qur'an. Also Opposed Israeli
Aggression in Occupied Palestine.
by Qaiser Sharif
The JI chief Sirajul Haq condemned the Israeli forces brutal
action and terrorism against Palestinian Muslims and
expressed solidarity with the Palestine freedom
movement.
In Pakistan, the protest rallies were taken out in Lahore,
Islamabad, Karachi, Quetta, Peshawar and other cities.
Thousands of people participated in the protest marches.
Holding banners and placards, they demanded action against
the person involved in a blasphemous act in Stockholm and
joint action by the Islamic world against the countries
where such criminals are allowed to hurt the feelings of the
Muslim world under government patronage.
JI Emir Sirajul Haq delivered a speech at Mansoorah and also
addressed a public gathering in Jhang. JI secretary general
Amirul Azeem led the protest march at Multan Chungi in front
of Mansoorah.
Sindh Emir Muhmmad Hussain Mehanti addressed the protest
march in Malir Karachi, Maulana Abdul Haq Hashmi in Quetta
and KP secretary general Abdul Wasay in Peshawar.
Haq called for the diplomatic and trade boycott of Sweden,
saying mere words uttered by the rulers in condemnation of
the burning of the Holy Quran were not enough to represent
the feelings of the Pakistani nation.
He demanded Islamabad convene an emergency meeting of the
OIC to devise a solid strategy against Islamophobia. He said
an organized campaign had been started against Islam and its
followers in Western countries after 9/11.
The hatemongers and psychological patients could put world
peace in danger if the Western government failed to stop
them, he warned, saying two billion Muslims could not bear
the disrespect of their most beloved personality, the Holy
Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), and the Holy Book.
The most unfortunate aspect of the Sweden incident, he said,
was that the Sweden authorities allowed a person to burn the
Quran under their protection.
The deal between Pakistan and the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) comes after months of delay and is still subject
to approval by the IMF board next month (Reuters). Pakistan
Awaits IMF Decision on $6 Billion Bailout
June 27, 2023The IMF mission chief in Islamabad applauded
Pakistan's efforts to bring its budget in line with
recommendations as high-level IMF and Pakistani government
officials hinted that a deal could be finalized soon
(AP).
WAR NEWS
Syria
America, Russia, Iran and Turkey are sending reinforcements
to their positions in Syria.
US forces have seized an oil well.
Bashar Assad's artillery shelled Islamic positions in Irbid
and Lattakia. They were responded by Islamic group Fathe
Mubeen using heavy weapons. Heavy casualties,
Turkish drones attacked SDF kurdish positions killing the
commander of the local Communist Kurdish groups.
Syrians supporting Turkey clashed with SDF in north central
Syria.
ISIS raiders attacked SDF in eastern and western Deir ex Zor
and Raqqah area. Number of casualties.
ISIS also attacked Bashar Assad troops and pro-Iranian
militia in various areas,
increasing crime and drug dealing in various areas.
Canada has accepted two pro-Isis women and their three
children who were in the refugee camp
[Source SOHR]
Iraq
189 Yazidis have returned to Sinjar from an Iraqi province,
[Iraq news]
ISIS positions developing in Kirkuk and Diyala
provinces,
PAKISTAN
Clashes with TTP continue.
6 killed on each side.
TTP is reported to have branched off into Baluchistan from
its bases in KP.
Iran
Mujahideen Sunnis attacked police station in Zahedan
[eastern Iran] killing an officer and several police,
Iran executed two ISIS who had attacked Shias in Shiraz last
year killing 13,
Ukraine
USA is sending bombs to help Ukraine which are considered
illegal in international law,
The war has reached 500 days.
Heavy fighting continues around Bachmut.
Long range Russian missiles have killed 7 civilians far away
from the battle area,
Jenin , Occupied Palestine
Latest Israeli War Crime against Defenseless People.
REUTERS
Dozens of Palestinians were injured in the air and missile
assault carried out by Israeli armed forces in the occupied
West Bank cities of Jenin and Al Bireh. / Photo: Reuters
The Palestinian Authority has decided to suspend all forms
of contact and security coordination with Israel after the
Israeli army raided the occupied West Bank city of Jenin.
"The Palestinian leadership decides to stop all contacts and
meetings with the Israeli side and to continue with halting
the security coordination in response to the Israeli
aggression on Jenin," said Palestinian presidency
spokesperson Nabil Abu Rudeineh following a meeting of the
Palestinian leadership in Ramallah on Monday.
He added that all recent understandings and commitments with
Israel reached at the Aqaba and Sharm El Sheikh meetings "no
longer exist."The meetings were held on Feb. 26 and March
19, respectively, to restore calm across the Palestinian
territories.
Earlier, Palestine condemned the Israeli military assault as
a "new war crime" against Palestinians."What the Israeli
occupation government is doing in the city of Jenin and its
camp is a new war crime against our defenceless people," Abu
Rudeineh said in a statement.
"The Palestinian people will not surrender or raise the
white flag, but will remain steadfast on their land in the
face of this brutal aggression until the occupation is
defeated and freedom is achieved," he added.
At least nine Palestinians were killed by Israeli army fire
early Monday, including eight in Jenin, according to the
Palestinian Health Ministry. At least 50 Palestinians were
also injured.
Abu Rudeineh said "crimes" committed by Israel and settlers
"will not achieve security and stability for them unless our
Palestinian people also feel them." He also called on the
international community "to break its shameful silence and
take serious action to compel Israel to stop its aggression
against our Palestinian people, and to hold it accountable
for all these crimes."
Guidance by Sis. Yasmin
Bismillah Walhamdulillah Was Salaatu Was
Salaam 'ala Rasulillah'
Bismillah Walhamdulillah Was Salaatu Was Salaam
'Ala Rasulillah.
As-Salaam Alaikum Wa-Rahmatullahi Wa-Barakatuhu.
Abû Bakr Al-Siddîq (Radiallahu 'Anhu) to 'Umar (Radiallahu
'Anhu) on his Deathbed .
When Abû Bakr Al-Siddîq (Radiallahu'Anhu) was on his
deathbed he called 'Umar (Radiallahu 'Anhu)
[Allah be pleased with them both] and said.... Fear Allah O
'Umar, and know that Allah has deeds to be done for Him in
the day which He will not accept if done at night ! and He
has deeds to be done for Him at night which He will not
accept if done during the day !
He will not accept extra (Nâfilah) deeds unless you fulfill
the obligatory deeds.
The scales of those whose scales will be weighty on the Day
of Resurrection will only be weighty because they followed
the truth in this life and it was weighty to them.
And scales in which the truth will be placed tomorrow truly
deserve to be heavy.
And the scales of those whose scales will be light on the
Day of Resurrection will only be light because they followed
falsehood in this life and it was a light matter to them
!
And scales in which falsehood will be placed tomorrow truly
deserve to be light !
Allah the Exalted has mentioned the people of Paradise and
mentioned them in the context of their Best Deeds, and
overlooked their evil deeds ! so when I remember them I say
to myself...
I fear that I will not be included with them !
And Allah the Exalted has mentioned the people of Hell and
mentioned them in the context of their worst deeds and
rejected their best deeds, so when I remember them I
say....
I hope I won't be amongst them !
Allah's worshipers should always be in a state of hope and
fear. they shouldn't wish flimsy wishes about Allah and
neither should they despair of Allah's Mercy.
If you keep to this advice of mine, no one who is not with
you now should be more beloved to you than DEATH !
and... it is sure to come to you !
But.... if you disregard this advice, no one who is not with
you now should be more hated to you than DEATH !
and you cannot escape it.
{Subhan Allah}
~MY 'SALAAMS' TO ALL ~
~Y a s m i n. ~
****************************************
"Never Despair Of The Mercy Of Allah"
********************************************
' Son of Adam! you are nothing but a number of days,
whenever each day passes then part of you has Gone.
{Al-Hasan Al-Basree (r)}
Hadith of the Week
Honesty, Honor, and Trust. No to Slavery.
Narrated by Abu
Huraira, r.a.:
The Prophet said:
"Allah said, 'I will be an opponent to three types of people
on the Day of Resurrection:
One who makes a covenant in My Name, but proves
treacherous;
One who sells a free person and eats
his price; and
One who employs a laborer and takes full work from him but
does not pay him for his labor."
n a previous New Trend, you stated that the Bible has been
altered with pornographic stories.
I remember a former co-worker announcing this and hearing
some dissension in the workplace over her comment.
Then, I heard a snippet of Leonard Cohen's song,
"Hallelujah," in the movie Shrek. When I heard the full
version of "Hallelujah" I was shocked that this song was
allowed to be a part of a children's animated movie
soundtrack.
The song recounts sexual experiences from the Bible. I
thought how typical it was for a Zionist Jew to write such
filth.
But, recently, I heard a minister, giving a motivational
speech, using King David (pbuh) and his sexual encounter
with Bathsheba bathing on a roof (astaghfirullah).
There were lyrics in the song pertaining to that encounter,
as well as Samson and Delilah's.
Leonard Cohen was definitely a sexualized creature who had
been accused of publishing explicit works but, it was
interesting for me to realize that the song Hallelujah's
sexual overtones were actually based on Biblical
stories.
Germany
Book Review
Why did Germany not surrender despite overwhelming odds or
why did the people not turn against the rulers?
By Kaukab Siddique, PhD
Eva Braun
by Heike B. Goertimaker
Translated from German by Damion Searls
325 pages,
40 photographs
published by Alfred A, Knopf in 2011
David Irving has written about the bombing of German cities,
American air fleets by day, British by night/ bombed
Germany. Entire German cities were literally incinerated.
Dresden was destroyed though it was an undefended "open"
city.
All German cities were bombed with horrific destruction in
Hamburg, Nuremburg, Aachen and many others, Churches,
libraries, bakeries, community centers were prime targets
after the military targets had been hit.
The German air force put up a brave fight and shot down
scores of bombers.
After the German air force had been seriously depleted and
then completely wiped out, German civilians were prime and
easy targets,
The bombing went on day after day and often several times a
day. Hundreds of thousands of women and children were killed
by the bombers. Churchill's Jewish adviser had told him that
if you slaughter masses of German civilians, Germany would
crumble and curse Hitler
. Nothing like that happened. Only Muslims can equal these
examples of sacrifice [like the Muslims who did not give up
in Guantanamo Bay.]
The living conditions in Germany were seriously impaired but
the women of Germany did not flinch. Not one woman ever
betrayed Hitler and the leaders with him. The women behaved
as if nothing could stop them from standing up for Germany
or for the Fuhrer.
Among them were great women like Eva Braun and Magda
Goebbels and millions of others. Eva Braun was even greater
than all the others.
This book was very difficult for Heike to write because Eva
was a
very private person and had taken detailed measures to make
sure that the enemies of Germany would not find out about
her life with Hitler.
After the defeat of Germany, the victors carried out what
was called a "denazification" process which meant that any
German who had contacts with Hitler and the leaders of
Germany were treated as criminals and the process went into
the lowermost households of Germany.
As a result after the war most Germans pretended to hate
Hitler and to have had nothing to do with him. As a natural
process they could not admit they had any information about
Eva, the woman who loved Hitler.
The author had to find ways of infiltrating the
denazification process.
In the meantime, the media of the victors started the
narrative that German women were very passive and totally
under the control of males. Eva Braun was seen as a lower
class helpless woman available to Hitler at his whims.
Slowly but certainly our author Heike upturned the hidden
sources and did a realistic report about Eva.
The greatest difficulty was that a top supporter of Hitler,
Albert Speer, avoided execution by convincing the victors
that he had genuinely turned against Hitler.
He still got 12 years in jail and wrote two books which have
valuable information in them but he wrote it as if he really
was against Hitler and of course knew nothing of Eva Braun
and her relations with Hitler.
Our author has done a good job of debunking Speer.
Our author found out that Eva loved Hitler with an
incredible passion and never missed an opportunity to be
with him. Much of Hitler's life, it seems, was influenced
by Eva though he hid it to avoid scandals,
At the end of the war, she died with Hitler. What is
astonishing is that she had the opportunity to leave when
the Soviets had just about encircled Berlin. She left to
take care of her relatives and then CAME BACK to the
crumbling city and calmly gave her life with him.
The author is very hostile to Eva but honest enough to
provide the information she found. Perhaps the author simply
wanted to prove that German women were as "bad" as German
men.
The author does admit that she could not find any
information on the Holocaust from the information Eva had.
If the woman closest to Hitler and included over the years
in his private life could not get any indications on the
Holocaust story It is difficult to believe that it is not a
hoax.
In the history part of this book, there is a report about
two Communist-Jewish governments which were established in
Munich before Hitler rose to power. These two governments
were scandalous and were despised by the German people and
helped Germany to decide that the Communist-Jewish mix were
the enemies of Germany.
[In the reporting provided by David Irving about Goebbels,
we see that Communists were active in the German streets
before Hitler's victory and also controlled the police and
the courts who punished and fought Hitler's supporters and
sent him to prison.]
China
Systematic campaign
Since about 2017, up to 16,000 mosques, or roughly 65%, of
all mosques have been destroyed or damaged as a result of
government policies, according to the Uyghur Human Rights
Project, a U.S.-based activist group.
Other mosques have been closed but left standing, and a few
famous ones remain open but under surveillance.
The moves are part of a larger campaign of repression to
erase Uyghur religious practices culture, along with the
arbitrary detention of an estimated 1.8 million Uyghurs and
other Turkic minorities in internment centers and
prisons.
In May 2022, when Michelle Bachelet, former U.N. high
commissioner for human rights, visited the mosque, the imam,
Memet Jume, told her that the facility was open for normal
religious activities, even though it was not.
When asked why there were so few worshipers in the mosque,
he said that the faithful were busy with their work and that
some had changed their viewpoints.
Residential committees paid Uyghurs to perform a dance
outside the mosque in an apparent bid to show that all was
well ahead of Bachelet's visit.
Bachelet's office issued a report in August 2022 documenting
cases of torture, forced labor and other severe rights
abuses against Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities.
For years now, foreign visitors have noticed the absence of
prayers inside the Id Kah Mosque. One of them posted a
travel blog on YouTube, showing thousands of worshippers
praying in the mosque between 2011 and 2016, but then an
empty holy place in 2019.
Turghunjan Alawudin, a vice chairman of the executive
committee of the World Uyghur Congress, said under Islam, it
was never permissible to take money from those who enter a
mosque, including tourists.
"If the tourists say they will donate to the mosque, they
will," he told RFA. "A mosque is only a place to worship
Allah."
"Therefore, it is completely fraudulent to say that we made
half of the mosque a picnic ground and the other half a
prayer ground," he added.
Translated by RFA Uyghur. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and
Malcolm Foster.
INSIDE AMERICA
July 8.
Extensive program on NEWSMAX about Harvey Weinstein.
He was the most powerful [Jewish} man in Hollywood and
molested or raped every young woman who wanted to be an
actress. It was very difficult to bring charges because he
had the most expensive lawyers,
Finally two women brought charges and over the years 100
women supported the two. [Known as the ME2 movement]
It seemed impossible to find him guilty. After 5 days of
jury meetings he was declared guilty but still got only 20
years.
The extensive report claimed that there are many like him.
Then homo men started doing it to homo men. That is just
coming out, the report says,