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Montreal Perspectives
By Jalaluddin S. Hussain
Campus activities - the heat and controversy
Montreal, the second largest city of
Canada,
after Toronto, can rightly be proud of its four big Universities,
two French: University of Montreal and University of Quebec and two
English: McGill University and Concordia University. These Universities,
as part of their regular curriculum, invite scholars, writers,
journalists and politicians, to speak on contemporary subjects of
concern to students and the general public. Sometimes these educational
institutions of high and scholarly repute, make sensational headlines
in the press because of the controversy surrounding the speakers.
This happened last year in the case of Israel Shamir, who, as an invitee
of the Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights
(SPHR)
organization, spoke on the highly controversial subject of
"Israel
as a
Zionist
state". At that time, his speech was violently protested by many Zionist
sympathizers who did their best to disrupt the meeting. However, thanks
to the disciplined attitude of the organizers and their effective crowd
control nothing untoward happened. The speech went on smoothly in spite
of the frequent provocations of the agents from Hillel and Bnai Brith
organizations.
Benjamin Netanyahu was not welcome!
In the case of Concordia, more recently, no less a person than the
former Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, who was also once
Israeli Consul General in Montreal, was invited by the Asper Foundation
to speak to the Concordia students and invited public. This Foundation
has been established by the Canadian Communication giant, Israel Asper,
owners of CanWest Global Communications. He also owns daily
The Gazette of Montreal. Strangely enough, this event was announced in
the press as a public meeting but the entry was through expensive
ticket and was supposed to be a highly restrictive and
scrupulously-screened affair. It may be recalled that Netanyahu, who was
a rival of Ariel Sharon in the last Likud Party and Israeli elections
(and most probably can be voted in once again as the next Prime Minister
of Israel), has openly expressed his weird opinion that Palestinians
in fact do not exist and therefore the question of establishing an
independent Palestinian state does not arise. He has all along resisted
the idea of two states, Israel and Palestine, coexisting side by side.
Instead, he has always been in favor of Eretz (Greater) Israel. When he
was Israeli Consul General in Montreal, he vigorously promoted the idea
of settling more and more Montreal Jews in the new Israeli settlements.
In short, by his words and deeds he has done everything to negate the
concept of a sovereign and viable Palestinian state. Instead he has
encouraged new settlements by driving our the Palestinians from their
ancestral lands.
It is fair to mention, however, that this time, except for a handful of
Zionists, most of the Jews of Montreal were also not ready to welcome
Netanyahu or to listen to him. Even before he came near the campus, the
demonstration against him became so intense that the
University and Montreal city authorities had to decide to cancel his
speech. Later, in a press conference, the former Prime Minister of Israel,
spoke bitterly against the "undemocratic" decision of the Concordia
authorities and lashed out his poisonous tongue against the Palestinian
sympathizers and the city Administration. However, to appear even-handed
the University Rector, Lowy declared a blanket 3 months moratorium on all
"Middle-East-related activities". By doing this he also canceled the
long-scheduled 12th September speech by Norman Finklestein, the famous
author of the book, The Holocaust Industry.
Student Union of Concordia against moratorium
Aaron Mate of the Concordia Student Union, himself Jewish, recently
wrote an article in daily The Gazette of Montreal ,opposing the 3
months moratorium. He thinks that even "three weeks later the situation
remains satisfactory for no one." Both the pro-Palestinian students and
the Pro-Israeli students think "you do not help a problem by suppressing
it. This only make things worse". The Concordia Students Union therefore
organized a big demonstration on Monday, September 30, in which hundreds
of University students and members of the public participated. About a
dozen speakers addressed the organized and the chanting demonstrators and
spoke against the moratorium. Majority of the students both Jewish and
non-Jewish are of the opinion that moratorium is against the democratic
spirit which institution of higher learning like Concordia should in fact
develop and foster. Considering the explosive situation in the
Middle East, it is feared that imposition of an artificial moratorium may
create even more problem than solving it.
While the Concordia students are demanding end of the moratorium and the
Zionists are suggesting to the Concordia administration to let Netanyahu
speak in the name of freedom of expression, Israel Asper the Zionist
owner of a number of Canadian newspapers, TV and radio stations under
the flagship of CanWest Global Communications and the initiator of the
Concordia trouble, in a recent hard-hitting denunciation of media
coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict charged that "much of the world
media have abandoned the fundamental precepts of honest reporting."
According to him, pervasive anti-Israel bias in the media is a cancer
that is destroying much of the media's credibility and eroding support
for the Jewish state.
Canadian Muslims suffering 9/11 backlash
In a September 11-related item, a Muslim student of Concordia, recently
wrote in the student newspaper of Concordia, The Link. Some of the
points covered by the writer were:
1. Thousands of Canadian Muslims live in an atmosphere of insecurity
prevalent after September 11, 2001, as a wave of Muslim- hate gripped
the North American continent;
2. Within two months of WTC/Pentagon attacks, more than 40 reported
cases of hate crime activities against the Arabs and South Asians,
were registered;
3. In the days after September 11, 2001 attack, a McGill Muslim medical
intern was grabbed by the throat choked, threatened and spat on in an
elevator by an unidentified assailant;
4. The Muslim Students Association (MSA) at Concordia has received over
two dozen reports from the students concerning incidents of discrimination
or harassment;
5. A recent Canada-wide survey conducted by
CAIR-CAN
(Council on American Islamic Relations - Canada) has revealed that 60 per
cent of Canadian Muslims have experienced harassment, discrimination
and other biases, after September 11, 2001.
There is no doubt that the fallout from the conflict between Israel and
Palestinians and from the US President Georg W. Bush's war on terrorism
threatens to undermine the progress made by Muslims and Jews in Montreal
to take a stable place in mainstream society. Bashar El-Solh President
of the Canadian Muslim forum recently emphasized that the society in
general is very much welcoming. He was of the view that he can envision
"generations of many backgrounds mingling in the their new identity as
Canadians." "Voices of Muslim Women", a report prepared in 2002 by
Samira Hussain on behalf of Canadian Council of Muslim Women, suggest some
of the following measures to alleviate some of the negative consequences
of 9/11:
1. Encourage young Muslims to follow non-traditional career paths and
become politicians, journalists, lawyers and public servants;
2. Encourage more and more Muslims to become involved in local voluntary
organizations;
3. Encourage networking outside the Muslim community;
4. Encourage the members of the Muslim community to be pro-active in the
political parties and lobby groups.
"Voltaire's Bastards "- appropriately reflects contemporary conditions
Recently, I read the paperback edition of John Ralston Saul's book
entitled Voltaire's Bastards - The Dictatorship of Reason in the West".
Saul is a great Canadian thinker and activist. He holds a Ph.d in history
from King's College, London and has written extensively about North Africa
and South East Asia. He also, incidentally, happens to be the husband of
our present Governor General, Adrienne Clarkson, who is a creative
writer and journalist in her own rights. Some of the interesting ideas of
Saul can be paraphrased as follows:
1. the exercise of power, without the moderating influence of any ethical
structure, rapidly became the religion of the new elite
(of Voltaire's time).
2. language - not money or force - provides legitimacy. So long as
military, political, religious or financial systems do not control
language the public's imagination can move about freely with its own
ideas. Uncontrolled words are consistently more dangerous to
established authority than armed forces.
3. a civilization unable to differentiate between illusion and reality
is usually believed to be at the tail-end of its existence. Our reality
is dominated by elites who have spent most of the last two centuries,
indeed of the last four centuries, in organizing society around answers
and structures designed to produce answers.
Voltaire's Bastards by Saul, has been rightly acclaimed internationally
by intellectuals writers and journalists all around the world.
Mary Pratt, the celebrated painter has commented on the book: A major
expose of power at the end of the 20th century in which he discusses the
failure of "reason" to create e a reasonable world. This book is worth
reading by all those who want to understand what lies behind
George Bush's obsession of "War on Terrorism". After killing the
thousands of innocent civilians in Afghanistan he plans to now kill
thousands in Iraq. What next? Perhaps, Iran, then Sudan and then, the
list goes on…Perhaps the American President has a Machiavellian adviser
in his team, and like Machiavelli believes, that when the question of
country's well being is the issue, "no consideration of justice or
injustice , of mercy or cruelty of honor or shame must be allowed to
enter at all". [J.S. Hussain's report ends here.]
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HRCP urges Bush to commute Kasi's sentence Updated on
11/2/2002 8:32:26 PM [The reference to "Arkansas" is an error. We hope
the appeal was not sent to Arkansas -- Editor]
QUETTA (APP): Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), Balochistan
Chapter, has appealed to President George Bush and Governor of American
State, Arkansas to commute the death sentence of Aimal Kasi to life
imprisonment or any other term. In a statement issued here Friday,
Vice Chairperson of Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, (HRCP),
Balochistan chapter, Malik Zahoor Ahmed Shahwani expressed the hope that
both the President and Governor would sympathetically consider their
appeal and commute the death sentence.
According to the statement, a court in Arkansas has convicted Aimal Kasi
in a firing case in June, 1997 and fixed November 14 as the date for
his execution.
http://frontierpost.com.pk
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2002-11-04 Mon 11:58ct