Anti-Islam

The German authorities have banned the carrying of posters that had cartoons insulting the Prophet Muhammad at the Leipzig rally organized by the fanatical anti-Islam PEGIDA movement.

Isn't this a restriction of freedom of expression? Leipzig German authorities explained it as such: "We think that, after the Paris incidents, these caricatures will be tools for provocation."

The former head of Turkey's top religious body has accused Muslims of contributing to the rise of Islamophobia around the world, while lamenting the declining number of pious people in Turkey.

Former Religious Affairs Directorate (Diyanet) head Ali Bardako?lu accused "some members" of the Muslim community of contributing to the rise of Islamophobia around the world.

Islam is a European reality and Muslims across the continent are there to stay, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davuto?lu told journalists while returning from Berlin late on Jan. 12.

"There is a settled persuasion that a solution can be found via accepting that Islam is a European reality," Davuto?lu said, commenting on the hot debate over rising Islamophobia in Europe.

Since the cruel attacks in Paris that killed 17 innocent human beings, Turks are discussing what really happened and why. Like on any other issue, there is a spectrum of views.

On the nicer end of the spectrum, there are millions of Turks who condemned the terrorists and offered solidarity with Charlie Hebdo and the French people. They have done the right thing.

Everyone, except for a few fanatics, has condemned the terrorist attack in France. They have cried out loudly that they stand alongside people's right to live, freedom of thought, and freedom of speech.

The terror attacks in Paris have resulted in much commentary among Islamists and Islamic intellectuals and commentators in Turkey. There is little that is new in Islamist quarters, of course. One reads the usual litany, if one may use the term, blaming the West for crimes against the Islamic world and its wily designs on the Middle East.

The Turkish prime minister says Turkey?s EU membership would ease the inter-cultural tensions currently threatening Europe, adding he expects the same reaction shown for the Paris terrorist attacks to be shown against Islamophobic attacks.

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davuto?lu on Jan. 11 hailed the unprecedented rally against terror in Paris as a "strong message to the world," while adding that he would expect a similar reaction to attacks on Muslims and Islamophobia.
      

Islamophobia is not the only right-wing trend rising in Europe: It is just one of the results of escalating xenophobia as anti-Semitic tendencies are also on the rise, according to Turkey's ambassador to France With Turkish authorities constantly warning of Islamophobia, the Turkish Ambassador to Paris, Hakk?

It is sad that innocent people have been murdered brutally. It is sad that the murderers did it in the name of a great religion. It is sad that the sons and daughters of poor immigrants turn out to be evildoers in the name of a violent radicalism that defines itself as "Islamism" and/or "jihadism."