More cartoon fallout

[qatarperegrine]

Here's a more disturbing local reaction: Jews, Christians wage war on Muslims: Scholar.

Six months ago this scholar called "dialogue with the other monotheistic religions a 'duty for all Muslims.'" Hmm.

Comments

Can we say

[shmuelisms.livejournal.com]

"toeing the party line"?
When the Sheik says "be nice to the Jews" he's all about "understanding" and "duty", but when the public opinion swings the other way, he's all "the Jews are the Evil".

It's really sad, how strongly the Arab/Muslim world thinks we influence or even control the Christian World. If only that were so... :-p Some Danes insulting the Muslims, is so "all about" the "Palestinian Issue". So sad.

Re: Can we say

[qatar.livejournal.com]

The scholars here are certainly not unanimous on the issue. Sheikh Qaradawi, to my knowledge, is still saying that Muslims ought to boycott Danish goods and protest nonviolently, but he is not saying that Jews and Christians are combining forces to attack Islam.

For sure

[shmuelisms.livejournal.com]

I was just commenting on Dr. Quradaghi "shift" in opinion. I'm more inclined to say that he doesn't really have one, if it changes that radically.

Re: For sure

[qatar.livejournal.com]

It seems more likely to me that whatever he meant by "dialogue with Christians and Jews" is not what I would mean if I stressed the importance of "dialogue with Muslims and Jews."

(General FYI -- I hadn't realized that at least one reader thought that Quradaghi and Qaradawi are the same person. They're not.)

Ooops

[shmuelisms.livejournal.com]

While I'm used to the inconsistencies of transliterating names, what actually threw me off, was not the similarity in names, but your specific choice of words. The first headline ends, with the word "Scholar". You started the second line with "This scholar", so I assumed it was the very same scholar mentioned above.

Re: Ooops

[qatar.livejournal.com]

Yes, both of those somewhat contradictory articles are about Quradaghi. :-)

[seetarkrun.livejournal.com]

Disturbing. Education isn't always a guard against intolerance and fundamentalism...

[qatar.livejournal.com]

My first reaction to that is to say: It all depends on what KIND of education, doesn't it? But that is too flippant. How many times have we heard the truism that Weimar Germany had one of the most educated populations in the world?

More fundamentally, though, I think that this is part of the culture gap at work here. To us, education means learning to think critically, being inculcated into an objective, modern worldview, etc. Even though I'm in this country for the express purpose of bringing this style of education to Qatar, I'm not sure that's really the accepted cultural meaning of education here.

[aristopheles.livejournal.com]

Well, Quradaghi wouldn't be the first person to say different things to different audiences.
Is he really as out of touch as he sounds?

" Where is the freedom of press while dealing in issues such as liberation of Palestine?," he asked.

He asked why were certain western countries concerned over the rise of Hamas in the recent Palestinian elections and where was the western world when abuses of Iraqi prisoners occurred in Abu Ghraib.

Frankly, Palestine gets press far out of proportion to its numbers, or it economic or geographic significance, and I frankly think that the Western press was too kind to Arafat and his cohort for years.
Abu Ghraib, of course, got far more attention than the Danish drawings did--at least until Muslims started rioting over them. :)

[qatar.livejournal.com]

I don't know a thing about Quradaghi, so I can't say.

The Abu Ghraib comment seemed particularly strange to me, though. If it hadn't been for 60 Minutes, The New Yorker, etc., would Abu Ghraib have turned into a scandal at all? How many people are subjected to similar treatment in countries where there is no scandal about it, because there is no free press to tell us about it?

I want to be clear that I'm not saying that "our" torture is in any way justified, or that our response to it was ideal -- but it seems weird to me for someone not to see that if you really want to stop government abuses, you need a free press!

[patgund.livejournal.com]

*sigh* Is quite the mess.

I noticed that Mega Mart in The Center hadn't removed Danish products from its shelves as of friday, but had been clearancing them instead.

And the Toys R Us still carries Lego sets. (chuckle)