Leave Our Islamophobes Alone, OK?

I love a good old full-bodied Islamophobic rant, don't you?

And nobody does it better than the late Italian 'journalist' Oriana Fallaci:

"What I say is that today's Islamic invasion of Europe is nothing else than a revival of its centuries-old expansionism, of its centuries-old imperialism, of its centuries-old colonialism. More underhand, though. More treacherous. Because this time it is characterized not only by the current Kara Mustafas and Lala Mustafas and Ali Pashas and Ahmet Pashas and and Suleymans the Magnificent, that is by the Bin Ladens and the Al Zarkawis and the various Arafats and the butchers who blow themselves up with the skyscrapers or buses. It is characterized also by the immigrants who settle in our countries, our homelands. And who without any respect for our laws impose on us their own laws. Their own customs, their God. Do you know how many of them live in the European continent, that is in the stretch running from the Atlantic coast to the Urals? About 60 million. In the European Union only, about 25. Outside the European Union, 35. Which includes Switzerland where they account for over 10% of the population, Russia where they account for 10.5%, Georgia where they account for 12%, the island of Malta where they account for 13%, Bulgaria where they account for 15%. And 18% in Cyprus, 19% in Serbia, 30% in Macedonia, 60% in Bosnia-Herzegovina, 90% in Albania, 93.5% in Azerbaijan... For the moment they are scarce only in Portugal where they account for 0.50%, in Ukraine where they account for 0.45%, in Latvia where they account for 0.38%, in Slovakia for 0.19%, in Lithuania for 0.14%, in Iceland for 0.04%. (Lucky Icelanders).But everywhere, even in Iceland, they are visibly increasing. And not only because the invasion is proceeding relentlessly but because the Muslims stand as the most prolific ethnic and religious group in the world. A characteristic favoured by polygamy and the fact that in a woman the Koran sees only a womb for giving birth." (The Force of Reason, 2004, pp 51-52)

Face it, our own common-and-garden Islamphobes of the corporate press are really pretty damn tame by comparison.

Still, up until a week or two ago, they could at least vent their peculiar obsession with nary a care in the world.

Take Piers Akerman for example. According to his professional playpen, The Sunday Telegraph, he had spent the week before last "on tour" in France, investigating what he calls "unwanted Islamic migration." Alas, poor Piers could find no encouraging developments, only a government hamstrung by "its elitist obsession with political correctness" and failing miserably in its Judeo-Christian duty to stem the advancing Islamic tide:

"Much was made of France's decision to ban the burqa, but the reality is the French government is all talk and no action. Not a single case has been pursued against an individual for wearing a full-face cover by the French police since the ban on face-covering headwear came into effect on April 11. In an interview at his Paris office, Bernard Godard, head of the French Interior Ministry's Central Bureau of Religious Affairs, told me the police had been told to 'avoid incidents'. He said about 40 women had been warned against wearing them, but there had been no arrests." (What a pack of burqas, 24/7/11)

Oh for the tumbrils and guillotines of yore! Where were the auto da fes when you needed them? Couldn't the French at least have afforded him the satisfaction of a little round-up, put a few of those burqas behind bars? Something? Anything? No, wherever he looked, all he could see were shameful signs of surrender:

"Politically correct, the French government does not attempt to determine what percentage of the Muslim population is unemployed, though it admits unemployent is high in low-income areas in industrial centre such as Lille, Paris, Lyons and Marseilles, which also happen to have higher numbers of Muslim residents. It would be simple for the government to estimate unemployment levels but it chooses not to, knowing that the details would only inflame the situation. Even in villages with populations of less than 5,000, a few hundred Muslims have been able to exert political influence beyond that warranted by their numbers."

Yes, wherever they went, they took over, staring down any politician, any bureaucrat, anyone who tried to resist, and always getting their way!

But at least, despite the crippling "elitist obsession with political correctness," (alas also alive and well in this once fair land) Piers could tell it like it is, albeit muttering darkly as opposed to shouting, Fallaci-like, from the rooftops: The Muslims are coming! The Muslims are coming!

Ah, yes. Halcyon days!

And then along came that bloody lunatic Anders Behring Breivik to spoil it all.

Talk about the the cat among the pigeons. Now the Islamophobes of the press would have to cough and splutter, pinching their nostrils with one hand and holding this Christianist terrorist rat at arms length with the other in a vain effort to avoid being contaminated by the god-awful stench. Henceforth, or at least until he had faded from the news cycle, they would feel constrained to justify every Islamophobic grunt and motion. Pretty damned uncomfortable!

Take The Australian's steamed foreign editor, Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan, for example:

"Breivik espoused hatred of Muslims. Does this make anyone who has questioned multiculturalism, or the success of the mass immigration of North African Muslims to Europe, somehow responsible for Breivik's actions? Certainly not. Any attempt to use this murderous tragedy for mainstream political point scoring is contemptible. Yet there is in truth no movement that can be accurately called a Christian terrorist movement. No serious Christian cleric ever gives such violence succour, no Christian-influenced state ever supports it. The terrorists concerned in custody do not read the Gospels, but always some other conspiracy literature concerning their own hang-ups. Similarly, there was in recent years one authentic Jewish Israeli terrorist, Baruch Goldstein, who in 1994, at the Tomb of the Patriarch in Hebron, shot and killed 29 innocent Palestinians. He was immediately condemned by all shades of Israeli politics and all mainstream shades of the Jewish religion. His action has not been repeated. This is not remotely equivalent to the worldwide Islamist movement of jihadist terror, led by al-Qa'ida but practised by many other groups with a degree of popular support, among them Hamas, Hezbollah, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Jemaah Islamiah and many others." (The unheeded steps of a psycho killer, 28/7/11)

Poor Greg! Can you feel his pain? Now as if this 'Don't look at me like that!' cris de coeur weren't bad enough, the very next day, along comes one of the tribe, in a letter to the editor, to berate him for his thoughtful defence of the Judeo- bit of the Judeo-Christian construct:

"Greg Sheridan describes Baruch Goldstein, the religious fanatic who shot dead 29 Palestinians in Hebron on the West Bank in 1994, as the 'one authentic Jewish Israeli terrorist'. Jewish he certainly was, though in the most extreme, fundamentalist way. But his 'Israeliness' went no deeper than his passport. Like a huge proportion of the Jewish settler movement, he was a product of the most fanatically religio-Zionist corners of the American Jewish diaspora, not the overwhelmingly secular and pragmatic Israeli mainstream. Those Jews who are raised in Israel grow up with the realities of war and a desperation for peace rather than some mad ideological fantasy - which is why it was an American import who committed the atrocity, not a home-grown Israeli." Dov Midalia, Bondi Junction, NSW

An American import! Nothing whatever to do with Israel. When it comes to terrorism, Israelis are as pure as the driven snow. Wouldn't hurt a fly. Really.

Enough, I say. Leave our Muslim-bashers alone. They're going through a hard time right now.