Mehdi Hasan 2015-11-29T15:25:23-05:00 Mehdi Hasan Copyright 2008,, Inc. HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for Mehdi Hasan Good old fashioned elbow grease. アウンサンスーチーがロヒンギャ問題について沈黙している。その理由は許しがたいものだ,2015:/theblog//3.7575022 2015-06-13T02:59:08-04:00 2015-06-13T06:21:57-04:00 Mehdi Hasan 声明を発表した。


早くもそれから24年経つが、ミャンマーのイスラム教少数民族ロヒンギャは、ノーベル委員会の5人が曇った目でスーチーを平和賞に選んだことに同意しないのではないか。それに、スーチーを「世界で最も名高く勇気ある良心の囚人」と褒め称えたイギリスのゴードン・ブラウン元首相にも同意しないだろう 。そして、ミャンマーの人々は「アウンサンスーチー氏がもたらす、道徳的で原理原則に基づくリーダーシップを、切に求める」と述べた、南アフリカのデズモンド・ツツ大司教に同意しないのは、言うまでもないだろう。



rohingya myanmar
ロヒンギャの少年が、ミャンマー・ラカイン州シットウェ市外にある難民キャンプの桟橋の近くで、小さなボートの上で魚を抱えている。Ye Aung Thu/AFP/Getty Images.









では、スーチーは、こうした問題の中でどのような立ち位置なのだろうか？　そもそもの話として、彼女の沈黙は許しがたい。僧侶アシン・ウィラトゥ（別名「ビルマのビン・ラディン」）に触発された仏教徒過激派がロヒンギャに暴力を加えているのはもちろんのこと、国家の支援を受けてロヒンギャを抑圧しているのに、非難するどころか、完全に認めようとすらしない。スーチーは問題を解決するのではなく、問題の一部になっている。


彼女はそれをしなかった。その代わり、彼女は過去数年間、――軍が彼女の大統領選出を可能にする、あるいは彼女の出馬を認めた場合 ――2016年に大統領に選出されるために必要な票をもつミャンマーのマジョリティである仏教徒に擦り寄った。そのため、ロヒンギャに犯した暴力を軽視し、迫害の加害者と被害者に対して見せかけだけの平等を提言してきた。




これは単なる誇張だろうか？ そうであったらいいのだが。アメリカ国立ホロコースト記念博物館の調査グループが下した判断に耳を傾けてみよう。

「私たちはミャンマーを去りました」 彼らは今月初めに公表したレポートでこう書いた。「ジェノサイドへの非常に多くの前提条件が、すでに整っていることを深く懸念しています」



いや、そうではないのかもしれない。「ヘンリー」と「キッシンジャー」という言葉が脳裏に浮かんでくる。さらに、ノーベル委員会には、拙速に平和賞を授与してきたかなり問題のあるの歴史がある。1994年のイツハク・ラビン、シモン・ペレス（イスラエル元大統領）、そしてヤセル・アラファト（パレスチナ自治政府前議長）の共同受賞を覚えているだろうか？ ガザの子供どもたちに、それがどのように役に立ったか聞いてみてほしい。2009年の、バラク・オバマ米大統領の受賞を覚えているだろうか？ パキスタンへの無人機攻撃で犠牲となった民間人に、それがどのように役に立ったか聞いてみてほしい。




悲しい現実がある。それは、映画『The Lady アウンサンスーチー ひき裂かれた愛』で描かれたようなスーチーはもういない、それは過去のものであり、楽観的な見方は捨てることだ。スーチーをありのままで認識しよう。かつての良心の囚人はどうなったのか。そう、今は喜んで原則よりも票を、無実のロヒンギャの命よりも政党の発展を優先する、シニカルな政治家なのだ。





로항야족 탄압에 대한 아웅산 수치의 침묵을 참을 수 없는 이유,2012:/theblog// 2015-06-05T02:33:06-04:00 2015-06-06T05:50:47-04:00 Mehdi Hasan

“아웅산 수치에게 노벨평화상을 수여하며, 이 여성의 지칠 줄 모르는 노력을 기리고 민주주의와 인권, 민족과의 호합을 위해 분투하는 세상 모든 이들을 지원하는 것을 보여주기를 바란다”고 1991년에 노르웨이 노벨위원회는 발표했다.

또 수치가 “압제에 맞서는 싸움의 중요한 심볼”이라고도 했다.

24년이 지난 지금, 미얀마의 무슬림 로힝야족들은 다섯 명으로 구성된 노벨위원회의 평가에 반대할지도 모른다. 수치를 ‘세상에서 유명하고 용감한 양심수’라고 불렀던 고든 브라운과도 의견을 달리할 것이다. 미얀마의 사람들은 “아웅산 수치가 줄 수 있는 것과 같은 도덕적이고 원칙에 입각한 리더십을 필요로 한다’’고 했던 데스몬드 투투 대주교는 말할 것도 없다.

UN에 따르면 ‘세상에서 가장 핍박받는 소수집단’인 로힝야족은 최근 몇 년 간 자신들의 곤경이 주목받을 수 있도록 노력해왔다.

몇 주 전 로힝야족 수천 명이 태국, 말레이시아, 인도네시아에 도착하기 전까지의 일이다. 아직도 이 세 나라의 바다에 수천 명의 로힝야족이 허술한 배를 타고 떠 있는 것으로 추정된다. 음식과 깨끗한 물은 점점 바닥나고 있다.


‘너무 배고프다. 너무 말랐다.’

“어부 무치타르 알리는 인도네시아 근해에서 절박한 굶주리는 로힝야 사람들이 초과 승선한 배를 보고 울음을 터뜨렸다.” 5월 20일 AFP의 보도다.

“나는 할 말을 잃었습니다. 그 사람들을 보고 나와 내 친구들은 울었어요. 그들이 너무 배고파 보이고 너무 말라서요.”

그러나 이런 로힝야족 ‘보트 피플’은 훨씬 더 큰 문제의 증상에 불과하다. 암네스티 인터내셔널의 아시아 태평양 연구자인 케이트 슈츠는 이렇게 말한다. “생명의 위협을 받고 있는 수천 명의 목숨이 지금으로선 가장 급한 문제이지만, 이 위기의 근원도 해결되어야 합니다. 로힝야족 수천 명이 미얀마에 머무르는 것보다는 살아남지 못할 지도 모르는 보트를 선택하고 있다는 것만으로도 그들이 미얀마에서 처한 상황에 대해 시사하는 바가 큽니다.”

그들이 처한 압제적 상황은 130만 명의 로힝야족 무슬림들에게 시민권을 부여하지 않는 것부터 이동, 취업, 교육 및 의료 서비스 접근을 엄격히 제한하는 것에 걸치며, 로힝야족이 사는 라킨 주는 로힝야족이 가정당 두 명까지만 아이를 낳을 수 있게 하는 차별법도 도입했다.

수십만 명이 자기 집에서 쫓겨났고, 광란에 빠진 군중들이 그들의 도시와 마을을 쑥대밭으로 만들었다. 2014년에 정부는 심지어 ‘로힝야’라는 단어 사용까지 금지하며, 미얀마에서 수세대에 걸쳐 살아온 소수 무슬림인 로힝야들이 인구 조사에서 ‘벵골인’으로 분류되도록 했다.

aung san suu kyi

용납할 수 없는 침묵

그렇다면 여기서 수치의 자리는 어디인가? 일단, 그녀의 침묵은 용납할 수 없다. 승려 아신 위라투(일명 ‘버마 빈 라덴’) 같은 사람들의 부추김으로 벌어지는 로힝야에 대한 불교 극단주의자들의 폭력은 물론, 정부가 나서서 그녀의 나라 국민들을 탄압하는 것을 규탄하기는커녕 제대로 언급조차 하지 않고 있다.

‘집단 학살에 있어, 침묵은 공모다. 아웅산 수치도 마찬가지다.’ 런던 대학 법학 교수이자 국가범죄 계획 디렉터인 페니 그린이 ‘인디펜던트’ 사설에 최근 쓴 글이다. ‘막대한 도덕적 정치적 자본을 지닌’ 미얀마의 야당 지도자 수치는 ‘버마의 정치적 사회적 담론의 특징인 용납할 수 없는 인종차별과 이슬람 공포증’에 도전할 수 있었다고 그린은 썼다.

수치는 도전하지 않았다. 그 대신 최근 몇 년 동안 미얀마의 대다수인 불교도들의 환심을 사려고 노력했다. 그녀가 2016년에 대통령으로 선출되려면 그들의 표가 필요히다. 만약 군부가 그녀를 대통령 자리에 앉게 내버려 둘지, 후보로 출마는 하게 해줄지 모르지만 말이다. 그래서 그녀는 소수인 무슬림들에게 자행되는 폭력을 축소하려 하고, 박해자와 박해 피해자가 평등한 것처럼 말하려고 애쓴다.

예를 들어 수치는 2013년에 BBC와 인터뷰하면서 추잡하게도 이 폭력이 ‘양측 모두에’ 책임이 있다고 하며, 인터뷰어 미샬 후세인에게 ‘무슬림들이 타겟이 되었지만 불교도들을 대상으로 한 폭력도 있었다’고 말했다.

그러나 미얀마에서 악취가 풍기는 수용소에 갇혀 ‘굶주림, 절망, 질병에 서서히 굴복하는’ 사람들은 불교도들이 아니다. 국제인권감시기구가 ‘인종청소’라고 부르는 일을 당한 것도, UN의 미얀마 인권 상황 특별 조사 위원이 ‘인류에 대한 범죄까지 이를 수 있다’고 한 일을 당한 것도 불교도들이 아니다. 이 나라에서 도망치려고 비좁은 배에 올라타는 것도, 그러는 와중에 망치와 칼로 공격을 받는 것도 불교도들이 아니다. 직설적으로 말하자면, 집단 학살에 직면한 사람들은 불교도들이 아니다.


‘집단 학살’의 위험

과장에 불과할까? 그렇다면 좋으련만. 미국 홀로코스트 기념관의 시몬-쇼드트 집단 학살 방지 센터 조사원들이 내린 결론을 들어보라.

그들은 5월 초에 발표한 보고서에 이렇게 적었다. “우리는 집단 학살의 여러 전제 조건이 이미 존재한다는 깊은 우려를 안고 버마를 떠났다.”

로힝야 억류 수용소를 방문하고 폭력적인 공격에서 살아남은 생존자들을 인터뷰한 조사원들은 ‘버마 정부가 이들 지역 사회 전체를 억압하는 법과 정책을 즉각 수정하지 않는다며 로힝야족에게 집단 학살은 심각한 위험으로 존재할 것’이라고 결론내렸다.

그러나 배와 시체들, 보고서와 폭로에도 불구하고 수 치는 아직도 말이 없다. 로힝야족들은 문자 그대로 목숨을 구하려고 달리고 있는데, 수치는 그들을 돕기 위해 손가락 하나 까딱한 적이 없다. 노벨평화상 수상자에게는 좀 더 많은 걸 기대해야 하는 것 아닐까?

아닐지도 모른다. ‘헨리 키신저’라는 이름이 떠오른다. 게다가, 노벨상 위원회는 평화상을 일찌감치 수여한 좀 괴상한 전력이 있어 왔다. 이스라엘 이츠하크 라빈 총리, 이스라엘 시몬 페레스 대통령, 팔레스타인의 야세르 아라파트가 1994년에 공동으로 노벨평화상을 받은 걸 기억하는가? 중동 상황이 어떻게 되었는지 가자의 어린이들에게 물어보라. 2009년의 버락 오바마는 기억하는가? 파키스탄에서 드론에게 희생당한 민간인들에게 상황이 어떻게 되었는지 물어보라.

라빈, 아라파트, 오바마…… 결국 그들은 물론 모두 정치인들이다. 수치는 다른 존재, 그 이상의 존재라고 우린 생각해왔다. 도덕의 아이콘, 인권 챔피언, 현대판 간디.

aung san suu kyi

슬픈 진실

오피니언 리더이자 한때 정치 죄수였던 그녀가 2013년에 CNN에 자신은 ‘이제껏 늘 정치인이었’고, 자신의 야망은 자기 나라의 대통령이 되는 것이라고 했을 때 왜 우리는 귀를 기울이지 않았을까?

슬픈 진실은 이제 우리가 장밋빛 색안경을 벗고 ‘그 분’을 바라볼 때가 이미 한참 지났다는 것이다. 수 치의 본모습을 보아야 한다. 한때 양심수였던 것은 맞지만, 이제는 자기 이익만 생각하는, 원칙보다 득표를 더 중요시하는 정치인인 것이다. 죄없는 로힝야족의 생명보다는 정당 정치의 발전이 그녀에겐 더 중요하다.

수치는 1991년에 가택 연금 상태에서 수상한 노벨상을 21년 뒤인 2012년 6월에 감옥에서 마침내 받아들이며 거창하게 선언했다. “우리의 궁극적 목표는 난민, 홈리스, 희망 잃은 사람이 없는 세상을 만드는 것입니다. 세상 구석구석이 모두 보호구역이고 사람들은 자유와 평화롭게 살 능력을 갖는 세상입니다.”

세상 따윈 잊어라. 그녀는 고국에서부터, 라킨의 로힝야족에서부터 시작해야 했다. 그러지 않겠다면, 혹은 그럴 수 없다면, 20년 넘게 기다렸다가 받았던 상을 반납하는 걸 고려해봐야 할 것이다.

이 글은 알 자지라에 먼저 게재되었다.

허핑턴포스트US의 Why Aung San Suu Kyi's Silence on the Rohingya Is Inexcusable를 번역, 편집한 것입니다.]]>
Why Aung San Suu Kyi's Silence on the Rohingya Is Inexcusable,2015:/theblog//3.7451776 2015-05-27T13:57:29-04:00 2015-05-27T13:59:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan announced in 1991, it wished "to honour this woman for her unflagging efforts and to show its support for the many people throughout the world who are striving to attain democracy, human rights and ethnic conciliation by peaceful means."

Suu Kyi, the Committee added, was "an important symbol in the struggle against oppression."

Fast forward 24 years, and the Rohingya Muslims of Myanmar might disagree with the dewy-eyed assessment of the five-member Nobel Committee. And with Gordon Brown, too, who called Suu Kyi "the world's most renowned and courageous prisoner of conscience." Not to mention Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who has said that the people of Myanmar "desperately need the kind of moral and principled leadership that Aung San Suu Kyi would provide."

In recent years, the Rohingya Muslims -- "the world's most persecuted minority," according to the United Nations -- have struggled to attract attention to their plight.

Until, that is, a few weeks ago, when thousands of Rohingya refugees began arriving in Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, while thousands more are believed to be still stranded on rickety boats off the coasts of these three countries, with dwindling supplies of food and clean water.

rohingya myanmar

A young ethnic Rohingya Muslim boy holds a fish on a small boat near a jetty at a refugee camp outside the city of Sittwe in Myanmar's Rakhine state. Ye Aung Thu/AFP/Getty Images.

'So Hungry, So Skinny'


"'I was speechless,' Ali told AFP. . . 'Looking at these people, me and my friends cried because they looked so hungry, so skinny.'"

These Rohingya "boat people," however, are a symptom of a much bigger problem. As Kate Schuetze, Amnesty International's Asia Pacific researcher, has observed: "The thousands of lives at risk should be the immediate priority, but the root causes of this crisis must also be addressed. The fact that thousands of Rohingya prefer a dangerous boat journey they may not survive to staying in Myanmar speaks volumes about the conditions they face there."


Hundreds of thousands have been driven from their homes; their towns and villages razed to the ground by rampaging mobs. In 2014, the government even banned the use of the word "Rohingya," insisting the Muslim minority, who have lived in that country for generations, be registered in the census as "Bengali."

"Her refusal to condemn, or even fully acknowledge, the state-sponsored repression of her fellow countrymen and women, not to mention the violence meted out to them by Buddhist extremists. . . makes her part of the problem, not the solution."

Inexcusable Silence


"In a genocide, silence is complicity, and so it is with Aung San Suu Kyi," observed Penny Green, a law professor at the University of London and director of the State Crime Initiative, in a recent op-ed for The Independent. Imbued with "enormous moral and political capital," Green argued, Myanmar's opposition leader could have challenged "the vile racism and Islamophobia which characterises Burmese political and social discourse."

She didn't. Instead, she spent the past few years courting the Buddhist majority of Myanmar, whose votes she needs in order to be elected president in 2016 -- if, that is, the military will allow her to be elected president, or even permit her to stand -- by playing down the violence perpetrated against the Muslim minority, and trying to suggest a false equivalence between persecutors and victims of persecution.

In a BBC interview in 2013, for example, Suu Kyi shamefully blamed the violence on "both sides," telling interviewer Mishal Husain that "Muslims have been targeted but Buddhists have also been subjected to violence."

Yet in Myanmar, it isn't Buddhists who have been confined to fetid camps, where they are "slowly succumbing to starvation, despair and disease." It isn't Buddhists who have been the victims of what Human Rights Watch calls "ethnic cleansing" and what the UN's special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar has said "could amount to crimes against humanity." It isn't Buddhists who are crowding onto boats, to try and flee the country, and being assaulted with hammers and knives as they do so. It isn't Buddhists, to put it bluntly, who are facing genocide.

Risk Of 'Genocide'

Is this mere hyperbole? If only. Listen to the verdict of investigators from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum's Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide.





Rabin, Arafat, Obama. . . ultimately, of course, they're all politicians. Suu Kyi was supposed to be something else, something more; a moral icon, a human rights champion, a latter-day Gandhi.

Sad Truth

Why weren't we listening when the opposition leader and former political prisoner told CNN in 2013 that she had "been a politician all along," that her ambition was to become president of her country?

The sad truth is that when it comes to "The Lady," it is well past time to take off the rose-tinted glasses. To see Suu Kyi for what she is: A former prisoner of conscience, yes, but now a cynical politician who is willing to put votes ahead of principles; party political advancement ahead of innocent Rohingya lives.



This piece first appeared on Al Jazeera.

Five Questions That Trouble Ed Miliband's Many Disillusioned Supporters,2015:/theblog//3.6668658 2015-02-12T07:51:00-05:00 2015-04-14T05:59:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
The Labour leader, contrary to the lazy conventional wisdom, has the potential to be a good, even great, premier. He has, his friends say, a "Thatcher-esque" ambition to transform the British political and economic scene and has proved to be one of the most influential leaders of the opposition in living memory, forcing issues such as phone-hacking, the cost of living and Palestinian statehood on to the political agenda. If he wins on 7 May, he will walk through the door of No 10 with more high-level government experience - as a former cabinet minister and an ex-Treasury adviser - than Tony Blair and David Cameron combined when they entered Downing Street.

Yet it isn't just his opponents who question whether Miliband will become prime minister. A growing number of his supporters do, too. Such is the right-wing reflex of much of our press that the only critique of the Labour leader which gets a hearing these days comes from either business bosses or Blairite ultras. There are, however, many centre-left MPs, peers and activists who backed Miliband's insurgent leadership candidacy in the summer of 2010 but who now have their own issues with the Labour leader and his failures. They gather in the pubs and tearooms of Westminster to moan and groan about their man, more in sorrow than in anger.

Consider the following five questions that disillusioned "Ed-ites" often obsess over - and that Miliband has yet to address, in public or in private. First, why has a former television researcher - yes, Miliband worked briefly on Channel 4's A Week in Politics in the early 1990s - failed to recognise how abjectly awful his performances on TV have been since 2010? Why hasn't he taken urgent steps to improve them? In 2011 David Cameron hired Craig Oliver, a former editor of the BBC's News at Ten, to be his director of communications. Miliband preferred to appoint three veteran lobby correspondents with zero experience in television, waiting until as late as September 2014 to recruit Matthew Laza, a former producer for the BBC of The One Show, to serve as his head of broadcasting.

Second, how did this son of Holocaust survivors allow his family's compelling story to be ignored so easily, despite high-profile attacks from the Daily Mail and the pro-Israeli actress Maureen Lipman (who announced that she would be abandoning Labour until it was "led by mensches" - the Yiddish word for people of integrity)? How many are aware that Miliband publicly challenged a Sudanese diplomat over his "disgusting" comparison of efforts to fight climate change with the Holocaust in 2009? A video of him receiving a standing ovation from UN delegates sits unwatched on an obscure BBC News web page and unused by Labour Party spinners. (Google "'Don't wreck conference' pleas Miliband [sic]" if you have three minutes to spare.)

Third, why is a former climate change secretary who launched a "clean coal" policy, who debated against the climate sceptic Nigel Lawson and helped - in the words of the science writer Fred Pearce - "save" the Copenhagen summit in 2009 shedding voters to a resurgent Green Party? Forget "Red Ed"; whatever happened to "Green Ed"?

Fourth, why isn't Miliband - whom the Daily Telegraph described in 2009 as one of the "saints" of the parliamentary expenses scandal - leading the assault on our sclerotic political establishment? Why has he ceded this fertile terrain to a former City trader named Nigel Farage, who once boasted he'd claimed up to £2million in expenses and allowances from the European Parliament?

Fifth, why has one of today's few front-line Labour politicians who opposed the disastrous 2003 invasion of Iraq kept so quiet about his anti-war record? Why hasn't he led the charge against the inexcusable delay in the publication of the Chilcot report? Labour is haemorrhaging voters to a range of anti-Iraq-war parties, from the Greens and the SNP to the Lib Dems. And yet, speaking at Prime Minister's Questions on 21 January, Miliband remarked, almost as an aside, "Frankly, my views on the Iraq war are well known." Sorry, Ed, they aren't.

The public doesn't have a clue that in early 2003 he phoned Gordon Brown - as I revealed in the New Statesman in 2010 - from the US, where he was on a sabbatical at Harvard, to urge the then chancellor to resist Tony Blair's march to war. (A former Downing Street aide told me how Brown "took Ed's phone call very seriously but, ultimately, other views prevailed".)

Yet on Iraq, as on MPs' expenses, Miliband has taken a vow of silence. Why? To avoid, I'm told, embarrassing or provoking front-bench colleagues who did abuse their expenses and did cheerlead for the war in Iraq - despite Labour's private polling showing how Miliband's record on these issues is of huge appeal to floating voters. "The price of unity has been radicalism," a friend of the Labour leader says. Another one told me that he "has to stop rewarding bad behaviour... He accommodates too much to others and isn't forceful enough."

Miliband is said privately to declaim that he is "strategically bold but tactically cautious". The inescapable problem for this wannabe prime minister is that, day after day, caution wins out. The Labour leader cannot afford to be his own worst enemy, as he approaches the closest general election in a generation. Cravenness doesn't win political battles. Courage does.

Mehdi Hasan is the political director of the Huffington Post UK and a contributing writer for the New Statesman, where this column is crossposted]]>
Harriet Harman Interview: 'Today's Unreasonable Demand Is Tomorrow's Conventional Wisdom',2012:/theblog// 2015-02-09T05:42:13-05:00 2015-02-10T18:59:01-05:00 Mehdi Hasan

Back in 1993, the then shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, Labour's Harriet Harman, hired a new 23-year-old researcher called Ed Miliband to work on her team. On the latter's very first week on the job, he was tasked by the more senior aides in her office with the all-important job of finding Harman's missing coat.

Twelve years later, what does Harman admire most about her researcher-turned-leader?

"That he is not cynical,” she says, almost instantly. "He hasn’t got a cynical bone in his body.

"He is somebody who believes in things and wants things to be better for people. He’s not in it for himself. All the things that people don’t like about politicians, that they're in it for themselves… he is the opposite of all that."

tv debates

I meet Labour's deputy leader, and Miliband's 'Number 2', in her corner office in Portcullis House, overlooking Parliament Square, as she prepares to launch the party’s 'Woman to Woman' tour of the country and embark on her eighth general election campaign.

The 64-year-old Harman, who has been the member of parliament for Camberwell and Peckham since her 1982 by-election victory, looks and sounds excited, energised, enthused.

"Unite [the union] has provided us with a driver and blow me down they’ve managed to find a woman with one of these [special] licenses,” she says smiling, before adding, with only a hint of sarcasm: "We’ve had lots of doctrinal discussions, such as: should we be alright with a male driver?"

Has there been any discussion of the colour of her vehicle, I ask? Isn’t driving around in a pink van a bit patronizing? A bit clichéd?

"Well it doesn’t have big eyelashes on the front,” she shoots back at me. "We don’t care. Actually it’s got to look like itself. Because it’s new; it’s different."

women to women van
This it the van in which Harman plans to tour the country

The deputy Labour leader is focused on (obsessed with?) the campaign for equality; it is the cause that animates her politics and which has come to define her as a public figure.

The 'Woman to Woman' tour - described by Labour spinners as the party's "biggest ever women’s campaign" - is the brainchild of Harman, who serves as both shadow deputy prime minister and shadow culture secretary, and Gloria De Piero, shadow minister for women and equalities and one of the party's rising stars.

"What is driving us to do this," explains Harman, "is there’s a general fall in turnout as part of people’s disaffection [with politics] and there’s an even bigger fall amongst women; it’s an accelerated decline amongst women."

She reminds me that 9.1 million women did not vote in 2010 - compared to 8 million men. "We’re saying, 'Don’t be part of the missing millions.'"

Harman’s message to disillusioned female voters is as simple as it is blunt: "We’re women. We’re inside the system. But we’re trying to change it. We want to be mobilizing with you, on your behalf.

"This is the biggest dividing line between women in the Tory Party and women in the Labour Party. The Tories want to hoover up lots of women’s votes so they can get into power [and] be a Tory government. We want to get women’s votes so Labour can be in power [and] we can deliver for women."

For Labour’s deputy leader, it’s a "two-way" relationship, "demonstrating that women are on our mind as politicians and we are focused on and interested in their lives. Because most women think politics has nothing to do with their lives."

It is the aggressive, masculine style of politics that turns women off perhaps? The shouting and heckling at Prime Minister’s Questions every Wednesday lunchtime?

"Well…" She pauses. "I think there’s that. I think that if the proportions were reversed in terms of the House of Commons, being four-to-one women, I think its inconceivable the atmosphere could be like it is is in Prime Minister’s Questions. But how much is it women watching PMQs forensically?" She's not so sure, preferring to highlight how politics consists mostly of "men talking about other men to men and arguing with men about men. And half the population are women."

What's her view of David Cameron then? Feminists have knocked the prime minister for his 'calm down, dear' asides and his much-discussed refusal to wear a 'This is what a feminist looks like' campaign T-shirt. Does Harman think the PM is a misogynist?

She sighs. "I’m not sure whether a name-called label is how we’re going to make progress on this. I certainly think that what his government represents for women is a stalling of progress and a turning of the clock back and if they were to get in again [that] would be even more the case."

harriet harman feminist
Harman wearing a 'This is what a feminist looks like' T-shirt at PMQs

Is she saying it'll be even worse for the women of Britain under a second-term Cameron government?

"I fear a second term [for women]," she replies. "Oh definitely."

Given her passionate, very genuine and long-standing advocacy on behalf of women in politics, does she believe that the next Labour leader, ideally, should be a woman?

She dodges my question. "We’re a balanced team in the leadership, in that we have a man and a woman [at] the top. We have a balanced team in the shadow cabinet. We’ve made huge strides but we’re still male-dominated in the parliamentary Labour Party so we’ve still got further to go."

But it must worry her that the Tories - in the form of Theresa May, the home secretary - could have a second female leader before Labour has even had its first?

"Erm.. well.. I do think that we are striving to be a balanced team delivering for women. And men. The point is for gender not to be an issue because across the team you’ve got a [gender] balance."

So, in a gender-balanced team, there's no need for a woman at the top? Ever?

She crosses her arms defensively. "Well, our top person is Ed Miliband and I’m not looking beyond that. Sorry about that. I’m just not. It’s a bit difficult to discuss it in theory."

Is it? Couldn't she say, in theory, that it'd be nice for the next prime minister or Labour leader after Ed Miliband to be a woman?

"Well, I wouldn’t love to see a woman prime minister if [she were] like Margaret Thatcher. I distinctly did not love seeing Margaret Thatcher."

She may not want to look beyond Ed Miliband but how about looking beyond Boris Johnson. Wouldn't it be a massive step forward if the next mayor of London were a woman?

"Or a black or Asian person," she counters, echoing the recent call made by Labour MP Margaret Hodge who quit the race for the party's mayoral nomination because, the latter declared, "the time is right for us to have a non-white mayor".

Harman explains that she wants politics to be "more diverse and more representative. Our institutions are supposed to be representative."

However, "the first thing is to have a Labour mayor so we can have a bit of progress and social justice within a dynamic economy. I am not at this point picking our London mayoral candidate."

Well, why isn't she standing herself? She has been a London Labour MP for more than three decades and would bring more high-level government experience to the job than any other potential mayoral candidate bar Tessa Jowell, the former culture secretary and Olympics minister.

"I want to be member of parliament for Camberwell and Peckham," Harman tells me. "And I would like to be in a Labour government with a majority."

harriet harman liberties
Harman campaigning in the Peckham by-election with Roy Hattersley in 1982

Would she be deputy prime minister in that Labour government, I wonder? Harman suggested in a speech in 2014 that Gordon Brown didn't make her deputy prime minister in 2007 - a post previously filled by John Prescott - because she was a woman.

"Well, I am shadow deputy prime minister now," comes the not-so-illuminating reply.

I ask again. There's an awkward pause. "Well, I’m deputy prime minister. I mean shadow deputy prime minister. Well, it's down to the prime minister of the day to decide what he does."

Has she discussed what her role and job title in government would be with Miliband?

"Honestly," she says with a big laugh, "I’m not discussing any of that."

But she has discussed it before, hasn't she, when she criticised Brown?

"Oh that’s true. I was looking back."

The deputy Labour leader is normally on the receiving end of criticism - much of it unwarranted, excessive and, yes, misogynistic. Right-wing papers such as the Daily Mail and the Daily Express have long mocked and caricatured her as 'Harriet Harperson' and constantly belittle her campaigns for gender equality and greater diversity.

What's it like being Harriet Harman, always under attack from the right?

She leans back in her chair. "It is like being somebody who is trying to be part of a movement which is trying to bring about change when there are lot of people who don’t want to see that change happen.

"I could lead a quiet life but actually that wouldn’t be bringing about any change. And I would rather endure the brickbats than endure the injustice and unfairness that’s out there." There's a pause. "It would be nice if you could strive for change and not have personal disparagement."

Harman, rather impressively, doesn't seem to let the attacks get under her skin. She is remarkably self-confident, self-assured and proud of her achievements in public life so far. "I do notice," she tells me, "that a lot of things that I have argued for and which were regarded as strident harpyism are now conventional wisdom agreed by everybody. The CBI organised virtual lynch mobs when I was proposing the national minimum wage [in the 1990s] and now everybody agrees with that. So, basically, I take a bit of satisfaction that today’s unreasonable demand is tomorrow's conventional wisdom."

I meet Harman almost exactly a year after the Daily Mail accused Harman and her husband Jack Dromey, who is also a Labour MP and shadow minister for policing, of being "apologists for paedophiles" due to the links between the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL) - Harman's former employer - and paedophile lobbyists in the 1970s.

What did she make of that tawdry episode, with all the awful smears and over-the-top accusations?

"Well, it was outrageous and calculated and it was wrong. It was absolutely wrong."

harriet harman liberties
Harman's past links with the NCCL were used to smear her in 2014

The shadow deputy prime minister reminds me of how, when she was solicitor general in the last Labour government, she repeatedly challenged the court of appeal over "unduly lenient" sentencing of child sex offenders. As for the Mail's attack on her, she says, "I am kind of assuming that a lot of people see it for what it is which is a cynical attack by the Daily Mail but I don't think they have any boundaries."

Why don't they? "They think anything goes when they're having a go at Labour."

So what does she think of Paul Dacre? Harman's former leader, Gordon Brown, once praised the Mail boss as "an editor of great distinction and someone of very great personal warmth". I'm assuming she has a lower opinion of Dacre than he did.

"I've never met him," she declares, before turning to her special adviser Ayesha Hazarika seated nearby to ask: "Have I met [Dacre]?" Hazarika shakes her head.

What would Harman say to him if she ever did meet him? "Nothing I haven’t said publicly."

I can think of few other politicians who have been subjected so relentlessly to such wild smears and constant caricatures. Does she ever allow the media attacks on her character, her appearance, her past, to get her down? Upset her?

"I've made a choice. I'd rather it be an easier pathway to progress and I certainly feel exasperated and frustrated by the length of time it takes to get even small steps towards equality. However, I’ve made a choice to do this because it needs people to step forward, and women have made choices to step forward in the past and open doors.

"You can’t just leave it other people."

The likes of Dacre might not want you to know it but Harman has had a long and distinguished political career. She served in both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown's cabinets; was elected Labour's deputy leader in 2007; and stood in for Brown at Prime Minister's Questions, becoming the first ever Labour female minister to do so.

In May 2010, Harman was appointed to Labour's negotiating team to help try and secure a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. What lessons for 2015 have Labour frontbenchers like her learned from the failure of those negotiations in 2010?

The shadow culture secretary makes a face. "What happened last time, I wouldn’t call it 'negotiations'. I think that’s overstating [it]."

Why? "Because the numbers didn’t work out. It’s a big rewriting of history that somehow if we’d have done more thinking [about coalition] in advance, things would have worked out differently.

"Us plus the Lib Dems did not produce a majority. And the Lib Dems were quite clear that they were going to go with the people who had the most MPs. Which was not us. Which was the Tories. So, yes, we sat in a room. But 'negotiations' would be overstating it because basically.. the real negotiations were between the Lib Dems and the Tories. It was a dead duck, basically."

This time round, explains Labour's deputy leader, "it's really important not be distracted by the notion of post-election negotiations. And I think people say it's going to be close. Actually nobody knows. It's uncertain."

In recent weeks, there has been much talk of a Labour-SNP coalition in the event of another hung parliament. First, shadow chancellor Ed Balls ruled out a coalition with the Scottish nationalists; then, Labour's election coordinator Douglas Alexander refused to rule it out. Where does Harman stand on this issue?

The deputy leader gives a safety-first answer: "We will deal with whatever the result is when it happens. But we are not looking over our shoulder, second-guessing the voters, trying to align our policies with what might suit the Lib Dems or anyone else. We’re aligning our politics to suit the people of this country. And that’s what our focus has got to be."

I ask again. Is she ruling out a post-election coalition with the SNP?

"Well, I’m just basically saying that we are not going into this thinking of a coalition with anybody. Because we’re trying to win an overall majority and I think its really important that we keep that focus because people don’t want to think that we are offering them a programme but somehow it’s a programme that is not about them, it's about second guessing some other party that we can ally with."

I'll take that as a 'no' then. I move onto the Lib Dems. Didn't she once call them "Tory accomplices"? Will it therefore be difficult to sit in a coalition government with Nick Clegg and co?

Harman has no interest in withdrawing her earlier remarks. "They are accomplices in a Tory government. They absolutely have colluded with them and have been willing partners in all sorts of things that are making things worse for people.. like the bedroom tax. That’s a statement of fact."

She continues: "Basically, we will decide what to do should the occasion require it - if it's not an overall [Labour] majority."

But can Ed Miliband pull off a Labour majority? Four and a half years into his leadership, and the Leader of the Opposition has yet to cut through to the British electorate. His personal poll ratings are dire, he is locked in a war of words with a variety of business bosses and, only a few months ago, Miliband found himself in the midst of a destabilising leadership crisis.

Harman is, characteristically, loyal and quick to defend her leader. "I don’t agree that he was having a leadership crisis," she says, in as convincing a tone as she can muster. "He has been very focused on what he wants to do. It's always been Labour's case that we support business in terms of its important role in creating jobs and creating prosperity but we want businesses to be responsible citizens who pay their taxes.. .pay the minimum wage." What Miliband is saying on business, argues his deputy, "is absolutely right and reflects Labour values".

harriet harman
Harman is a loyal deputy to her leader and former researcher

Has the Opposition, however, gone too far in its denunciations of big business? Can it afford to go into another general election without the support of any major business leaders?

Harman tells me the recent attacks by former M&S boss Stuart Rose and Kingfisher chief executive Ian Cheshire were "probably" coordinated by the Tories but says "it's down to us to respond and argue that we, of course, support business, we support jobs in the private sector, and that's one of the principal reasons why we don’t want there to be a referendum on the European Union.

"We are setting out our case that what we’re doing is in the interests of a flourishing economy and in the interests of business. But that doesn’t mean that we have to say we’re happy with the energy market as it's currently structured. No, we’re not. And we think its not good for consumers and not good for other businesses that are ripped off by energy companies, as it’s a big bill for them."

I return to my earlier, unanswered question: why hasn't Miliband cut through to the voters? "Well, he has," she says in response. "Actually we’ve been winning council seats across the whole period of Ed Miliband’s leadership.. It was never going to be easy to be Leader of the Opposition when you have been roundly kicked out of government but he has led us to a position where we are in contention. He always knew it was going to be very hard."

What about the claim that Miliband doesn't pass the 'blink test', where voters close their eyes and try and imagine the Labour leader standing, as PM, on the doorstep of Number 10 Downing Street?

She shrugs. "That is often the case with leaders of the opposition."

Really? What about Tony Blair in the run-up to the 1997 general election?

"I think those were very exceptional circumstances."

How about David Cameron prior to the 2010 election?

"Well, nobody thinks very much of Cameron as prime minister right now. He is the prime minister and still not looking that prime ministerial to many people. So I don’t think that’s a fair comparison."

Harman points out that Miliband "has been making the political weather which, from opposition, in your first term, is unprecedented. So, basically, the Tories didn't want the NHS on the agenda. It is. They didn’t want the cost of living on the agenda. It absolutely is. They are having to respond to the force of what he has put on the political agenda."

Yet the paradox of Ed Miliband's leadership is that his very real and tangible achievements - from dominating the debate on living standards to taking on Rupert Murdoch over phone hacking - haven't translated into positive poll ratings. Meanwhile, his critics inside the Labour Party line up to kick him, loudly and publicly. In recent weeks, Blairite ex-cabinet ministers such as Alan Milburn, John Hutton and Peter Mandelson have grabbed headlines by criticising Miliband's NHS and tax policies, provoking Harman's predecessor as deputy Labour leader, John Prescott, to denounce them as "Tory collaborators". What does Harman make of these interventions from the New Labour flag-carriers ?

She leans forward and stares at me intently. "Nobody made Alan Milburn leave parliament. He could have stayed on as a Labour MP and been part of the team. It was his choice to go. The same with John Hutton. It was his choice to go.. They've stepped aside, okay that’s their choice for them to do that, but actually [they should] support the team that is fighting for social progress in this country."

Harman then issues this scathing message to the likes of Milburn and Hutton: "Don’t become an unhelpful commentator, using your position as a former person in a Labour cabinet."

john hutton
Former cabinet minister John Hutton is an 'unhelpful commentator', says Harman

Labour's deputy leader is a shrewd and experienced political operator, who clearly isn't afraid of picking fights. So what does she think motivates Miliband's Blairite critics? Do they really want to see, as Prescott suggests, the re-election of a Cameron-led government?

"I don’t know," she sighs. "I think people sometimes can't resist a sort of moment of being back in the frame. But they chose not to be in the struggle. They chose that. So basically.. they should focus on what they chose to do. Not dip in with comments when we are heading to a general election."

She continues: "I hope you won't see me doing that at anytime in the near future." She checks herself. "Not that I’m stepping aside from the struggle."

I don't doubt that for a second.

]]> Don't Let the Ridiculous Smears Fool You: Syriza Is No Party of the Radical 'Far Left',2015:/theblog//3.6570994 2015-01-29T09:59:20-05:00 2015-03-31T05:59:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
Then there is Greece, where Syriza's Alexis Tsipras, a mild-mannered, tieless civil engineer, was sworn in as prime minister on 26 January. Judging by the hysterical tone of the press coverage, you could be forgiven for assuming that the love child of Karl Marx and Che Guevara had been elected to office in Athens. "Far-left firebrand races to victory", read a headline in the Times. "Shock waves across Europe as the far left sweeps to power in Greece", shrieked the Daily Mail.

Syriza, we are told, by everyone from the Mail to the BBC and the Guardian, is a bunch of radicals, revolutionaries and extremists. It's not centre left; it's far left. In this bizarre inversion of reality, those who helped to inflict mass unemployment, widespread poverty and public-health emergencies - involving a succession of HIV, tuberculosis and malaria epidemics - on a once-developed western country are deemed to be the moderates and the centrists. Is any more evidence needed of how our political debate has become so skewed to the right?

After all, what is "extreme" about providing free electricity and food stamps to 300,000 Greek families now living below the poverty line, as Syriza has pledged to do? What is "revolutionary" about wanting to negotiate a restructuring of ballooning, essentially unpayable debts? Especially after austerity measures demanded by the unelected "Troika" (the European Central Bank, the European Commission and the International Monetary Fund) led to Greece's public debt climbing from 126% of GDP in 2009 to over 170 per cent of GDP in 2014. Is it "radical" to describe - as Tsipras has done - five years of relentless, growth-choking austerity, in which the suicide rate rose by 43%, as a period of "humiliation and suffering"? Or to refer to Troika-enforced spending cuts - as Syriza's Yanis Varoufakis, the new Greek finance minister, did - as a form of "fiscal waterboarding"?

Don't be distracted by the "far left" smear. Syriza's programme of debt relief, fiscal stimulus and financial support for the poorest, rather than the richest, is mainstream macroeconomics. The party is merely planning to do what the textbooks suggest.

Don't take my word for it. On 23 January, two days before the Greek elections, 18 eminent economists, including the Nobel laureates Joseph Stiglitz and Christopher Pissarides, the Oxford University professor Simon Wren-Lewis and the former Bank of England interest-rate setter Charles Goodhart, published a joint letter to the Financial Times endorsing Syriza's call for debt forgiveness. Economic stability in Greece, they argued, could be "achieved through growth and increased efficiency in tax collection rather than through public expenditure cuts, which have reduced the revenue base and led to an increase in the debt ratio".

Stiglitz and the others also called for a "further conditional increase in the grace period, so that Greece does not have to service any debt, for example for the next five years and then only if Greece is growing at 3% or more". They cited the precedent of the "bisque" clause of the 1946 Anglo-American financial agreement, under which the UK was allowed a waiver of 2% interest payment until its economy "met agreed conditions". As the 18 economists concluded, "the whole of Europe will benefit from Greece being given the chance of a fresh start".

Remember, the Greeks have not suddenly embraced Marxism. But they have revolted against the insanity of neoliberal economics - and against the extremists in Brussels and Berlin bent on imposing austerity on them. The only real "shock" is that it took so long for this Hellenic backlash against fiscal sadism to commence. On a visit to Athens in 2012, I met Nikitas Kanakis, the director of the Greek branch of the charity Doctors of the World. He described to me in graphic detail how his country was in the midst of a "humanitarian crisis". "If the people cannot survive with dignity," he said quietly, "we cannot have a future."

Will Syriza give them back their dignity? "Hope is here," declared a victorious Tsipras on 25 January. But time is not on the party's side and this movement of political novices will have to confront a vast array of vested interests at home and abroad - from the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the bean-counters of the Troika to the tax-dodging business elite of Athens and a Greek police force infiltrated by neo-Nazis. It won't be easy and if Syriza fails, the swing back to the right will be both decisive and disastrous.

A few days ago, I rang Kanakis to see if he was celebrating Syriza's rise to power. He wasn't. "What I'm afraid about," he said, "is that sometimes hope creates illusions."

Alan Duncan Interview: David Cameron And The Tories Must Make Voters 'Tingle' To Win 2015 General Election,2012:/theblog// 2015-01-29T06:42:08-05:00 2015-02-03T08:59:01-05:00 Mehdi Hasan

Sir Alan Duncan isn't happy with the state of British politics - or the Conservative Party, for that matter.

"What disappoints me most is we seem less prepared to make a clear stand on something we believe in for fear of offending people, of losing support," the former Tory minister tells me, "when, in fact, we would be in a far stronger position if we had made a stand on things which are controversial in the short term but respected in the long term."

Like what, for example? Which controversial "things" is he referring to? There's a pause. "It’s just the whole attitude… which tends to want to follow opinion polls and the news agenda rather than say, 'I believe in low taxes because…'"

So he's basically saying our politics needs to be bigger, more ambitious, more ideological?

"That sums up my thoughts totally."

tv debates

I meet Duncan - who was knighted last summer for his diplomatic work in the Middle East - in his wood-panelled parliamentary office in the Palace of Westminster, six months on from his resignation from the coalition government in July 2014, having served as a minister of state for international development over the previous four years.

Duncan, elected to the Commons in 1992 as MP for Rutland and Melton after a stint as an oil trader, has long been identified with the so-called modernising wing of the Tories, which is often accused by its traditionalist opponents of hollowing out the Conservative Party and emptying it of ideological certainties. So, how does he square his call for more ideology and big ideas with his status as a card-carrying Tory moderniser?

"I don’t like being labeled a moderniser," he says, sitting across the table from me, his hands tucked deep inside his pockets. "I don’t mind being labeled a progressive because I think some fuddy-duddy approaches to society are so out of date they just look absurd.

"Conservatism has always been effective when it understands the country it aspires to govern. And I don’t think we do understand all corners of the country any more. We’ve only got one MP in Scotland. We understand our cities, particularly our northern cities, less and less. We are retreating and shrinking into safe… areas which means that our overall percentage of support is diminishing. We need to understand the entire country we aspire to govern."

There are some in his party who say modernisation didn't go far enough - some say it went too far. Where does he stand?

"I never go with these simple labels," he repeats, before pointing to the record of his own former department. "With aid, we’ve delivered it."

But only in the face of widespread opposition amongst Tory MPs and activists who want to see the aid budget slashed, no?

"Well, in a mild sort of way. It’s an easy quote to keep someone in the news but actually people are not fuming about it."

For Duncan, the "mayhem" in Syria and Iraq, as well as the spread of Ebola, has made it "more and more difficult" for his fellow Tories to say "we should spend less" on the aid budget.

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Duncan, while development minister, visiting a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan in 2013

Nevertheless, he concedes, "there is quite a lot of pressure on some of DfID’s resources".

Duncan points also to greater diversity in the Tory parliamentary party. "In terms of candidates, we’ve got a lot more ethnic candidates. I think that’s good. When the project started, we didn’t have a single Muslim MP. Now I’m pleased to say we do."

But the former minister isn't a fan of quotas or positive discrimination. "I’m against that," he says. "I prefer evolution to imposition. But I think through a natural evolution within the party it does look very different to how it did 10 years ago."

A decade ago, in 2005, Duncan stood for the leadership of the Conservative Party before pulling out of the race and lambasting the "Tory Taliban" with regressive social views who, he claimed, would condemn the party "to oblivion". It was a bold and much-needed analysis of an opposition party in limbo.

But what's changed, I wonder? The Tories didn't win a majority in 2010 and look no closer to winning one in 2015. The swivel-eyed tendency on the Tory backbenches has been energised and empowered by the rise of Ukip and, thus, Duncan's Tory Taliban, like the real-life Taliban, don't seem to have been defeated or gone away.

He chuckles. "I don’t think your question is accurate. The Tory Taliban quip referred to those who sort of huffed and puffed at anyone who was gay… that’s changed."

Has it? What about the ructions over the gay marriage bill? Did he not notice all those Tory backbenchers who loudly objected to it, and all those Tory activists who defected to Ukip over that specific issue? I mention his fellow former minister, Sir Gerald Howarth, who warned of the dangers of an "aggressive homosexual community" during a Commons debate on the bill in May 2013.

He laughs again. "I think he was referring to the manner of some of the campaigning in its favour. That’s very Gerald... I don’t think one should characterize him in that mould, really."

For Duncan, "a lot of these attitudes have changed. We are not at odds with what are current social attitudes amongst young people on matters of sexuality. Everyone is now at ease. It’s a great tribute that we have been able to go down this path over what has been a 15-year period started by Tony Blair. It is a not a world whose attitudes were anything like the ones that existed when I entered parliament in 1992."

So, does he think the "changed" Conservative Party can win a majority come May 7?

"I think we can win. I think we are in a far better position than people realize. I don’t think Labour has a hope in hell of increasing its support. I think we do."

Duncan argues that the Tories are "going to do far better in the election than people think we are today. I think the polls understate our support, for lots of reasons."

However, he concedes that his party must do more to win over BME communities and is "weak in appealing to three million Muslims in the country".

"I don’t think we properly articulated our view on immigration," he continues. "Immigration, when it is just used as a word that means everything, ends up meaning nothing. We have to say which bits of it we like and which bits of we don’t. I, for one, do not think it’s right that non-British people who have not paid into an insurance system should so quickly receive benefits. So, inevitably, if you have to have this auction of benefits you’re going to suck people into the UK with artificial economics. I feel strongly about that."

On the other hand, he says, "I don’t think you can overcome in the modern world either globalization or the movement of people."

There are many in his party who would like to do just that. They point to the loss of national identity and dilution of British culture, not to mention the electoral threat from Ukip. Can the Tories afford to soften their harsh rhetoric on immigration?

"I think it's futile to think you can put the clock back to 1945. Our society has dramatically changed. It's all very well to go on about British values, well, let’s say what they are.

"I think one of the values is that we should include everybody in a united society which enjoys everyone’s difference. Diversity is a strength - but better that it’s not forced on people."

Duncan has a sharp political mind and is a veteran of both John Major's and William Hague's (successful) leadership campaigns. I ask him how he'd like his party high command to approach the coming general election campaign and, in particular, how he'd handle the growing threat from Ukip if he was in charge? Can the Conservatives (re)establish a poll lead over Labour, with less than 100 days till polling day?

"I think if we talk more in terms of vision than in terms of day-to-day politics, we can break out of this headlock. We’ve got to teach a whole new generation what politics is about. People leave school with almost no understanding of politics and it's becoming increasingly shallow because of social media – and I have to say ruder and cruder – but if people are given something to believe in, to make them realize that we can and will be better than France and better than Greece, then they might realize that there's a choice that really matters."

Cameron, however, isn't an ideologue. He is a former public relations operative who is said to have once remarked that he wanted to be prime minister because he would be "good at it". Is the Tory leader really the right man to be articulating the importance of politics and big ideological choices?

"We’ve got [less than] 100 days to make it clearer what we stand for and I think that would bank more votes, reap dividends and give people a proper reason for believing in us. We’ve got to work out what it is we are selling. We cannot administer our way to victory.

"We have to persuade people that there is a reason for voting us and we have time to do that."

Duncan thinks a majority is within grasp if the Tories and their leader campaign with "a bit of passion with a bit of vigour, with what I call the tingle factor. We need the tingle factor in politics."

I ask again: does the PM have what it takes? Does he have that "tingle factor"? "If he pushes the button and goes for it, yes he does. He did it over Scotland. He’s quite good when he gets angry." Duncan chuckles.

"Conventional wisdom is that we live in a non-ideological age," he adds. "I think that’s an error."

So non-ideological Cameron is the right man to lead the Tories in an ideological age? Really?

"He’s capable of it," says Duncan. "And he is the best of the bunch."

This doesn’t sound to me like a ringing endorsement of his party leader and the nation’s premier.

duncan cameron
Cameron is 'quite good when he gets angry', says Duncan

Cameron has also been accused of being "frit" by trying to avoid the televised leaders' debates - the same debates he supported back in 2010. Does Duncan agree?

"No, I think his approach to the debates is perfectly logical and clearly he is getting his way," is the firm reply from the former development minister, who goes on to say: "I have, however, always been against these debates; they belittle politics, they’re shallow, they’re trivial."

Duncan believes it would "be better to have long, deep interviews of an hour with each of the leaders rather than this sort of mock BBC Question Time formula. You go and do Question Time and it’s got five people on it. You travel all the way to Newcastle and you get two minutes. The idea that anyone is going to say anything profound in a 7-way debate…" His voice trails off as he rolls his eyes.

What about the proposed one-on-one TV debate between Cameron and Miliband? Is Duncan one of those Tories who sees Miliband as a loser and an oddball, who poses no threat to the Conservatives’ electoral prospects? Or does he worry that the Labour leader is being underestimated by Tory high command?

The MP produces a mischievous smile. “Oh, I’ve always thought he was by far the more normal of the two brothers.”

Come May 8, both Cameron and Miliband could be competing with each other to win over the support of the Liberal Democrats in a hung parliament. Does Duncan want to see another Con-Lib coalition? My assumption is that he does.

There's a pause. "Well, these hypothetical questions beg the big question about parliamentary arithmetic. I would like, and I still think it’s just possible, to get an overall Conservative majority and that’s what we’ve got to fight for. But even if we get that, the fixed-term parliaments act is still a complete Horlicks piece of legislation. Let’s say we get a majority of five. Well, maybe after two years when you want to go back to the people to say 'Lets refresh this mandate', you cant do that unless you have a vote of no confidence in yourselves so stupid is this piece of legislation."

Yes, but a "stupid piece of legislation" put on the statute book by a government of which he was part? "Well… it was a way of glueing the coalition together. But I think it was an excessive way of doing it and to slip in a massive constitutional change on that basis was an error." Duncan says he would have preferred a "handshake" between the Conservative and Lib Dem leaders, rather than legislation. "Or they should have had a sunset clause so that it expired on May 8."

As for minority governments, Duncan isn’t a fan. Such a government "can only limp along doing the barest minimum. It’s all very well to call for it but you’re not calling for a strong government. You’re calling for a government that can do almost nothing."

What about Ukip? Would he be willing to go into coalition with Nigel Farage and his gang, or rely on the Kippers in a confidence and supply agreement?

"I think [that] is easily avoided by the fact that Ukip will be lucky to get more than one or two seats."

What, excluding sitting Ukip MPs (and Tory defectors) Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless?

"Including,” he responds. "I think they’ll get anywhere between zero and four." Duncan believes Ukip’s support has been overstated by both the polls and the media and things will be "very different" as election day approaches and voters are forced to choose between a Conservative and a Labour government.

Nevertheless, Duncan, despite describing some Ukip candidates as "pretty odd", is an ardent Eurosceptic who says Ukip as a whole “has a point” in relation to the European Union. "They have strayed from being the party that says we don’t like being governed by Brussels, to one which has a second strand, which is getting pretty brutish on immigration, and they have become the bucket for people to spit in. That I think will not translate into many seats. However, they do have a point about the way in which we’re governed from Brussels and we cannot ignore that."

Duncan tells me that he shares some of Ukip’s "anger" over Britain’s relationship with the EU: "I have done ever since I voted ‘no’ in 1975."

nigel farage ukip
Duncan shares Farage's anger over Britain's membership of the EU

Is he a supporter of 'Brexit' now? He shakes his head. "I wish we’d never joined. That’s not the same as saying we should pull out straight away because no one has properly assessed the real costs and benefits of doing so. I think, also, the review of competencies which happened in this government didn’t amount to much. It was supposed to be a way of working out where Brussels has power over us… well, it just turned into 10 telephone directories written by officials and meant absolutely nothing. That project, in my view, failed."

What would it take for him to vote 'yes' in an in/out EU referendum? "If renegotiation really changes to a significant extent the scope Brussels has to tell us what to do then I think staying in would be fine," is his answer.

But he’s not ruling out a 'no' vote? "I would not rule that out at all."

Duncan has been outspoken on the issue of the Israel-Palestine conflict since leaving government last summer. In October 2014, in a speech at the Royal United Services Institute thinktank in London, the former development minister condemned the Israeli government for its "reprehensible" behaviour in the West Bank and its creation of "illegal colonies", and even drew an analogy between the Occupied Palestinian Territories and apartheid South Africa.

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Duncan has condemned Benjamin Netanyahu's Israeli government for 'reprehensible behaviour'

Why is it that so many politicians decide to criticize Israel’s behavior in the Occupied Territories only after they leave office, I wonder? I’m thinking here of, among others, Jimmy Carter in the United States, the late Robin Cook and Clare Short in the Labour Party and, of course, Duncan's fellow Tory, Baroness Warsi?

"Well, I was very vocal within government and it probably held me back," he replies. "The fact is there is a very strong view [on Israel] at the top which is very rigid and that is that."

But why is it so strong?

"It’s very difficult to analyse. I've said it before: it's partly funding... partly a lack of understanding about the plight of the Palestinians. It’s just an ingrained attitude which no one has stopped to reassess and it is sort of pushed to one side and put in the box marked ‘too difficult."

Does he regret singling out the influence of a "very powerful financial lobby" which puts pressure on British political parties to back the Israeli government? The Board of Deputies of British Jews condemned Duncan for his remarks and accused him of "raising the antisemitic theme of a Jewish lobby".

"It’s so obvious it’s undeniable," he laughs. In a nod to the Board of Deputies, he adds: "Those who protest, protest too much. They become self-defeating in their protest because it is so obvious."

Duncan continues: "It’s legitimate [to lobby], it’s fine in many, many ways, but one can’t pretend it does not exist."

The former minister tells me that "some of the closest allies I’ve made since my speech are with Jewish people within the United Kingdom who feel that the Jewish voice is the unrestrained voice of the ultra-right and is not one they share."

What would he say to critics who suggest his support for the Palestinians derives from his own background as an oil trader?

"It’s totally wrong," he replies, staring at me intently. "Marc Rich was a Jewish company, a very, very Jewish company, [where] I worked for 8 years." As a Tory parliamentary candidate, he continues, "I went to Israel with the CFI [Conservative Friends of Israel] and I’m one of those who formed an early view in their favour but I’ve learned more and more and travelled more and more and in the end you cannot ignore injustice. If you want to ignore injustice don’t be in politics."

After a decade in politics, in 2002, while serving as an opposition foreign affairs spokesman, Duncan became the first serving Conservative MP to reveal publicly that he was gay. "Living in disguise as a politician in the modern world simply isn't an option," he told the Times.

More than 12 years later, how hard is it being gay in the modern Conservative Party? "It’s fine," he says, quite nonchalantly. "We’ve smashed a glass ceiling. I think to be the first meant that quietly a lot was achieved on the back of it. It’s utterly immaterial."

Why, then, isn’t there a single openly gay cabinet minister in this coalition government? "I don’t know." He laughs. "Maybe I wasn’t good enough." He laughs again. There’s a long and quite awkward pause. And then he adds: "Well, its because…" Another pause. “I’ll let you work that one out.”

Can’t he tell me? He doesn’t respond and I'm left befuddled.

In 2010, WikiLeaks cables revealed that US spies had put together a dossier on Duncan and on his relationship with leading Conservatives, including the then foreign secretary William Hague. Did that bother the former development minister?

"I was very flattered to be in the WikiLeaks list," Duncan says, with a wry smile. "I’ve known all the [US] ambassadors… so I suppose I’ve been on their list as someone who is influential at the top of Conservative politics. They were charming when Wikileaks came out. I was immediately asked to a private lunch with the deputy ambassador who apologized. I said, 'It’s very simple. You would only need to apologise had I not been included.'" He chuckles.

alan duncan william hague
US intelligence officials took a special interest in the relationship between Duncan and Hague

Duncan has a sense of humour; he's intelligent, charming and charismatic. The former minister is a plain-speaker and a shrewd analyst of party politics. Thus, for many on the progressive wing of the Tory party, his departure from government in 2014 was a massive loss. To others, his failure to reach the cabinet is a bigger source of mystery.

Was it perhaps because of the financial scandals he was involved in? In the early 1990s, it emerged that Duncan had loaned his elderly next-door neighbour money in order for him to buy his council home, at a massive discount, under the right-to-buy legislation - and then bought it from him neighbour three years later. He had to resign from his post as a junior minister in the John Major government. In 2009, Duncan was caught up in the MPs' expenses scandal, after agreeing with parliamentary officials that the thousands of pounds he claimed in gardening expenses "could be considered excessive".

For the first time in the interview, he scowls. "No, not really. The right-to-buy thing was completely concocted."

But he quit the Major government over it, didn’t he?

"Yeah, because 'keep it quick, keep it tidy'. Once the press decide they have got a story sometimes you have to go to bow to the inevitable even if it’s unfair. That’s political life."

How about the expenses scandal then? Duncan was pilloried after being caught on camera complaining that MPs, in the wake of the expenses affair, were being forced to live on "rations". Does he regret that remark?

"Well," he shrugs, "you could go and talk to a lot of MPs now and ask them if being an MP is what they expected."

Does he mean in terms of pay and affordability? "In terms of affordability, dignity, effectiveness. So many are going. I don’t regret saying what I said because over the long term there is a real danger that parliament is going to be so browbeaten and bombarded and diminished, people are going to say: 'Oh my God, is that what we’ve really created?'"

Several Tory MPs from the 2010 intake have announced they're standing down at the next general election. What's driving this exodus of the newbies from Westminster?

"They can’t bear it. Its not just newbies. People come in, they just want to be a minister, and then they just push off. This is becoming a much diminished parliament, it’s becoming shallow, inexperienced, short-termist and petty."

The former minister tells me we now have an "ineffective legislature and an over-dominant executive, including lots of people who do not have any deep experience elsewhere."

Duncan and I were educated at the same private boys' school, Merchant Taylors' in Middlesex - more than 20 years apart, I hasten to add. Yet we were both taught by the same history teacher, who once told me that a young Alan Duncan had boasted of how he planned to become first an MP, then a minister, and then, finally, prime minister.

He made it two-thirds of the way towards his goal but does he regret never making to Number 10?

He dodges my question. "I stood down as a minister out of choice not to go out to grass but to change gear."

Well, what gear is he in now? "I always remain in sport gear," he says, leaning back in his chair, a wicked grin on his face. "Never in reverse."

]]> 난 무슬림으로서 '표현의 자유 근본주의자'들의 위선이 진절머리 난다,2015:/theblog//3.6484504 2015-01-16T19:41:37-05:00 2015-03-18T05:12:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
당신들도 또 나도 조지 W. 부시 전 대통령을 좋아하지 않는다. 9/11이 일어나자 "우리 편이 아니면 테러범 편이다"라고 하던 그의 유치한 발언을 기억하나? 그런데 최근 일어난 끔찍한 테러에 대한 당신들의 반응은 그의 구호를 업데이트한 것이나 다름없다. 즉 "표현의 자유를 지지하지 않으면 표현의 자유를 반대하는 것이다"라는 식의 주장이다. 샤를리 엡도 아니면 자유를 증오하는 광신주의자, 둘 중에 하나라고 단정하는 것이다.

매우 간단한 부탁을 하기 위해 이 글을 쓴다. 제발 그만하기 바란다. 이런 행동이 테러범에게 맞서는 방법이라고 착각하는 모양인데 분열을 조장하고 상대를 악마화하는 것은 오히려 그들의 피 묻은 손에 놀아나는 것밖에 안 된다. 우리와 그들을 나누고, 계몽된 서양과 대비되는 야만적인 무슬림이 있다고 하는 셈이다. 당신들은 1월 7일 파리 총격이 표현의 자유를 겨냥한 것이라고 계속 외치고 있다. 보수파인 니콜라 사르코지 전 프랑스 대통령도 당신들에 동의하는 것 같다. 그는 이번 사건을 "인류를 향한 전쟁 선포"라고 했다. 진보 진영의 대표인사인 존 스노우(Jon Snow)도 "문명의 충돌"을 거론하며 "유럽은 언론의 자유를 지향한다"는 식의 둔감한 얘기를 트위터에 했다.

파리의 비극에 대한 비탄 속에 위선과 과장이 난무한다. 이번 사건이 상상을 초월한 악의적 행위였다는 것은 사실이다. 죄 없는 사람들을 겨냥한 용서할 수 없는 무자비한 살인행위였다. 그렇지만 정말로 표현의 자유를 "암살하려는 의도"(ITV의 마크 오스틴에 의하면)였다고 할 수 있나? "자유로운 사고"에 대한 우리의 신념을 "훼손"(스티븐 프라이가 말했듯이)한 것인가? 난 이번 사건은 사회에 대한 불만을 품은 젊은이들이 저지른 범죄라고 생각한다. 그런데 이들이 과격화 된 계기는 2006년이나 2011년에 만평에 묘사된 선지자 무함마드의 이미지 때문이 아니라 2004년 미국이 이라크에서 저지른 고문의 이미지 때문이다.

제발 정신 차리기를 바란다. 아무런 제약이 없는 표현의 자유가 있다고 믿는 사람은 아무도 없다. 적어도 법과 질서를 지키기 위해 넘어서는 안 될 선이 있다는 데 모두 동의한다. 아니면 품위와 절제 차원에서 넘지 않아야 할 선이 있다는 것을 알고 있다. 각자 그 선을 어디에 놓느냐는 차이가 있을 뿐이다.

예를 들어, 당신들의 언론에서 유대인 홀로코스트를 조롱하는 만평을 소개한 적이 있었나? 없다고? 9/11 희생자들이 트윈타워에서 떨어지는 만평은? 당연히 없었을 것이다. (난 그런 일이 없었다는 것을 다행으로 여긴다). 옥스퍼드 철학자 브라이언 클러그가 제시한 '사고 실험'을 생각해보자. 그는 1월 11일에 파리에서 개최된 시위에 "나는 셰리프다"(샤를리 앱도 사건 테러범 중 한 사람인 셰리프 쿠아치)라는 배지를 달고 누군가 나타났다고 상상해보자고 한다. 이뿐 아니라 살해된 언론인들을 조롱하는 만화가 그려진 플래카드를 들고 있다고 상상해보라고 그는 덧붙인다. "거기에 모인 사람들이 어떻게 반응했을까? 표현의 자유를 외치는 외로운 영웅으로 이 남자를 취급했을까? 아니면 극심한 모욕감을 느꼈을까?" 클러그의 결론, 즉 그 남자는 "목숨을 부지해 도망갈 수 있었다면 운이 좋은 것으로 여겨야 한다"는 말이 틀렸다고 생각하나?

내 입장을 다시 한 번 확인하고자 한다. 언론인이나 만화가를 총격한 것에 대해서는 어떤 변명도 있을 수 없다는 것에 나도 동의한다. 하지만 누구를 불쾌하게 할 권리는 있지만 그 행동에 아무 책임이 없다는 당신들의 견해에는 동의하지 못한다. 또 누군가를 불쾌하게 할 수 있다는 권리가 있다고 해서 당연히 그렇게 해야 한다고 생각하지도 않는다.

당신들이 "나는 샤를리다"라고 할 때, 이 잡지가 흑인인 프랑스 법무장관 크리스티안 토비라를 원숭이에 빗댄 것을 지지한다는 뜻인가? 또 에드워드 사이드를 무덤에서 벌떡 일어나게 할 코 큰 아랍인에 대한 캐리커처는 어떤가?

인종차별적 그림으로 인종차별을 조롱하는 것은 꽤 미심쩍은 풍자 방법이다. 과거 샤를리 엡도에 재직했던 언론인 올리비에 시란은 2013년에 9/11 이후 "이슬람공포 노이로제가 차차 쌓였고" 그 결과 잡지가 "정치적 영향력이 전혀 없는 소수 종교인에 대한 공격"을 옹호하게 됐다고 주장했다.

이런 이유에서 나는 샤를리가 될 수도 없고 또 되고 싶지 않다. 만약 누군가를 추종하고자 한다면 이 잡지의 권리를 보호하다 피살된 무슬림 경찰 아흐메드를 따라야 한다. 작가 태주 콜이 얘기했듯 "가당찮은 표현을 옹호하지 않으면서도 표현의 자유는 보호할 수 있다."

그리고 왜 당신들은 확연한 이중잣대에 대해서는 아무 얘기를 하지 않나? 2008년 샤를리 엡도가 반-유대인적 표현을 했다는 이유로 만평가를 해고한 사실을 모르고 있나? 또 2005년 무함마드 만평을 게재했던 네덜란드 신문 '율란츠 포스텐'이 예수를 조롱하는 만화를 "격렬한 반응"을 야기할 수 있다는 이유로 싣지 않았고, "어떤 상황에서라도 유대인 홀로코스트에 대한 만평은 싣지 않겠다"고 자랑스럽게 발표했다는 것도 알지 못했나?

크리스천이나 유대인보다 무슬림은 더 둔하다고 생각하는 것일까? 사회적 배경도 중요하다. 유럽 전역에서 이슬람을 비방하고 있는 현시점에(독일을 방문해보라) 또 교육과 취업, 일상에서 무슬림들에 대한 차별이 만연한 상황에서 당신들은 우리 보고 그런 것은 다 무시하고 무함마드에 대한 만평을 보고 웃으라고 요구하고 있다.

드론 공격 반대활동으로 수감된 언론인을 풀어줘선 안 된다고 예멘 정부에 요구한 오바마 대통령이 표현의 자유를 외치는 것이 거슬리지 않나? 2014년에 가자에서 7명 언론인의 목숨을 앗아간 베냐민 네타냐후가 파리 시위에 참석한 것을 보고 역겹지 않았나? 그리고 베냐민 옆에는 유대인 홀로코스트를 부인하면 5년 형까지 처해질 수 있는 독일의 앙겔라 메르켈과 "민주주의 전복"을 꾀하는 비폭력 극단주의자의 TV 출연을 금지해야 한다고 말한 영국의 데이비드 캐머런이 있었다.

또 독자들의 문제도 있다. 그들과 제발 대화하기 바란다. YouGov 조사에 따르면 2011년 영국 유권자 82%가 양귀비 모형을 태운 시위자들을 (2011년 종전기념일에 영국 무슬림들이 종전 기념의 상징인 양귀비 모양의 인형을 불태우며 시위를 벌임) 처벌해야 한다는 데 동의했다.

확실히, 무슬림들만 모욕을 느끼는 것은 아니다.

메디 올림.

* 이 글은 허핑턴포스트UK에 게재된 블로그를 번역한 것입니다.]]>
イスラム教徒として言おう。「言論の自由」原理主義者の偽善にはもう、うんざりだ,2015:/theblog//3.6476358 2015-01-15T03:13:04-05:00 2015-03-16T05:12:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
あなたも私もジョージ・W・ブッシュが嫌いだった。9.11の後、「我々の味方か、それともテロリストの味方か」という幼稚な宣言を覚えているだろうか？　けれども今、新たな恐ろしいテロ攻撃を受けて、あなたはブッシュのスローガンを焼き直したようにみえる。言論の自由に賛成か、反対か。「シャルリー・エブド」でないなら、自由を憎悪する狂信者だと。


パリ事件後の悲しみの中、偽善と大言壮語が蔓延している。もちろん、あの攻撃は計り知れない悪のなせる業であり、無辜の人々を無慈悲に殺したことは決して許されない。しかし、あれは本当に（ITVのマーク・オースティンいわく）「言論の自由を暗殺する企て」や、（スティーブン・フライいわく）「思想の自由の神聖性を冒す」行為だったのだろうか？　あの犯罪（戦争行為ではない）は、不満を抱えた若者が実行したものだ。そして彼らの過激化の原因は、2006年と2011年にヨーロッパで予言者の風刺画が描かれたことではなく、2004年のイラクでのアメリカ軍による拷問を知ったことだった。


あなた方は、例えば、ホロコーストを嘲る漫画を出版したことがあるだろうか？　ない？　では9/11の犠牲者たちがツインタワーから落ちる風刺画はどうだろう？　なかったと思う（そう思うし、なくてよかった）。あるいは、オックスフォード大学の哲学者ブライアン・クラッグによる「思考実験」を考えてみよう。彼はこう書いている：1月11日のパリでの「団結の行進」に、『私はシェリフ』と書いたバッジをつけた一人の男が参加したとしよう。シェリフは「シャルリー・エブド」襲撃犯の一人のファーストネームだ。彼はさらに、殺されたジャーナリストを嘲る風刺画を描いたプラカードを掲げていたとしよう。「群集はどんな反応をするだろう？　この孤独な男を、言論の自由のために立ち上がったヒーローとみるだろうか？　あるいは心から怒りを覚えるのだろうか？」。彼が「生きて出られれば幸運」だとするクラッグの結論に、異論はあるだろうか？


あなたが「私はシャルリー」と言うのは、シャルリー・エブドが黒人であるフランス司法大臣のクリスチャーヌ・トビラを猿として描くことの是認なのか？　それとも、エドワード・サイードが草葉の陰で嘆きそうな、団子鼻のアラブ人の下品な風刺画の是認か？



それに、なぜあなたは明白なダブルスタンダードに沈黙を保っているのだろう？　2008年、「シャルリー・エブド」がベテランのフランス人漫画家モーリス・シネを、反ユダヤ的とされる発言を理由に解雇したのはご存知だろうか？　デンマークの新聞ユランズ・ポステンは、2005年に予言者の風刺画を掲載したが、キリストを嘲った風刺画は「非難を呼ぶ」として没にしたとされ、また「いかなる理由であれホロコーストの漫画は掲載しない」と堂々と宣言したことにはお気づきだろうか？







あなたには読者がいる。彼ら読者に何かコメントはないのか？　2011年に行われた世論調査会社「YouGov」の投票では、戦没者追悼のポピーに火をつけた抗議者たちを起訴することに、82%が賛成している。




Como musulmán, estoy harto de la hipocresía de los fundamentalistas de la libertad de expresión,2015:/theblog//3.6472222 2015-01-15T01:01:22-05:00 2015-03-16T05:12:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
Ni a ti ni a mí nos gusta George W. Bush. ¿Te acuerdas de su declaración pueril tras el 11-S en la que dijo "o estás con nosotros o con los terroristas"? Pues ahora, a raíz de otro ataque terrible, parece que se ha actualizado el lema: o estás con la libertad de expresión... o estás en contra. O eres Charlie Hebdo... o eres un fanático que odia la libertad.

Te escribo con una simple petición: por favor, para. Piensas que estás desafiando a los terroristas cuando, en realidad, estás jugando en sus manos manchadas de sangre dividiendo y demonizando. Nosotros y ellos. Los occidentales, liberales e ilustrados, contra los musulmanes, atrasados y bárbaros. No dejáis de contarnos que la matanza en París del 7 de enero fue un ataque a la libertad de expresión. El expresidente francés, el conservador Nicolas Sarkozy, lo califica de "guerra declarada a la civilización". También apoya esta idea el liberal de izquierdas Jon Snow, que en Twitter habló sobre un "choque de civilizaciones" y de la "confianza de Europa en la libertad de expresión".

En medio del dolor post-París, abundan la hipocresía y la hipérbole. Efectivamente, el ataque fue un acto de crueldad inconmensurable; un asesinato de inocentes injustificable y sin piedad. Pero, ¿fue realmente un "intento de asesinar" la libre expresión (Mark Austin, del canal ITV), de "profanar" nuestras ideas de "libre pensamiento" (Stephen Fry)? Fue un crimen -no un acto de guerra- perpetrado por jóvenes desafectados; radicalizados no por dibujos del Profeta en Europa en 2006 o 2011, sino por las imágenes de la tortura de Estados Unidos en Irak en 2004.

Enteraos. Nadie cree en un derecho ilimitado de libre expresión. Todos estamos de acuerdo en que siempre habrá líneas que, por cuestión de orden o ley, no se pueden cruzar; por cuestión de gusto o decencia, no se deberían cruzar. Sólo diferimos en dónde deberían trazarse esas líneas.

¿En vuestra publicación salen dibujos que se burlan, por ejemplo, del Holocausto? ¿No? ¿Y caricaturas sobre las víctimas del 11-S cayendo de las torres gemelas? No creo (y me alegro de que así sea). Piensa en el experimento de pensamiento del filósofo de Oxford Brian Klug. Imagina, escribe, que un hombre hubiera ido a la marcha de la unidad del 11 de enero en París "con una chapa en la que se leyese 'Je suis Chérif'" -el nombre de uno de los asesinos de Charlie Hebdo-. Supón, añade Klug, que lleva un cartel con un dibujo en el que se burla de los periodistas muertos. "¿Cómo reaccionaría la multitud?... ¿Verían a este individuo solitario como un héroe que defiende la libertad y la libre expresión? ¿O estarían profundamente ofendidos?". ¿Entendéis la conclusión de Klug de que el hombre haría mejor en irse para no poner su vida en peligro?

Seamos claros: estoy de acuerdo en que no hay ninguna justificación para matar a periodistas o dibujantes. No estoy de acuerdo con el punto de vista de que el derecho a ofender no conlleva ninguna responsabilidad; y no creo que el derecho de ofensa se traduzca automáticamente en una obligación a ofender.

Cuando dices "Je suis Charlie", ¿apoyas la descripción de Charlie Hebdo de la ministra de Justicia francesa, Christiane Taubira, que es negra, como un mono? ¿O las crudas caricaturas de árabes narigudos que harían a Edward Said revolverse en su tumba?

Parodiar el racismo reproduciendo imaginería racista es una táctica satírica un tanto dudosa. Como Olivier Cyran, antiguo periodista de Charlie Hebdo, dijo en 2013, "una neurosis islamofóbica se apoderó poco a poco" de la revista tras el 11-S, que efectivamente respaldó los ataques a "miembros de una religión minoritaria sin influencia en los pasillos del poder".

Por estos motivos, yo no puedo "ser", no quiero "ser", Charlie; en cualquier caso, deberíamos querer ser Ahmed, el policía musulmán que fue asesinado mientras protegía el derecho de la revista a existir. Como ha observado el escritor Teju Cole, "es posible defender el derecho a la expresión [...] ofensiva sin fomentar o promocionar el contenido de ese discurso".

¿Por qué os quedáis tan callados ante la evidente doble vara de medir? ¿No sabíais que Charlie Hebdo despidió al veterano dibujante francés Maurice Sinet en 2008 por hacer un comentario supuestamente antisemita? ¿No erais conscientes de que Jyllands-Posten, el periódico danés que publicó caricaturas del Profeta en 2005, rechazó unas viñetas que se burlaban de Cristo porque "provocarían indignación" y declaró con orgullo que "bajo ninguna circunstancia publicaría dibujos del Holocausto"?

Supongo que creerán que los musulmanes tenemos la piel más curtida que los cristianos y los judíos. También importa el contexto. Nos pedís que nos riamos de un dibujo del Profeta mientras ignoramos el vilipendio del islam por todo el continente (¿habéis visitado Alemania últimamente?) y la extendida discriminación contra los musulmanes en educación, empleo y vida pública, especialmente en Francia. Pedís a los musulmanes que denuncien a un puñado de extremistas como una amenaza existencial a la libre expresión mientras que os hacéis los locos ante la misma amenaza -pero mayor- que ponen vuestros líderes.

¿No os molesta ver que Barack Obama (que pidió que Yemen mantuviera entre rejas al periodista antidrones Abdulelah Haider Shaye después de ser condenado por actos relacionados con el terrorismo en un tribunal irregular) se monta en el vagón de la libertad de expresión? ¿No os entrarían náuseas al ver a Benjamin Netanyahu, el Primer ministro de un país responsable de matar a siete periodistas en Gaza en 2014, asistir a la marcha de la unidad en París? A Bibi le acompañaba Angela Merkel, canciller de un país en el que la negación del Holocausto es castigada con penas de hasta cinco años en prisión, y David Cameron, que quiere prohibir que aparezcan en televisión los "extremistas" no violentos entregados al "derrocamiento de la democracia".

Entonces ahí están vuestros lectores. ¿Les diréis algo a ellos? Según un sondeo de 2011 de YouGov, el 82% de los votantes respaldaba el procesamiento de los manifestantes que quemaran amapolas, símbolo de los soldados británicos muertos en la Primera Guerra Mundial.

Parece que no sólo los musulmanes nos ofendemos.



Mehdi Hasan es el director político del 'Huffington Post UK' y colaborador de 'New Statesman', donde también se publicó este artículo

Este post fue publicado originalmente en la edición británica de 'The Huffington Post' y ha sido traducido del inglés por Marina Velasco Serrano]]>
Als Muslim habe ich die Heuchelei der Meinungsfreiheits-Fanatiker satt,2015:/theblog//3.6470038 2015-01-14T15:25:08-05:00 2015-03-16T05:12:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
Sie und ich mochten George W. Bush nicht. Erinnern Sie sich noch an seine kindische Erklärung nach 9/11, derzufolge jemand „entweder für uns ist oder für die Terroristen"?

Nun scheint es, dass der plumpe Slogan Bushs infolge einer anderen schrecklichen terroristischen Attacke aktualisiert wird: Entweder ist man für die freie Meinungsäußerung ... oder man ist dagegen. Entweder ist man „Charlie Hebdo" ... oder man ist ein freiheitshassender Fanatiker.

Wir gegen sie - das spielt den Terroristen in die Hände

Ich schreibe Ihnen, um eine simple Bitte vorzubringen: Hören Sie damit auf. Sie denken, Sie bieten Terroristen die Stirn, aber in Wirklichkeit spielen Sie in deren blutbefleckte Hände, in dem Sie spalten und dämonisieren. Uns und sie.

Der aufgeklärte und liberale Westen versus die rückständigen, barbarischen Muslime.

Das Massaker von Paris am 7. Januar war, so sagen Sie uns, ein Angriff auf die freie Meinungsäußerung. Der konservative ehemalige Präsident Frankreichs, Nicolas Sarkozy, stimmte dem zu, indem er es eine „Kriegserklärung an die Zivilisation" nannte. Ebenso macht es der liberal-linke-Vorzeigemann Jon Snow, Anchorman bei Channel4News, der krasserweise von einem „Zusammenprall der Kulturen" twitterte und sich auf den „Glauben Europas an die Freiheit der Meinungsäußerung" bezog.

Mitten in all dem Kummer nach den Ereignissen von Paris gibt es Scheinheiligkeit und Übertreibung im Überfluss. Ja, die Attacke war ein unfassbar böser Akt, ein unentschuldbarer und mitleidloser Mord an Unschuldigen.

Aber war es wirklich ein Versuch, die freie Meinungsäußerung zu „töten" (ITV-Journalist Mark Austin), unser Ideal von der „Freiheit der Gedanken" zu entweihen (Moderator und Comedian Stephen Frey)?

Das Massaker war ein Verbrechen, kein Kriegsakt

Es war ein Verbrechen - kein Kriegsakt -, begangen von desillusionierten jungen Männern; radikalisiert nicht durch in Europa 2006 und 2011 veröffentlichte Zeichnungen des Propheten, wie sich gezeigt hat, sondern von Bildern von US-Folter im Irak 2004.

Bitte seien Sie ehrlich! Keiner von uns glaubt an ein uneingeschränktes Recht der freien Meinungsäußerung. Wir sind uns alle einig, dass es immer Grenzen geben wird, die um Recht und Gesetz willen nicht überschritten werden sollten. Wir sind uns nur nicht einig, wo man diese Grenzen ziehen soll.

Ich will keine Cartoons über 9/11 oder den Holocaust

Hat Ihre Zeitung zum Beispiel Cartoons gezeigt, die sich über den Holocaust lustig machen? Nein? Oder Karikaturen von den Opfern, die an 9/11 von den Twin Towers fallen? Ich glaube nicht. Und ich bin froh darüber.

Denken Sie auch an das „Gedankenexperiment" des Oxforder Philosophen Brian Klug. Man stelle sich vor, schreibt er, jemand hätte den Trauermarsch in Paris am 11. Januar mit einem Anstecker mit der Aufschrift „Je suis Chérif" - dem Vornamen eines der „Charlie-Hebdo"-Attentäters - besucht. Angenommen, fügt Klug hinzu, er hätte ein Plakat mit einem Cartoon getragen, der sich über die ermordeten Journalisten lustig macht. „Wie hätte die Menge reagiert? Hätte sie dieses einzelne Individuum als Helden betrachtet, der für die Meinungsfreiheit einsteht? Oder wäre sie massiv brüskiert gewesen?" Würden Sie Klugs Schluss widersprechen, dass derjenige „Glück gehabt hätte, mit dem Leben davonzukommen"?

Freie Meinungsäußerung braucht Verantwortung

Um das klarzustellen: Ich finde auch, dass es keine wie auch immer geartete Rechtfertigung gibt, Journalisten oder Cartoonisten niederzuschießen. Ich finde aber nicht, wie Sie offenbar finden, dass das Recht zu beleidigen keine Verantwortung erfordert. Und ich finde nicht, dass das Recht zu beleidigen automatisch eine Pflicht zu beleidigen bedeutet.

Wenn Sie sagen „Ich bin Charlie", billigen Sie dann die Darstellung in „Charlie Hebdo", die die schwarze französische Justizministerin Christiane Taubira als Affen zeigt? Die geschmacklosen Karikaturen knollennasiger Araber, die den palästinensisch-amerikanischen Intellektuellen Edward Said dazu gebracht hätte, sich im Grab umzudrehen?

Höhnischen Rassismus über den Abdruck dreister rassistische Bilder zu verbreiten, ist eine ziemlich dubiose satirische Taktik.

Satire über andere Religionsgruppen wurden teils verhindert

Zumal der ehemalige „Charlie Hebdo"-Journalist Olivier Cyran 2013 sagte, nach 9/11 habe das Magazin allmählich eine „islamophobe Neurose" entwickelt, die letztlich Attacken auf „Anhänger einer Minderheitenreligion ohne Einfluss auf die Schalthebel der Macht" unterstützte.

Aus diesen Gründen kann ich nicht Charlie sein, will es nicht sein - wenn überhaupt sollten wir Ahmed sein wollen, der muslimische Polizist, der ermordet wurde, während er das Existenzrecht des Magazins schützte.

Wie der nigerianisch-amerikanische Autor Teju Cole beobachtet hat, „ist es möglich, das Recht auf schamlose ... Meinungsäußerung zu verteidigen, ohne deren Inhalt zu bewerben oder zu fördern".

Und warum waren Sie angesichts der offensichtlichen Doppelmoral so still? Wussten Sie nicht, dass „Charlie Hebdo" den altgedienten französischen Cartoonisten Maurice Sinet 2008 wegen einer angeblich anti-semitischen Äußerung gefeuert hat?

Wussten Sie nicht, dass der „Jyllands Posten" - die dänische Zeitung, die 2005 Karikaturen des Propheten veröffentlicht hat - Berichten zufolge Cartoons abgelehnt hat, die sich über Christen mokieren, weil das einen „Aufschrei provozieren" würde?

Ich nehme an, man erwartete von Muslimen, dass sie ein dickeres Fell haben als ihre christlichen und jüdischen Brüder. Es kommt auch auf den Kontext an. Sie wollen, dass wir über eine Karikatur des Propheten lachen, während Sie die Herabwürdigung des Islam überall auf dem Kontinent ignorieren (man sehe gerade mal auf Deutschland), und die weit verbreitete Diskriminierung der Muslime in der Bildung, in der Arbeitswelt und im öffentlichen Leben - vor allem in Frankreich.

Nicht Extremisten bedrohen die Freiheit - sondern Staatschefs

Sie wollen, dass Muslime eine Handvoll Extremisten als eine existenzielle Bedrohung für die freie Meinungsäußerung anprangern, während Sie die Augen vor der viel größeren Bedrohung verschließen, die unsere gewählten Volksvertreter dafür darstellen.

Macht es Ihnen nichts aus zu sehen, wie Barack Obama auf diesen Zug aufspringt - er, der verlangte, dass der Jemen den gegen die Drohnenpraxis anschreibenden Journalisten Abdulelah Haider Shaye hinter Gittern ließ, nachdem dieser in einem windigen Prozess wegen „Vorwürfen in Zusammenhang mit Terrorismus" verurteilt worden war?

Stieß es Ihnen nicht sauer auf zu sehen, wie Benjamin Netanjahu, Premierminister eines Landes, das für die Ermordung von sieben Journalisten in Gaza 2014 verantwortlich ist, den Trauermarsch in Paris besucht hat? Und David Cameron, der gewaltlose „Extremisten", die die „Demokratie umstürzen" wollen, von Fernsehauftritten ausschließen will?

Dann sind hier Ihre Leser. Würden Sie sich die bitte zur Brust nehmen? Laut einer Umfrage von YouGov aus dem Jahr 2011 standen 82 Prozent der Befragten hinter der Strafverfolgung von Demonstranten, die die Remembrance Poppies anzündeten - Anstecker in Form von Mohnblumen, mit denen an Kriegsopfer erinnert wird.

Offensichtlich sind nicht nur Muslime gekränkt.

Mit freundlichen Grüßen


Dieser Artikel erschien ursprünglich auf The Huffington Post UK und wurde von Susanne Klaiber aus dem Englischen übersetzt.]]>
Da musulmano, sono stufo di tutti quegli ipocriti fondamentalisti della libertà di parola,2015:/theblog//3.6468376 2015-01-14T04:18:58-05:00 2015-03-15T05:12:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
George W. Bush non piaceva né a te né a me. Te la ricordi quella dichiarazione piuttosto puerile che fece dopo l'11 settembre: "O state dalla nostra parte, o state coi terroristi"? Beh oggi, pare che tu abbia deciso di ripescare lo slogan di Dubya, aggiornandolo: O state dalla parte della libertà di parola... oppure ne siete oppositori. O vous êtes Charlie Hebdo ... o siete dei fanatici che odiano la libertà.

Ti scrivo per farti una semplice richiesta: ti prego, dacci un taglio. Ti sarai anche convinto che così stai sfidando i terroristi, ma la realtà dei fatti è che, seminando discordia e demonizzando, ciò che stai facendo invece è consegnare un bel regalo direttamente nelle loro mani insanguinate. Noi e loro. L'occidente illuminato e liberal contro tutti quei musulmani arretrati e barbari. Ci continui a ripetere che il massacro parigino del 7 gennaio è stato un attentato alla libertà di parola. E l'ex presidente francese, il conservatore Nicolas Sarkozy, è d'accordo con te: lui la chiama "una dichiarazione di guerra alla civiltà". Proprio come l'uomo immagine della sinistra liberal, Jon Snow, che ha volgarmente twittato parlando di "scontro di civiltà" e facendo riferimento alla "fede europea nella libertà d'espressione".

Nel lutto post-parigino ipocrisie e iperboli abbondano. Sì, l'attacco è stato un gesto d'incommensurabile malvagità; imperdonabile e spietato omicidio d'innocenti. Ma davvero si è trattato di un "tentativo di assassinare" la libertà di parola (Mark Austin, ITV), di "profanare" le nostre idee sulla "libertà di pensiero" (Stephen Fry)? È stato piuttosto un crimine -- non un atto di guerra -- commesso da giovani frustrati; radicalizzati, a quanto risulta, non tanto dalle vignette raffiguranti il Profeta pubblicate in Europa nel 2006 o nel 2011, ma dalle immagini delle torture americane in Iraq del 2004.

Ti prego, datti una regolata. Nessuno di noi crede in un diritto incondizionato alla libertà di parola. Noi tutti concordiamo sul fatto che dovranno sempre esserci dei confini che, per ragioni legate al mantenimento dell'ordine pubblico e della legalità, non potranno essere superati; o che per ragioni legate al gusto e alla decenza, non dovrebbero essere superati. Ciò su cui non ci ritroviamo d'accordo è solo su dove bisognerebbe tracciare quei confini.

Per esempio: la tua testata ha forse pubblicato vignette che prendevano in giro l'Olocausto? No? E caricature delle vittime dell'11 settembre che si lanciavano giù dalle torri gemelle? Come pensavo (e ne sono lieto). Prova anche a fare questo "esercizio mentale", così com'è stato concepito dal filosofo di Oxford Brian Klug. Immagina, scrive, che qualcuno avesse partecipato alla "marcia unitaria" dell'11 gennaio a Parigi "indossando una spilla con su scritto 'Je sui Chérif'" -- il nome di uno degli aggressori armati di Charlie Hebdo. Supponi, prosegue Klug, che questi reggesse inoltre fra le mani un cartello con una vignetta satirica nei confronti dei giornalisti assassinati. "Come avrebbe reagito la folla?... L'individuo solitario sarebbe forse stato accolto come un eroe della libertà di parola? O se ne sarebbero magari sentiti tutti profondamente offesi?". Ti trovi per caso in disaccordo con le conclusioni di Klug, secondo il quale l'uomo in questione "sarebbe stato fortunato a salvarsi la pelle"?

Siamo chiari: concordo con te sul fatto che non vi sia giustificazione alcuna per l'aver aperto il fuoco contro dei giornalisti o dei vignettisti. Ma dissento su quello che sembra essere il tuo punto di vista, per cui il diritto d'offesa non si fa carico di alcuna responsabilità; e non credo che il diritto d'offesa si traduca automaticamente nel dovere d'offendere.

Quando dici "Je suis Charlie", stai forse condividendo la raffigurazione che Charlie Hebdo ha fatto del ministro della giustizia francese, Christiane Taubira, una donna di colore rappresentata come una scimmia? E che mi dici di quelle rozze caricature di arabi dal naso bulboso che farebbero rivoltare Edward Saïd nella tomba?

Prendersi gioco del razzismo riproducendo un'iconografia sfacciatamente razzista è una strategia satirica di piuttosto dubbio valore. Inoltre, come sosteneva nel 2013 l'ex redattore di Charlie Hebdo, Olivier Cyran, dall'11 settembre in poi "una neurosi islamofoba si è gradualmente impossessata" della rivista, che aveva finito per sposare una linea aggressiva nei confronti di "membri di una religione minoritaria senza alcuna influenza nei corridoi del potere".

È proprio per queste ragioni che io non posso "essere", né voglio "essere" Charlie -- più che altro dovremmo voler essere Ahmed, il poliziotto musulmano ucciso mentre proteggeva il diritto ad esistere della rivista. Come ha osservato il romanziere Teju Cole, "è possibile difendere il diritto all'oscenità... di parola senza volerne sposare o promuoverne i contenuti".

E come mai invece sei rimasto in silenzio di fronte ai due pesi e delle due misure evidentemente adottati [dalla rivista]? Non sapevi che nel 2008 Charlie Hebdo ha licenziato Maurice Sinet, il veterano vignettista francese, per quello che sarebbe stato un suo commento antisemita? Non sapevi che Jyllands-Posten, il quotidiano danese che nel 2005 aveva pubblicato delle caricature del Profeta, a quanto pare avrebbe rifiutato di pubblicare delle vignette satiriche sulla figura di Cristo, perché avrebbero "suscitato proteste", per poi dichiarare orgogliosamente che "in alcuna circostanza... pubblicheremmo vignette sull'Olocausto"?

Immagino che dai musulmani ci si aspetti una pellaccia più dura di quella dei loro fratelli cristiani ed ebrei. Anche il contesto conta. Ci chiedi di ridere delle caricature del Profeta, ma ignori il vilipendio dell'Islam in tutto il continente (sei mai stato in Germania negli ultimi tempi?), nonché la diffusa discriminazione nei confronti dei musulmani nel mondo dell'istruzione, in quello del lavoro e nella vita pubblica -- specialmente in Francia. Tu chiedi ai musulmani di denunciare un pugno d'estremisti in quanto minaccia esistenziale alla libertà di parola, e allo stesso tempo chiudi un occhio di fronte alla ben più grande minaccia ad essa rappresentata dai nostri leader eletti.

Non ti disturba vedere Barack Obama saltare sul treno della libertà di parola dopo aver preteso che lo Yemen lasciasse dietro le sbarre il giornalista anti-droni Abdulelah Haider Shaye, incarcerato per "reati di matrice terroristica" in seguito a un processo farsa? Non ti ha fatto venire la nausea vedere Benjamin Netanyahu, premier di un paese che nel 2014 si è reso responsabile dell'uccisione di sette giornalisti a Gaza, partecipare alla "marcia unitaria" di Parigi? Bibi si trovava in compagnia di Angela Merkel, cancelliera di un paese in cui la negazione dell'Olocausto è un reato punibile con un massimo di cinque anni di detenzione, e di David Cameron, che vorrebbe proibire agli "estremisti" non-violenti impegnati a "rovesciare l'ordinamento democratico" di comparire in televisione.

Infine ci sono i tuoi lettori. Non è che saresti così cortese da scambiarci due parole? Stando a un sondaggio YouGov del 2011, l'82 per cento degli elettori sosteneva un'azione penale nei confronti dei manifestanti che avevano bruciato dei papaveri.

A quanto pare i musulmani non sono i soli a offendersi.

Un cordiale saluto,

Mehdi Hasan è il direttore della politica di The Huffington Post Uk. Questo post è stato pubblicato originariamente da The Huffington Post Uk e New Statesman ed è stato tradotto in italiano.

(Traduzione di Stefano Pitrelli)]]>
As a Muslim, I'm Fed Up With the Hypocrisy of the Free Speech Fundamentalists,2015:/theblog//3.6462584 2015-01-13T19:00:00-05:00 2015-03-15T05:59:01-04:00 Mehdi Hasan
You and I didn't like George W Bush. Remember his puerile declaration after 9/11 that "either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists"? Yet now, in the wake of another horrific terrorist attack, you appear to have updated Dubya's slogan: either you are with free speech... or you are against it. Either vous êtes Charlie Hebdo... or you're a freedom-hating fanatic.

I'm writing to you to make a simple request: please stop. You think you're defying the terrorists when, in reality, you're playing into their bloodstained hands by dividing and demonising. Us and them. The enlightened and liberal west v the backward, barbaric Muslims. The massacre in Paris on 7 January was, you keep telling us, an attack on free speech. The conservative former French president Nicolas Sarkozy agrees, calling it "a war declared on civilisation". So, too, does the liberal-left pin-up Jon Snow, who crassly tweeted about a "clash of civilisations" and referred to "Europe's belief in freedom of expression".

In the midst of all the post-Paris grief, hypocrisy and hyperbole abounds. Yes, the attack was an act of unquantifiable evil; an inexcusable and merciless murder of innocents. But was it really a "bid to assassinate" free speech (ITV's Mark Austin), to "desecrate" our ideas of "free thought" (Stephen Fry)? It was a crime - not an act of war - perpetrated by disaffected young men; radicalised not by drawings of the Prophet in Europe in 2006 or 2011, as it turns out, but by images of US torture in Iraq in 2004.

Please get a grip. None of us believes in an untrammelled right to free speech. We all agree there are always going to be lines that, for the purposes of law and order, cannot be crossed; or for the purposes of taste and decency, should not be crossed. We differ only on where those lines should be drawn.

Has your publication, for example, run cartoons mocking the Holocaust? No? How about caricatures of the 9/11 victims falling from the twin towers? I didn't think so (and I am glad it hasn't). Consider also the "thought experiment" offered by the Oxford philosopher Brian Klug. Imagine, he writes, if a man had joined the "unity rally" in Paris on 11 January "wearing a badge that said 'Je suis Chérif'" - the first name of one of the Charlie Hebdo gunmen. Suppose, Klug adds, he carried a placard with a cartoon mocking the murdered journalists. "How would the crowd have reacted?... Would they have seen this lone individual as a hero, standing up for liberty and freedom of speech? Or would they have been profoundly offended?" Do you disagree with Klug's conclusion that the man "would have been lucky to get away with his life"?


When you say "Je suis Charlie", is that an endorsement of Charlie Hebdo's depiction of the French justice minister, Christiane Taubira, who is black, drawn as a monkey? Of crude caricatures of bulbous-nosed Arabs that must make Edward Said turn in his grave?

Lampooning racism by reproducing brazenly racist imagery is a pretty dubious satirical tactic. Also, as the former Charlie Hebdo journalist Olivier Cyran argued in 2013, an "Islamophobic neurosis gradually took over" the magazine after 9/11, which then effectively endorsed attacks on "members of a minority religion with no influence in the corridors of power".

It's for these reasons that I can't "be", don't want to "be", Charlie - if anything, we should want to be Ahmed, the Muslim policeman who was killed while protecting the magazine's right to exist. As the novelist Teju Cole has observed, "It is possible to defend the right to obscene... speech without promoting or sponsoring the content of that speech."



Does it not bother you to see Barack Obama - who demanded that Yemen keep the anti-drone journalist Abdulelah Haider Shaye behind bars, after he was convicted on "terrorism-related charges" in a kangaroo court - jump on the free speech ban wagon? Weren't you sickened to see Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of a country that was responsible for the killing of seven journalists in Gaza in 2014, attend the "unity rally" in Paris? Bibi was joined by Angela Merkel, chancellor of a country where Holocaust denial is punishable by up to five years in prison, and David Cameron, who wants to ban non-violent "extremists" committed to the "overthrow of democracy" from appearing on television.


Apparently, it isn't just Muslims who get offended.

Yours faithfully,


Mehdi's Minute: The Best (Worst?) Bits of 2014,2014:/theblog//3.6395072 2014-12-30T07:00:00-05:00 2015-03-01T05:59:01-05:00 Mehdi Hasan
Here's the past 12 months in 60 seconds.

If Mary and Joseph Tried to Reach Bethlehem Today, They Would Get Stuck at an Israeli Checkpoint,2014:/theblog//3.6365270 2014-12-22T06:02:19-05:00 2015-02-21T05:59:01-05:00 Mehdi Hasan How would that carpenter and his pregnant wife have circumnavigated the Kafka­esque network of Israeli settlements, roadblocks and closed military zones in the occupied West Bank? Would Mary have had to experience labour or childbirth at a checkpoint, as one in ten pregnant Palestinian women did between 2000 and 2007 (resulting in the death of at least 35 newborn babies, according to the Lancet)?

"If Jesus were to come this year, Bethlehem would be closed," declared Father Ibrahim Shomali, a Catholic priest of the city's Beit Jala parish, in December 2011. "Mary and Joseph would have needed Israeli permission - or to have been tourists."

Three years on, nothing has changed. Bethlehem today is surrounded on three sides by Israel's eight-metre-high concrete wall, cutting it off from Jerusalem just six miles to the north; the city is also encircled by 22 illegal Israeli settlements, including Nokdim - home to Israel's far-right foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman (the only foreign minister in the world who doesn't live inside the borders of his own country).

The biblical birthplace of Christ has had large chunks of land confiscated and colonised and its tourism-dependent economy has been hit hard: the city has one of the highest unemployment rates (25%) and levels of poverty (22%) in the West Bank. As a result, Christians continue to emigrate from one of the holiest places of Christianity - the Christian proportion of Bethlehem's population has dropped, in recent decades, from 95% to less than a third. Overall, in 1948, Christians in Palestine accounted for roughly 18% of the Arab population; today they make up less than 2% of the Palestinian population of the occupied territories.

So here is another question to consider: why is it that the plight of persecuted Christians in the Middle East, or countries such as Sudan, has attracted the attention and anger of politicians in the west, yet the Christians of Palestine don't get a look-in? There are no motions, resolutions or petitions filed on their behalf; no solidarity expressed. Could it be because their persecutors aren't Arabs or Muslims: it's the state of Israel?

The Israeli government, conveniently, blames the decline of the Palestinian Christian population on the intolerance of militant Muslim groups such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The problem for the Israelis is that the Christian exodus pre-dates the existence of Hamas - the creation of Israel in 1948 was marked by the expulsion of as many as 50,000 Christians from their homes - not to mention that Palestinian Christians in their own right have repeatedly refused to endorse their occupiers' dis­ingenuous narrative. A 2006 poll by the Open Bethlehem campaign group found that 78% of Christian residents of the city singled out "Israeli aggression and occupation" as "the main cause of emigration", while a mere 3% exclusively blamed the "rise of Islamic movements".

"Divide and rule" is the name of the (Israeli) game; trying to turn Palestinian Christians against Palestinian Muslims by blaming the latter for the persecution and emigration of the former; even trying to redefine what it means to be a Palestinian Christian. In February, the Knesset passed a law recognising Palestinian Christians in Israel as a minority distinct from Palestinian Muslims. Yariv Levin, the Likud politician who sponsored the law, said it would "connect us to the Christians, and I am careful not to refer to them as Arabs, because they are not Arabs".

Yet Arab Christians, and specifically Palestinian Christians, have always been at the forefront of efforts to resist Israeli expansionism: from politicians such as Hanan Ashrawi to diplomats such as Afif Safieh, who served as the PLO's envoy in London, Washington and Moscow; from the New York-based academic Edward Said to the militant leader George Habash, who founded the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The current mayor of Bethlehem is Vera Baboun, a Palestinian Christian who has written of "the despair of decades of living under a foreign occupation". The Palestinian ambassador to the UK, Manuel Hassassian, is Christian, too. "We as Christians are part and parcel of the social fabric of [Palestinian] society," Hassassian told me, adding: "I want to celebrate Christmas in a free country."

Palestinian church leaders - Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, Greek Orthodox - came together in 2009 to declare the occupation a "sin against God" and urge a boycott of Israel. What a contrast with US evangelical leaders who shamefully line up behind right-wing Israeli governments and Jewish settlers as they wait for Armageddon.


"There is no difference between Christian and Muslim," remarks a character in Saraya, the Ogre's Daughter, a novel by the Palestinian Christian writer Emile Habibi. "We are all Palestinian in our predicament."

Mehdi Hasan is political director of the Huffington Post UK and an New Statesman contributing writer, where this column is crossposted]]>