France: Access denied - by Abdul Rahman al-Rashed

Whether the French president did so for the mere purpose of political gain, or to send a clear message to advocates of extremism and violence to say there is no place for them in his country, his decision is a step towards restarting the battle over the limits of freedom and public responsibility. It has also prompted the Islamists to reconsiders their stances and be aware that what they say on their platforms comes with a price.

The story did not begin in the wake of the crime committed by Mohammed Merah, who murdered seven innocent people, including three children, just because they were Jews, for he also murdered three Muslims just because they served in the French army. Had these crimes been committed in a Muslim country, that state would have certainly inflicted capital punishment upon him. Merah’s crime was an individual case that we must not use to generalize about all Muslims, or even about the most radical among them. President Nicolas Sarkozy's anger about what happened was something natural, and was not necessarily an electoral play as some Muslim hardliners may like to portray it. Had the crime been committed in Algeria, the birthplace of Merahh, Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika would have said more than Sarkozy did, and perhaps the security apparatus there would have done more than the French police did.

But what about the government’s decision to prosecute radicals and target even French clerics of Muslim descent, threatening to expel them from France? What about the Interior Minister’s decision to deny famous Muslim speakers entry into Paris, by announcing that they are no longer welcome?

Some of those who were denied access are even more moderate than the French government. Furthermore, it is a mistake to make a generalization about someone like, for example, Sheikh Aaidh al-Qarni, who we regard as a symbol of moderation, based on the practices of other extremist orators. Not all bearded Islamists are necessarily extremists, and some of them have even shouldered the responsibility of confronting advocates of terrorism. They have even risked their lives by facing dangerous organizations like al-Qaeda when fighting such extremist ideologies and this shows a marked development in the mindset of political Islam.

Note EU-Digest: this is an interesting argument by Mr. Abdul Rahman al-Rashed , but unfortunately not a very realistic one. Every country applies its own rules in this case and it is very difficult to make exceptions based on the profiling of people. Muslim countries need to deal with the extremists among them first before they make any critical comments on other countries surveillance policies in relation to terrorism.

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