veiled4allah: Tariq Ramadan: who is this guy?

There's been quite a furor in recent days over the barring of Muslim scholar Tariq Ramadan from the U.S. Ramadan had been offered a faculty position at the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, and he had been granted a work visa in February. However, his visa was suddenly revoked with the allegation that he uses his position to advocate for terrorism.

Last year, I briefly reviewed Ramadan's book "To Be A European Muslim". Read it for yourself. The entire book is about how Muslims living in the West should integrate into Western societies, and what is the best way to do so without losing their cultural and religious identity. In a more recent interview, Ramadan said that secularism should not be a problem for European Muslims. I thought this was the kind of view we wanted to encourage among Muslims.

Probably the most thorough news coverage is from the Swiss news journal NZZ (Ramadan is a Swiss citizen who lives and works in Switzerland) and from Indiana's South Bend Tribune, near Notre Dame.

Much of the fuss seems to be over whether Ramadan has expressed anti-Semitic views. Richard Silverstein initially took a very negative view of Ramadan, but subsequently found a lengthly interview Ramadan gave to the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz. Here's a sample quote:

He firmly condemns the anti-Semitic incidents that took place during the past year in France, Belgium and other European countries, such as attacks on synagogues and Jewish institutions. "Too few Muslims have spoken out against these anti-Semitic and Judeophobic phenomena," he says. In his opinion, any attempt to afford legitimization to anti-Semitism on the basis of texts taken from the Islamic tradition, and as an expression of protest against the suffering of the Palestinians, must be firmly rejected.

"To my regret, anti-Semitic utterances have been heard not only from frustrated and confused young Muslims, but also from certain Muslim intellectuals and imams," he says, "who in every crisis or political backsliding see the hand of the 'Jewish lobby.' There is nothing in Islam that gives legitimization to Judeophobia, xenophobia and the rejection of any human being because of his religion or the group to which he belongs. Anti-Semitism has no justification in Islam, the message of which demands respect for the Jewish religion and spirit, which are considered a noble expression of the People of the Book."

Even when he identifies urges that have their source in economic distress and social frustration, or the desire to protest against Israel's oppressive policy, among people who express themselves in an anti-Semitic way and are involved in anti-Semitic acts, Ramadan refuses to demonstrate understanding or forgiveness toward them. He says: "The social and political forces in the Muslim communities must act to educate toward the delegitimization of elements of anti-Semitism. Leaders and imams have the responsibility to disseminate an unequivocal message about the profound connections between Islam and Judaism and Islam's recognition of Moses and the Torah."

"Despite what is happening today in Israel and Palestine, despite [Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon's policy, despite the feelings of anger and frustration - those responsible for all the Muslim political and social organizations must open a clear dialogue that distinguishes between criticism of Israel's policy, and anti-Semitic and Judeophobic statements and actions. This is lacking today and this is a great responsibility."

The statements made by Muslim leaders so far do not satisfy him; these saw the anti-Semitic acts as deeds of a local nature, behind which there have been no national organizations and which derived from a sense of economic and social frustration. "The neighborhoods and suburbs must take educational action to clear out phenomena of Judeophobia and of the attaching of labels and stigmas; it is necessarily to criticize mercilessly the theses of the extreme right ad not to abandon the arena to dangerous political forces," says Ramadan.

As far as I can tell, just as Ramadan in the passage above condemns certain Muslim intellectuals for failing to live up to the universal teachings of Islam and promoting narrow-minded, bigoted views, so he also condemned certain Jewish intellectuals for what he saw as failing to live up to the universal teachings of Judaism; he felt that they were supporting a war (Iraq) they would otherwise condemn because they were (in his opinion) too narrowly focused on the interests of Israel. That is, he is making the same basic criticism in both cases and whether or not he's right he's at least consistent, and certainly does not spare his own community from criticism (in fact, his criticism of the Muslim intellectuals seem much stronger to me).

Richard probably wouldn't agree with me on this, but he's very clear in his outrage over the revocation of Ramadan's visa:

So, Tariq Ramadan is either a spy, saboteur or potential terrorist??? Gimme a break! This is an outrage not just to Muslim-Americans but to all who cherish religious freedom, the right to think and teach, and all who love freedom and liberty... ...I deeply hope that the leaders of my own Jewish community will unite to issue a statement in Ramadan's defense.

The only possible offense I can see that Ramadan committed is his attack on several French Jewish intellectuals for what he saw as their undue deference to Israel in their views on the Mideast conflict ... I said at the time that I didn't agree with Ramadan's statements in this case and found them borderline anti-Semitic. But Ramadan has made other positive and forthright statements about relations between Muslims and Jews (including a persuasive interview in Haaretz which I link to) which mitigate what he said about the French intellectuals.

Since when do we let a few blockheads in Homeland Security and the State Department decide that a prominent (and totally non-violent) scholar is too dangerous for our citizens to hear? I'm so mad as I write this that my blood pressure's probably gone up ten points.

In any case, no evidence has yet been presented that Ramadan is a threat, only that his political views are offensive to some people. Have we forgotten about the First Amendment here?

The best suggestion I can make is to read Ramadan's writings for yourself, and make your own decision. The two full-length works I've read (his book, and the Ha'aretz interview) certainly don't make him sound like an extremist to me. In fact, he seems to have a lot of things to say that people on all sides agree that Muslims need to hear.