Help! There’s A Moslem On My Plane

– I stumbled upon a question on Yahoo Q&A which, at first, enraged me to the extent that I was going to send in an abuse report.  The question asked whether or not people would feel nervous were they to board a plane and discover that one of their co-passengers was decked out in `Moslem garb.’  First of all, there is no such thing as `Moslem garb’ and apart from instructing Moslems to dress modestly, Islam does not prescribe a particular style of clothing.  Secondly, the question came across as highly racist as it was premised on the assumption that Islam and Moslems were synonymous with terrorism and terrorists.  Just as I was about to click the ‘Report Abuse’ link, I suddenly remembered an interesting incident.  My mother, sister and I were shopping at an exclusive ladies’ boutique in Milan when three bearded, obviously Middle Eastern, men walked in.  Since the beard denotes an extremist interpretation of Islam which has little, or nothing, to do with the religion and as we felt that there really was no reason for 3 males to shop at a ladies’ boutique, we were terrified.  I then rethought the question posed on Yahoo Q&A and discovered that `yes,’ I would be terribly scared were a bearded Middle Eastern male wearing a jallabiya and head cap to board the same plane as me.  I would similarly be scared were a niqab-donning female to board the same flight as me.  If I, as a secular Moslem would be terrified, how can we shout `racism’ when a non-Moslem expresses a comparable fear?  I then realised that the question posed on Yahoo Q&A was both legitimate and important.  It was not an expression of racial, or in this case, religious profiling but of a very real and extremely justifiable fear.  What is the source of our fear?

As Moslems our fear is founded upon our knowledge that Islam defines itself as the Religion of Moderation; explicitly clarifies jihad as a violent internal struggle between an individual’s propensity for evil versus his/her inclinations towards `good;’ categorically prohibits Moslems for labelling any as `Infidels;’ and without any mincing of words, completely forbids the taking of innocent lives or engaging in anything but defensive war within the territorial bounds of one’s homeland and, even in cases of war, outlaws any/all forms of aggression against civilians, women, children (even if armed) and unarmed soldiers.  As none of this is open to alternate interpretations, having been repeated and explicated in several Quranic passages and emphasised by the Prophet Mohammed, the ability of a few to grossly misinterpret that which is clear and to pervert the religion they claim to espouse for the purposes of portraying mass murder as a religious duty, is nothing short of terrifying.  We, as Moslems, know that these people have nothing to do with Islam and cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be defined as Moslems.  Yet, in their somewhat crazed minds, they are Moslems and theirs is the legitimate interpretation of Islam; in their sociopathic minds, we are the non-Moslems, the infidels whom they are duty-bound to slaughter.  So, yes, they terrify us and our terror is the logical outcome of the disparity between Islam proper and their perverted interpretation of it.

Why should the so-called `Moslem garb’ scare us, the Moslems?  It scares us because Islam never stipulated that women wear a face veil or deck themselves out in black clothing; it scares us because Islam instructed modesty of dress and nowhere in the Quran is it mentioned that women are expected to cover their hair.  Yet, those of us who are not veiled and do not don the supposed Islamic dress, are immediately judged as infidels whose fate lies in the everlasting fires of Hell.  As for long and unkept-bearded men wearing the jallabiya and cap, they push us beyond the point of abject terror.  Their dress code is simply that which was common to Arabia over 1500 years ago; it was the dress code for people of all persuasions, including the Atheists.  It has nothing to do with Islam but everything to do with their fanatical, single-minded, perverted vision of religion.  Their dress code is a `tell.’ It is an exposition of their mentality, their religious ideology, their perceptions of us and their determination to distinguish themselves from the far greater majority a majority which they perceive of as corrupt infidels whom they have a `religious’ duty to eliminate.

Yes, as Moslems, the so-called religious garb scares us.  These people are not one of us and they have judged us to be unworthy of life.  They may claim that they are Moslems but we do not believe them to be.  We share neither language nor faith with them and trying to reason with any of them is an exercise in futility.  If they scare us half-to-death, if they choose to ignore the Prophet’s statement that even atheism is a belief system worthy of respect and completely ignore countless Quranic references to Jews and Christians as believers, as `People of the Book,’ how can we, in all honesty, expect non-Moslems to refrain from the profiling of any wearing the so-called religious garb?  The Yahoo Q&A question was a perfectly legitimate and completely understandable one.  More importantly, it exposed how completely derelict Moslems have been in responding to the sociopaths who justify their murderous activities and their trampling upon human rights through reference to a religion to which they bear no relationship whatsoever.

By Hala Khalek

Oxbridge Researchers Ltd

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