Australian Muslims: Second-Class Citizens? |
In reaction to the NSW Police’s crackdown on anti-Israel protests, Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi, who is Muslim, made the following comments:
“We have known that we are second-class citizens in this country for a very long time. Now everyone can see that Muslims are not just gaslighted, they are not just scapegoated, but they are actually assaulted by the very people who are supposed to protect us.”
According to Faruqi, Muslims are “second-class citizens” and are “scapegoated” and “assaulted.” If one were to believe her words, they would imagine Australia is an anti-Muslim state filled with high levels of Islamophobia. In reality, Muslims are far from second-class citizens. Not only do Muslims who are Australian citizens have the same rights as non-Muslim Australians, but Australian Muslims are sometimes given much leeway.
For example, soon after Oct 7, the largest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, committed by jihadists, many pro-Palestine activists and Muslims openly celebrated the massacre outside the Sydney Opera House. These celebrations were accompanied by chants such as ‘f… the Jews.” Despite these vile chants and support for terrorism, there was no forceful police crackdown. There have also been many Islamic preachers who have spewed antisemitic rhetoric, as documented by the Middle East Media Research Institute in a compilation. On Oct 9, 2023, Sheikh Ibrahim Dadoun celebrated Oct 7, exclaiming, “I’m smiling and I’m happy.”
How many extremist Islamic preachers were arrested or deported? How many Muslim protestors who celebrated the jihadist massacre of Jews by Hamas and gleefully chanted ‘f… the Jews,” were arrested or deported? Little to none. If Australia is so anti-Muslim that Muslims are treated as second-class citizens, why does Australia tolerate Islamists who incite violence and support terrorist groups? The answer is because Muslims are not an oppressed people equivalent to second-class status in Australia. Is there any anti-Muslim discrimination that occurs in Australia? Sure, there unfortunately is, and that should be condemned, but it is nowhere near the same as wholesale oppression.
Ironically, if Faruqi were to look at how her coreligionists treat minorities in their nations, she perhaps would come to see her blatant hypocrisy. In Islamic countries, non-Muslim minorities are treated as second-class citizens, being discriminated against and, at times, outright murdered.
Take Egypt for example. Coptic Christians have faced much persecution, from the destruction of their churches by Islamists to the kidnapping and forced marriages of their daughters by Muslims. In Pakistan, minorities, despite being no threat, face severe Islamic persecution due to the country’s blasphemy laws.
Journalist Uzay Bulut explains:
“Pakistan’s blasphemy laws are among the harshest in the world. They prescribe a mandatory death sentence for insulting Islam’s Prophet Muhammad and prison terms for Ahmadis who “pose as Muslims.” These laws often become weapons with which to settle personal scores and incite communal violence.”
While the media barely reports the persecution Christians worldwide endure, Christians are the most persecuted group in the world. Interestingly, the most persistent force behind the persecution of Christians just so happens to be Islam, whether it be jihad terrorists or Muslim citizens in Islamic nations.
This extreme level of Islamic oppression of non-Muslims in their nations is not surprising however, when one considers Islamic history and texts.
Historically, the threat of Islamic jihad has constantly threatened infidels, ever since the rise of Muhammad, and has overall been the biggest threat to the West for the last 14 centuries. During the Islamic conquests, Muslims conquered 3/4ths of Christendom, including North Africa and the Middle East, and even managed to penetrate Europe, taking Spain and launching raids in France. Ever since these conquests, Europe was in much danger from Islamic takeover and fought off many invasions.
The historian Bernard Lewis says: “We tend nowadays to forget that for approximately a thousand years, from the advent of Islam in the seventh century until the second siege of Vienna in 1683, Christian Europe was under constant threat from Islam, the double threat of conquest and conversion. Most of the new Muslim domains were wrested from Christendom. Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and North Africa were all Christian countries, no less, indeed rather more, than Spain and Sicily. All this left a deep sense of loss and a deep fear.” (p. xiii)
When infidels fell under Muslim rule, they were often oppressed, with the desecration of their holy sites and, at times, even massacres of their peoples. Such hatred and need to oppress the infidel are embedded in core Islamic texts.
After commanding Muslims to fight unbelievers, Surah 9:29 of the Quran says the infidels must submit, pay the jizya (poll tax) and feel themselves subdued. According to renowned Quran commentator Ibn Kathir, this is because the infidels are supposed to be:
“disgraced, humiliated and belittled. Therefore, Muslims are not allowed to honor the people of Dhimmah or elevate them above Muslims, for they are miserable, disgraced and humiliated.” (p. 2058 in pdf)
Undoubtedly, while the majority of Muslims are peaceful, non-Muslims in Islamic countries are severely oppressed due to troubling aspects of Islamic texts and history. While Faruqi cries about the ‘oppression’ the “second-class” Muslim citizens of Australia face, minorities in Muslim countries are discriminated against, massacred, kidnapped, assaulted and endure much more, continuing a fourteen-century-year-old pattern. Further, as shown before, there is a problem with Islamic antisemitism in Australia that has gone largely unanswered by authorities. The conclusion is obvious: Australian Muslims are treated far better than minorities in Islamic countries. As such, while Faruqi complains that Muslims are “gaslighted,” her actions fit the description of gaslighting quite well.
Michael Savvakis is a journalist and arts student interested in religion, history and geopolitics.