Last Sunday, in the historic Paris show of solidarity of nearly four millions against the Islamist attacks on the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket, French President Francois Hollande vowed: “France will never break, will never yield, never bend.” He must honour this on the realistic plane too.
The freedom of expression is the soul of modern civilisation. The journalists of Hebdo have been killed by the two Islamist fanatics for having exercised this freedom only. Their weekly has throughout been critical of the established order in all its forms. It has ridiculed the bureaucracy, the police and the Army. It had the famous provocative “mort aux vaches” “(“Death to Pigs”) reserved for the cops. On the New Year’s Eve it published a caricature of a dog having sex with the leg of French President Hollande.
The weekly lampooned all religions, including Judaism, Christianity and Islam. In 2006, Charlie Hebdo published the Danish cartoons of Prophet Muhammad. In 2006, the magazine had Jesus on the cross on its cover shouting, “I’m a celebrity, get me out of here.” In 2010, it had Pope Benedict XVI holding a condom. In December 2014, it published a cartoon on Virgin Mary giving birth to Jesus with a pig nose. In 2011, it had Prophet Muhammad. Stéphane Charbonnier was averse to illogical extremism of any kind, religious ones especially. He chose not to shield himself with self-censorship and paid the price for it!
As one of the leading champions of democracy in the world since the 1789 French Revolution, France must defend this freedom of expression. It seems that despite a number of counter-terrorism measures that have been adopted by Paris in the post-9/11 landscape, there are some serious lapses in its internal security mechanism.
The state of affairs in the traditionally secular, multicultural France has of late been shocking. Reports are that anti-Semitism is growing across the country. This has compelled between 100,000-200,000 Jews to leave France for Israel. The French security is being virtually helpless before the gangs of Islamists. The terrorists in the Paris attack case functioned like a military unit — able to get in and get out. Paris would do well to remedy such lapses, if any, so as to foil any jihadist attacks on the freedom of expression in future. Besides, in combating Islamist terrorism, Paris may consider fighting this war on Islamist terror on the ideological front as well. The path of hatred and violence the jihadi terrorists have resorted to is absolutely unIslamic.
There is a near consensus among leading theologians and historians that the war on terror and the defence of freedom are not against Islam. Islam accommodates other schools of thought. Every religion’s origin lies in humanity. Like Hind-uism, Judaism, Budd-hism, Christianity, Sikhism and other religions in the world, Islam has propagated the values of liberalism, equality and justice. The consensus goes that Islam shares a lot even with the Vedas. Ultimately, both prescribe worshipping the One Supreme Lord.
Both systems recommend fighting for dharma or justice — without any ulterior motives and violence to the non-combatants and civilians, especially women and children — and that, too, only when there is no alternative to war. Paris could use the enlightened sections of its Muslim community to spread this finer version of Islam to sideline the terrorists. It is heartening to find that many religious Muslim leaders in France have come together to condemn the recent Paris attacks.
On its website the Grand Mosque of Paris has said, “We expect the authorities to take the most appropriate measures. Our community is stunned by what just happened. It’s a whole section of our democracy that is seriously affected.” The Union of Islamic Organisations of France has said: “ The UOIF condemns in the strongest terms this criminal attack and horrible murders.” Hassen Chalghoumi, imam of the Drancy mosque in Paris’ Seine-Saint-Denis suburb, has said, “Their barbarism has nothing to do with Islam… These are criminals, barbarians. They have sold their soul to hell. This is not freedom. This is not Islam and I hope the French will come out united at the end of this.”
France could meaningfully use this social base in combating lslamist terrorism. Simultaneously, Paris could rein in such ultra-nationalist elements at home as regularly blame Islam for many of its social problems. The ultra-nationalists’ activities do not but help the Islamists justify theirs.
The author is a senior journalist based in New Delhi
