By Shireen Senadhira
A statement that justifes anarchy – “People are going to make sacrifices. People will lose things; people are worried about their businesses, nobody should have to lose their livelihood, people are losing their life, actual human life… Do you know what an insurance check will pay for people’s businesses? One day you will be able to open and recover your businesses. These families are not together getting their family members back.”
Answer to the above statement – “This is one of the most preposterous, incendiary, and insidious statements you have made that justifies anarchy. Anarchy perpetrated by White Antifa liberals or White supremacists to coax Black protesters to fall in the trap of magnifying the misperception of Black violence. What is it about peaceful protests that you do not understand? The changes that are taking place to start correcting injustices would have happened without the violence. Why do you undermine the peaceful protesters and assume that their messages will not get through? By undermining them, you undermine their powerful messages, and you also stick two fingers up at the very eminent leaders of the 20th Century. They moved mountains through non- violent protests and actions, Martin Luther King Jr, Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela.
Do you understand this? If not, why not? “
Intriguing isnt it? You read the above statement of Linda Sarsour and the answer to it by Hasan Ali Imam. Then you read it a second time. Intriguing as well as interesting and so is the title of the book as depicted above. The book is more or less an entire debate. The book published on 17 October 2020 is of 200 pages. Linda Sarsour is an American-Palestinian Muslim Socialist activist from USA and the author Hasan Ali Imam, a British-Bangladeshi Muslim Conservative from the UK. They both practice the same religion of Islam, but are poles apart politically. This is seen drastically as the pages unforld and therefore, the ensuing discourse, diaogue and debate becomes very animated.
Linda Sarsour’s way of thinking on the incidents mentioned in the book is typically socialistic which Imam says is not how to mitigate a problem. Take for example the George Floyd murder in Minneapolis in May 2020 in the middle of the pandemic and what happened thereafter.
So much venom has also been observed in the violent protests after the tragic murder of George Floyd. The peaceful movement of Black Lives Matter has been hijacked by thugs and Marxists who exploited Floyd’s murder to promote their agenda of dismantling Capitalism through burning of buildings, violence and intimidation. This is addressed in detail and Sarsour’s support of such violence is heavily criticised as well as her comrades’ deafening silence on other gross injustices.
A forty-six-year-old Black American named George Floyd died in a horrific way on 25 May 2020 in Minneapolis. Floyd was killed by a police officer strangling him with his knee on Floyd’s throat when on the ground. The next day, hundreds of protesters, many wearing face masks to guard against covid-19, braved the pandemic to protest at the spot where Floyd died. Nearby police cars were pelted with rocks, and officers responded by firing tear gas. It must be said that within twenty-four hours of the video of Floyd’s death coming to light, the Minneapolis Police Department fired the officer who had knelt on Floyd and three others who had been at the scene.
This deplorable incident was the impetus for thousands of Americans to take to the streets to protest about racism – many for the first time in their lives. Why did this particular tragedy struck such a chord? George Floyd was not the first African American whose death in police custody resulted in protests. There were rallies for others too but this time seemed different, with the response more sustained and widespread. There have been demonstrations across the US – in all 50 states and DC – including in cities and rural communities that are predominantly white. Local governments, sports and businesses took a stand this time – most notably with the Minneapolis city council pledging to dismantle the police department. The Black Lives Matter protests this time seem more racially diverse – with larger numbers of white protesters, and protesters from other ethnicities.
What happened at the incident’s aftermath was how the white agitators too joined in and looted and pillaged enhancing the horror scene. Anger and taking revenge gives such chances to those who are waiting and watching to pounce on such opportunities to aggravate the situation for their own ends. George Floyd’s unnecessary, unconscionable death should be the catalyst to make people realize that both personal and systemic discrimination and racism felt by people of color must end.
People need to adjust with time as time marches onwards never stopping. That’s what Linda Sarsour and her counterparts will not do. They are the same steadfast socialist activists full of fire and angry epithets. Sarsour and counterparts have not displayed any change in their atttitude of answering these drastic problems.
Looking at another event, it is ironic to see how much is lost in terms of the principles for fighting the enemy in warfare. In the middle east, however much people are reminded of the Islamic rules of justice during warfare, Muslim fanatics ignore these and justify suicide bombing and terrorism. Listen to a British colonel’s words, Tim Collins, who gave his troops an inspiring speech before they went into Iraq in 2003. His speech is hung in the Oval Office. Soldiers could do well to learn from him. Here is an extract of his speech:
