Paris attacks: we need to discuss Islamic terrorism intelligently

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Michael Doran wants to be heard. His daughter, Sophie, was at the Bataclan concert hall with her friend last Friday night. Five or six songs into the concert, Islamist terrorists struck. Sophie’s friend was shot. The two hid under seats for what seemed like an eternity and eventually were rescued by police. Sophie is still trying to process the horror.

Her father, who lives in Melbourne, rang me on Monday. He wants to be heard. Not to talk about the bullets, blood and mayhem. Not to feed the news cycle. Doran wants to talk about what comes next. After the three days of mourning in Paris, the unity statements, the peace vigils, the hashtag campaigns, after the French national colours lit up the Sydney Opera House, the question is: what’s next?

Symbols of solidarity make us feel good. They signal our sympathy and remind the French people we are thinking of them. But we have been here before. Remember the Je suis Charlie marches in January, the hashtag campaigns, the vigils? And now this. An even more horrendous, co-ordinated and sophisticated series of terrorist attacks across Paris on a Friday evening as locals, including Doran’s daughter, who lives in Paris, danced at a rock concert, went to see a friendly soccer match and relaxed in restaurants.

In his quiet, considered voice, Doran told me that he wasn’t one of those people who called or emailed journalists. He’s never called talkback radio. He’s never written to a politician. He’s just a regular bloke who has been touched by the terror that engulfed his daughter. It has forced him to think differently — or, rather, to think more clearly. “I am concerned that if no one like me speaks, if there is a vacuum, then it’s filled by the right-wing lunatics and their arguments are easily rebuffed,” Doran told me.

He’s right. The loudest voices get all the attention and people like Doran are rarely heard. We hear from Muslim leaders. We hear about the far Right because they attract the media’s attention. And we hear endlessly from politicians.

“Every time it gets too tough, they (the politicians) just say ‘this is a very, very complex situation’, which is just their way of saying ‘we are above you, you’re too dumb to understand, so we’ll say it’s complex because we don’t know what else to say,’ ” Doran said.

If ever there were a moment when political and religious pusillanimity must be replaced with candour and courage, it’s after Islamic State struck at the heart of Paris, killing more than 120 people in six terrorist attacks. Yet, once again, we’ve been sorely let down. Buckets of feel-good fuzz but nothing of substance, nothing honest, nothing difficult.

Malcolm Turnbull told us that “freedom stands up for itself”.

No, it doesn’t. Freedom is not one of those air-filled clown bop-dolls that you can hit and it pops right up again. So how do we better defend our freedoms from Islamic State ambitions for a caliphate and the Islamist radicalisation of young Muslims? How to we protect ourselves from Islamist terrorist attacks at soccer games, concerts and restaurants?

Those in high office will decide the issues around Middle East foreign policy. Intelligence bosses will work out what went wrong, the need for new laws and more funds. Terrorism experts will debate the tactics of Islamic State. Military leaders will focus on the battlefield. But what can we do? What can a bloke like Doran do?

We can demand to be part of an open and honest debate. Doran isn’t the only person concerned that we cannot talk about Islam and terrorism. He’s not the only one pointing out that many religions have undergone reformation. “Why hasn’t it happened in Islam?” he asks quietly.

He’s also not the only one to wonder aloud about “who are these people beholden to? They must be beholden to somebody,” he says, “because otherwise at least someone would come out and say, we need a reformation to make it clear Islam doesn’t mean what you people say it means. Their community leaders must say in clear words that what happened here is wrong, it is an incorrect interpretation of Islam.”

Why don’t we hear even a few Australian Muslims critique their religion in the quotidian manner in which Christianity or Judaism is critiqued and analysed? Is it because someone of Muslim faith who criticises Islam fears being labelled an apostate? If so, that’s the problem with Islam.

To be sure, in January Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi called for a religious revolution. “You, imams, are responsible before Allah,” Sisi said. “The entire world … is waiting for your next move … because the Islamic world is being torn, it is being destroyed, it is being lost — and it is being lost by our own hands.”

But where’s the follow-up? It hasn’t come from Australian Muslim leaders. After Paris, the statement from the Grand Mufti in Australia sank to deplorable depths of blame-shifting.

It’s not good enough that the Grand Mufti, Ibrahim Abu Mohammed, said racism and Islamophobia must be addressed. It’s not enough for the Grand Mufti to say that strategies to deal with the threat of terrorism are not working. And it’s not enough for him to express condolences and “call upon all people of goodwill to stand against fearmongering and injustice”.

This is not just ineffective leadership, it’s counter-productive. And it’s dangerous. We are in a battle against Islamist terrorists. Whose side is the Grand Mufti on? This is the same chap who wouldn’t call the killing of a police worker in Parramatta an act of terrorism.

And after the Charlie Hebdo attacks, he said: “We don’t have the need to comment or to apologise on every insane act that a criminal of Muslim background commits around the world.”

No one wants an apology. All we want is an honest discussion about the role Islam plays in Islamist terrorism attacks. As the leader of Australian Muslims, do these views represent the views of most or many Australian Muslims?

If so, that’s not good enough. Islamophobia is not the core problem when 129 people have been slaughtered in the name of Islam in Paris. It’s a side issue at most and, at worst, the word is often used deliberately as a weapon to shut down debate. And racism? As Doran told The Australian: “The ultimate form of racism is when you want to exterminate another group of people. We know that from World War II. That’s what’s going on here, just on a different scale.”

But where are the voices of Australian Muslims who regard the Grand Mufti’s comments as a cop-out?

To be fair, US President Barack Obama finally demanded more from Muslim leaders. At the G20 this week he said: “Muslims around the world — religious leaders, political leaders, ordinary people — have to ask very serious questions about how did these extremist ideologies take root, even if it’s only affecting a very small fraction of the population.”

Recall, too, that British Prime Minister David Cameron made honest comments about Islam back in July, saying that we cannot dismiss the religious aspect of Islamist extremism. Cameron said: “It’s dangerous to deny the link with Islam because when you do that you neuter the important ­voices challenging the religious basis which terrorists use for their own warped purposes.”

But where are those important, moderate voices?

Muslim leaders such as the Grand Mufti get away with the blather and blame-shifting because our political leaders are too often too weak on this front. Senator Nick Xenophon described the Grand Mufti’s comments on the ABC’s Q&A program as “very encouraging”. Huh? It’s a symbiotic cycle of feebleness.

Just as freedom does not stand up for itself, freedom isn’t defended by a few belated words from Obama, a one-off speech from Cameron or Sisi. We know political leaders respond to political pressure. So it is up to us to ask more from them to defend our freedoms.

Otherwise, as Doran said, those French colours on the Opera House, “well, they’re our colours too, so you may as well keep the lights ready for when we get hit”.

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