Can Japan show the West how to live peacefully with Islam?

[LeveragedBuyout]

Yes, as per the theory of social cleavage in its effect on terrorism, the more economically dire the society, this will lead to higher quality of suicide attacks. Many of the propagators of terrorism utilize a millieu of financial support and religious reference to motivate economically disadvantaged individuals to take up jihad. These terrorist organizations are backed up financially by very wealthy organizations. In actuality, terrorists take advantage of a political unstable setting.

The dichotomy between Guizhou province and other areas that have a large muslim population can be explained by the presence of support system, and the presence of terrorist organizations that use very tactical public relations campaign to raise the support of the troubled , economically hit population by joining in jihad; promising financial support for their families and of course the use of religious text (which is already taken out of context-- in this case).

How can you dismiss the ideology component, and rely wholly on the financial aspect?

 

[Aepsilons]

I don't understand what you're trying to imply here, can you please connect your excerpt with an argument? I have shown, and this paper agrees, that poverty and low education does not increase terrorism. The paper points out that poverty provides a larger pool of educated candidates to choose from, and so they are able to execute higher-quality attacks, but the frequency of attacks is not affected by poverty.

And? What is the connection to our topic?

Perhaps you were lost in my analysis of the paper (i read the entire paper, and addressed points). The point is that the more economically disadvantaged a society, the more successful terrorist organizations will be in recruiting volunteers; and they find positive correlation in the more financially disadvantaged the environment, the greater the chance in higher quality of terrorist suicides. Again, it supports my premise in my previous post of the theory of social cleavage.

How can you dismiss the ideology component, and rely wholly on the financial aspect?

I'm not dismissing the ideology component. lol. I'm saying that both independent variables are rather active.

 

[LeveragedBuyout]

Perhaps you were lost in my analysis of the paper (i read the entire paper, and addressed points). The point is that the more economically disadvantaged a society, the more successful terrorist organizations will be in recruiting volunteers; and they find positive correlation in the more financially disadvantaged the environment, the greater the chance in higher quality of terrorist suicides. Again, it supports my premise in my previous post of the theory of social cleavage.

Perhaps I was lost. Where does the paper show that poverty increases the frequency of terrorism?

I'm glad you agree with me that low education does not increase the frequency of terrorism, so we can put that trope aside.

 

[Falcon29]

I didn't cite the study because it was Israeli. I cited it because it was published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, which is an unimpeachable source. If you have a better study by an equivalent source, let's see it.

Research means nothing when violence is taken out of context. The bombings mostly done inside occupied Palestinian territory were a response to colonialism and crackdown on the Palestinian uprising. Without occupation there wouldn't be bombings, with a brutal occupation there are.

Those bombings targeted Israeli male adults for the most part, which meant many killed soldiers. Mostly who were taking part in enforcing the occupation.

You still haven't responded to my other posts.

How can you dismiss the ideology component, and rely wholly on the financial aspect?

Ideology component of what?

Educate me on this ideology component:

Qibya massacre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Qibya massacre, also known as the Qibya incident, was a reprisal operation that occurred in October 1953 when Israeli troops under Ariel Sharon attacked the village of Qibya in the West Bank. At least sixty-nine Palestinian Arab villagers,[1] two-thirds of them women and children,[2] were killed. Forty-five houses, a school, and a mosque were destroyed

.....................

 

[Aepsilons]

Perhaps I was lost. Where does the paper show that poverty increases the frequency of terrorism?

Please refer to Table 2 (Economic Demographic Statistics), which expounds on the financial situation of many of these volunteers.

In addition, the more politically and economically disadvantaged the population sample, the greater the quality of suicide terrorist attacks (Benmelech et al, 2010).

Your own reference supported my position regarding Social Cleavage Theory.

 

[LeveragedBuyout]

Please refer to Table 2 (Economic Demographic Statistics), which expounds on the financial situation of many of these volunteers.

In addition, the more politically and economically disadvantaged the population sample, the greater the quality of suicide terrorist attacks (Benmelech et al, 2010).

Your own reference supported my position regarding Social Cleavage Theory.

I don't mean to be rude, but I wonder if you understand what you're writing. You've now repeated several times that poverty increases the quality of suicide terrorist attacks, which is the conclusion of the study I referenced. I agree. What that means, in simple terms, is that suicide bombings are more effective and kill more people under conditions of poverty. OK, but irrelevant.

But again, it's time to take a step back and look on a macro level. Poverty doesn't cause terrorism. That has been my premise all along, and you have failed to refute it. Once terrorism is going to happen, poverty can affect how effective it is, but there is another catalyst for terrorism. It isn't poverty. You have not proven otherwise.

To bring it back to topic, since that is always necessary, what this means it that Japanese selection criteria for immigrants will not filter out potential terrorists, it will only influence how effective those terrorists are once they decide to commit terrorist acts. If Japanese economic conditions deteriorate, predicted terrorist efficiency will increase.

Does that satisfy you?

 

[Tshering22]

A piece of home: The multinational congregation at the Tokyo Camii attends Friday prayer.


Long ago, in another life, I went to a mosque in San Francisco to attend Friday prayer. More than the calling of Islam, it was a Libyan woman who beckoned me, and for the sake of family blessing, I considered a love conversion.

Enamored and clueless, I checked out the scene — an alabaster agnostic among dark-skinned and bearded believers, who eyed me wonderingly as we kneeled to pray.

Face down with my arms outstretched, my behind in the air and my nose smelling the prayer rug, I could feel that a prostration is a submission — a concession of smallness in front of a higher power. I could feel that as a humble servant to the only one god, Allah, you are no longer boss of the spectacle that is you. It was a gut-level challenge.

As I was leaving the mosque, saying goodbye to the regulars who had warmed to the newbie, I started liking these people and their humility. But with the exotic aroma of spices and the muezzin droning the Arabic verses, there was a sense of an alien reality. “If I get in too deep here,” I mused in private, “I might lose myself.”

The intrepid writer George Plimpton — who made a career out of ambling into otherness — once captured this bittersweet affirmation, leaving a football field to applause after a hapless trial with the Detroit Lions.

“The outsider did not belong,” Plimpton wrote about the amateur and his audience, “and there was comfort in that being proved.”

Like other projects enamored and clueless, my love conversion was later aborted.

Fast forward to Tokyo, the present. As this Saturday ushers in Ramadan, the monthlong fasting from dawn to dusk that is observed by Muslims worldwide, it has been striking to see Japan’s efforts to make this minority feel at home.

Some university cafeterias, hotels and restaurants now offer halal meal choices. There are Muslim tour guides, as well as prayer rooms at airports and companies — in addition to more than 100 Islamic associations. Even Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, at a Ramadan party last summer, assured foreign ambassadors of the “unbroken bond” between Japan and the Muslim world.

In part, the embrace is customer service. As relations with China went sour, Japan eased visa restrictions last year for Southeast Asian nations, to offset the lost business. This boosted tourism and student exchanges from Malaysia and Indonesia — the latter home to the largest Muslim population in the world — to the point that now more and more hijab headscarves are dotting Japan’s urban landscapes.

“Islam here is growing,” says Musa Omar, the executive director of the Islamic Center Japan in Ohara, Setagaya Ward, which first opened in 1963. He speaks with congenial authority, the kind of man who inspires you to read books and be a better, more spiritual person.

“We don’t recruit, but the mosques are full and each day people are coming to visit. Also, there are more conversions — many of them for marriage, both women and men.”

There is no reliable count of Muslims in Japan, allows Musa, but it now far exceeds 100,000. Having lived here for 40 years and served as the Sudanese ambassador, he thinks that the local community enjoys a unique idyll.

“There are no ties to our homeland politics,” says Musa. “At Japanese mosques there are no divisions, no problems between Sunnis and Shiites. The police here are on our side, and the people are open to Islam. Whatever prejudice they may have, they get from the West.”

Who would have thought: Japan, a utopia of pluralism?

Uniting a colorful mix of expats from Asia, Africa and the Middle East, removed from the context of sectarian strife and the historical Western interference still haunting many Muslim countries, could the Japanese brand of Islam be a showcase for its peaceful essence? Are the frictions between Muslims and the West based in part on identity posturing?

The Tokyo Camii, the largest mosque in Japan, built in a lavish Ottoman style, emerges from the Shinjuku skyline like something out of “Arabian Nights.” For the second Friday prayer in my life, I embedded myself there with 200 Muslims who had gathered for a sermon and food — perhaps the most multiethnic crowd anywhere in Japan (although the vast majority of the faithful are men).

The sermon, held in English and Japanese, exhorts the congregation to respect their parents. Later on, as people line up for rice and potatoes, the atmosphere is relaxed and clubby, a meet-and-greet among fellow immigrants. A visiting group of Japanese seniors is getting a tour of the mosque.

It feels different from Western environs, where Christianity and Islam are seen as the other’s Other. There is the fear of a Muslim planet — an immigrant force out-populating the natives, seeking to set up a caliphate governed by Islamic law. Afraid of a stealth ideology, conservatives such as the historian Sir Martin Gilbert warn that “the European idea is being subverted by Islamic hostility to the very ethics and values of Europe itself.” The message is picked up by politicians and media exploiting the Muslim bogeyman.

“The larger threat comes not from the immigrants themselves, but from our response to them,” Doug Saunders counters in his book “The Myth of the Muslim Tide: Do Immigrants Threaten the West?”

“These are clashes within civilizations, not between them,” Saunders writes, “and to a large extent they are products of the false belief, held by Muslims and non-Muslims alike, that the world is divided into fixed and irreconcilable civilizations.”

With an array of surprising facts, Saunders claims to show that most Muslim immigrants have no wish for Shariah law. Likewise, he writes, their fertility rates are actually decreasing as this diaspora adjusts to lifestyles and trends in the West.

Meanwhile, in Japan, no one frets over the Great Decline. Islamophobia is not an industry; the Other here is Chinese. The Japanese may be drawn to what they see as the pureness, the disciplined abnegation on display during Ramadan, yet unlike some in the West, they don’t appear to feel challenged by perceptions of superior spirituality.

“The Tokyo religion is fashion,” jokes Rahil Khan, 47, from Rawalpindi in Pakistan. A company owner with a swashbuckling air, he is a fixture in the Muslim community. Khan believes it is the social element that is attracting the Japanese.

“People are lonely at home,” muses Khan, “so they come to the mosque for company, for conversation and jokes. At the iftar (the shared breaking of the fast after sunset during Ramadan), many Japanese show up for free food. They follow Ramadan more than Islam — it’s like a festival.”

On a Saturday night, Khan takes me to my third mosque in Tokyo, on the outskirts of Asakusa. A prayer leader from Indonesia speaks to a group of Pakistanis and a Tunisian about the “Five Intentions to Read the Quran.”

The multinational setting leads to a comical misunderstanding, when the leader asks the group in English, “So why does the Quran have 30 juz (the Arabic word for ‘sections’)?” and Khan replies, perfectly sincere, “It is, like, orange juice for the 30 people. You know, they are thirsty.”

Being a Muslim means many things to many people in their very different lives. As for the evening prayer in Asakusa, it feels like a guys’ night out without booze — expats meeting with friends and connecting through things they would do back home.

But in Japan as well, the authorities are watching Islam. Government officers check the mosque in Asakusa, and the police keep an eye on Khan as he roams Shinagawa on business. One day, in decidedly un-Japanese fashion, he walked into a station and confronted the officers.

“I go inside and say, ‘What is the problem? Let us talk about this problem!’ If you need something, you should come and ask.”

No one says that diversity is easy, or even natural. A harmonious pluralism might need curiosity as well as indifference, both emblematic of how Japanese handle otherness. As for the showcase Muslim community, the alabaster agnostic is keeping his fingers crossed.


Can Japan show the West how to live peacefully with Islam? | The Japan Times

You have to learn much about this religion nihonjin-san.

 

[Falcon29]

I don't mean to be rude, but I wonder if you understand what you're writing. You've now repeated several times that poverty increases the quality of suicide terrorist attacks, which is the conclusion of the study I referenced. I agree. What that means, in simple terms, is that suicide bombings are more effective and kill more people under conditions of poverty. OK, but irrelevant.

But again, it's time to take a step back and look on a macro level. Poverty doesn't cause terrorism. That has been my premise all along, and you have failed to refute it. Once terrorism is going to happen, poverty can affect how effective it is, but there is another catalyst for terrorism. It isn't poverty. You have not proven otherwise.

To bring it back to topic, since that is always necessary, what this means it that Japanese selection criteria for immigrants will not filter out potential terrorists, it will only influence how effective those terrorists are once they decide to commit terrorist acts. If Japanese economic conditions deteriorate, predicted terrorist efficiency will increase.

Does that satisfy you?

A lot of different things cause terrorism. What are you trying to suggest?

 

[Aepsilons]

I don't mean to be rude, but I wonder if you understand what you're writing. You've now repeated several times that poverty increases the quality of suicide terrorist attacks, which is the conclusion of the study I referenced. I agree. What that means, in simple terms, is that suicide bombings are more effective and kill more people under conditions of poverty. OK, but irrelevant.

This is my premise, and it is very relevant because it identifies the underlying factors that predisposes to terrorism. This is why statisticians have agreed that despite the fuzzy line between poverty and terrorism, there is an indirect link that takes into consideration political and economic stability. This is explained in the Theory of Social Cleavage.

Your problem in comprehending that relationship cannot be blamed on me, my friend.

 

[Falcon29]

You have to learn much about this religion nihonjin-san.

What about it?

 

[itaskol]

you should thank china for it.
because china is between muslim world and japan.
muslim can not spread fast to japan in the history.

and even you have limited muslim population. you should be careful.
the muslim population is less than 0.1 % of your population,that is true
but the uyhgur population is also less than 0.1 % of our population. And we have already many problem with it.

You should ban some extrem religion such like Wahhabis before it is too late.

 

[Aepsilons]

But again, it's time to take a step back and look on a macro level. Poverty doesn't cause terrorism. That has been my premise all along, and you have failed to refute it. Once terrorism is going to happen, poverty can affect how effective it is, but there is another catalyst for terrorism. It isn't poverty. You have not proven otherwise.

Terrorism's effectiveness is dependent on two independent variables: 1) economic and political instability, 2) radical elements who use a twisted version of Islam

 

[LeveragedBuyout]

This is my premise, and it is very relevant because it identifies the underlying factors that predisposes to terrorism. This is why statisticians have agreed that despite the fuzzy line between poverty and terrorism, there is an indirect link that takes into consideration political and economic stability. This is explained in the Theory of Social Cleavage.

Your problem in comprehending that relationship cannot be blamed on me, my friend.

We'll have to end with that disagreement. I demand proof of a direct cause-effect relationship, and you are satisfied with an indirect, unproven allegation. We'll not reach any further progress, at this rate.

Thanks for your time. I always enjoy the discussion.

A lot of different things cause terrorism. What are you trying to suggest?

You seem intent on goading me into an argument, but I'll not take the bait. Instead, I will thank you for agreeing with me, that several factors cause terrorism, but those factors do not include poverty and low levels of education.

 

[Aepsilons]

To bring it back to topic, since that is always necessary, what this means it that Japanese selection criteria for immigrants will not filter out potential terrorists, it will only influence how effective those terrorists are once they decide to commit terrorist acts. If Japanese economic conditions deteriorate, predicted terrorist efficiency will increase.

Of course our selection criteria will be very helpful in filtering out those who have a history of criminal background, and since immigrants will be selected based on their educational and technical expertise, the less likely they will be more inclined to take up jihad in Japan. Come on man, this is basic multivariate analysis...! By reducing the factors that influence dependent variable, you reduce the risk. I mean, do you want me to explain the basis of power, too?

 

[MarkusS]

Sorry to post OT, but you make a very interesting observation.

Just like you to know that having experienced Crusades, Forced conversions / expulsions, colonialism, etc.. reflects rather poorly on Europe.

the crusades were a necessary evil to push islam back where it came from. The crusades were a response against 200 years islamic agression against europe.