NO...They aren't Victims and the Left is Reckless to Feed that Confected Fury !

By Gerard Henderson
Gerard Henderson (photo right) is an Australian author, columnist and political commentator. He is the Executive Director of the Sydney Institute, a privately funded Australian current affairs forum.

There is something dangerous in the pandering of the Race Discrimination Commissioner, who indulges what he should reject:
 

On Tuesday, The Age published an opinion piece by Race Discrimination Commissioner Tim Soutphommasane that was essentially a fudge. He began by conceding that “all of us are rightly disturbed by the prospect of terrorist acts on Australian soil; counter-terror raids in Sydney and Brisbane, and the shooting of Muslim teenager Numan Haider in Melbourne, have highlighted community concern”.

Soutphommasane’s reference to the shooting of Haider by Victorian Police failed to mention the evidence that the deceased had wounded with a knife and attempted to murder two counter-terrorist policemen. The Race Discrimination Commissioner also declined to remind The Age readers that Haider’s family had migrated from Afghanistan to ­settle in Australia and that he obtained a good ­education, had a job and a car, and lived in a fine house. Haider was no victim.

Soutphommasane

Soutphommasane went on to argue that “Muslim Australians are entitled to a fair go”. This suggests that they do not get a fair go already. It’s another way of saying that Muslim Australians are victims. 

This led to writer Gabrielle Lord contacting the Australian Human Rights Commission to express her disappointment with the Race Discrimination Commissioner’s comments, which she interpreted as “largely a reprimand to the non-Muslims of Australia”.

Lord’s position is that “rather than chiding non-Muslims for their suspicions, fears (and on occasions bigotry), a Race Relations Commissioner would surely be better advised to address those Muslims in our community who bear a lethal hatred and contempt towards all of us non-Muslims and tell them this will not be tolerated”. 

Too many commentators on the Left have been reckless in feeding the absurd paranoia and victimology that is so marked in parts of Muslim Australia, and which feeds the dangerous notion that Australia is at war with Islam - and vice versa.

Note how Soutphommasane’s preferred narrative would only feed into that of, say, Tahmid Mirza:

Tahmid Mirza, 21-year-old Deakin University student by day.....jihadi by night, [is] one of the 10 most-followed jihadist propagandists among English-speaking foreign fighters… In April, King’s College’s International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence named his Twitter account in the top 10 “disseminators” of propaganda followed by English-speaking foreign fighters. The think tank said the ­account was followed by 48.6 per cent of the 190 foreign fighters it had studied online.

Mirza, taken in from Bangladesh and given a good education, security and access to taxpayer-support, nevertheless prefers to see himself as another victim:

''I am with all the sincere Mujahideen, whether from AQ (al-Qa’ida) or ISIS… We should not delay in establishing an Islamic State or applying the shariah whenever the Muslims have authority.... [Australians] don’t give me ‘security,’ why on earth have many Muslims been harassed, betrayed and in fact lied to by the government and the so-called ­‘security’ intelligence? I love the nature and the landscape (of Australia), that’s about it… You fear terror attacks back home? Your government should stop destroying other people’s homes then. It’s not rocket science now is it?'' 

These sort of threats from immigrants in our on country are opposite to what Australians have seen in previous war efforts. We were assured that immigrants from lands we're fighting in are loyal to their new country. But many Muslim spokesmen now don't assure us of the loyal of their followers but warn of - or threaten - the very opposite.

A month ago, when we woke up to news of another Islamic State beheading, this time Stephen Sotloff, that very day Muslim leaders again put out a statement condemning...Tony Abbott. This time, it was from the Australian National Imams Council. Again it blamed the West for jihadism: ''One of the main causative factors for local radicalisation in the West has been the western governments' military involvement in the Middle East.''  And there was this warning: ''If the Australian government is serious about reducing the terror threat locally, then it must review its foreign policy decisions with regard to this region.'' That sounds like an outrageous threat. Name one other ethnic or religious group here that warns Australia to change its foreign policies or face violence from its members. Western governments around the world could be pushed into an internment program for these so-called ''alien immigrants,'' even though it has been universally denounced in the past as human rights. 

The Way I See It......the more the Muslim community slowly reveals where it sympathies lie, the more Australians could start to compromise their Judeo-Christian goodwill, but above all, they will not tolerate its Left media and politicians pandering to Muslims sense of victimhood. If the Muslim community feels put upon, it is only through their collective posture of denial of their leaders that makes it so.  They must  speak out that modern civilisation can't tolerate the people following the violence and brutality that is expressed in the Qur'an. Islam is at a cross-roads, it's 7th Century ideology should be reformed now or thrown on the camel dung heap of history, there is no middle ground anymore.