COMMENT: Baghdad - once a city for all faiths ...

The October 7 2007 edition of the New York Times magazine includes a profile of Iraqi-American author Kanan Makiya, who wrote (under the pen-name of Samir al-Khalil) one of the most influential biographies of Saddam Hussein.

There's plenty in the profile to blog about. Despite spending much of his undergraduate years a supporter of the Palestinian cause, Makiya wasn't exactly fond of fellow Columbia University Professor Edward Said. Makiya promised George W Bush on the eve of the Iraq invasion that Iraqis would greet US forces with "sweets and flowers".

What particularly struck me was the description of historical Baghdad. The profile speaks of perhaps Makiya's most important achievement - the documentation of Saddam Hussein's atrocities under the auspices of the Iraq Memory Foundation.

Since 2003, Makiya and his small staff have scoured Baath party offices and dungeons, adding to a collection that would reach more than 11 million pages of records. And they began filming interviews with the regime’s victims. 

Makiya’s dream was to build a museum for the archives on the site of the Victory Arch, the memorial commissioned by Hussein to commemorate Iraq’s so-called triumph in the Iran-Iraq War ... Among the foundation’s most vivid achievements are the 190 videotaped testimonies from Hussein’s victims. They include Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds and even Jews.

One of these testimonies takes us back to a time when Baghdad was a centre of Jewish cultural life. Thanks to the infiltration of Ba'athist ideology, the tolerance of devout Iraqi Muslims was undermined. Suddenly, anyone deemed non-Arab became a target. And supporting Palestinian rights became a cover for some of the most virulent and despicable acts of anti-Semitism.

In December 2003, at the age of 98, Shao’ul Sasson, for example, described his arrest and torture at the hands of the Baath Party police. Sasson, who died in 2005, was an Iraqi Jew. As late as the mid-1930s, Baghdad was one of the world capitals of Jewish life, with Jews making up a third of its population. Most of Iraq’s Jews either fled to Israel or were expelled beginning in the late 1940s; most of the rest were harassed or killed. In January 1969, in one of the Baath Party’s first displays of public brutality, 13 Iraqi Jews and 4 other men were hanged in a public ceremony in Baghdad before a crowd of about a half million people. Iraqis were bussed in from around the country to witness the event.
“I was born in Baghdad,” Sasson says on the videotape. “My father was the chief rabbi. He sent me to a Jewish school to learn Hebrew, but I can’t remember much of it.
“I was working for Mohammed al-Damarchi. My salary had been stopped because I was Jewish, and there was a warrant out for my arrest. They knocked on the door and asked for Shao’ul. 

“My wife said, ‘Let him take his clothes or put something on,’ but they said there was no need, as I would be brought back soon. They blindfolded me and took me away. I could tell we were going to the notorious Al-Nihaya Palace prison, because I lived in the same area. . . . They asked me to confess to everything, but I told them I didn’t have anything to confess to. And yet they insisted I must. They brought a metal bar and hit me on my legs. I fell into the wall and broke two teeth. Again, they told me to confess and hit me on the legs. Again, I fell and broke a few teeth. I lost 9 or 10 teeth that day.
“I saw Abdul Rahman al-Bazzaz (the former prime minister). They had hung him up and burned his tongue with matches. . . . My worst experience was the day I saw all the prisoners hanging up on either side of the corridor. 

“They put me in a cell where the floor was covered in urine and feces. I couldn’t bear to stay in it, so I would bang my head hard against the wall in an attempt to kill myself.”

The Prophet Muhammad is reported to have said: "Those who so much as lay one finger on the dhimmi (non-Muslim citizen of an Islamic state) will have me witnessing against them on the Day of Judgment."

Sadly, so many Muslim politicians like to flex their political muscle at the expenses of non-Muslim minorities. Those of us fortunate enough to live as Muslim minorities in non-Muslim countries should be at the forefront of campaigning for non-Muslim minorities in Muslim countries.

© Irfan Yusuf 2007

John Mustafa Ilhan's not-so-crazy legacy ...

I never had the honour of meeting the late John Mustafa Ilhan (rahimahullah - God have mercy on him). But my respect for him skyrocketted in August 2005 when he 'came out of the closet' about his faith.

It seemed those close to him always knew that John took his religious heritage seriously. Certainly he came from a devout Muslim family - his father was instrumental in establishing the Broadmeadows Mosque. Further, despite this not being a religious requirement, his wife Patricia took the enormous step of adopting her husband's faith as her own. Like many women of Jewish and Christian backgrounds, Mrs Ilhan could have just as easily kept her faith without compromising her husband's.

But it was in August 2005, in a profile for the Australian Financial Review magazine, that Ilhan spoke about how his faith influences his business decisions. Ilhan was the only Muslim to be profiled about his faith. The magazine said Ilhan

... carries his Islamic faith with him
everyday ... applying what he sees as basic tenets of honesty and integrity to
his business.

And what are these basic tenets. First,
there is "asking for forgiveness". Then there is loving one's neighbour as one
loves one's self. He won't open an outlet next door to a competitor he knew,
even if it be a former employee or a cousin.

The Australobe blog has an entry on Ilhan's passing, with links to a variety of news reports. Today's jenaza was was attended by Ilhan's parents, wife and close friends including Eddie McGuire, Shane Warne and Ahmed Fahour. It's a tribute to Ilhan's ability to bring Australians of all backgrounds together that Broadmeadows Mosque today looked like the scene of a large inter-faith gathering.

The Canberra Times reported the response of Turkey's Ambassador to Australia ...

Turkish ambassador Murat Ersavci said his
close friend's death was "a very, very sad occasion for me and my wife".

"I really grieved for his wife, too.

"Patricia was a very strong voice behind him,
supporting him.

"I visited him a few months back at his home
in Melbourne, and you should have seen how he was proud of that family and
children and of his wife. He was a very kind man, very kind, very hard working,
I think he was a symbol for a young Australia."

Mr Ilhan was "passionately philanthropic" and
"a good human being who wanted to help his fellow man". Closely tied to his
roots, he was proud to be an Australian and his death was a loss to the nation.

"He was a perfect example of Australia's
successful multicultural policy. His father comes from a humble background, a
working man, and Australia provided an opportunity and he wanted to return that
any way he could."

Patricia Ilhan's words were published in the order of service. The Herald-Sun reported ...

Emotions almost spilled over when Mr Ilhan's
wife Patricia, wearing a pink headscarf and sunglasses, made her way with her
three young daughters through the throng to his casket.

In keeping with Muslim tradition, they and
other women were asked to move away from the coffin so prayers could begin.

In the order of service, Mrs Ilhan described
her husband as the family's "inspiration and rock".
"He loved his family
more than anything. We always came first. We saw the man who cared so much about
people," she said.

She said their four children - Jaida, Hannah,
Yasmin and Aydin - would forever cherish the times they played with their
father, who died on Tuesday aged 42 after suffering a heart attack while walking
near their Brighton home.

"I will remember we were true soulmates - he
always knew what I was thinking."

Ilhan generated respect from friends, strangers and customers. Among his customers was journalist and former TV personality Libby Gorr who wrote these touching words in the Crikey daily alert for 24 October 2007:

I interviewed him in 2005 for Sunday Life magazine. It's the only time on
record John spoke about his faith.

This guy was a really amazing person; a great salesman yes, but a deeply
spiritual man who strove to be an integrated Muslim in Australia, despite all
sorts of prejudice hurled his way, from all corners - including from his in
laws, in the early years.

Here's a glimpse (for the piece in full click here):

This is a man who knows it’s important to look good but that appearances only
go so far. “I’m a Muslim and I realise that arrogance is a no-no,” says Ilhan,
who was born Mustafa in Yozgut, Turkey, and moved to Australia with his family
at age five. He took the name John after his best mate at primary school; the
“Crazy”, he says, came later, inspired by a customer’s remark that giving away
hundreds of dollars worth of free phone accessories was just that. “I think I
will struggle in life spiritually unless I do good things. It might sound naive
but I think life is as simple as that. If you are kind to your staff, they will
probably work harder. Arrogance kills CEOs. I think life gives you what you
deserve. But I think there is a higher being that controls us.”

He believes in destiny because “I’m a coward. Being a coward, you think
somebody else is determining your life. I’m not so courageous to be an atheist.
That just scares the hell out of me. I need to have someone looking after
us.”...

Ilhan is aware that coming out as a Muslim in Australia right now is a risky
cultural business. “Some of my staff probably haven’t met a Muslim before,” he
reflects. “When I was young, I used to hear all about the wars in the Middle
East. And then you come to a country like Australia and make so many wonderful
friends who are Jewish, it’s like, what are we talking about?”

John Ilham is one of the most impressively decent people I have met on the
high achievement scale. This is so sad for his family, and unfathomable for
those of us that liked and admired him.

Readers are requested to at least recite fatiha after reading these tributes.

© Irfan Yusuf 2007

A much-maligned but harmless group ...

Tonight I found myself amongst a group of people I haven’t shared company with for years. The last time I saw them, few people outside South Asian and/or religious Muslim circles knew these people even existed.

Today these people are demonised in many different parts of the world. They are accused of all sorts of ccrazy things – sheltering terrorists, plotting to spread extremism, following Saudi-style cultish Islam etc.

But I’ve always known the Tabligh Jamaat (TJ) as being a harmless bunch of blokes who take their religious observance very seriously.

Politics and the TJ? What moron thought that one up? The TJ are about as interested in politics as I am in lawn bowls. My own dealings and experiences with the TJ have led me to know that they have little interest in jihadist or Islamist groups, even during periods when these groups were being sponsored by the West against communism.

Back in the mid-1980’s, I read in the Minaret magazine(published occasionally by the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils or AFIC) that the TJ had caused controversy at one of their annual ijtima’s (as they used to call their national gatherings) in Melbourne. An executive member of the Islamic Council of Victoria had asked the TJ leadership if the Australian representative of one of the Afghan mujahideen groups could say a few words about the Western-backed jihad against the Soviets. The TJ leadership refused, citing their aversion to political discussion at their gatherings.

He correspondent who wrote about this incident in the Minaret included in his story words to the following effect: “We allow these people to use our mosques, yet they won’t allow us to discuss the Afghan jihad in their gatherings!”

I also remember one Bangladeshi imam once tell me that he used to have run-ins with the TJ at university. He used to urge them to support the Jamaat-i-Islami (a major Islamist group founded by Syed Maududi) but they would refuse. He once told me: “These people would rather vote communist than for JI”.

The TJ generally don’t allow discussion in their gatherings that goes over and beyond the 6 points of tabligh. The word tabligh literally means admonition or warning. The TJ’s theory is that their scholars have studied the lives of the Prophet Muhammad and his companions and have extracted 6 basic principles. If Muslims focus on these principles and put them into practise, they will start to show traces of the Prophet’s companions.

One important principle is ilm wa dhikr (seeking and gaining knowledge together with maximising the remembrance of God). The TJ say that both must go together. If a man gains knowledge of religion but doesn’t purify his heart, his knowledge could do little but boost his ego and make him arrogant. If he remembers God excessively but doesn’t supplement it ith knowledge, he might lose his sense of balance.

Another major principle of the TJ (though not identified as one of the 6 points) is to visit Muslims. Many Christian churches refer to this as ‘pastoral’ work. The churches are active in this work, but sadly most Muslim religious organisations ignore it. The TJ play a very important role, visiting Muslims all over Australia, especially those in isolated areas.

One person recently told me of an occasion he was with the TJ. They were staying at a regional mosque and once drove some three hours just to visit one Muslim living in an isolated area.

Tonight a group from the TJ were gathered at an inner-city Melbourne mosque. They were breaking their fast when I saw them. Amongst them was a fellow I hadn’t seen for some 10 years and who used to live in Sydney but was now based in Adelaide.

It saddens me that in the UK the TJ are being demonised as extremists. I can say much critical about the TJ. I think their insistence on the more conservative interpretations of Islam in some areas render their methodology argely irrelevant in Australia. I think their menfolk spend too much time on the road, neglecting their families. But to desbribe them as following an Islamist political cult is absurd.

At a time when even harmless groups like the TJ are being aligned as extremists, I don’t think the time is far off when Jonathan Freedland’s words might turn into a true prophesy ...

Right now, we're getting it badly wrong -
bombarding Muslims with pressure and prejudice, laying one social problem after
another at their door. I try to imagine how I would feel if this rainstorm of
headlines substituted the word "Jew" for "Muslim": Jews creating apartheid, Jews
whose strange customs and costume should be banned. I wouldn't just feel
frightened. I would be looking for my passport.

© Irfan Yusuf 2007

COMMENT: Campus Muslims ...

Stephen Crittenden’s Religion Report program on Radio National this week interviews a range of people who spoke at a recent conference on Muslim students held at the University of Western Sydney.

Among them is former UWS Muslim Students’ Association President Mona Darwiche. I’m not sure how much of Mona’s comments have been edited out. Perhaps what has been left in doesn’t reflect what she meant to say.

Still, what has been broadcast isn’t terribly helpful. Darwiche focuses on the “special needs” of Muslim students which she expects universities to meet. Among these are “[h]alal food, adequate prayer facilities, adequate ablution facilities, and segregation between men and women.”
In relation to halal food, perhaps Darwiche should consider that many Muslims regard it as perfectly permissible and halal to eat food prepared by non-Muslims which doesn’t contain pig meat and/or alcohol. Hence, the issue of halal really doesn’t arise. Further, why expect the university to deal with this? Wouldn’t it be more appropriate for Muslim students to approach food retailers on campus and suggest halal food as a commercial proposition? Why turn this into an issue of “special need”?

Darwiche has this to say about prayers:

It's important that the University provides adequate facilities for Muslim
students where students can observe prayers on campus, and I also mention the
time of prayers, because I know with myself, sometimes when it came time to
praying, I would be in a lecture, I would be sitting an exam, I would be giving
a presentation, so it's important for Muslims to pray at the designated times,
and so sometimes that could be a bit challenging for Muslim students to meet
their prayers on time when they have other commitments at Universities, such as
attending lectures, sitting exams, which sometimes go between two different
prayer times.

Darwiche seems to be getting two completely different issues confused – the alleged need for special facilities and the alleged need to account for prayer times.

Certainly it makes sense for universities to provide Muslim students with the same facilities as provided for students of other religious denominations. But how hard is it to take out a few minutes from your lecture or tutorial (or even exam) to say your prayers? And must you have special designated places all over campus for this purpose?

Further, in relation to segregation, what is the issue? If you want to live in a segregated environment, what are you doing at university in the first place? Darwiche comments:

Now I want to touch on a bit of a controversial topic. When I say the
segregation of men and women on campus, I say this with... segregation must be
considered in its context. There seems to be a lot of misconceptions about the
way in which Muslim men and women can interact with each other and also with
other non-Muslims.

Yes, and sadly many of the misconceptions are perpetuated by Muslims themselves. For instance, the whole idea that men and women can never shake hands. Or never even sit next to each other. When I went with a group of Aussie Muslims to Indonesia and Malaysia last year, our hosts wondered which planet us Aussies were from. This was because we always ensured we were seated in such a manner that no man sat next to a woman unless she was his wife. Yet in the world’s largest Muslim country, men and women sat next to each other all the time. They also weren’t afraid of shaking hands.

Darwiche continues:

And in regards to social interaction at university, whether it be lunch breaks
or otherwise, generally Muslim females and males do stay separate in terms of
social interaction. But in regards to fostering a relationship in terms of
university studies and working on particular tasks between males and females,
working as a team, achieving a core aim or objective towards a course, is
definitely allowable in Islam because you actually have a purpose behind your
interaction between interacting between males and females.

So unless they are studying together or organising some Muslim function, Muslim guys and gals always keep away from each other. Now this might be true for people from certain cultural backgrounds. But to make the blanket suggestion that all students of Muslim background and/or faith and/or heritage will all necessarily practise segregation requires an uncomfortable level of hubris.

It seems that Darwiche is confusing actual practice of Muslim students with what she regards as Islamic orthodoxy. It’s OK to express your opinion of what religion requires of you. It isn’t ok to insist that all Muslims agree with you and that therefore (largely non-Muslim) university administrators presume that they should make special allowances for this.

Sadly, once again, we see spokesmen and women for religious institutions pretending to speak for all people from their group who happen to be Muslim. Representing Islam and representing Muslims are not one and the same.

© Irfan Yusuf 2007

I know it is Ramadan but ...

Time for a trip down memory lane.

This is a song from the first Hindi/Urdu movie I ever saw in Australia.

That's right. The first one. Down under. Ever.

Rajesh Khanna wearing an olive skivvy and a traditional Central Asian fur cap.

The overly-made-up Tamil Princess Sharmila Tagore on the train enjoying Rajesh's flirtatious behaviour while showing off her sideburns and reading Alistair MacLean.

And let's not forget the stupid driver who thinks he can play an electric guitar with his lips.

All this set in the old English hill station of Simla, on the foothills of the Himalayas.

And the words of love and devotion. Here's a line together with a rough translation:

HINDI: Challi aah, thoo challi aah

ENGLISH: Get over here. Oi! You! Get over here!!

Which woman worth her salt could resist so sensitive an invitation?

© Irfan Yusuf 2007

CRIKEY: The Middle Eastern Gerard Henderson?

Imagine writing a monograph on Islam in Australia: Democratic bipartisanship in action including interviews with prominent players in law enforcement and politics but without interviewing a single Muslim, and launching the monograph in ... of all places ... the United Kingdom!

I was a little sceptical yesterday when I was forwarded an e-mail announcing the launch of Gerard Henderson’s monograph published by UK conservative thinktank Policy Exchange.

Especially when the study claimed that Australia actually had a "model" to "approach its Muslim population". (I feel so special knowing Dr Henderson has identified a special model to approach me!) Yet only four of the eight points in the model actually mention Islam or Muslims.

The first three points deal with security and the fourth tackles the end (well, sort of) of multiculturalism. Muslims are only involved to the extent that they do not

... fail to uphold core Australian values of citizenship ...

and

... it is not enough for self-appointed Muslim community leaders to oppose violent and aggressive jihad in Australia whilst supporting it beyond the shores of the Commonwealth.

In short, Muslims are a security threat to be managed. They aren’t people to be consulted or involved or even understood.

I felt it important to show Henderson the respect he failed to show the subjects of his monograph. I telephoned Henderson to ask about his study. He told me the original title was Islam and Democracy: The Australian Experience.

When I asked him whether there was any reason for not interviewing Muslims (or at least Reference Group members), Henderson became rather Middle Eastern.

Are you lecturing me? Who are you to tell me what I should write? What sort of question is that? This is most unprofessional.

Henderson claims the first Muslims to emigrate to Australia were Afghan cameleers. For someone with a PhD in history, this is a serious error. Indeed, Henderson need only look back to the speech delivered at his thinktank by West Australian author Dr Nahid Kabir.

Still, that’s neither here nor there. What is strange is that Henderson, a fellow with no serious knowledge of Australia’s Muslim communities only cites Kabir once. He doesn’t cite any other scholar on Muslim communities. I don’t expect Henderson to cite sycophantic non-critical writers. But Policy Exchange describes itself as taking an

... evidence-based approach to policy development … in partnership with academics and other experts.

Henderson is no expert on the topic, and he reaches questionable conclusions without citing experts. For instance, Henderson makes claims concerning Lebanese Muslims without citing a shred of evidence. He claims (on p10) that many of Australia’s Lebanese Muslims live in south west Sydney and that ...

... [n]o other Muslim group is so concentrated in a specific area.

He obviously hasn’t been to Auburn (known to many as "little Istanbul") or Coburg. Henderson’s ignorance of Australia’s Muslim organisational landscape especially became evident when he claimed (on p24) that ...

... the Howard government consciously chose not to consult with existing Muslim groups ... Instead the Prime Minister set up the Muslim Community Reference Group.

I’m sure many on the MCRG would find such claims amusing. If anything, the Group was deliberately stacked with existing religious organisational heads and stereotypical imams (like Hilaly). Among those invited by the PM to his Muslim leaders’ summit was Shafiq Khan, a prominent Saudi financier. In fact, Henderson feels quite able to write about the MCRG without even interviewing a single member of the group.

Further, his claim that

... the criticisms which John Howard ... levelled at al-Hilali’s January 2007 outburst created a climate in which Muslim Australians felt freer to state their own views than would otherwise have been the case.

So Aussie Mossies weren’t criticising religious leaders before January? Which planet has Henderson been living on? And as if we needed Howard’s blowing of the dog whistle to release us from our shackles!

If anything, Muslim critics of Hilaly were wishing Howard would shut up and let them deal with the issue. Howard’s interventions made things only more difficult. The study includes interviews with law enforcement, intelligence and political leaders. Instead of asking Muslims in Lakemba for their thoughts, Henderson interviews Bob Carr and Tony Burke (MP for Watson). Instead of asking anyone from the MCRG how they viewed the process, Henderson asks Andrew Robb.

Henderson suggested I "go and write a rant for The Age or the Canberra Times" before hanging up.

He may well find Aussie Muslims aren’t as rude. Assuming, of course, he bothers to talk with them and not just at or about them.

An edited version of this was first published in the Crikey daily alert on Thursday 6 September 2007.

Words © 2007 Irfan Yusuf

PROFILE: On Ibn Warraq ...

I'm always amused by persons who claim to live in secret locations out of fear of threats received from "Islamic extremists". Heck, I've received some threats in my life - from anti-Muslim extremists, from Muslim extremists and from people with no identifiable agenda. I guess it's the price one pays for being involved in public discussion.

Ibn Warraq is one such author. He uses a pseudonym apparently for safety reasons. He has authored and edited a variety of books, claiming to hold some scholarly credentials in Islamic sciences. Dr Jeremiah McAuliffe has dealt with some of Ibn Warraq's more controversial arguments and methodology here.

Ibn Warraq has also been criticised by other writers and scholars, including Fred Donner of the University of Chicago. Here is part of what Donner has to say about Ibn Warraq's The Quest for the Historical Muhammad:

... the compiler’s agenda ... is not scholarship, but anti-Islamic polemic

... “Ibn Warraq” and his co-conspirator “Ibn al-Rawandi” detest anything that, to them, smacks of apologetic; for this reason they criticize harshly several noted authors for their ‘bad faith’ or ‘moral ambiguity.’ Yet this book is itself a monument to duplicity. The compiler never has the honesty or courage to divulge his identity, even though a list of contributors (pp. 551-54) gives a biographical sketch of all the other contributors who, unlike “Ibn Warraq” and “Ibn al-Rawandi,” are already well-known. Far more serious is the fact that this book is religious polemic attempting to masquerade as scholarship. It is a collection of basically sound articles, framed by a seriously flawed introduction, and put in the service of anti-Islamic polemic dedicated to the proposition that Islam is a sham and that honest scholarship on Islam requires gratuitous rudeness to Muslim sensibilities. By associating these articles with “Ibn Warraq’s” polemical agenda, The Quest for the Historical Muhammad will raise suspicions among some Muslims that all revisionist scholarship is
motivated by such intolerance. This is likely to make the future progress of sound historical scholarship on Islam’s origins harder, rather than easier.

Words © 2007 Irfan Yusuf


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CRIKEY: Yes, Jesus was indeed a "sand nigger" ...

In 1998, I visited Brazil. In the world’s largest Catholic country, I saw icons of Jesus and Mary everywhere. There was one not-so-subtle difference between these and the icons I see in Australia. For millions of Brazilian Catholics, the Blessed Virgin with child both had black skin.

Of course, we all know that Jesus wasn’t a negroHe was, after all, born in a place called Beyt Lahm, an Arabic/Aramaic phrase meaning literally "House of Lamb Meat" or 'House of Bread". He spoke fluent Aramaic. His mother wore (at the very least) a traditional head scarf worn today by many orthodox Jewish and Muslim women.

A delegation from Jesus’ town is currently visiting Australia. All delegation members are Christians. All are accused of being terrorists. All no doubt look like Middle Easterners. All look like Arabs. Usama bin Ladin is a Middle Easterner. The Mayor of Bethlehem is a Middle Easterner. Jesus was a Middle Easterner. No doubt Jesus probably bore some resemblance to other Middle Easterners.

Yet for some reason, American-owned tabloids in Sydney and Melbourne are behaving in a very Middle Eastern fashion over one entry to an art prize. One that shows Jesus' mum in traditional arab garb (see right). Even the PM joined the fray, telling journalists ...

The choice of such artwork is gratuitously offensive to the religious beliefs of many Australians.

Yes, it is offensive if you believe Jesus looked something like Merv Hughes and Mary looked like Jennifer Hawkins. Yet the fact is that Mary wore something on her head (and, given her noble ancestry and her cultural heritage, quite likely something over her face).

What all this shows is how far the far-Right evangelical view of Christianity has strayed from the reality of Jesus. Allegedly conservative mono-cultural fruitloops keep referring to Australia’s Christian heritage. Yet how would they react if the real Jesus returned and arrived in Australia?

Well, for a start, they’d probably think he was a terrorist. He wouldn’t be speaking English, and would suddenly appear from the wilderness looking rather dishevelled.

Jesus’ photo would be splashed across our American-owned metropolitan tabloids. Piersed Akumen and his colleagues would be waxing unlyrical about this latest foreign threat. Gerard Henderson would attack the "civil rights lobby" for defending Jesus. Janet Albrechtsen would castigate lawyers and judges for defending a man who wants to establish the Kingdom of God (read sharia law) in Australia. The Australian Federal Police wouldn’t understand a word Jesus was saying but would charge him anyway. Some magistrate would grant Jesus bail, and the good Catholic Kevin Andrews would cancel Jesus’ visa and send him back to … um … er … God The Father?

As William Dalrymple keeps reminding us, Christianity (like Judaism and Islam) is a Middle Eastern religion. And Jesus was a Middle Easterner. Just accept it.

First published in the Crikey daily alert on Thursday 30 August 2007.

Words © 2007 Irfan Yusuf