It is one of the rare times when followers of the three Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) are coincidentally celebrating holy days of spiritual significance to each of them. Yet, the so-called “holy wars,” which is widely launched by the racist politicians who find muse in fueling religion-based hatred among the people of different religions, with the purpose to gain social influence, are painfully undermining the special spiritual momentum we are living through.

Since the beginning of April, Muslims have been celebrating the month of Ramadan, by fasting all day and praying most of the night, in order to free themselves from the materialistic world and reach spiritual revelation. This week, on Easter Holiday, Christians are celebrating the resurrection of Jesus, after practicing fasting and atonement during the past forty days of the Great Lent. On the same week, the Jews are celebrating the Passover (Pesach Holiday), to remember their liberation from slavery, after a few weeks of fasting and deep spiritual reflections.

The one common moral of all the historical incidents, upon which these special holidays are based, is that it is completely in the hand of humans to make their world a piece of hell, by hating each other, or a piece of paradise, by loving and accepting each other. In all existing religions – Abrahamic or not – the common instruction is for humans to love each other and act as equals; no one is better and no one is inferior regardless of their different characteristics. “Diversity is a blessing” this sentence is stated in almost all the holy books, in one way or another.

Nonetheless, all over history there are examples of politicians abusing religion to justify wars that harvested thousands of lives, labeling their hellish assaults on other humans as an act of defending their own religion or “defending God,” the Almighty himself. That was the case in ancient Egypt, when Pharoah the King discriminated against the followers of Prophet Moses because they had shaken his throne by worshiping a different god. Also, that was the case of the ancient romans who targeted Jesus and his followers after seeing them as a threat to their political power. Many centuries later, the Crusades were launched under the same flag of the “holy war.” In our current days, Islamist terrorist organizations are using the same flawed religious rhetoric to justify killing and terrorizing innocent civilians everywhere.

Although we are not living in the dark ages, any more, and despite the existence of countless number of local and international laws that criminalizes all forms of discrimination, some politicians are still using religion to gain influence. That is not only true for the political Islamist organizations of the Middle East that have been mobilizing followers under the flag of religion, for decades. But even in Europe, where respect for human rights is unnegotiable, some politicians, especially from the far-right wing, are shamelessly promoting hate against the Muslim minorities, with the purpose to gain popularity among their citizens, who are legitimately panicked by the Islamist terrorist organizations, which leaked into their countries over the past decade. Yet, the victims of such discrimination are usually peaceful Muslims, who have nothing to do with the extremists.

One of those European politicians is Rasmus Paludan, a Danish-Swedish lawyer who leads a far-right political party with the name “Stram Kurs” or Hard Line. In bid for collecting voter signatures required to secure his candidature in the coming Swedish elections, in September, he decided to hold a gathering wherein he and some other extremists burn the Muslim’s holly book of Quran in public. In parallel, a similar group of far-right extremists in Norway convened an anti-Muslim rally, wherein they tore pages of Quran and spat on it.

Sadly, this is not the first time Paludan provokes Muslims in such a way. It will not be an exaggeration to say that Paludan’s entire political career and fame is based on the hatred he shows towards Muslims. While he is getting fame and political influence, his actions are causing riots that ended up paralyzing life in Malmo city and stirring anger among more than one billion Muslims worldwide. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, as well as the United Nations’ Alliance of Civilizations denounced the practice of burning the Quran. And, recently, he got arrested for practicing racism and prevented from entering Sweden. Yet, none of that was not enough to deter him.

European far-right extremists, like Paludan, are not less dangerous than the Islamist terrorists, from ISIS and Al-Qaeda. In fact, they are constantly fueling the terrorist groups with the “state of victimhood” they need to recruit followers and justify their terrorist operations, especially against non-Muslims. The most heartbreaking fact in all this dark scene of hate and discrimination is that neither the greedy politicians nor the violent extremists pay the price of these so-called “holy wars.” Only the innocent civilians do.

 

BY: Dalia Ziada