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SHARIA LAW IN AUSTRALIA PART TWO

In 2010 the Australian Institute of Family Studies examined whether or not Australia should give for-mal legal recognition to Islamic sharia law in resolving family law disputes; arguing that because Australia is multi-cultural, multi-religious and multi-ethnic that per-haps we should also have multiple legal systems. The academic author of the paper stated that “sharia law is already operating in Australia” and presented the case for and the case against recognition of Islamic sharia law by Australian law. The report concluded that “Aus-tralia is already accommodating of Islam”.On the grounds of multi-cultur-alism there has been a push for sharia law and our leaders have ignored it. A few politicians who have questioned Islamic law and practices have been vilified. The ongoing media campaign to reassure citizens that we have nothing to fear from Islam and Islamic practices raises more questions than it answers, as the following item shows.The West Australian newspaper

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT ISLAMIC LAW

In the last issue of this newspa-per, the operation of the Islam-ic legal system (sharia law) in Australia was discussed. This issue continues that discus-sion.

publishes a regular article by Dr Ameer Ali, who is a lecturer in Eco-nomics at the School of Manage-ment and Governance at Murdoch University. In his opinion piece on 4 January 2016 he stated that anti-Islam scaremongers, such as the former Australian Treasurer Peter Costello, ‘Recovering Australia’ and Australian Liberty Alliance have no understanding of Islamic sharia law. He then added that the Islamists who advocate sharia law are just as ignorant. Those state-ments are false and misleading and should be challenged. Although the newspaper does not give read-ers a right of reply, some letters sent to the paper are published.

The Prime Minister Mister Turnbull hosted an Islamic Ramadan dinner at Kirribilli House. in June 2016.

Photo: AAP Image/Fairfax Media Pool, Andrew Meares

The editorial team of Face The Facts prepared a reply with state-ment from an Atheist, Buddhist

and Christian in response to Dr Ali’s article. See Page 3

“No sharia law” is a popular slogan heard at anti-Islam protests in this country. As if to reassure the non-Muslim fear, Islamist organisations reiterate they are struggling to-wards creating a trans-national ca-liphate ruled by sharia law. Neither these advocates nor the scaremon-gers seem to have any understand-ing about sharia. Literally sharia means the ‘way’ and it stands for divine guidance, and in a legal sense it denotes divine law. Realistically and logically this law is known only to the Divine, although there are some indications of it in Islamʼs holy sources, the Koran and the Hadiths. All that a human can do is search for this law. Muslim jurists at different times and places have derived varied sets of rules and regulations. So what is commonly called sharia law are laws drawn by humans and they are not immutable [unchangable]. The term for these laws is Fiqh. All laws are subject to interpretation and amendment when need arises.

The sharia laws are not an excep-tion. Fiqh laws were derived and compiled by Muslims for Muslims when they were a world power. None were written to fit a situa-tion in which Muslims would live as minorities under non-Muslim regimes. Muslim intellectuals in Western centres of learning are well-placed to think freely and write about Is-lam and its legal dimension. Such efforts go a long way in easing the fear about sharia. No secular society has prevented any Muslim from practising their religion. Issues that have been highlighted have more to do with regional cultures from which Mus-lims have migrated than with the religion of Islam. When out of ignorance sections of Muslims mix culture with religion and the use the name sharia as an all-encompassing cover, who can blame the equally ignorant anti-Is-lamists from shouting “No to sharia law”?

Ignorance feeds fear, tensions on sharia law’ by Ameer Ali

Photo: AAP Image/FairfaxMedia Pool, Andrew Meares

“What do you think?” 18/6/2016 Bill Leak

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64 | Australian Institute of Family Studies

whom adherence to their religious law—the Sharia1—is an Islamic obligation and not a matter of personal preference, particularly in regard to family matters.

The issue of whether Australia should give formal legal recognition to Sharia law in resolving family law disputes involving Muslims will be canvassed in this paper. The case for and against such recognition is outlined. Debate on this issue has gained currency across common law jurisdictions due to several recent events. One was the legal recognition given to Islamic arbitration in the province of Ontario, Canada, in 2004. Although the enabling sections of the Arbitration Act were subsequently repealed, it did ignite the possibility that within a common law system there could be faith-based dispute resolution for family law and other legal matters. The second event was the Archbishop of Canterbury’s address to the Royal Courts of Justice (Williams, 2008), in which he promoted the concept of Britain becoming a “plural jurisdiction” by accommodating aspects of Sharia law. Although this speech provoked opposition from some other members of Britain’s legal, political and religious communities (including some Muslim groups), the Lord Chief Justice of Britain came to the Archbishop’s defence by also supporting alternative dispute resolution using Sharia principles. Whether this is the right direction for Australia or whether we should retain the status quo needs consideration and debate.

A new direction for a pluralistic nation?Australia is marked by pluralism—cultural, religious and ethnic. Yet, our legal system is not pluralistic. Apart from some concessions to the Indigenous peoples of this country, we abide by the “one law for all” mantra. Both sides of politics have rejected a separate stream of law for specific religious or ethnic communities on the basis that Australia is a secular nation. Freedom of religion and worship is protected, but religion is to play no part in the formal legal system. Australia’s former treasurer, Peter Costello (2006), argued, “there is one law we are all expected to abide by. It is the law enacted by the Parliament under the Australian Constitution. If you can’t accept that then you don’t accept the fundamentals of what Australia is and what it stands for” (para. 44). This year, Attorney-General Robert McCelland confirmed that the “Rudd government is not considering and will not consider the introduction of any part of Sharia law into the Australian legal system” (Zwartz, 2009).

Research undertaken by Dunn (2005) and Poynting, Noble, Tabar, and Collins (2004) indicates that there is a high level of apprehension among the general population about Muslims “in our suburbs”, which gives support to the contention that the majority of Australians accept and endorse the “one law for all” approach. However, this position does raise challenges for Australian Muslims for

Ann Black

Legal recognition of Sharia lawIs this the right direction for Australian family matters?

Australian Institute of Family Studies Family Matters 2010 No.84

My wife and I have been visiting Phuket for 27 years and have al-ways loved the people and the laid-back atmosphere. But it all changed during our visit in August this year. We were shocked by the increase in Islamic tourists from Oman, Ku-wait and Pakistan. They were on the beach and for the first time in our hotel. The women dressed like ninjas while the men were dressed by Billabong. My wife was too nervous to go in the pool with the presence of many Islamic men.

The Thursday night before the bombs (set by Muslim separatists from the south) went off in Phuket, a family of Muslims were desper-ately hassling a travel agent at the hotel to get them tickets out of Phuket that night. On the Friday morning when the bombs went off, the usual array of Islamic guests in

THE NEW FACE OF PHUKET the breakfast room were nowhere to be seen. This was before we had heard about the bombs 500 meters

down the road. These bombs de-stroyed a hotel and two shops, one of which was beside a police sta-

tion. On the following Sunday my wife was having lunch at a restau-rant on the beach road when the police commenced putting up yel-low tape on the beach. When she asked the waiter what was going on she was told there was an unex-ploded bomb on the beach and the police were bringing in the bomb disposal team.

Something that really surprised me this holiday was that the McDon-alds was packed with Muslims all the time. Maccas sold pulled pork burgers and offered bacon in the big macs, so the place was obvi-ously not ‘halal’ and pork products were being cooked on the prem-ises and yet was full of Muslims. Strange considering in Australia they place so much importance on halal certification. Normally we never see Muslims eating in the restaurants we frequent. They are always in Islamic style premises which now play Koranic prayers over loudspeakers during the day before they open — also a new phe-nomenon.

If this was not enough to spoil our holiday we had another interest-ing event at our hotel. In the early hours one morning there was a noisy argument in the hotel ground between four Australian Muslim twenty-somethings. They were try-ing to talk one of their mates from heading off to Syria to fight with ISIS. Security intervened but the police were never called. Another guest did call the Australian Em-bassy in Bangkok but we will never know if anything happened to this would be jihadi on his return to Australia.

Needless to say we are looking for a new holiday destination.

The editors have withheld the sender’s name and address from publication.

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There is no such organisation as ‘Recovering Australia’ in the con-text to which Ameer Ali refers. Pre-sumably he means either ‘Reclaim Australia’ or ‘Restore Australia’. If he cannot get a name correct, his other arguments are suspect.Aliʼs argument hinges on Sharia and Fiqh law. The Oxford History of Islam defines Islamic law: Sharia contained in divine revela-tion is an integral part of the dog-ma of Islam. Fiqh is a product of speculative reasoning and does not command the same authority as Sharia. Ali argues that Sharia and Figh are inter-changeable, but according to Islamic jurisprudence, only man-made laws such as Figh can be changed, the revelations of God in the Quran, cannot change. Ali in-fers that Muslims living as minori-ties in non-Islamic countries adapt Islamic laws to fit in with the law of the land. However, the policy of Multiculturalism has encouraged Muslims in Western countries to set up their own communities with their own Islamic laws and courts. The UK has in excess of 100 estab-lished Sharia courts, and Australia has some unofficial Sharia courts. Where Sharia law has been ap-plied to family matters concerning inheritance, marriage, divorce and custody, it has proved a disaster for women. In England, where there are towns with a large Islamic population, demands have been made for Sha-ria law to replace English common law. There are even Sharia-con-trolled zones.So how can Ameer Ali claim ig-norance feeds fear of Sharia law? Australians have every right to be fearful of the introduction of Sharia law.

From a Buddhist

From an Atheist

What an Atheist, a Buddhist and a Christian said about ‘Ignorance feeds fear, tensions on

Sharia law’

Continued from Page 1 SHARIA LAW IN AUSTRALIA

Ameer Ali takes us on a seemingly harmless romp, blithely skipping through glorious fields of meta-phorical buttercups, better known as the grim minefield of Islamic law. Ali’s claim of Muslims adapting to live with the laws of non-Islamic host countries, is contradicted by the Organization of Islamic Co-op-eration (OIC). The OIC argues for example, that a Muslim could claim that a human rights violation had occurred if he was exposed to the sight of a Christian cross or crucifix in a Catholic school classroom (Fox News, October 26, 2011). NOT liv-ing with the law of the land means a proliferation of separate Muslim only prayer rooms and washing fa-

cilities, which are already popping up like toadstools in our hospitals and other public spaces. Such so-cial segregation is like the institu-tionalised racism of the recent past, which the US civil rights move-ment and the anti-apartheid activ-ists fought to eliminate. Australia-wide, groups of con-cerned citizens are calling for a re-versal of this Islamic stealth apart-heid. Australian Liberty Alliance is just one such group that supports egalitarianism and a fair go for all, but will not endorse Islamic sub-version of those Australian values. Our politicians seem unwilling to protect us against the re-emergence of social segregation and discrimi-nation by Islam, which is apparent-ly fully endorsed by “it’s as safe as milk” Ameer Ali.

Photo: Graham Turner/Guardian.

Ameer Ali is living in a bubble of ignorance dreaming of his own fairytale interpretation of Sharia law which is a complete way of living. It is based entirely on the Quran, the Sunna and the life and sayings of Mohammed (the Hadith and Sira). Yet Ali claims there are merely ‘some indications’ of Sharia law in those sources. Sharia law is fixed. Criticism of the Quran or Shariah law is not an op-tion in the Islamic world, where laws are not ‘dynamic’. Islam has not kept ‘pace with human pro-gress’ but is firmly entrenched back in the 7th century.The Al Azhar university and mosque in Cairo, Egypt, is ac-knowledged as the ultimate inter-preter of the Quran and Sharia law. That university and the religious leadership of the Middle East en-dorses the Islamic book Reliance of the Traveller which documents Sha-ria law. Ali seems to challenge their authority. There is no basis for Ali’s claim that new laws are needed for Muslims living in countries where they are in the minority. When Muslims mi-grate they bring Sharia with them and then try to change the laws of their host nations to conform to Sh-aria. Look at Sharia courts appear-ing as an alternative judicial sys-tem; the demands for halal food, prayer rooms, mosques, Islamic schools, the wearing of the full-face covering, recognition of polygamy ... the list goes on.Ali states that Sharia laws were compiled ‘by Muslims for Muslims and when Muslims were a world dominant power’. The Islamic con-quering armies took Sharia with them and it applied to Muslims and non-Muslims alike. As Mus-lims today are spreading, they too are bringing Sharia with them. As a Christian woman I do not want to become a second class citizen with no freedom of speech. So I do say “No to Sharia law” and that is not out of ignorance.

From a Christian

The new face of Phuket - the new look beach wear for ladies

Send your comments or submit an article for publication to : inbox@qsocaus.org Letters may be edited.

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Impressum Q Society of Australia Inc PO Box 1228, Altona Gate, Victoria 3025 www.qsociety.org.au/contact.htm ABN 11 883 362 342 Views and opinions expressed in this publica-tion are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Q Society of Australia Inc.

Your News and Views“

ISLAM AND THE NAZI LINK

by John Severus

Compared to the German Kaiser in the First World War (see Volume 2 (2) of Face the Facts), Hitler’s links with Islam during the Second World War were more direct. The Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin el Husseini, was one of Hitler’s chief Islamic contacts. In November 1941 Hitler met with Husseini and agreed that

ited by Adolf Eichman and was fi-nanced by the Nazis between 1936 and the outbreak of hostilities. Doc-umentation from the Nuremburg and Eichman trials clearly showed the Nazi intent to exterminate both European and Middle Eastern Jews. It was Husseini’s interven-tion through Himmler that ensured that, in 1942, 10,000 Jewish children went to the death camps and not to a trade-off organized via the Red Cross. After the defeat of the Ger-mans at El Alamein, Husseini tried to organize an Arab uprising from his base in Berlin and went on to plan a death camp outside Nablus in Palestine to implement the Final Solution in that region.While Hitler died in the ruins of Berlin, Husseini lived until 1974. In his memoirs he wrote: “Our funda-mental condition for our cooperat-ing with Germany was a free hand for the eradication of every last Jew from Palestine and the Arab world. I asked Hitler for an explicit un-dertaking to allow us to solve the Jewish problem in a manner befit-ting our national and other racial aspirations and according to the scientific methods innovated by the Germans in the handling of its Jews. The assurance I got was ‘The Jews are yours’”. The Mufti Haj Amin el Husseini is still revered and his blood kinsman Yasser Arafat, whose real name was Yasser Arafat al-Qudwa al-Hussei-ni, never repudiated him.

Husseini would command a divi-sion of 20,000 men, known as the Hanzar Division. These men were recruited and then conscripted into the Nazi SS. The Hanzar Division was comprised mainly of Yugosla-vian Muslims. They were tasked with the genocidal killing of Jews in Croatia and Serbia, as part of the

Nazi Final Solution which was the total eradication of Jews from Eu-rope. The Mufti was helped in his endeavours by Heinrich Himmler and other high-ranking Nazi offic-ers. In fact, the Nazi association with Husseini extended back to a time before the war, when he was vis-

• Westpac has called on Carla Zampatti to design a corporate hijab as the bank joins a growing trend to expand workwear to ac-commodate Islamic headgear. The Zampatti design is expected to be incorporated into the new uni-form collection next April. Westpac joins other major corporates, in-cluding the Commonwealth Bank and Optus, in including the hijab in staff uniforms.• London’s Metropolitan Police Force introduced the headscarf as part of its official uniform in a bid to create a more diverse force and

Westpac employee Connie Wehbe with her own hijab.

to encourage women from Islamic communities to join its ranks.For story see http://pamelageller.com/2016/09/uk-may-let-muslim-police-offic-ers-wear-burka-as-uniform-in-effort-to-boost-diversity.html/

I pass it [Face the Facts] onto my friends. They have been asking when the next is-sue will be out. Mundaring, Western Australia

Picture: Britta Campion

Did you know ...?

• That moments before the terrorist entered Sydney’s Lindt Cafe, a leading Australian halal certifier left the premises. The Lindt Cafe does not have halal certification. ‘The fuse of public fury has been lit as terror comes to Sydney’ Daily Telegraph 15 December 2014

• That evidence at the inquest into the Lindt cafe siege showed that six hours into the siege the NSW Police

Lindt Cafe siege Dec 2014Commissioner and the Deputy Com-missioner were far more concerned about possible hate crimes against the Islamic community than the welfare and lives of the hostages. There was an official rush to emphasise “community harmony” and “tolerance so as not to fuel anger which may have led to a bias motivated crime.” (A bias crime is when someone is targetted because of race, religion or national origin.)‘Police had PC operation, no ter-ror plan’ by Sharri Markson and Sam Buckingham-Jones The Weekend Aus-tralian 20-21 August 2016.