Muslims thrown off plane - for speaking Arabic

The Mail on Sunday reports on the incident of two Muslims who were thrown off a Manchester-Malaga flight after passengers complained they were speaking Arabic.

The incident is so bad that even the Tories have condemned it. The Mail however, manages to write a whole article about the incident without using the term "Islamophobia". They actually describe the men as "Asian", despite the fact they spoke Arabic.

One of the families on the flight are interviewed like they were the victims. Would love to see one of the tabloids doing a heart-to-heart with the guys who were humiliated.

British holidaymakers staged an unprecedented mutiny - refusing to allow their flight to take off until two men they feared were terrorists were forcibly removed.

The extraordinary scenes happened after some of the 150 passengers on a Malaga-Manchester flight overheard two men of Asian appearance apparently talking Arabic.

Passengers told cabin crew they feared for their safety and demanded police action. Some stormed off the Monarch Airlines Airbus A320 minutes before it was due to leave the Costa del Sol at 3am. Others waiting for Flight ZB 613 in the departure lounge refused to board it.

...

Websites used by pilots and cabin crew were yesterday reporting further incidents. In one, two British women with young children on another flight from Spain complained about flying with a bearded Muslim even though he had been security-checked twice before boarding.

The trouble in Malaga flared last Wednesday as two British citizens in their 20s waited in the departure lounge to board the pre-dawn flight and were heard talking what passengers took to be Arabic. Worries spread after a female passenger said she had heard something that alarmed her.

Passengers noticed that, despite the heat, the pair were wearing leather jackets and thick jumpers and were regularly checking their watches.

Initially, six passengers refused to board the flight. On board the aircraft, word reached one family. To the astonishment of cabin crew, they stood up and walked off, followed quickly by others.

The Monarch pilot - a highly experienced captain - accompanied by armed Civil Guard police and airport security staff, approached the two men and took their passports.

Half an hour later, police returned and escorted the two Asian passengers off the jet.

Soon afterwards, the aircraft was cleared while police did a thorough security sweep. Nothing was found and the plane took off - three hours late and without the two men on board.

...

A spokesman for the Civil Guard in Malaga said: "These men had aroused suspicion because of their appearance and the fact that they were speaking in a foreign language thought to be an Arabic language, and the pilot was refusing to take off until they were escorted off the plane."

UPDATE: The website where a cabin crew member reports a seperate incident of passengers trying to get a Muslim thrown off a flight because he had a beard can be viewed here (HT). Turns out that he was also engaging in suspicious activity - sleeping.

I had a similar experience tonight when boarding in Spain. Two British ladies travelling with their young children began complaining about a Muslim (he even has a beard, they said!) pax, who had behaved suspiciously in the terminal and prayed (which - naturally - should be a crime when done at an airport... ).

After some enqueries I found out the pax had all ready complained at the terminal, and the poor Muslim had been checked by security twice - and nothing suspicious had been found.

...

With little option the ladies settled down and we managed to take off. Shortly after the seatbelt sign had gone off another lady, who sat behind our Muslim "terrorist", approaches me and told me she was terrified because the Muslim pax was being "weird".

When I was finally pushing my drinks trolley past this highly suspicious terrorist, I noticed he was in fact sleeping peacefully - and continued to do so the whole flight.

Comments

[joe90]

Osama,
I often refer to the Middle East (which is actually the 'Near East') as West Asia -

You say the men are accused of being 'Asian' depsite the fact they spoke Arabic -

Can Arabic not be seen as a language of that great and huge continent?

I'm just wondering - you know how it is - I would rather people tell me about their world rather than me just use worn-out washed-up western mass-media cliches mate!

All the best!

[SharifHssn]

This kind of harassment is completely despicable. One is reminded of how the Jews in Germany, and blacks in America went through similar stigma from the press which had led to abuse and overt racism of black people, and of course holocaust of the Jews. This is pure racism, these individuals are judged by their colour, their creed and their language.

[Sohaib]

Looks to me like the Mail is just giving a suggestion to passengers on other flights. And we're taught by this loony lecturer to look out for anyone with a "scruffy, rough, appearance and long hair"!

Joe: The Middle East is not "actually" the Near East - both are arbitrary terms useful within a colonialist mindset: I mean, they are East relative to what?

The Arabic language (in various forms) is prominent in numerous countries that may be considered in Asia, but also in numerous African countries, such as Egypt, Libya and Morocco. People from these latter countries cannot be called Asian at all.

Moreover, there is an understanding in this country that when we say "Asian" we mean from the subcontinent, i.e. Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi. In this, we differ from the Americans who are more likely to mean Chinese, Japanese etc.

As for these passengers, they may well have been Asian and been speaking Punjabi or anything else, as far as these racists are concerned.

[joe90]

How about the harrassment of Palestinians and or Arabic speakers at Israeli controlled customs or illegal military checkpoints -

From Umkahlil's blog -

http://umkahlil.blogspot.com/2006/08/what-do-you-imagine-happens-to-others.html>'What Do You Imagine Happens To Others?'

http://umkahlil.blogspot.com/2006/08/zionists-brutalize-handicapped.html>Zionists Brutalize Handicapped Palestinian American

I remember the old joke when lots of innocent Irish folk were getting put into jail in England for crimes they did not commit -
- they were innocent until proven Irish!

It's the way I tell 'em!

All the best!

[Osama Bin Lalluh]

What SharifHssnIt talked about racial harassment suddenly ring a bell. The bell chimed back haunting memories of the 1930s when Jews were forced to put on the arm brand with David’s Star. This was to signify their ethnic origin until they were deported to the concentration camps. Jewish historical about the Holocaust has focused on the six million Jewish victims to the exclusion of the other 20 million victims Of course, there were many other ethnic backgrounds met with similar fate - because of their power friends in the US media they were protracted as the only scapegoat of the Holocaust..

In fact, Germans prove they exterminated millions of Communists, Czechs, Greeks, Gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, mentally and physically handicapped, Poles, resistance fighters, Russians, Serbs, Socialists, Spanish Republicans, trade unionists, Ukrainians, Yugoslavians, prisoners of war of many nations, and many others unknown souls. Some "were of some thirty nationalities, from Nepalese to Andorrans, and of a variety of racial and linguistic stocks.

Little information about this has ever been disseminated to the general public; the other victims were simply sub-human and disposable. The creation of the nation of Israel, its pivotal role as a bulwark against the spread of Islamic states, and its close ties with the United States ensured that the definition of the Holocaust would take on a uniquely Jewish identity at the expense of the non-Jewish victims. America was peopled by white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant, upper-class aristocrats. So, a large scale immigration of Jews into US is out of the question. No red blooded American would like to see their country swam by Jews.

[Parlicoot]

Is "Suspax" (suspicious passenger) a new word?

[Yakoub/Julaybib]

This is the kind of the thing that makes me want to put on shalwar kameez, keep my moustache clipped very short and my beard untrimmed. I'm not hiding behind my white face, so whatever my sisters and brothers are facing, bring it on, insha Allah!

Wasalaam

TMA

[joe90]

Thanks for that Sahib,
but I was asking Osama what he meant by Asia and the fact 'Asians' don't speak 'Arabic' -

A perfectly legitimate question I would've thought, as I like to understand people who have relatives and relations or who come from other parts of the world, I've never actually been to myself, and what it is they mean by things that don't take for granted -

I find other people, and the world ,interesting that way, which is why ask them stuff!

I don't think saying there is an 'east' and a 'west' is racist or colonialist - these are directions, as well as commonly used conventions to denote geographically areas, and are perfectly neutral, usable terms -

Why you're getting so hot and bothered about directional-geographical terms, generally accepted and used by everybody I've no idea - how about Africa, America, Australasia then, are they ok to use?

I fail to see what is inherently colonialist about saying Asia starts at the Bosphorus - obviously your idea of Asia Sahib, isn't colonialist but the truth!

And thanks for the linguistic-geographical lecture, but I knew all that -

It seems I'm being criticised for being ignorant and for asking questions, and by someone who assumes I don't know much anyway - or maybe I'm just prejudiced ?

They then proceed to give me answers to questions I've never asked Cand actually know all ready) but that never crossed their minds - perhaps it's not me that's prejudiced after all!

[Osama]

Joe, sir, we could have a debate about what constitutes Asia, and what is Arabia.

That is not however the point here. The Mail does not call Arab speaking countries "West Asia". What they are in fact doing is denying their Islamic identity (which they would not do if they were actually terrorists i.e. they wouldn't get called "Asian terrorists"). But when they're on the end of prejudice, they deny their religion has anything to do with it, and lazily just call them Asians, not recognising the growing phenomenon of Islamophobia.

[joe90]

Osama mate,
I am just being curious that's all!

I've no intention of bringing race, creed or beliefs into question - I'm not

I merely wanted to understand what it is you mean and wasn't trying to question your assumptions -
- your views as are perfectly valid as anyone elses, hence they seemed interesting and I just wanted to understand more!

I quite agree with you about the racism of the British Establishment - there's no more voracious critic than myself when it comes to the British and western governments -

- or the way governments use others as scapegoats, as a method of social control in order to stop people thinking rationally about the activities and policies the governments say they are carrying out on behalf of the people!

Trust Tony Blair - he'll protect us from all these threats we are constantly exposed to, every time we read a newspaper or switch on the tv or radio news -
It is western governments interference that is a cause of the problems of the world, not a solution to them - blame the victims, as per usual!

All the best Osama!

PS
sorry if I've been a pain or tactless- I didn't mean to offend anyone's sensibilities - far from it!

[Yitzchak Goodman]

Little information about this has ever been disseminated to the general public; the other victims were simply sub-human and disposable. The creation of the nation of Israel, its pivotal role as a bulwark against the spread of Islamic states, and its close ties with the United States ensured that the definition of the Holocaust would take on a uniquely Jewish identity at the expense of the non-Jewish victims.

An educated person who has learned about the Holocaust usually does know that the Nazis killed many non-Jews. They killed 3 million non-Jewish Poles, for instance. But it is true that the Jews were uniquely singled out by the Germans. The Jews loomed larger in their consciousness as the great enemy and they went to greater lengths to kill Jews than to kill other people. So, yes, it is something that people with a superficial knowledge of the Holocaust know about. I don't think it is true that the founding of Israel has affected people's perception of the Holocaust that much. It has worked more the other way around: People's perception of Israel has been colored by the Holocaust. Sometimes this has generated sympathy for the state of Israel, and at other times it has been given a pro-Palestinian spin. How can the Jews blah blah blah the Palestinians when the same thing was done to them by the Nazis, etc. Current Iranian rhetoric turns the whole thing on its head, and to hear Ahmadinejad speak you would think Israelis are all of European origin. I guess even the ones from Iran should "go back to Europe."

[Sohaib]

Joe, I think you're reading a tone in my comments that wasn't there. I didn't have a problem with the question you asked, but just wanted to answer from my perspective. And sorry if it turned out to be a "lecture"! I thought I was quite interesting. :-)

By the way, my name's Sohaib. But I'll take your calling me "Sahib" as an innocent mistake.

As to your points in response: I said that the terms ME & NE are both "arbitrary terms useful within a colonialist mindset" - I stand by that, and note that I didn't say that anybody who uses them HAS such a colonialist mindset.

I recently took a course on Middle Eastern History, and the first lecture was about how to define the Middle East... the conclusion being that there's nothing we can settle on.

[Paul H]

Hmmm - some very good points here. Myself, I'm a white British man with an agnostic/Christian background but I find the behaviour of a huge number (if it's a minority, it's a BIG minority!) of my fellow country men to be unbelievably racist at times. If I could actually do something about that I would, but I can't. I can only apologise. So it goes.

[joe90]

Well of course,
me calling you 'sahib' is just a typo, or other, what else could it be - is there something in all this that I can't see - is sahib some kind of name or label ?

I don't really buy into this idea that words have no useful purpose except as vehicles for the powerful to subjugate the powerless - I find all that post-modernist stuff pure mind-rot.

You have to call things something - and if you want to read into labels what you want, that's your affair - you can call them green cheese if it makes you happy, it makes no difference to me - I'm not prejudice in any way and prefer to communicate via agreed common usage.

You seem quite certain Sohaib, that you know where 'Asia' is, or not, I'm not quite sure. I, on the other hand, use assumptions reminscent of colonial mindsets rathet than definitions you could easily look up in the dictionary. People can call their own home and land what they want in their own language - it has nothing to do with me. I was asking Osama about his opinions, because I take him seriously, and find his ideas interesting - and not because he is challanging my prejudices. Challanging my ignorance perhaps, but that is why I like Osama's blog - he is Scottish, so am I and he is concerned about the same issues which motivate me, but he has a more involved knowledge about them than my humble self.

And if
"arbitrary terms useful within a colonialist mindset"
isn't a long-winded way of referring to me as a colonialist and racist, I don't know what is - so what should I have said in order for me not to be accused of being a colonialist?
Is Osama in a 'colonialist minset' for using the word 'Asia', or me for not understanding his use of this common term?

What about Africa, Europe Australia, the Artic - colonialist mindsets or not ?

So, from what I can gather - by the use of quotation marks and qualifying words like 'understanding', 'arbitrary', and 'relative' - the truth is, we don't know what the truth is, but one things sure, I don't know what the truth is!

That is the truth, is it Sohaib - that the truth is relative and there are no absolutes ? - which is a contradiction, and therefore, total nonsense -
- which is what 'post-modernism' is, and the rest of that bankrupt intellectually corrosive mind junk.

I am actually sorry I asked about 'Asia' now - that is one lesson I have learned, at least!

PS
I did originally just want to post this -

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/highlands_and_islands/5270598.stm>Fireball sparks plane crash alert

- as evidence of the latest mass-media scare campaign, timed to coincide with the attack and invasion of Gaza and Lebanon and Gaza, and deflect growing public attention and concern away from the crimes of Blair, Bush and Olmert.

It is very reminiscent of the 'War of the Worlds' scare when American radio listeners, to the live broadcast of the Orson Wells plays, thought they were being invaded by Martians from the Red Planet
ie 'Red Commie pinkos from Russia and Commie subversives working undercover, as a fifth column, in American society - all very Joe McCarthy!

[joe90]

More on harrassment,
sorry if this may only be tangential to racism and Islamophobia here in Britain but this is good blog and Umkahlil is mentioned as a link

http://www.osamasaeed.org/osama/2006/08/muslims_thrown_.html>Quote of the Week: 20.8.06
- from the great Lawrence of Cyberia

And here is today's headline in the Glasgow Herald -
http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/68375.html>Show-off children: the link to crime and violence

Does this mean that Blair, Bush and Olmert were 'show-offs' when they were young, as they are the ones responsible for most of the crime, violence, terror and misery in the world?

Blair also uses our taxes, running into tens of billions, to carry out his unending war crimes campaigns - and of course, he says he does what he does in our name with our democratic consent!

All the best guys!

[Sohaib]

Joe, honestly, you're reading me all wrong. If I wanted to call you names I wouldn't bother with a long-winded way. :p

My small disagreement with your first comment was your saying that the Middle East is "actually" the Near East. I pointed out that both are arbitrary. I have no problem with adhering to conventions, and I do refer to that (nebulously defined) region as the Middle East.

How could NE/ME be more 'colonialistic' than continent names like Asia/Europe? Simple. Because the latter refer to regions in their own right, while the former are placed relative to something else. While there is a "West", there is no "Far West" or "Middle West". Indeed, oughtn't the Middle East to be the Middle, full stop?

None of that is to say I advocate abandoning the conventional terms altogether. I just think we should be critical of our language. So sue me for being a mind-rotter!

[joe90]

OK,
I'll sue!

That is the trouble with people these days - they are so nice - it is difficult to get a decent argument going when people are so decent, honest and agreeable!

All the best Sohaib mate!

[George Carty]

Why not "South-West Asia"?

[Shavez]

Why not "North-West Africa"? "South-East Europe"?

[George Carty]

Why not "North-West Africa"? "South-East Europe"?

These terms are OK, although in these cases "Maghrib" and "Balkans" will also do the job, while being shorter to boot...

[joe90]

I love the Magrib and the Hejaz - brilliant!

I am also partial to a bit of the old Filastina-Philistine for Palestine etc - also Persia and Farsi I quite like too!

Also,
I love the way that so called 'science' (or western science if you want to be pedantic, and why not? - its still a free country, so far) is employed to contradict and disprove beautiful and creative myths such as the Hindu religion's conception of the world resting on the backs of elephant, who are standing on the backs of turtles -

- so the logical rational western type criticies this wonderful image, literally undermining it, by asking - and what are the turtles resting on?

Well, all that's been disproved by this ultimately futile exercise is that elephants and turtles don't seem to be involved in keeping the earth in its divine station -

- but ask the whereabouts of the known universe, and they won't be able to tell you - the universe has to be somewhere in relation to something else, or else its nowhere really, so where is it?

- which is just another way of formulating the lovely Hindu image of the place of the world in the scheme of things -
- all the scientific rational types have done is to postpone the eventual truth about their own ignorance of the world - they haven't answered the question at all, falsely accusing Hindu worshippers, and other religions as well I might add, for failings they to are guilty of.

All the best!

PS
there are some good comments here on the Medialens.orh messege board about Islamophobia
http://members5.boardhost.com/medialens/msg/1156108901.html

[Perla Zhemchuzhina]

Sahib is a Hindi word for sir or lord.

[Sohaib]

It's used more like "Mister", and usually said after someone's name, e.g. "Sohaib Sahib". It is generally respectful.