from yesterday’s Crikey ….. 

No basis for Murdoch's Muslim
scaremongering

Charles Richardson writes: 

Rupert Murdoch picked a bad time
to express the view, as he did yesterday, that Muslims'
religion "supercedes any sense of nationalism wherever they go".
Perhaps he was following Mark Steyn, who maintained back in February that Islam
"is not something you leave behind in the old country. Indeed, for its
adherents in the West, it becomes their principal expression – a Pan-Islamic
identity that transcends borders."

Just last week, the Pew Global Attitudes Project released a report that
provides strong evidence against the Murdoch-Steyn position. Pew surveyed
people in Muslim countries, western Europe and the US, and also specifically
Muslims in western Europe. While the responses were not monolithic, they show
that as a general rule European Muslims were more liberal and less anti-western
than their counterparts in the Middle East.

For example, asked how many of
their country's Muslims "support Islamic extremists like al-Qaeda",
only 12% of Muslims in Britain, Spain and Germany (9% in France) said
"many" or "most". In Pakistan it was 35%, Egypt 22%, Jordan
18%. Muslims in Europe were much more likely to associate positive
characteristics such as "generous", "tolerant" and
"respectful of women" with westerners. And large majorities of
Muslims in the four European countries said they had a favourable opinion of
Christians – more than in Muslim countries, and also more than the numbers of
Europeans who were favourable towards Muslims. 

The report suggests that the
failure of sympathy comes from the western side at least as much as the Muslim.
Asked whether there was a conflict between being a devout Muslim and living in
a modern society, Muslims in all countries except Pakistan were more likely to
say "no" than "yes". But the general populations in
Germany, Spain, Britain and Russia all said "yes" by substantial
majorities.

There were also substantial
differences in how the results were reported. The New York Times, whose report
was reprinted in The Age, headlined with
"Poll Finds Discord Between the Muslim and Western Worlds". But in
Europe, where Muslim immigrants are supposed to be a threat, it was easier to
see the positive side: Le Monde led with "A
majority of westerners have a favourable opinion of Muslims".