A journalist for the Mississauga, Ont.-based newspaper The Pakistan Post was assaulted by two men, one armed with a cricket bat, who warned him to stop “writing against Islam” and a Pakistan-based religious organization, the Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) reported Thursday.
Journalist Jawaad Faizi was attacked on the evening of April 17 while sitting in his car outside the home of the newspaper’s editor, Amir Arain. The two men smashed the car windows, and repeatedly hit Faizi. They fled when they saw him call 911 on his cell phone.
During the attack, Faizi said, the men told him to stop writing critically of the religious organization Idara Minhaj-ul-Quran and its leader, Cleric Allama Tahir-Ul-Qadri. Allama Tahir-Ul-Qadri is a frequent visitor to Canada, CJFE said.
“A journalist for the Mississauga, Ont.-based newspaper The Pakistan Post was assaulted by two men, one armed with a cricket bat,”
I suspect the attackers were new immigrants from Pakistan.
If they had been second generation Pakistani Canadian they would have likely used a golf club, preferably Titanium Driver or maybe even a sand wedge.
Welcome to liberal kanada. It will get worse, guaranteed, just wait for the next episode. As my Iranian friend/business acquaintance pointed out long ago, and I think I mentioned it here, this is exactly why the moderate Muslims don’t speak up, here, and in other parts of the world. My friend also told me it has nothing to do about religion per say, but everything to do about money, money and power. Religion is just the vehicle to get there for this very sophisticated criminal element. I guess time will tell, but in general and watching the present relationships between religion and government, I tend to agree with him. More specifically I feel, governments won’t act because they are intimidated by religion.
We wouldn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings would we, but a cricket bat is OK.
A cricket bat is an ethnic icon, but a baseball bat is a weapon…
Good luck to Stephen Harper in getting votes in the 905 area codes.
I hear the sounds of crickets chirping.
Farmer Ben,
It isn’t just cynical to relate this to getting votes. It’s a sign of an inferior education.
Please condemn the violence. Show some courage.
Too bad they dont have guns otherwise those two thugs would be on amarble slab with a tag tied to their big toes
A neo conservative is a person who spends their days railing against Muslims – while actively supporting open immigration and the immigration of said Mulsims into their own country. The new neo-con hotness, in fact, is claiming that Canada needs even greater numbers of Muslms.
Sometimes you guys make less sense than the left. Would it kill you to make the slightest effort at explicitly advocating immigration reform?
Most Canadians including the MSM will continue to look the other way at least until the cricket bat registry is expanded to include hockey sticks.
Muslims need a good reformation. Where is their Martin Luther?
Bob,
You make less sense as days go by. Neo-con is nothing but a construct, or label, of the identity politics usual suspects.
In fact, conservatives and liberals welcome immigration policy reforms [you could look it up!] its just a question of passing a bill in a minority parliament is not exactly a ‘gimme.’
Please condemn the violence, make your point by all means, but please focus on the post.
Journalist beaten up? It only shows EVEN muslim extremists have their GOOD POINTS.
A journalist is beaten up for speaking out against Islam and the news story is / will be framed as the need to protect the freedom of speech of the journalists, NOT the danger posed by Islam. Just watch.
MSM journalists are already dhimmis and, worse, facilitators. For shame, cowards and traitors!
Yes, Bob, “neocons” for people paying reasonable amount of taxes, but against tax evasion.
That makes sense, doesn’t it?
The journalists and politicians that don’t see Islamic supremacism for the threat it really is are idiots, and they put the rest of us in jeopardy. It’s just plain. Too bad the normal human beings who happen to be Muslim are being steam rollered.
Imagine building a house 100 meters from the base of a glacier that creeps forward 1 cm per day. Absolutely the house will be flattened. Point this out, and the njournalist and leftie apologists label you a Glacialphobe, or an alarmist, or racist. But its an inevitable fact. The Islamic supremacist glacier is heading for our house, it’s obvious.
The Muslim normal-human being community needs our help to feel secure enough to thwart these power-hungry men that use the cloak of Islam to achieve dominion over others through violence.
Let’s brainstorm on how we best enable their defense. We have to help them overcome their fear.
Recently released is a book “Because They Hate” by Brigitte Gabriel – I picked up a copy at the local library.
It is the reflections of a woman who as a young Lebanese Christian in Lebanon moved through a privileged childhood life, into a life of hell as a teenager during the civil destruction of the 1970s, and on to a life in the U.S.
She eventually made here way to America via Israel after a many horrendous experiences, ending up in journalism. She now lectures in the U.S. and decries how the West is giving up far to much in the name of accommodation/multiculturalism.
The incidence reported in this thread emphasizes the intimidation that the moderates are feeling. They must continue to speak out and the rest of us must continue to show (not talk about) that we are able/willing to protect them when they do.
For the most part, “us” generally, will do this but a more important question will be: will the judges do their part when they have the chance – like nail these thugs hard. A weapon is a weapon – a vicious attack is a vicious attack – so let’s hope they use their power and forget the politically correct niceties. This is a huge opportunity to set a precedent.
jrb: “You make less sense as days go by. ”
Good. I want no part of the status quo thinking. Here’s another one: never attribute to religion what can best be explained by science. Sikhs and Tamils have had violent incidents similar to this one.
jrb: “a question of passing a bill in a minority parliament is not exactly a ‘gimme.'”
True, but whose fault is that? It’s yours, for not speaking up. Why should Harper take one for the team if his own “supporters” refuse to support him on this issue by aggressively opposing open immigration, a system even some Liberals admit is a mess?
jrb: “Please condemn the violence, make your point by all means, but please focus on the post”
Fine, I condemn the fleeing of the horse, now will you consider shutting the damn barn door?
Why is’nt this story on the front pages of the Red Star or any other Mainstream Media?
Frankly i hope those islamic wackos try that with somebody who carries a 44 magnum revolver and sends some of those hooded scum to meet ALAH or MUHAMED in person
I hope that police, politicians and, yes, journalists take what hapened to Jawaad Faizi as seriously as they would if a prominent “white” journalist was attacked.
In the 1980’s the publisher of the Indo-Canadian times, Tara Singh Hayer, a Canadian Sikh from Surrey BC, began to speak out against violence in the Sikh separatist community. He was labeled a “lunatic”, a wife-beater, a “senile incontinent” and “man born of foul semen.” A bombing attempt was made on his printing plant in 1986; two years later he was shot and paralyzed by a man named Karkirat Singh Bagga, who had stayed over at the home of Lib MP Navdeep Bains’ father-in-law immediately before he flew west to shoot Hayer. According to court documents from the Air India trial, Saini met Bagga in Pakistan through acquitted Air India bomber Ajaib Singh Bagri.
Later Hayer, now wheelchair-bound from the gunshot injuries, gave an affidavit in which he detailed an incriminating conversation he’d overheard in England between the editor of a Punjabi newspaper and Bagri. The editor was murdered soon after, and three years later Hayer — the only other witness, and who had offered to testify at the Air India inquiry, was shot and killed as he arrived at his home in Surrey. His killer was never found.
Hayer’s son is now a BC MLA. He told the Kim Bolan of the Vancouver Sun that (in her words) “Witnesses have been reluctant for years to come forward in cases like the Air India bombing and his father’s murder because they see how closely suspects are aligned with politicians…”
That might sound ludicrous but in 1990, when the International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF) had already been identified by CSIS as a terrorist group, and four of its members convicted of the attempted assassination of an Indian politician visiting Canada, leadership-hopeful Paul Martin gave a speech to them asking for their support. He told them he was honoured to “meet friends who share the same belief in this country, the same belief in peace, the same preparedness to defend themselves…”
At the most recent Liberal leadership convention Navdeep Bains and his allies led hundreds of Sikh delegates at the Liberal convention into the Dion camp; later the LPC opposed extending investigative powers in the Anti-Terrorism Act that were useful to the Air India investigation.
I’m not suggesting that there is a connection between these two actions, just that, inasmuch as the ethnic vote has hitorically been a key component of Liberal success, hard questions must be asked about the extent to which ethnic/religious grievances must necessarily be accomodated as part of this endeavour.
Apart from soft politics, though, it’s critically important that Canadian law-enforcement officials take very seriously the safety and right to free speech of immigrant Canadian journalists, and to ensure that there are not any double standards employed in the name of “accomodation” of differences. Obviously, if a Jeffrey Simpson, say, were beaten as a result of what he wrote — especially in the aftermath of the murder of another similarly prominent “white” Canadian journalist — extensive action would be taken.
Those involved in the beating of Faizi should face serious prosecution.
Thanks for that very rational and informative post, EBD. I am still horrified by that Air India bombing and the cavilier way it was handled by the Liberano government. Your post filled in some holes in my quandry.
jihad, coming to a venue near you, soon.