Russia: Muslims should copy from Jewish lobbying

Instead of blaming Islamophobia for their problems and waiting for someone else to solve them, Russia's Muslims should do what Russia's Jews have done and create an institution to lobby the Russian government on their behalf, according to a leading Muslim commentator.


In an article posted on the Islam.ru portal, Abdalla Aminov notes that there are nearly 100 times as many Muslims in the Russian Federation as there are Jews and that "the overwhelming majority of Muslims belong to the indigenous population of our country".


But despite that, he continues, the Jewish community has a far greater impact on the Russian government because its members, unlike those of the Muslim community, do not simply blame others for their problems and wait for someone to solve them. Instead, Aminov writes, they organize and work for their co-religionists.


The latest example of their efforts, he continues, is the formation of a Jewish Social Chamber, which is charged with defending and advancing the interests of the 230,000 Jews in Russia. And 20 million plus Muslims, instead of ignoring what the Jews are doing, should copy them and create a Muslim Social Chamber to do the same thing for the Islamic community.


Such a body, Aminov argues, will help the Muslims of Russia to overcome their "passivity" and their current "unwillingness or inability to defend their legal and inalienable rights" by providing a venue for regular and intense communication between the Muslim community as a whole and the various components of the Russian state.


Among the tasks such a body could take up, he continues, are "the spread among ethnic Muslims and other strata of the population of the spiritual values of the umma, the awakening of interest in live in Islamic countries, and operational reporting on manifestations of Islamophobia in Russia."


Given that the Russian government has welcomed the creation of the Jewish Social Chamber, the Muslim commentator says that he is "certain that such an initiative would find support and understanding from the Russian authorities," who are increasingly aware that "the size of the Muslim population of our country will only grow in the future.


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Source: Georgian Daily (English)

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