Repeated Anti-Semitism, Misogyny by NZ Muslim Leader

From Stuff NZ and Scoop NZ

Race Relations commissioner Dame Susan Devoy has condemned an Auckland Imam’s anti-Semitic hate speech. 

A video has surfaced online showing Dr Mohammad Anwar Sahib speaking at the At-Taqwa mosque in Manukau. “The Christians are using the Jews, and the Jews are using everybody,” Sahib said in a sermon filmed in November. “Because they think that their protocol is to rule the entire world….”

Dr Sahib is the President of the At Taqwa Mosque in Manukau, Auckland (where the comments were made, and from where they were broadcast on YouTube) and is also (according to FIANZ and his CV) secretary of the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand (FIANZ) Ulama Council and FIANZ Advisory Board. The FIANZ Ulama Council is responsible for religious affairs in the New Zealand Muslim community, including family counselling and dispute resolution. Dr Sahib also claims to be an adviser to the New Zealand government on Halal issues.

Like his views on Jews, Dr Sahib also shares views on women’s rights that are out of step with New Zealand values. In one sermon, he proclaims that “No woman can dare step out of her house without the permission of her husband”.

Fiji-born Dr Sahib was trained in Saudi Arabia, receiving a PhD in Qur’anic Sciences and Islamic Studies from Madinah University. In 2013, as New Zealand’s only Salafi preacher at the time, he led prayers at an Australian conference, which had invited other like-minded speakers who spread anti-Semitic hatred such as “Read history and you will understand that the Jews of yesterday are the evil fathers of the Jews of today, who are evil offspring, infidels… the scum of the human race whom Allah cursed and turned into apes and pigs… These are the Jews, an ongoing continuum of deceit, obstinacy, licentiousness, evil, and corruption…“.

…how it is that an Auckland-based, Saudi-trained, Muslim religious leader has been continuously allowed by the Auckland Muslim community and FIANZ itself to maintain and repeatedly propagate to his congregation a collection of anti-Semitic and misogynistic slurs that are clearly out-of-step with contemporary, pluralistic New Zealand society. How widely held are these views in the New Zealand Muslim community and over how many Muslims does Dr Sahib have influence?

Such racist and damaging teachings are utterly unacceptable and should be condemned by the Muslim community and its leadership.

Devoy said the HRC has contacted leaders of the NZ Jewish Council as well as the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand. “We urge Kiwis to recognise that these are the views of a single person and are not held by every single Muslim New Zealander, however questions need to be answered,” she said. “We have asked for an urgent response from FIANZ.”

The Islamic Women’s Council of New Zealand said Sahib’s comments were “totally inappropriate and that they “unequivocally condemn any divisive comments of a similar nature”. “While we may disagree with aspects of Jewish theology, and may have political disagreements, we see the Jewish people as closely connected to us through the Abrahamic tradition. The Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) had good relationships with his Jewish neighbours & encouraged Muslims to do the same,” they said in a statement.