An anti-hate campaign launched by Norway’s Muslim community last week, after a tragic attack on a Denmark synagogue, culminated tonight with over 1,000 Muslims forming a ‘ring of peace’ around an Oslo synagogue. Citizens linked hands, chanted anti-hate slogans and offered a show of solidarity with Norway’s Jewish community, one of the smallest in Europe.
Via Reuters:
Chanting “No to anti-Semitism, no to Islamophobia,” Norway’s Muslims formed what they called a ring of peace a week after Omar Abdel Hamid El-Hussein, a Danish-born son of Palestinian immigrants, killed two people at a synagogue and an event promoting free speech in Copenhagen last weekend.
“Humanity is one and we are here to demonstrate that,” Zeeshan Abdullah, one of the protest’s organizers told a crowd of Muslim immigrants and ethnic Norwegians who filled the small street around Oslo’s only functioning synagogue.
“There are many more peace mongers than warmongers,” Abdullah said as organizers and Jewish community leaders stood side by side. “There’s still hope for humanity, for peace and love, across religious differences and backgrounds.”
This show of solidarity came at the close of the Jewish Sabbath, with Norway’s Chief Rabbi, Michael Melchior, singing to the crowd and marking the end of Shabbat outside the synagogue’s walls.
Image via the AP.
Anti-semitic and Islamaphobic attacks are on the rise throughout Europe, even in Scandinavia, where mosques have been firebombed in Sweden and Jews attacked in Denmark in recent months (to name just two of several incidents).
Tonight’s show of solidarity, Jews and Muslims standing together against hate, was called “unique” by Ervin Kohn, head of the Oslo Jewish community. However, such stances done quietly among individuals and friends are common.
Perhaps it’s time for more of these public shows of solidarity to take place, with the next one being Jews circling a mosque in the next ‘ring of peace,’ inspired both by this action and by U.K. Jews who protected a London mosque in 2013.
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David Harris-Gershon is author of the memoir What Do You Buy the Children of the Terrorist Who Tried to Kill Your Wife?, published recently by Oneworld Publications.
Follow him on Twitter @David_EHG.
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What a strange and libelous comment.
A) I’m “sticking it to the Jews” by suggesting that a Jewish community take the baton and replicate this beautiful moment? Seems like a lovely suggestion to me. I take it you don’t, which is unfortunate (and perhaps hateful).
B) I always find a way to “stick it to the Jews” by critiquing Israel and those policies simultaneously harming Palestinians and Israel’s long-term survival? Only if you are conflating Israel and all Jews, an anti-Semitic trope.
Personally, I stand against such anti-Semitism.
You should also stand against the antisemitism that fills the comment sections at the blog where you cross-post. Your silence in the face of such filth is awful.
The Norwegians for some reason are awesome (could that be social democracy?). I remember the mass killing last year. They manage to keep their minds in the face of provocation, a quality that seems to be lacking elsewhere. While this might be a symbolic action, it cut through the negative atmosphere and I heard a report on ABC Radio News this evening. Their action reached the Southern Hemisphere. Credit to all involved, both Norwegian Muslims and Jews.