If you read The Observer in England, you will learn that, “Spirits had been calmed thanks to the intervention of a handful of young men from the mosque, known as les grands-frères, who stood between the rioters and the police, shouting ‘Allahu akbar!’ — ‘God is great.’ “If you read David Warren, in the Ottawa Citizen, you will learn about gangs of street thugs, openly Islamist, whose “war cry, while hurling missiles and setting fires, is ‘Allahou Akbar!’ — ‘God is great!’ ”
If you use a search engine to scan American newspapers, you will not read about this at all.
It sounds like a crucial detail, to me. I would like someone out there in the mainstream press to answer this question for me, as a journalist who cares about religion news: Who is shouting “Allahu akbar”? Is anyone shouting “Allahu akbar”?
My suspicion is that there are several groups shouting “Allahu akbar” at each other, with mainstream Muslim leaders frantically working to promote order while the gangs rage on, perhaps led by shadowy organizers who insist that when they shout “Allahu akbar,” they really mean it.
I would prefer not to have my questions about this answered by bloggers, voices on talk radio or through an alternative news site for political conservatives (as if this is a left vs. right question). I would rather see this kind of question answered in mainstream newspapers and broadcasts.
After all, we are watching a story unfold in Europe that — whether we like it or not — is soaked in religion. This is true of so many stories that are woven through our headlines day after day, often linked to conflicts between the extremists that many now call Islamists and other religious believers, from Christians to Jews, from secular Muslims to Western Muslims.
The problem, of course, is that this religion is woven into ancient and modern conflicts that now involve politics, ethnicity, economics, blood feuds and many other factors. Can reporters separate the threads?
This religion X factor exists on both sides, but journalists all too often hesitate to name or explain what is happening. As a journalist who writes for a wire service, I realize that this would be hard to do. Were reporters supposed to have described the complex role of religion in each and every 700-word wire service report about the status of the new Iraqi constitution?
So a Palestinian bomber blows himself up at a sandwich stand in Israel and people are killed and injured. Was it just any sandwich stand? Do journalists have to tell us that it was a sandwich stand popular among Jews? Do we need to know the religious makeup of every victim on the list? Can journalists simply assume that we know?
I am frustrated with much of the coverage of the riots in the Paris suburbs. At the very least, this is a story that represents a violent new stage in debates about the future of the European Union. It is a story linked to the fading of one faith and the rise of another on the continent. It is a story about high birth rates and low birth rates. It is a story about religious liberty and threats to religious liberty — on both sides.
This is a religion-haunted story. But is it truly a story about a clash between religious groups, between different visions of culture and civilization? When are thugs merely thugs? When are police just police?
This is how Molly Moore of The Washington Post started an early report about the rioting:
The street rampage of angry youths continued to expand across immigrant-dominated suburbs of Paris Thursday, with gangs attacking commuter trains, elementary schools and businesses in an eighth night of violence, according to local police officials.
French government leaders met in emergency sessions for a second day but again failed to agree on how to stem the violence.
Rock-throwing gangs attacked two trains linking Paris to Charles de Gaulle Airport, dragging out a conductor and smashing windows. Other attackers torched a car dealership, supermarket and gymnasium in violence in at least nine impoverished towns and communities populated primarily by immigrants and first-generation French citizens. A large percentage of the area’s population is Muslim.
Angry youths. Immigrant-dominated. Can you hear the eggshells underfoot?
There are dozens of stories like this in our newspapers day after day. You can watch them on the news broadcasts tonight.
You are the editor: Is that last sentence too early or too late? Should journalists focus on the role of religion or should we strive to minimize these divisive elements in these conflicts? If so, what is the journalistic motivation for doing that?
I am frustrated and I openly admit that, in this case, I do not know what reporters should be doing. But I do want to know: Who is shouting “Allahu akbar”?
Terry Mattingly (www.tmatt.net) directs the Washington Journalism Center at the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities. He writes the weekly “On Religion” column for the Scripps Howard News Service in Washington, D.C., and leads the GetReligion.org project focusing on religion news in mainstream media.
