Ireland’s first Islamic university
Headlines in the Irish Daily Mail newspaper (Thursday February 18th) announced the opening of an Islamic university in Ireland situated in CityWest, Dublin. What caused this to be headlines is that the School is being funded by Saudi Arabia, which has funded similar schools in England where controversy has surrounded aspects of the curriculum. In England, a British Muslim teacher who had taught for 18 years at the King Fahad Academy, a London school owned, run and funded by Saudi Arabia, claimed that pupils at the school were being taught from Arabic textbooks which described Christians as ‘pigs’ and Jews as ‘monkeys’. Indeed, the paper reports that in 2008, an enquiry into Muslim schools in Britain by a leading think-tank suggested that more than 60% of them are linked to potentially dangerous Islamic fundamentalists. The fear in Ireland is that this new school could promote the same kind of intolerant and racist thinking.
The announcement of the opening of this school makes sense of a recent bizarre change to the Irish Blasphemy law in 2009. This law, which led to outrage amongst Ireland’s atheist community, was a puzzle to many as no-one had called for such a change and no public controversy had preceeded it - it was simply introduced and narrowly passed in Leinster House. The new law was introduced to protect religions other than christianity and defines blasphemy as ‘publishing or uttering matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters sacred by any religion, thereby intentionally causing outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion, with some defences..’
It seems then, along with the recent announcement by the Irish government that it is to allow the introduction of Shariah law in the Irish banking system, that the Blasphemy law was designed to pave the way for the introduction into Ireland of Saudi schools and Saudi money. The Irish government is desperate for a way out of its present economic crisis that has left Ireland in billions of euros of debt. Saudi money, whether in banking or building schools, seems to be regarded as a good bet, but at what price? Saudi Arabia is a state associated with extremism and the funding of terrorist organizations as well as the persecution of Christians. What impact will Saudi funds and Saudi funded institutions have on Irish society and relationships in Irish society? Will its promotion of an extreme form of Islam be felt in Ireland? One thing is for certain, the new Blasphemy law will be no protection against Islamic extremism. Rather, its introduction would seem to be for the purpose of prohibiting any discussion, debate or criticism of the religious views and teachings of Ireland’s new Saudi masters.