Making sense of the massacre in our midst

The Quebec massacre reminds us that terror can erupt anywhere, at any time. From anyone.

And the public response has become a muscle reflex: Insistent demands that Muslims at home condemn, own and atone for the sins of their so-called co-religionists wherever they strike. Followed by the usual chorus insisting that society call it what it is — Islamic terrorism. Except when it isn’t. This homegrown attack isn’t “them” against “us.” It’s us against us — a Canadian is accused of killing fellow Canadians for the apparent sin of bowing their heads in prayer at their local mosque.

This time it’s different. But it’s not the first time innocent Muslims have been slain in a house of worship, for none are exempt from extremism that thrives in intolerant environments.

Dehumanization is the prerequisite to terrorism. And demonization of Islamic dress is a precursor to dehumanization.

It’s worth noting that former prime minister Stephen Harper condemned — commendably — the Quebec massacre as “barbaric.” But that’s the very same word he used in the 2015 federal election, when his Conservatives announced a “barbaric cultural practices” snitch line encouraging us to report, anonymously, anyone guilty of female genital mutilation — a harmful practice linked in the public mind to Muslims (though it predates Islam and is still widely practised by Coptic Christians across Egypt).

Harper also used his prime ministerial pulpit to condemn and try to outlaw Islamic face coverings in citizenship ceremonies. That campaign was an echo of equally odious attempts by the shamelessly tribal Parti Québécois to profit from latent anti-Islamic sentiment by proposing bans on the burka or niqab.

This is a time for introspection, not recrimination. Our politicians might reflect on whether they have stoked the demonization of Muslims in this country by fetishizing Islamic dress and politicizing “barbaric” acts (linked to Islam).

But that is in the past. The question now is how our leaders, and opinion leaders, will show the way in future.

Refraining from the demonization of Islamic dress would be a good start. And an example for our neighbours to the south as they go further down the road of dehumanization.

Despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s claim that Christians are being executed in droves in Islamic countries, most of the violence takes the form of Muslim-on-Muslim massacres. As a foreign correspondent, I wrote about Sunni fanatics attacking worshippers from the rival Shia sect whom they deem “infidels” — dehumanization by another name.

But the news from Quebec reminded me of another mosque attack that shook a society to its core: In 1994, a Jewish settler named Dr. Baruch Goldstein walked into a mosque in Hebron, in the occupied West Bank, and mowed down 29 Palestinian Muslim worshippers at prayers.

Israelis were horrified by his terrorist act. But extremists exalted Goldstein’s massacre, building a shrine at his tomb in an adjoining Jewish settlement — a controversy I had to cover during my Middle East posting in the late 1990s.

The terrorist shrine was visited by another Jewish extremist, Yigal Amir, who drew inspiration from Goldstein’s tomb before going on to assassinate then-prime minister Yitzhak Rabin in late 1995. Amir and Goldstein were outliers, but they were not alone.

To their credit, Israeli parliamentarians ultimately passed a law ordering the dismantling of this perverse shrine, but it took five long years.

Canada is a world away from the tensions and complications of the Middle East. And yet, today, Canadians are trying to fathom an equally fanatical act — a massacre in our midst.

Terror can strike in any place, at any time. No community is immune. But our society can lead the way by learning the lessons of history, and humanity, at home and abroad.