Attack on Durban Writer Zainab Priya Dala for appreciation of Rushdie and Statements Condemning the attack

http://mg.co.za/article/2015-03-24-dala-attackers-enhance-stereotype-that-muslims-are-violent/

Mail & Guardian

'Dala attackers enhance stereotype that Muslims are violent'

24 Mar 2015 10:56 Fatima Asmal

The SA Muslim community condemns assaults on author Zainub Priya Dala in Durban after she expressed admiration for Salman Rushdie’s writing style.
Admiration for the writing style of Salman Rushdie resulted in author Zainub Dala being violently attacked. (Reuters)

Zainub Priya Dala – whose debut novel What about Meera was due to be launched at the festival on Human Rights Day – was attacked after a Time of the Writer event in which she expressed her admiration for Salman Rushdie’s writing style, in Chatsworth, Durban.

After she made the remark, a number of teachers and their learners walked out of the event. Dala’s vehicle was forced off the road by three men in a car the next day. A knife was held to her throat, and she was hit in the face with a brick, while her attackers called her “Rushdie’s bitch”.

A Durban-based advocacy group, South African Muslim Network (Samnet), condemned the attack in a pictograph that it mass circulated on various social media platforms, including Facebook and Whatsapp.

“Samnet unequivocally condemns the attack on Zainub Priya Dala,” the pictograph stated. “This intolerance is an antithesis of the teachings of the Quran and the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

“The assailants should be ashamed of themselves. If they are under the illusion that they are defending some Islamic principles or position they are sorely mistaken in this regard [and] are in serious need of education on Islamic law and values and the teachings and principles of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).”

‘No basis for attack’
This was notwithstanding Salman Rushdie’s views on Islam, the Quran and the Prophet Muhammad, Samnet chairperson Faisal Suliman told the Mail & Guardian: “There is no basis in Islamic teachings for the kangaroo style attack on Zainub Dala – this further enhances the stereotype of Muslims being violent and intolerant and further undermines the good work and the peaceful life of coexistence led by the vast majority of Muslims all over the world.”

Various Muslim writers also expressed their shock at the incident. “I find it utterly reprehensible that this can happen in this day and age and in this country where more than anything we are supposed to have learnt the constructive importance of respecting the diversity of opinion and people,” said author Shubnum Khan. “It’s our personal freedom to say what we want without fearing for our lives.”

“It’s such sickening intolerance and the fact that it culminated in physical violence, towards a woman no less, is horrific … I hope this incident creates more discussion about the kind of intolerance we are cultivating in our societies, because something like this is just totally unacceptable.” Cape-based journalist Shafiq Morton described the incident as ‘a despicable act of cowardly urban terror’, and a ‘total violation of Dala’s constitutional rights’.

“While a person may harbour misgivings, and even hurt, about the content of Rushdie’s Satanic Verses, nothing can ever justify intimidation and assault as a response to it,” he said.

“Writers drink from many sources – Ms Dala also cited Arundhati Roi – and to isolate one influence is to insult the integrity of the author. The dangerous assumption is that because the author was influenced stylistically by Rushdie, she automatically endorses his choice of subject matter.”

== Statement From PEN South Africa in Mail & Guardian ==


Mail & Guardian

Violent intimidation of writers must not be tolerated

24 Mar 2015 13:18 PEN South Africa

The savage attack on Zainub Dala shows the terror of the freedom to use words, and the desire to obliterate them.
Author Zainub Priya Dala. (Supplied)

On Wednesday March 18 author, Zainub Priya Dala was violently attacked as she left her hotel during the Time of the Writer Festival in Durban. A woman driving alone, she was harassed by three men who forced her off the road, cornered her, held a knife at her throat, smashed a brick in her face, and called her “Rushdie’s bitch”. The day before she had been asked about writers she admired: Salman Rushdie’s name had figured on a long list of others. People walked out in protest.

Writers do not fear difference of opinion. On the contrary, we thrive on difficulty, on complexity, on posing vexed questions and exploring unresolved ideas. We sketch characters with conflicting emotions, fraught relationships with their families, their lovers and their gods, we place them in troubled circumstances, sometimes offer them redemption. This is the stuff of good drama, of engaged fiction. We gravitate towards, not away from, debate and nuance, knowing that the more considered the idea the better the text.

But what we do not thrive on, and what we will not tolerate, is violent intimidation. Like us, Dala is a writer. She is a reader. She is both a consumer of and producer of words. She would not have avoided a conversation; she would not have shut down a debate. But debate, conversation and engagement are not possible in the face of violence.

And this type of violence – cowardly, sinister, designed to create fear in the moment and silence in the future – is the sort that simultaneously demonstrates its terror of words and its desire to obliterate them. In South Africa, our freedom of speech and movement is a fundamental right. Our Constitution insists on them. It is the same Constitution that protects the rights of those uncomfortable with or offended by Rushdie’s work.

The question of freedom of expression, of speech, has occupied South African writers for decades and is one that has changed shape over the years as we’ve moved from repression to democracy and into the troubling era of the “secrecy Bill”. As South Africans, as writers, we have not always experienced freedom but we have always known what we were fighting for, sometimes at a fatal cost.

We have always known that freedom of expression is, at its deepest, most profound level, the right to speak without fear. It is the knowledge that sharing an opinion with the public should at best be met with passionate engagement, at worst with disinterested dismissal. It is, in its simplest form, the right to speak. It is also the right to listen and to be heard.

There is no glory to be had in attacking an unarmed woman alone. There is nothing heroic about attempting to intimidate people into silence. This was an unconscionable and shameful act. Above all, it was criminal.

As writers, as South Africans, we wish to make this plain: we will not be silenced and intimidated by brutish thuggery. We stand in solidarity with Dala. She is one of us, and in the tradition of our country’s resistance and resilience, we say clearly and unanimously that an injury to one is an injury to all.

PEN South Africa, the local chapter of PEN International, a worldwide association of writers; Njabulo Ndebele, Nadia Davids, NoViolet Bulawayo, Rustum Kozain, Mandla Langa, Margie Orford, Phillippa Yaa de Villiers, Imraan Coovadia, Gabeba Baderoon, Fourie Botha, Imran Garda, Kirsten Miller, Thando Mgqolozana, Ben Williams, Tshifhiwa Given Mukwevho, Dilman Dila, Siphiwo Mahala, Fiona Snyckers Helen Moffett, Nthikeng Mohlele, Percy Zvomuya, Jacob Dlamini, Zakes Mda, Ivan Vladislavic, Elinor Sisulu, Rachel Zadok, C.A. Davids, Tiah Beautement.


=== Statement distributed by SAMNET - The South African Muslim Network ====

JOINT STATEMENT ON VIGILANTISM
Human rights are the basic and inalienable rights that are divinely bestowed on every human.
Currently we are witnessing atrocities of the worst kind plastered daily in the media headlines. The need of the hour is the revival of the Islamic spirit of not only justice and equity, but also of compassion and mercy. The first step is for us to embrace this spirit within our own lives, a step which we all have the power to do.

Recently Sister Zainub Dala expressed the view at an academic workshop that she admired the creative ability and writing style of Salman Rushdie and Arundhati Roy. It is alleged that in response to that statement 3 males stopped her car, held a knife to her and assaulted her with a brick, leaving her with physical injuries and severe trauma.

In Shariah it is unlawful for any person to take the law into his or her own hands. Even if a lawful authority finds that a crime has been committed, the punishment can be meted out only by the lawful authority. The position is no different under South African Law. If this were not the case then the result is vigilantism, kangaroo courts, lawlessness and social anarchy. The alleged wanton aggression of the 3 thugs is sheer criminality. In the case of sister Zainub, she committed no crime.

In terms of the South African constitution, we have (within certain parameters) freedom of expression and freedom of belief. Here all faiths have greater freedoms than that enjoyed by most countries in the World.

In fact, we are the envy of most Muslims who visit our country from abroad. The criminal acts of the intolerant misguided few can have harmful repercussions. The result will be disharmony with the other communities in South Africa, restrictions on the cherished freedoms enjoyed by all citizens and even xenophobic attacks on minorities.

While there is no indication of the religious affiliation of the assailants, as a matter of principle in the Shariah, regardless of whoever they are, the Muslim community is united against the un-Islamic actions on sister Zainub, which are unequivocally condemned.

We call on all to disassociate themselves from and to denounce such acts of delinquency. We also urge everyone to be extra vigilant and help us remove this cancer of hate crimes, whether in writing, or speech or action.

This statement is supported by:

UNITED ULEMA COUNCIL OF SOUTH AFRICA (UUCSA)
MUSLIM JUDICIAL COUNCIL OF SOUTH AFRICA (MJC)
HABIBYA SOOFIE MOSQUE - WESTVILLE
SOUTH AFRICAN MUSLIM NETWORK (SAMNET)
WOMEN’S CULTURAL GROUP (WCG)
JUMMA MUSJID TRUST – GREY STREET MUSJID
ASSOCIATION OF MUSLIM SCHOOLS (AMPS)
ISLAMIC MEDICAL ASSOCIATION (IMA)
MINARA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
MUSLIM VISION 2020
ISLAMIC BURIAL COUNCIL