'Fitna' fits-up Islam

Dutch MP Geert Wilders' controversial short film Fitna briefly aired on online video site LiveLeak on Friday, March 28. Less than 24 hours later, LiveLeak pulled the film and replaced it with the following statement:

Following threats to our staff of a very serious nature, and some ill-informed reports from certain corners of the British media that could directly lead to the harm of some of our staff, LiveLeak.com has been left with no other choice but to remove 'Fitna' from our servers.

This is a sad day for freedom of speech on the net … We stood for what we believe in, the ability to be heard, but in the end the price was too high.

That the film was pulled due to death threats is indeed a sad state of affairs, yet many - including the UN Secretary General - have slammed the film, saying it is little more than an incitement to violence and that with "freedom of speech comes responsibility".

It is not my intention to discuss whether or not the removal of the film is contrary to freedom of speech. Rather, I wish to critique it as both a political commentary and as a film.

I saw Fitna last Friday. The film, which takes its name from an Arabic term loosely defined as "trouble" or "disturbance", is ostensibly concerned with what it calls the growing "Islamisation" of Europe. Wilders maintains that his intention is to raise awareness of the threat that Islam poses to modern Western civilisation.

The political situation in The Netherlands has been volatile, to say the least, and it is not the first time a Dutch MP has been embroiled in a controversy over the making of an anti-Islam film. The Somali-born (and former Muslim) female MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali went into hiding in 2004 following the assassination of Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh on the streets of The Netherlands by a Muslim extremist. Hirsi Ali had written the script for Van Gogh's  short film entitled Submission, which featured semi-naked women praying, with verses from the Koran written on their bodies. The verses were those which Hirsi Ali felt condoned the oppression of women. With a dagger to the heart, the murderer, Mohamed B, attached a letter to Van Gogh's body that called for the death of  Hirsi Ali.

Coming just months after the Madrid train bombings, Van Gogh's murder lead to a long period of tension between non-Muslim and Muslim residents in Holland. Muslim immigration to The Netherlands had increased sharply in the decade preceding the incident with ultra-right politician Pim Fortuyn, another anti-Muslim crusader, gaining popularity in 2002 with his catchphrase that "Holland was full". This widespread anti-Muslim sentiment was the perfect breeding ground for the rise of Geert Wilders.

Like Hirsi Ali, Wilders is a far right conservative. A member of  Parliament since 1998 with the liberal People's Party For Freedom and Democracy (VVD), he left in 2002 and formed the Party for Freedom (PVV). Wilders new Party called for a drop in immigration in general and a complete stop to Muslim immigration. Other PVV policies include stripping criminals with dual nationality of their Dutch citizenship and deporting them, paying Muslims to leave the country and refusing Turkey entrance into the European Union. Wilders also favours lower taxes, cutting welfare programs and tougher crime laws.

Wilders' anti-immigration stance won him many supporters in the wake of Van Gogh's murder, with the PVV winning nine of the 150 available seats in the Dutch Parliament in the 2006 elections. In December 2007 mainstream Dutch radio station NOS-radio named him Politician Of the Year due to his popularity with both the press and the general public.

Fitna is a 15-minute montage, with a classical soundtrack (featuring Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite also known as The Arabian Dance). It features pages of the Koran being turned and highlights certain passages, or Surahs. The Surahs it chooses are invariably ones featuring violence or the incitement of devotees to violence; the film then cuts to images of terror attacks committed by Muslim extremists, such as 9-11 and the Madrid train bombings. The obvious message is that the Koran leads to terrorism.

The film also features an interview with Theo Van Gogh and his murderer Mohammed B, various Muslim clerics giving rhetorical speeches denouncing the West, an interview with a three-year-old Muslim girl who claims the Koran says that all Jews are "pigs" and images of stonings, beheadings and hangings in Muslim countries. Wilders' stance is firm and unflinching: Islam hates freedom and the West and wishes to see it destroyed, for no other reason than that it exists.

Is this an accurate portrayal of Islam? There is no doubt that the terror attacks featured in the film were perpetrated by Muslims. However, Fitna does not take into consideration any of the political and social motivations behind the attacks.

It is well known that the young British Muslims behind the July 2005 train bombings in London were recruited after being shown graphic images of Muslim victims of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. They were told that the West hates Islam and that their attack would be retaliatory. The Madrid train bombings too were a revenge attack, this time against Spain's involvement in Iraq.

At the 9-11 Commission hearing, FBI special agent James Fitzgerald stated that the motivation behind the attacks was because the perpetrators felt "a sense of outrage at the United States. They identify with the Palestinian problem."

The 9-11 Commission Report notes that, "By his own account, [9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed's] animus toward the United States stemmed not from his experiences [in the US] as a student, but rather from his violent disagreement with US foreign policy favoring Israel".

In Wilders' determination to place the blame squarely on Islam, he has completely overlooked the recent political history of the Middle East. The hijackers of the planes quite likely believed that there would be a heavenly reward for their actions, but the masterminds have admitted to being motivated by politics. The truth is the volatile situation in the Middle East is a deadly mix of religious devotion fuelled into fanaticism by political goals. It is not Islam itself which is to blame. Wilder's tactic of intercutting footage of the Koran's pages with footage of death and destruction is omitting vital information.

It may well be that Arab Muslims have more reasons to "hate us" than most Westerners are willing to admit. When questioned in 1996 on the US program 60 Minutes about the death of over 600,000 Muslim Iraqi children due to the sanctions against Iraq during Clinton's Presidency, then US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright responded "it's worth it". That's 600,000 reasons just there.

Wilders has taken the easy route. Yes, many atrocious acts have been committed in the name of religion with Theo Van Gogh's tragic fate a reminder of the lengths a religious fanatic will go to prove their devotion, but Muslims are not alone in this regard. In 2002 the Reverend Paul Hill was executed in Florida for the 1994 murder of abortion doctor John Britton. Like Mohammed B, Hill showed no remorse and believed "what he did was right". Hill was praised by other religious leaders, who did not consider his actions murder. While it is doubtful that Bin Laden and other terror masterminds would be able to recruit their suicide attackers were it not for the promised reward in the afterlife - after all they would not be receiving any in this one - what this means is that religion is being used as an excuse for attacking the West. It is a tool. It is not the reason in itself.

Propaganda is defined as information and/or images used to influence the opinions or actions of large groups of people. That is exactly what Fitna is. In its own context, this film gives us no other recourse but to believe its premise. That makes it good propaganda. It does not, however, make it a good film. Fitna has no story arc; we are not taken on a journey of any kind. We are simply fed image after image of slaughter and hatred.

The film offers only a superficial treatment of Islam. There are just as many passages in the Bible that call its followers to wage war against non-believers. The Old Testament frequently instructs the Israelites to murder and rape other tribes, but no one seriously blames the Bible every time an Israeli kills a Palestinian.

A good film also has some level of critical analysis and context. Fitna has neither of these. The images we see of Muslim clerics preaching hatred are not explained. Just who are these men? Who are they speaking to? In which country? Do they have terrorist links? Are they mainstream preachers or they are the Muslim equivalent of Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church? There are over 1.5 billion Muslims in the world. Do they all subscribe to this point of view? Fitna makes no distinction between suicide bombers, extreme Muslim clerics and the Muslim women wearing hijabs it depicts strolling through the streets of The Netherlands.

Particularly guiling is the "interview" with the small Muslim girl who is asked what she thinks of Jews. She calls them "pigs", claiming that is what is stated in the Koran. But again, who is this girl? As a three-year-old, she obviously has not read this for herself. Someone has been feeding her this information. She could be reciting from a script, for all we know. Where is her family from? What is their history? A good film introduces us to its characters, and gives us a little back-story as to why the characters behave the way they do. It then assumes we have enough intelligence to form our own opinions about them. Again, Fitna does not do this.

The only interesting cinematic device employed is the final sequence where there is a blank screen with the audio of pages been torn from a book. We are led to believe that it is the Koran but titles inform us that the pages are actually being torn from a phone book - it is up to Islam itself to remove the hate from its pages.

But even here Fitna fails, as it is clearly contradicting itself. Throughout the film, the viewer is being told to fear Islam, to hate Islam, to "stop Islamisation" - in short to curb the immigration of Muslims to the West - then it turns around and places the ball squarely back in Islam's court by offering no real solutions to the questions its raises. It is up to Islam to reform itself. Don't expect help from us, we hate you, just stay out of our countries.

Wilders' popularity in The Netherlands waxes and wanes depending on the climate of fear at any given time. It declined once the furore of Van Gogh's death subsided but peaked again after the Danish cartoons scandal in 2005-06. In the week following the airing of Fitna, Wilders' life has, predictably, been threatened numerous times. He has 24-hour police protection, no permanent address and cannot spend more than two consecutive nights in the same safe house. He claims he has acted in the name of freedom of speech but one wonders if this is really the case.

Other Dutch MPs have denounced him as a political arsonist. His popularity is dwindling again in the polls. The Dutch Parliament is even considering bringing charges against him. This has led to an online petition in his defence calling for a boycott of Dutch goods (ironically, so are many Muslims). But was Wilders really acting in the name of free speech or in the name of hatred? After all, this is the man who has called on the Koran to be banned, without apparently any sense of irony.

At some 600 years younger than Christianity, Islam has yet to undergo a Reformation and perhaps it is the case that Islam and the West are at a crossroads. Certainly many fundamentalist Muslims cannot accept criticism of their religion. But does Fitna encourage a dialogue with Islam or does is only demonise?

Mohammed Rabbae, Chairman of the National Moroccan Council of the Netherlands, has appealed for calm saying,"We want to tell our Muslims brothers and sisters abroad, in the Middle East, in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia etc, that we as Muslims in the Netherlands are best positioned to analyse the situation in the Netherlands, and to determine the response to Wilders and others … I am appealing to our brothers and sisters abroad to follow our strategy, not to frustrate our strategy by any violent incidents or an attack to a Dutch embassy".

From this statement, one could deduce that contrary to Wilders' claims, not all Muslims are inherently violent and some are actually willing to engage in peaceful dialogue.

A quick look at some right-wing websites and blogs reveals that Fitna is being hailed as one of the most important documentaries of our time. The film is even bookended with one of the infamous Danish cartoons featuring the prophet Mohammed wearing a bomb in his turban and the sound of a ticking clock. In the end, of course, the bomb detonates. There is no other possible outcome: Islam is intent on destroying the world.

Fitna is a call to arms for those who hate Muslims, but unlike a real documentary, it does not analyse its subject, it does not defend its premise with more than the most superficial evidence, it does not offer any alternative points of view, and it does not offer any solutions to the questions it raises. In fact, Fitna raises far more questions than it answers. In this respect, it is not part of the solution, merely another flame added to the anti-Muslim fire that is raging in the West.