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May 4, 2012
Website offers another view
Pakistani journalist presents positive image of Israel and Jews.
PAUL LUNGEN CANADIAN JEWISH NEWS
A recent English-language item on Tariq Khan’s news website, geared to a Pakistani audience, was a sympathetic story about Eva Sandler, whose husband, Rabbi Jonathan Sandler, and two children were killed by a terrorist in Toulouse, France.
Scan down the page and you’d find an article headed “Peace-loving Israelis march in Tel Aviv against war with Iran,” along with another about the second concert Madonna has added during her summer tour of Israel.
In the Urdu-language portion of the website, there’s an image of the Israel Defence Forces emblem and another of the Israeli flag. Nobody is burning the Israeli flag or stomping on the IDF logo.
On the contrary, said Khan, the Weekly Press Pakistan website (weeklypresspakistan.com) offers stories that cast a positive light on Israel and the Jewish people. Khan believes that Ajmi (non-Arab Muslims) have no beef with Israel or Jews.
“We have nothing to do with the Palestinians. We have no feelings [for] them, and they have no feelings for us,” he said.
A veteran journalist who worked for the Nawaiwaqt group of newspapers in Pakistan before moving to Canada in 2000, Khan believes there is no reason Jews and Pakistanis should not be friends. In Canada, he is dedicating himself to inter-community relations, and serves as director of the Christian-Muslim Forum of Canada. He has started a Shalom Israel group to promote friendship between Jews and Muslims.
Jews, Muslims and Hindus got along well on the Indian subcontinent, and there is no reason that should not be replicated in Canada, Khan said.
So far, his overtures to the Jewish community have been met with some hesitance. Meanwhile, he has participated in more than 50 sessions with the Christian-Muslim Forum. Jews, he said, have been “a little cautious and careful.”
“Muslims in the GTA [Greater Toronto Area] and the Jewish people can become friends, gradually,” he added.
There’s no ulterior motive, no hidden agenda, he asserted. “We announced it in the online paper that we want friendship with the Jewish people, the Israeli people. We recognize Israel as the Jewish state. We want friendship – that’s it,” he said.
Khan has met so far with members of Congregation Darchei Noam and visited the synagogue. He’s had people over to his house to continue the dialogue. He’s also consulted with Avi Benlolo of the Canadian Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, who has been receptive – and cautious – about the overtures. Khan has visited the organization’s offices, Benlolo said. What’s more, Khan has included articles Benlolo has provided on his website.
Since then, the centre “has had international Pakistani journalists contacting us for information on issues or to put us on an e-mail list,” Benlolo said. They seem to be interested in learning more about Jewish history, Israel and the Holocaust.
The relationship with Khan is at a preliminary stage, Benlolo continued. “Any opportunity to dialogue or build bridges with any community is a positive step…. This is all step by step and [we are] as optimistic as we can be.”
The chair of the Jewish unity committee of Darchei Noam, Andrea Spindel, has met Khan, visited his home and hosted Khan and other local Pakistanis at her home. Spindel believes Khan is genuinely interested in establishing good relationships with local Jews and changing the perception of Israel and the Jewish people among Pakistani intelligentsia.
Several of Spindel’s articles on Jewish life, including one explaining Chanukah, were published by Khan. Through her work with Kulanu, a nongovernmental organization that aids Jews in remote communities, she’s met Khan’s nephew, Navras Aafreedi, who lectures on Jews and Israel in northern India. Both Khan and his nephew are ethnic Pashtuns, and they believe the Pashtun people are descendants of the lost tribes of Israel, Spindel said.
Khan does not deny the connection. His family was originally from Kandahar in Afghanistan and moved to Malinabad, near Locknow. He traces his family roots to King Solomon and said that he believes that the “Pashtuns are one or two” of the lost tribes. The Star of David, he said, is a common decorative motif in Peshawar.
Is that why he’s trying to improve relations with Jews?
“The Ajmi Muslims have no bad feelings towards Jews…. You have a problem with the Arab people.”
Khan calls the current residents of the Palestinian territories “recent immigrants…. The present settlers, these are immigrating Arabs, not the original citizens of Palestine.”
As for Iran, he believes that “Israel should attack Iran’s nuclear facilities immediately.”
Khan said that presenting a positive view of Israel and Jews on a Toronto-based website can have influence back in his homeland. “What happens in Toronto will transmit back home [to Pakistan]. It will be talked about,” he said.
He also intends to stir debate among Pakistan’s top journalists, many of whom worked under him when he lived in Pakistan. He also noted that, when he worked in Pakistan, he constantly received Urdu-language press releases from a variety of sources, but, never once from Israel.
It’s clear his views on Israel and Jews have prompted debate, but judging from the comments in a Pakistani journalists group on Google, which carries his online newspaper, a good number of the reporters remain hostile to Israel and Jews. Under the heading “When Pakistan will stop considering Israel as enemy?” several posters revived classic antisemitic stereotypes in the discussion. One stated, “Deception is the biggest tool of the Zionists.” Another claims that the United States and Israel “are ready to destroy half the world,” and another, after saying Palestinians freely sold their land to Jews at exorbitant prices, goes on to say that the United States and other world powers “act as hooligans of the world … all of them have a very small, you may say tiny, community of Jews on their land or offshore who control over 90 percent of their economy.” In another posting that cited religious sources, a correspondent said that, on Judgment Day, “God [will] send all the Jews in hellfire.”
Not all postings are negative. Some recount the creation of Israel as a positive event and question what benefit Pakistan has received from Arab states for being hostile to Israel since it was founded.
Khan believes his reputation in Pakistan will influence some journalists to take another look at their attitudes about Israel and Jews. “Jews are the enemy of nobody,” he said. Jews are behind many medical advances and “I don’t know how many good things they are doing and passing it to all people.”
For more national Jewish news, visit cjnews.com.
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