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Ramadan began on Thursday, and among my goals for this holy month (apart from survival), I intend to be more patient, less angry and more open. But Lord, I am immediately being tested.
Because once again, Pauline Hanson has attacked Muslims and Lakemba, maintaining her nearly three-decade obsession with us. On Monday, she suggested there were no “good Muslims”. On Wednesday, she offered a partial apology if she had “offended anyone out there that doesn’t believe in sharia law, or multiple marriages, or wants to bring ISIS brides in, or people from Gaza that believe in a caliphate”.
And then, once again, she rounded on Lakemba, saying it was one of “certain” suburbs “people can’t go into”. She added that she felt she was “unwanted there”.
It’s audacious of Hanson to assume that she should feel welcome in Lakemba, given her long record of abusing Muslims and given her sleights against this very postcode.
And yet Lakemba is one of the most welcoming suburbs in this country, evidenced by its wildly successful Ramadan Night Markets that have exploded in popularity. The markets, which started in 2007, take over Haldon Street during the nights of Ramadan, transforming an already buzzing area into a food bazaar offering snacks and meals from an array of cultures. More than a million people are expected to attend this year. Many take long bus and train routes to get there.
If Hanson feels unwelcome in Lakemba, perhaps that’s on her.
Muslims have, in fact, offered her grace many times despite her obvious disdain for us. Aftab Malik, the special envoy to combat Islamophobia, has joined a long list of Muslims offering to break bread with Hanson, I can only assume in the hope that good will might shift her position and dilute her vitriol. Malik’s follows a succession of peace offerings from Muslims. Former Labor senator Fatima Payman offered to have tea with Hanson; Mohammed Attai invited her to dinner on the ABC’s Q&A as far back as 2016.
The good will is running thin, and the truth is, Muslims have not forgotten, and they certainly have not forgiven Hanson’s fuelling of Islamophobia and revival of her tired attacks this past week.
Does she think her tirades should be overlooked, erased every time she steps foot in a suburb like Lakemba? Likewise, does she think we forget each time she wears a burqa to parliament, rages against halal food or derides Muslim immigration? Or does she think Muslims are fair game? Or that she gets a free pass because she’s a politician?
In the 25 years since 9/11, we’ve seen waves of anti-Muslim hatred roll over this country, usually fuelled by conservative politicians, always leaving a trail of destruction.
We thought we might have been past this rhetoric after the Christchurch massacre, in which an Australian killed 51 Muslims praying at two mosques. But no, here we are again, backed into defending our way of life – our religion, our suburbs – after the Bondi terrorist attack, despite no clear connection to the Muslim community or Islam as it is practised by almost every Muslim.
It is bizarre that Hanson expects grace from a community unduly in her firing line, which she has consistently demonised yet knows nothing about. Her fixation with Lakemba, despite Muslim communities flourishing all over western Sydney, reflects her ignorance of the city and its culture. I suspect she is ignorant of Auburn, Granville, Punchbowl and Bankstown. Perhaps that is for the best.
Every reasonable Sydneysider who visits Lakemba over Ramadan will tell you they feel welcome, but Hanson wouldn’t know. She doesn’t understand how Sydney, a famously multi-faith and multicultural city, feels about Muslims and the suburbs they live in. She clings to outdated views of Muslims, detached from this city’s evolving lived reality.
It is galling, yes, but it is all so bloody boring. It’s boring to hear her repeat her tropes about Muslims, to hear her vilify Lakemba and bang the drums of hatred once again. Pauline Hanson once provided some sideshow entertainment, but with her shock value dwindling and her tired set known by heart across the nation, I wonder how far she will reach for new material.
The real problem is not that Lakemba may not welcome a politician who famously said Australia was at risk of being “swamped” by Muslims. It is that Hanson has made it her business to target Muslims at any given opportunity, and she anticipates their rejection should she come to visit. That’s OK. She mightn’t cope with the spices, anyway.
Mostafa Rachwani is a Parramatta reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald.
Mostafa Rachwani is a Parramatta reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald. He was previously the Community Affairs reporter at Guardian Australia.Connect via email.From our partners
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