#1 Muslim demands in Sweden
Posted: Sun Apr 30, 2006 3:32 am
Read Carefully
[quote]An open letter to all Swedish political parties that are participating in this year’s election.
Hello!
If we are to succeed in engaging Swedish Muslims so that they will participate in the election in September 2006, we should take note of the following demands and wishes from the Muslim minority in Sweden.
I have not seen clear signals from all parties as to whether they’ll accept such wishes. We want to see the most important demands as a part of the political programs. Otherwise there is the risk that the majority of the Muslims will remain on their couches on election day.
Muslims are fed up with broken election promises, and therefore they wish concrete suggestions to show that we care. It won’t hurt if our elected representatives or new candidates would set aside an hour to read our open letter that is sent to all established parties.
Kind regards
Mahmoud Aldebe
The Forgotten Minority
Islam in Sweden, a short history.
Sweden didn’t really get its first contact with Muslims before immigration began during the 1940s, when the first Muslims came from the east, that is from Finland and Estonia, they were Tatars and it was they who established the first house prayer assembly in Stockholm 60 years ago. The Muslims who immigrated during in the 1960-1970 period were part of the big labour immigration. Between 1970 and 1990 the immigration changed character; a flood of refugees began to make up a much larger share of the number of Muslims in Sweden. The Islamic community calculates the number of Muslims in Sweden to be roughly 470,000 people [out of a total population of 9,100,000, or about 5.2%]. Everyone that through birth belongs within a tradition [culture] traditionally dominated by Islam, who accepts the Islamic declaration of faith, belongs to a Muslim people, is descendant of Muslims, have a first name that belongs in an Islamic tradition, and who themselves identify with or consider themselves part of this religion or tradition are Muslims. There are some immigrant Muslims that don’t want contact with the Islamic community and that considers themselves secularized, and on occasion we have heard that they are objecting to being considered Muslims. It is hard to calculate the exact numbers but from our analysis and mapping, we can assume that there are approximately 15% of the Swedish Muslims that want nothing to do with Islam and that want to be considered as Swedes with an ethnic background.
Swedish Muslim rights and duties, special laws for religious freedom.
Regarding the problems that concern the legal status of Muslims â€â€
[quote]An open letter to all Swedish political parties that are participating in this year’s election.
Hello!
If we are to succeed in engaging Swedish Muslims so that they will participate in the election in September 2006, we should take note of the following demands and wishes from the Muslim minority in Sweden.
I have not seen clear signals from all parties as to whether they’ll accept such wishes. We want to see the most important demands as a part of the political programs. Otherwise there is the risk that the majority of the Muslims will remain on their couches on election day.
Muslims are fed up with broken election promises, and therefore they wish concrete suggestions to show that we care. It won’t hurt if our elected representatives or new candidates would set aside an hour to read our open letter that is sent to all established parties.
Kind regards
Mahmoud Aldebe
The Forgotten Minority
Islam in Sweden, a short history.
Sweden didn’t really get its first contact with Muslims before immigration began during the 1940s, when the first Muslims came from the east, that is from Finland and Estonia, they were Tatars and it was they who established the first house prayer assembly in Stockholm 60 years ago. The Muslims who immigrated during in the 1960-1970 period were part of the big labour immigration. Between 1970 and 1990 the immigration changed character; a flood of refugees began to make up a much larger share of the number of Muslims in Sweden. The Islamic community calculates the number of Muslims in Sweden to be roughly 470,000 people [out of a total population of 9,100,000, or about 5.2%]. Everyone that through birth belongs within a tradition [culture] traditionally dominated by Islam, who accepts the Islamic declaration of faith, belongs to a Muslim people, is descendant of Muslims, have a first name that belongs in an Islamic tradition, and who themselves identify with or consider themselves part of this religion or tradition are Muslims. There are some immigrant Muslims that don’t want contact with the Islamic community and that considers themselves secularized, and on occasion we have heard that they are objecting to being considered Muslims. It is hard to calculate the exact numbers but from our analysis and mapping, we can assume that there are approximately 15% of the Swedish Muslims that want nothing to do with Islam and that want to be considered as Swedes with an ethnic background.
Swedish Muslim rights and duties, special laws for religious freedom.
Regarding the problems that concern the legal status of Muslims â€â€