Rhian

You say:
"Bassam
Your ad hominem attack on Irfan is irrelevant to the argument and does you no credit. "

Anybody suggesting that Muhammed's insane doctrines have nothing to do with this argument is either lying or ignorant. The history of Islam is one of violence and intolerance. Violence and intolerance are the subjects in this article. Maybe you meant I was irreverent.

You say:
"As I see it, the facts are
1) The Sudanese refugees who come here are mostly coming from desperate circumstances and have no hope of any decent life unless another country such as Australia is willing to accept them permanently. If some find it hard to integrate, I believe our response should be compassionate understanding and offers of help, not demonisation. And not all do find it hard to integrate - most of the Sudanese families I know are productive and valuable contributors to our community and economy."

I agree with what you say here, but you overlook the fact that these refugees come from countries who adopt Muhammed's rantings. The very thing contributing to their woeful state in the first place. That is why, when I say it is a bit rich coming from somebody who elevates Muhammed to sainthood whilst pointing the finger at others. Why people would continue to give more energy to Muhammed's insane message is beyond me.

You say:
"2) Generalising about the criminal tendencies of an ethnic group is racist. Furthermore, Andrews’ attack has been shows shown to be without foundation. I believe this is despicable politics, “dog whistling” the racist and fearful in advance of the election. "

Sure, but as more and more people come to know Islam and it's mentally insane prophet, there will be less and less trust of those who follow his rantings.
It is despicable politics, but it is only worse elsewhere. Take Saudi Arabia for example, The Holy Land muslims bow down to each day. There is not one synagogue, temple or church left standing. I can't believe people keep feeding this insanity.

Bassam: "There is not one synagogue, temple or church left standing."

Now that's what I call a good start! Maybe we could adopt that policy in Australia, and extend it to include mosques :)

Basaam
The majority of Sudanese refugees coming to Australia are of Christian and/or traditional animist religions, not Muslims (though some are).

In fact, the Sudanese civil war is often characterised as a conflict between the ethnic Arab/ religiously Muslim North and government, and the ethnic African/religiously Christian South. Most of our refugees are from the South.

This is a great oversimplification of a messy and complex conflict, but holds elements of truth. As a result, some Sudanese refugees have even lower opinions of Islam than you do, though most I have spoken to recognise that you can’t blame the religion for the actions of its adherents.

Our refugee intakes from some other African countries are largely Muslim – Somalia, for example – but Andrews specifically mentioned Sudanese.

Around the time of the civil war in Lebanon, we allowed many thousands of Lebanese Muslims to come here. I think it is fair to say that has not been a great success as,in general, they have not integrated well. Perhaps the multicultural policy had a lot to do with this as people were encouraged to retain their original culture and no effort was made by us to encourage integration. I wonder how many of these went back to live in Lebanon and/or their offspring went to live in Lebanon.

During the most recent conflict in Lebanon we had to evacuate a large number of "Aussies" from Lebanon and they all were not tourists. Given that seminars were organised to inform many of the ways Centrelink could help them once they arrived here, one has to conclude that they had little ties here and had been permanant residents in Lebanon. It is their right to live there if they wish and the reason they lived there is that they preferred Lebanese society.

It may come as a shock to some that there are many people that, after living here, they still prefer a different society.

If this is correct, then we should consider the prospects of likely integration when arranging refugee and immigration intakes. It should not be simply taken for granted that all immigrants or refugees will integrate or be happy here.

Obviously there are differing cultures among African refugees and also among other refugees. Would we not be doing both them and us a favour by bringing those most likely to integrate.

One of the things that is a must to ask of anyone coming to Australia (as refugee or immigrant) is to leave behind your old racial/cultural hatreds. Would go a long way towards eliminating the Serb vs Croat, Sunni vs Shia issues in this country (leave the rest of the world to sort itself out). Now, there is no doubt that we still have deep reservations about accepting people from other cultures, and this should be addressed to. But even that issue would sort itself out over time with the requirements of immigrants to drop their race wars.

Its interesting to see the old Lebanese Muslims dragged up again. Did anyone watch the Australian Story on Hassam Al-masri a couple of weeks ago? It was very interesting to see just how well behaved a Lebanese muslim in with a bunch of ocker Aussies can really be. The rest of the bulldogs club should be ashamed of themselves and their actions. If that's what an immigrant Lebanese muslim is like, then we need more of them not less.

Well said, CG. Poor old Banjo has a real and demonstrated prejudice against Lebanese Muslim Australians, so he appears quite blind to the fact that the vast majority have integrated well into Australian multicultural society.

But I suppose at least he's stopped referring to them as "Lebs" - in this forum at least.