Bin Laden song shocks Macedonia

27/08/2010

The Muslim community's schism continues even during the holy month of Ramadan.

By Klaudija Lutovska for Southeast European Times in Skopje –27/08/10

Isa Beg mosque prayer service in Skopje. [Tomislav Georgiev/SETimes]

A song in Albanian praising Osama bin Laden and calling Muslim believers to join a holy war appeared on YouTube during Ramadan, shocking the Macedonian public.

The majority of ethnic Albanians in the country, who make up a quarter of the population, are followers of Islam.

It is a new low for the Islamic Religious Community (IVZ), which is divided between the majority that follow IVZ's leader imam Sulejman Redzepi and the Wahhabi wing led by suspended IVZ imam Ramadan Ramadani.

Redzepi condemned those who "muddy Islam" by cultivating such songs. IVZ imams publicly support Redzepi's stand, and, suspecting Ramadani's hand in the song incident, warned that mosques serve to pray, not to practice politics and Wahhabism.

"They are trying to ... conclude agreements and dishonestly provide votes so that when a party comes to power it becomes their service, promoting their Wahhaby ideology," said Redzepi.

Unfazed, Ramadani organised a campaign to replace Redzepi as IVZ head, netting over 7,200 signatures from disgruntled believers. Ramadani disputes "the violent and militant manner in which the current leadership took control of IVZ in 2004", and then changed the group's constitution.

Ramadani himself faces accusations of violence. In 2003, he allegedly entered the IVZ with an armed Wahhabi group and forced the then mufti to propose him as imam.

The Bin Laden song is a symbolic climax of the schism that turned violent last month in Skopje's Isa Beg mosque -- one of four controlled by Ramadani -- when his supporters forcefully removed IVZ officials from the prayer service.

Bloggers are dumbfounded at the turn of events.

To Evil Betty and many Macedonians, it is obvious that the Islamic tradition is dying out among local Albanians, and is increasingly replaced with a new, imported version.

"It is clear that you as Albanians are putting up national resistance and some will keep the traditional Islam. But time changes things. How many Wahhabi mosques were there five to six years ago and how many are there today? How many will there be in ten years?" she asks.

Toni provides the optimistic side of the Albanian Muslim reponse. "It's not that easy to lose the Albanian tradition," he claims. "Yes, there are Wahhabis, but nobody likes them except themselves."

Toni explains that Albanians are aware of the situation and trend. "In my neighbourhood, there is a group of seven to eight [Wahhabis] but they are isolated. Nobody talks to them, they have their own meeting place ...The end of their cause will come," he concludes.

Another Albanian, Abdurahman, disagrees. "I do not recognise the IVZ, [but that] does not make me a Wahhabi," he says. Abdurahman perceives the IVZ as corrupt, serving a privileged few. "I am against the IVZ becoming a private enterprise that instead of being at the service of the citizens, it is serving certain members, not to say families."

Yet others, like nihilista, disagree on religious grounds. "The Wahhabis are pure Islam and against innovations ... The true Muslims are a minority everywhere; the majority are nominal believers just like in Christianity."

Wahhabis "are internationalists whose religious affiliation is important, not the national one, and in that sense they do not create inter-ethnic intolerance", he says.