Bangladesh: American Blogger Hacked to Death by Islamic Group.
| By Rachel Molschky |
Free speech is under constant attack by Muslim groups
ANOTHER DEED OF THE RELIGION OF PEACE
Atheist blogger Avijit Roy and his wife, Rafida Ahmed, were attacked on the street in Dhaka, Bangladesh on Thursday night after attending a book fair. Roy was reportedly hacked to death either by machetes or cleavers, and Ahmed was seriously injured but survived.
A Bangladesh-born U.S. citizen, Roy spoke out against religious extremism but fell victim to the very extremism he condemned. Ansar Bangla-7, an Islamic group, has claimed responsibility.
The Washington Post reported:
"Roy, reported to be in his 40s, founded a blog called 'Mukto-Mona,' or 'free mind.' He had received threats from extremists before. His books — with titles such as “The Virus of Faith” sure to inflame fundamentalists — were banned from at least one popular Bangladeshi online retailer."
Those books were banned by the online retailer after the owner had received death threats by Farabi Shafiur Rahman, a Muslim allegedly linked to the hardline Islamic party Jamaat-e-Islami, for selling Avijit Roy's books. The store subsequently stopped selling the books.
The Post continues:
"Bangladesh is almost 90 percent Muslim, and one of the world’s few Muslim-majority democracies — but, it seems, always near a tipping point."
"... 'He was a free thinker,' Baki Billah, a friend and fellow blogger, toldIndependent TV station. '… He was not only a strong voice against Islamic fanatics but also equally against other religious fanatics.'"
It is important to note that while he may have written against all religious extremism, the religious group which turned to violence against him was Muslim.
Previous attacks against free-thinkers in Bangladesh include that of writer Humayun Azad in 2004 while he returned from the very same book fair, and the murder of anti-extremist blogger Ahmed Rajib Haider in 2013.
Violence has been a constant in the Muslim country. Earlier this month, the firebombing of a Bangladeshi bus in Dhaka claimed seven lives, and at least 100 people have died since the beginning of the year in similar attacks, considered to be political in nature, resulting from tension between the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League. In 2013, political violence was to blame for at least 300 deaths.
While Islamic parties have been calling for blasphemy laws, liberal group seek to ban religious parties- and the struggle continues.
MY PS.-
AVIJIT WAS A BLOGGER AND SO AM I....TODAY JE SUIS AVIJIT...
AVIJIT WAS AN ATHEIST AND I AM NOT; HOWEVER, HE WAS A HUMAN BEING AND IT WAS HIS FREE CHOICE. I FEEL SORRY ABOUT HIS DEATH...AND I FEEL SORRY BECAUSE WHILE HE WAS ALIVE, HE NEVER KNEW THE OUTMOST PLEASURE OF KNOWING THE L-RD, OF FEELING HIM AROUND US AND INSIDE OF US...BELIEVING IN G-D IS AN ESSENTIAL PART OF MY LIFE...AND NOW AVIJIT IS IN HIS PRESENCE...MAY THE L-RD RECEIVE HIM WITH OPEN ARMS AND FORGIVE HIS ERROR...AMEN
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