Faced with a backlash against their Islamophobic statement, Margarita Simonyan and her allies decided to shift the blame for the outrage they had caused from themselves to others. Ramazan Alpaut, editor of Idel.Realii, was named as the perpetrator of this Caucasian and Islamist threat. He reposted our article and called on North Caucasus activists to show what kind of men they are and demand an apology from the Islamophobe. Predictably, Simonyan and her Kremlin propaganda colleagues portrayed this call as a physical threat. However, the author herself made it clear that she was referring to something else entirely.
In this context, let us explain the context of his speeches, in particular the phrase «show what kind of men you are,» which was portrayed as a call for physical violence against opponents and women. Alpaut’s regular readers know that he is skeptical about famous Caucasian athletes attacking organizers of «cultural events» that violate Islamic and Caucasian morality, believing that it does not require much courage, unlike criticizing the authorities and security forces in cases such as the kidnapping and arrest of Muslims and other manifestations of repressive policies. Incidentally, we disagree with him on the first point, believing that doing something is better than doing nothing. However, his call to «men» clearly referred to the need to show courage in this case by taking an open public position against a person who, as head of a state channel in a country with millions of Muslims from its indigenous peoples, portrays them as a threat.
Yes, we agree with Alpaut when we say that the impunity of such statements, coming not from a private person but essentially from a high-ranking state official, indicates the absence of any influence in the country for the praised «20 million Muslims of Russia» that is proportional to their number, as well as any voice or civic courage, as mentioned by the editor of Idel.Realii. If it were otherwise, and if there were a real civil society in the country, representative democracy and federalism, then the leaders of religious Islamic organizations, freely elected heads of Muslim republics, dependent on their voters and society, their representatives in federal politics would demand and achieve either Simonyan’s retraction of her words and an apology, or her removal from the position of head of the state channel in a country with numerous Muslim regions and citizens. After that, her position as a private citizen would no longer matter to them.
This was the political meaning of Alpaut’s call, which the Kremlin propaganda blew out of proportion, launching a smear campaign against a person who was simply upset by the mistreatment of millions of his co-religionists and compatriots. The most interesting and telling thing about this situation is that Simonyan, through her posts, demonstrated that she, not Alpaut, is the one inciting physical violence, as clarified by his unambiguous statement. However, her team did not stop there, and their behavior clearly showed that Muslims correctly understood the anti-Islamic sentiments of Simonyan and company. In particular, Ekaterina Vinokurova, recently appointed head of regional projects at Russia Today, publicly cursed Saudi Arabia for adhering to Islamic norms regarding gender segregation (ignoring the well-known liberalization of the kingdom’s policies in recent years). When one of her interlocutors pointed out that she, as a representative of a state-owned channel, was openly cursing a country with which her state seeks cooperation, she did not hesitate to repeat the curse. Then she did it a third time. The question is, would an employee of a state company dare to make such statements about Israel or Armenia? Once again, in response to speculation about us, we would like to clarify that, unlike our opponents, we not only do not call for the deportation of Russian citizens on the basis of their nationality or religion, but also do not present them as a threat or curse their native countries. So, compared to them, even «The Voice of Islam», which they try to portray as «extremists», represents moderation and political correctness. We are merely pointing out the political status of communities according to the principles of international law, which distinguishes between indigenous peoples living on their ancestral lands and national minorities and diasporas enjoying their hospitality. Thus, it is impossible to imagine an employee of a Russian state company publicly cursing countries that are to some extent associated with privileged representatives of the diaspora in Russia. However, this is easy to do when it comes to the indigenous but marginalized Muslim peoples of the country. Moreover, do not think that this applies only to foreign Muslim countries and that they have a different attitude toward Russian Muslims. Simonyan made it clear in her statement that this is how the Kremlin, whose mouthpiece they are, really sees it, allowing them to remain in their positions after such statements. Not only «radicals» but also «traditionalists» are considered enemies by the Kremlin. So much for the «traditional Islam» that pro-Kremlin figures try to portray positively to Russian Muslims. The true attitude of the Kremlin, as expressed by Simonyan, Vinokurova and others, is clear. They see as a threat not only distant Saudi Arabia, no matter how much its king visits Moscow, but also Habib Nurmagomedov and the general growth in the number and demands of Russian Muslims. According to them, these Muslims should hide, forget about their religion or not display it in their public sphere, where Muslims are nobody and are never called upon.