Dutch Muslims will be deprived of watching Islamic and Arab satellite channels this `Eid.

By Wafa Bubnad, IOL Correspondent

THE HAGUE, January 19 (IslamOnline.net) – As Muslims throughout Europe celebrate Thursday, January 20, `Eid Al-Al-Adha (feast of sacrifice), Dutch Muslims brace themselves for an almost joyless festival in view of incessant harassments and bothering by right-wingers and xenophobes.

Some one million Muslims in the  Netherlands felt really hard done-by because of their religion after the November killing of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh by a Moroccan, following his insulting documentary about Islam.

Even before the murder, Dutch Muslims have been targeted by the extremist agenda of the influential right-wing parties.

Much to their annoyance, housing companies ordered all satellite dishes to be removed from balconies and rooftops just before the start of the most important feast in the Islamic calendar.

These dishes are, in effect, the one and only window for the Muslim community, mostly hailing from Moroccan, Iraqi and Turkish origin, on the Arab and the Muslim world.

This `Eid, they will be deprived of the pleasure of tuning in to a host of Arab and Islamic channels with fingers pointing at right-wing schemes.

“These companies have indeed cast a gloomy atmosphere over `Eid,” Mohammad Akshar, an employee at the Moroccan Cultural Society in  Rotterdam, told IslamOnline.net Wednesday, January 19.

“Every `Eid we used to switch to a plethora of Arab and Islamic channels thanks to satellite dishes, which became an integral part of our lives and not a luxury.”

He said the Muslim community smells a rat, especially after a ferocious media campaign against these Islamic and Arab channels.

Slaughterhouses

Adding to their displeasure, Dutch laws prohibit Muslims from slaughtering their udhiyah (sheep) inside their homes and oblige them to give it to slaughterhouses.

Dutch Muslims argue that some neighboring European countries like  Belgium allow Muslim citizens to perform the holy ritual inside their homes in a hygienic and an organized way.

“We can understand the government’s point of view, but some Muslims are keen on slaughtering their udhiyah instead of butchers, following in the footsteps of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and Prophet Abraham,” Maher Abu Laban, of Palestinian origin, told IOL.

`Eid Al-Adha is celebrated every year as a way of remembering Prophet Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son at God's command.

According to the Noble Qur'an, Abraham was ordered by God to slaughter his son Isma`eel; as difficult as this was, the prophet abided nonetheless. Just as he was about to do so, God replaced the son with a sheep.

A financially-able Muslim sacrifices a single sheep or goat or shares six others in sacrificing a camel or a cow as an act of worship during the feast.