[This piece appeared in the June 2006 issue of the Arab Voice on page 1]- translation provided by AIFD. AIFD Comment below translated article. “If you hear bad things about me” by Marwan Ahmed, Editor-in-Chief “If you do not like to be criticized do not do anything that leads to it. Our work in journalism forces upon us to have an opinion and to take a stand. Journalism that pleases everyone is a deceiving form of journalism and many times journalism results in many friends and enemies.” “Today we have friends and we have enemies. But our enemies are predominant at this time due to our clear and solid stands on several issues and due to our obvious influence on the local Arab American forum and the clear relationship we manage to build in the economic and political milieus. And because of the bridges we built between the Arab community and other communities, some started to build animosity and vengeance and envy to influence advertisers who use our publication to stop using us in order to put pressure on us. But they ended up failing in all of their attempts of both the old and the new in forcing us to change our fixed attitudes. They started claiming that we hate Shiites and other times they said we hate Christians or that we support terrorism.” “In all of this I would like to relay good tidings for the readers that all of these are false claims and some of the advertisers informed us officially about them and that they had no influence on them and their intention of continued advertisement.” “And we say this so that we wontﾒ be blamed for any measures that we take against these individuals who are trying to subvert our interest and our rights in the freedom of opinion and publication. We need to mention also that publications that take certain attitudes stimulate discussion and exchange of ideas which in the final analysis is to the interest of the community which is by itself in the interest of the advertisers and their businesses.” “I have other good tidings to relay to all readers and haters, that we will continue reporting our attitude strongly and our advertisers will not be affected. We will always express fully where we stand even if we pay for it a price from the financial or personal standpoint. As the poet said, ﾓif my criticism comes to your from one who is deficient, it is further proof of his deficiency and of my wholesomeness.ﾔ —————————————————- AIFD COMMENT: This rambling nonsensical diatribe is a most bizarre letter of reassurance to his readers and advertisers. It is quite remarkable that Mr. Ahmed has resorted already after just four months of our educational program to front page diatribes of fear which one would have thought would happen only as a last resort not as an initial salvo. His comments are intentially vague, and one can only guess that they refer to some of our educational efforts at AIFD herein to expose his ideology. Our Arizona Islamist Watch reports have focused on simply disseminating his ideology in an educational manner and responding to it from an anti-Islamist Muslim perspective. We do this to inform the public about the opinions distributed by the Arabic language Arab Voice and the English language Muslim Voice while showing that other entirely different viewpoints do exist in the Muslim community. Yet, note Mr. Ahmedﾒs complete avoidance in this editorial of any issues of substance but rather focus upon demonization of others and victimization of himselfﾗtelling his readers, ﾓeven if we pay for it a priceﾔ. This hyperbolic response comes yet only after a mere 4 months and counting of exposure of his pervasive Islamism to the general public. For the first time in over 10 years, this educational service from AIFD has begun to break the Islamist monopoly which Breek Publishing has on opinion representation in the activist Muslim community locally. For some reason which is not clear here, Mr. Ahmed is very upset about this. His comments in Arabic to his local Arabic audience seem to say that when the same freedom of speech he enjoys and uses is used by those who disagree with him to provide an alternative viewpoint, it becomes ﾓhate, vengeance, and envy.ﾔ Mr. Ahmed conveniently confuses his own Arizona public accountability for all of his opinions with his own visceral emotions of choice– ﾑhateﾒ and ﾑvengeanceﾔ Most papers of credibility would have welcomed attention to their opinions from other mediums since newspapers are supposed to be in ‘opinion’ industry. However, his victimization response can only mean that Breek Publishing has a great deal to hide. Why fear an informational service which highlights his Islamism? Our educational program only informs the greater Arizona community about Breek Publishingﾒs opinions and material while also providing some response. There is nothing more democratic than that. Breek Publishingﾒs form of democracy has nothing to do with real debate of the issuesﾗIslamism vs anti-islamism within Islam. In fact, much as one may find in the ailing Arab world, anti-democratic forces prefer to demonize individuals and distribute hateful cartoons in the name of democracy (as Mr. Ahmed has before) rather than try and defend their politically volatile Islamist opinions to the greater Arizona community. Finally, Mr. Ahmed has also already begun to discharge veiled threats in Arabic telling his readers, ﾓso that he wonﾒt be blamed for any measures that he takes against these individualsﾔ. Certainly not typical comments for a serious journalist. Herein is the typical Islamist dissociation of responsibility for their own actions. He is already laying the groundwork in Arabic on his pages for taking ‘measures’. It would seem that from the outset, he would rather begin by doling out veiled threats than by engaging in a legitimate debate about the incompatibility of Islamism with Americanism or any of a number of the other topics our reports have exposed. His is just another typical response from a dodging Islamist. Islamists will do anything to avoid real debate. They prefer to focus on demonizing those who disagree with them while wrapping themselves shamelessly in victimization and freedom of speech all the while denying the same for their adversaries. Perhaps it is becoming more clear now why in over ten years no one else had yet outed Mr. Ahmedﾒs Arabic publication to the greater Arizona community. ——————————————————————————– This report and translation is provided as a service to our community. We pray that this type of extremism and lack of moderation in opinion does not represent the majority of Muslims and Arabs in the community. See “Why AIFD provides the ‘Arizona Islamist Media Reports” for our commentary which clearly explains our intentions in providing these reports.