Amina Sboui Quits Femen Over ‘Islamophobia’ and Asks about ‘Israeli’ Funding.
Amina: Worried About ‘Israeli’ Finance for Femen.
This morning on France-Inter the Tunisian Femen activist (imprisoned and still charged with outrage of public decency) explained why she had left the feminist group.
She highlighted her concerns about Femen’s ‘Islamophobia’.
Amina then stated that she was worried about the finances of the organisation.
She expressed the view that she would not accept money from “America or Israel”.
Why did you decide to quit the Femen group?
I don’t know how the movement is financed. I asked Inna several times, but I didn’t get a clear answer. I don’t want to be in a movement supported by dubious money. What if it is financed by Israel? I want to know.
And then, I don’t want my name to be associated with an Islamophobic organization. I did not appreciate the action taken by the girls shouting “Amina Akbar, Femen Akbar” in front of the Tunisian embassy in France, or when they burned the black Tawhid flag in front of a mosque in Paris. These actions offended many Muslims and many of my friends. We must respect everyone’s religion.
But these actions were taken to support you while you were in prison. Why didn’t you consider them as such?
I thank them all for their support. Especially Joséphine, Marguerite and Pauline, who were also imprisoned. They took some good actions, but it wasn’t the case for all of them. They should have asked for my lawyer’s advice before taking some of these actions. This made my case even more difficult. Because of the protests I was charged with a new crime, “criminal conspiracy,” when I was in prison.Have you informed the Femen group about you quitting the organization?
No. They are not going to like it, but that’s the way it is.So, you decided to quit the organization, but you posted another topless photo just four days ago…
Yes, a topless photo of myself bearing a painted circled A, the anarchist symbol. It’s different.
Amina then announced her possible support for an Anarchist group Feminism Attack.
She declared that the “problème c’est tout le système” , the problem is the whole system (original – bizarrely translated in the English language Huffington Post as “I don’t like the system altogether”).
We strongly suspect this is the source of Amina’s ‘concern’ about the money behind Femen.
From what is known about their funding: the key player appears to be an individual named Jed Sunden. (6) Sunden is a Brooklyn-born American Jew who founded a major Ukrainian newspaper/media company; KP Media (which owned the Kyiv Post till 2008/2009 for example) , (7) and also is an active part of the Ukrainian jewish community. (8) Sunden was the man who‘discovered’ Femen and it was he who began to give them the oxygen of publicity (and notoriety) for their topless protesting in the Kyiv Post.
The anti-Semitic site (Semitic Controversies), continues,
This Jewish money and influence behind Femen seems to also be reflected in the organization’s public activities in so far as it protest against a vast number of things in different countries, including outraging Islamic opinion by performing topless stunts in North Africa and outside mosques in Europe. (13) This is in addition to Femen’s attacks on anything even remotely conservative as being‘patriarchal’ as well as their fairly crude hatred of religion writ large (and without qualification), but primarily of Christianity and Islam which they consider (as good third wave feminists) to be ‘evil patriarchal religions’ responsible for ‘innumerable atrocities against women’ as being intrinsically deeply oppressive towards the fairer sex.
There is plenty in the same vein from Russian racist sites, and the British ‘Stormfront‘.
This is a great shame.
Amina showed great bravery in protesting at sexism in Tunisia.
She still risks two years in Prison.
Amina betrayed not FEMEN but thousands of women who acted for her freedom during “Free Amina campaign” and because of who she is free now
Tendance Coatesy 
Reblogged this on oogenhand and commented:
Irony, irony, irony. What a clusterfuck the triangle has become!!!
oogenhand
August 21, 2013 at 4:26 pm
Press TV Iran reports on this,
“”According to Russia Today, the Russian television news network, in Russia and Ukraine, FEMEN-linked protest groups funded by Jewish benefactors, including hedge fund tycoon George Soros and the Brooklyn-born publisher of the Kyiv Post Jed Sunden, have chain sawed crosses and committed acts of hooliganism inside churches. One such gang, the feminist group FEMEN, offered $188 to anyone who cut down a cross. There were reports of crosses being chain sawed across Russia and Ukraine. The FEMEN group videotaped a large cross erected by the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church being toppled in a park in Kyiv. Three female punk rockers with the group “Pussy Riot” were convicted of hooliganism for conducting an anti-Christian demonstration laced with profanity at Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow. FEMEN protesters disrupted services at St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv. FEMEN activists have staged chainsaw beheadings of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Pope Benedict XVI, and Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill I. FEMEN activists also staged a lewd protest at the famous Hagia Sofia Mosque in Istanbul. ” http://www.presstv.com/detail/2012/10/11/266033/the-war-on-christianity-and-islam/
Andrew Coates
August 21, 2013 at 4:35 pm
Do you have a filter on comments, Comrade?
dagmar
August 21, 2013 at 5:41 pm
Yes, for very obvious reasons.
But sometimes things, yours in fact, simply get caught up in the Spam folder, for reasons which are beyond me.
There are so many varieties of feminism that some do all kinds of actions which I don’t agree with.
Like the British ones campaigning for censorship of pornography.
I have not commented on this.
On the case of Tunisia, something I follow closely, I was struck by the statement in an interview with Amina Sboui about the finances of Femen, which echoed (though not explicitly) anti-Semitic claims about which I am well aware of.
On France-Inter this was given prominence in later news bulletins.
Citing Press TV, a station which is no stranger to anti-Semitism, indicates the basis for these concerns.
I am not making judgements on Femen’s wider politics or effects, which is not something I know enough about to make a reasonable assessment about.
Andrew Coates
August 22, 2013 at 11:16 am
Another try with even more asterisks:
I have generally assumed FEMEN – at least in ‘the west’ – are a parody intended to discredit feminist politics. Or maybe something ‘postmodernist’. “Get your t *** out for the lads” to protest against sexism is certainly an, hm, interesting, strategy. There’s a nice (?) photograph of Putin looking quite lecherous while being protested at when he was at a trade fair with Merkel (who just looked a bit confused) a few months ago.
Less nice are the photographs of a FEMEN ‘demo’ outside a Lahore Ahmadiyya* mosque in Berlin, telling them to “f *** your Islam” and “f *** your morals” – outside the most liberal mosque in the city, which has nothing to do with the situation in Tunisia (the supposed reason for the ‘action’).
The Ahmadiyya mosque is, however, in the middle of nowhere, and in a middle class, leafy suburb, unlike, say, actual islamist mosques, which tend to be in the inner city where there is a large and visible muslim population – who probably would not have let the eight topless activists get away with having their photos taken by the tabloid press and then being able to vanish again after the next day’s equivalent of ‘political page 3’ had been taken.
* this lot: see wikipedia – Lahore_Ahmadiyya_Movement_for_the_Propagation_of_Islam
dagmar
August 21, 2013 at 5:44 pm
I give up – I’ve sent it to your live.co.uk address, maybe you can publish it from there….
dagmar
August 21, 2013 at 5:47 pm
Andrew, I am very disappointed by this woman’s statement and actions having previously publicised her plight and have cross-posted your piece on my blog. I hope that is ok. Howie.
Howard Fuller
August 21, 2013 at 6:28 pm
Regardless, there’s an interview in the German once-left daily “taz” with the founder of Femen, who says that Amina Shoui “is too weak for our tactic of ‘sextremism’, is too weak to resist the islamic society”. And those who accuse Femen of anti-islamism “suffer from Stockholm syndrome.”
http://taz.de/Femen-Gruenderin-ueber-Aminas-Austritt/!122270/
dagmar
August 22, 2013 at 2:00 am
I am not greatly fond of Taz – it reminds me of Libération at its worst (mid-1980s) phase.
Andrew Coates
August 22, 2013 at 11:18 am
It doesn’t exactly say that Dagmar,
Alexandra Shewtschenko suggests, only suggests, that she is under somebody’s influence, or that she may even be under the impact of drugs (dass sie unter dem Einfluss von irgendwem steht, vielleicht sogar Drogen nimmt..)
That she may equally be under the influence of her friends, alarmed at the unrest/crisis in Tunisia (Strömungen) and she has been unable to decide who her real friends are or who is under the control of the Government (wer wirklicher Freund ist und wer in Wirklichkeit für die Regierung arbeitet0
Alexandra Shewtschenko thinks those Muslims who cry Islamophobia, (not only Amina) suffer from Stockholm-Syndrome.
This is an unfortunate reference but she then goes on to say
That is they think that they have to defend their heritage, their tradition, their beliefs.
(an important qualification I believe)
The Femen activist then adds, “what has oppression to do with Culture and Religion” (Aber was soll Unterdrückung mit Religion und Kultur zu tun haben?)
The answer is that, Femen is not only against Islam, we are against every Religion.
Alexandra Shewtschenko answers on the financial issue,
Amina has asked us repeatedly asked us for money, but we couldn’t give her any. (Amina hat uns immer wieder nach Geld gefragt, wir konnten ihr keines geben).
We have always said, we could not finance her life, and that we have no cash. I, one of the founders of Femen, live in a small flat in Kiev and travel on the Metro. We exist from donations, and all of this is transparent. (Immer wieder haben wir ihr gesagt, dass wir ihr Leben nicht finanzieren können, dass wir kein Geld haben. Ich, eine der Femen-Mitbegründerinnen, lebe in einer kleinen Wohnung in Kiew, ich fahre mit der U-Bahn. Wir leben von Spenden, alles ist transparent.)
Much as I dislike Taz, which reminds me of a side of Libération I try to ignore, I would say they are right to publish what is a thorough interview, which does not exactly say what you claim Dagmar.
Andrew Coates
August 22, 2013 at 11:36 am
The interview is fairly long (for the taz), but my quotes are correct (and not out of context, I feel): To complete them:
Shewtschenko: Wenn man wie Amina ständig solchem Druck ausgesetzt ist, dann ist es sehr schwierig, Widerstand zu leisten. Sie ist nicht stark genug für unsere Taktik, den „Sextremismus“. Amina ist nicht stark genug, der islamischen Gesellschaft Widerstand zu leisten.
“If you are put constantly under pressure, like Amina is, then it is is very difficult to carry out resistance. She is not strong enough for our tactic of ‘sextremism’. Amina is not strong enough to resist the islamic society.”
and
taz: Musliminnen auf der ganzen Welt fühlen sich von Femen bevormundet.
Shewtschenko: Es gibt auch Musliminnen, die uns unterstützen. Diejenigen, die uns Islamophobie unterstellen, leiden unter dem Stockholm-Syndrom. Sie denken, sie würden ihre Herkunft, ihre Tradition, ihren Glauben verteidigen. Aber was soll Unterdrückung mit Religion und Kultur zu tun haben?
taz: Muslim women in the whole world feel patronised by Femen.
Schwetschenko: But there are also muslim women who support us. Those who accuse us of islamopobia suffer from Stockholm syndrome (and it is clear who she means in the context of this interview). They think they are defending their background, their tradition, their beliefs. But what does repression have to do with religion and culture?
Strangely. Schwtschenko says in the next paragraph that Femen is against all religions as they all repress women (true). So of course repression has a lot to do with religion…
Liberation is also published by a clique of ex-Maoists turned tabloid media whores (who have the left ‘lifestyle’ without much of the politics), whose paper serves as an apprenticeship-ground for the tabloid shits of the future, then?
dagmar
August 22, 2013 at 8:31 pm
Libération is something different to its former self.
Editor Serge July (who in the Mao-Spontex Gauche prolétarienne) has long departed.
They now say that is the newspaper of “toute la gauche”.
Andrew Coates
August 23, 2013 at 11:33 am
One pedantic point: Stormfront is an American and not a British hate site.
We have a great many things to be ashamed of as a nation at least in this case these aren’t our neo-Nazis.
R F McCarthy (@RF_McCarthy)
August 23, 2013 at 5:10 pm
There is a major problem Dagmar with criticism of femen as neocolonial, patronising and so on (made for example here: http://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2013/06/11/les-femen-un-feminisme-de-type-neocolonial_3428285_3232.html and by another in English – Le Monde Diplomatique’s Englishhttp://mondediplo.com/blogs/the-fast-food-feminism-of-the-topless-femen version,
That is Ukraine, where Femen originates, is not exactly a Neocolonial power.
Anybody who knows 20th century history would find this accusation against Ukranian feminists wrong-headed.
Not to say, given the recent past of their country, obscene,
Andrew Coates
August 24, 2013 at 11:26 am
Indeed, Comrade Andrew. To describe Ukraine as “neocolonial”, even “just” ideologically so, would be ridiculous. But I don’t think anyone has done that, I certainly haven’t (and I haven’t described Femen as that either). If you are implying that, I would suggest that your Saturday morning red wine (cheers!) may have gone to your head a bit quicker than is advantageous when it comes to logic 🙂
dagmar
August 24, 2013 at 1:12 pm
Daggie, the only liquid I’ve had today is the kind that comes out of a T-pot or Moka pot: Co-op 99 tea and Lavassa coffee.
The objects of my riposte were the articles,
This is what I was referring to,
From the first article,
“Les Femen, un féminisme de type néocolonial.”
“Une grande partie de leurs interventions ont pour objectif les femmes musulmanes qu’elles entendent “libérer” et “sauver” des hommes musulmans, de la culture musulmane et de l’islam en général.”
The objective of a large part of their interventions were Muslim women, that they intend to ‘free’ and ‘save’ from Muslim men, Muslim culture and Islam in general.
From the second article, “Given the overwhelming weight of the Orthodox Church in public life in Ukraine, the Femen’s public and radical anti-clerical position is understandable. But when it comes to Islam, spokespeople for the group seem to cross a line. A founding member, Anna Hutsol, certainly flirted with racism when she deplored a Ukrainian society incapable of «eradicating its Arab mentality toward women.»
Andrew Coates
August 24, 2013 at 4:23 pm
It doesn’t look like Deutschlandfunk will be repeating this in the middle of the night, but you might find the transcript of this reportage from a Femen training camp in Paris interesting…
http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/reportage/2229455/
I was surprised to discover that the activist (interviewed in the reportage) who chainsawed-down that massive crucifix in the centre of Kiew to protest against the imprisonment of Pussy Riot political asylum in France.
dagmar
August 27, 2013 at 1:24 pm
There is a difference between showing support for a fellow feminist that was in jail and in the xenophobic anti-islam ranting of Amina Akbar done by FEMEN’s inane protestors that absolutely washed their hands off any responsibility for inflaming the Islamists by deriding religious call to prayers.
http://saadiahaq.wordpress.com/2014/02/26/femen-akbaris-that-branding-feminism/
hqas
March 1, 2014 at 9:11 pm
anybody can show us images of femen against sinagogues or Orthodox Jews or israeli settlers?
if I see these ones I think femen are really fighting against religious sexism…
autocritico
April 29, 2015 at 5:31 pm