Islam has gradually put down roots in Japan. There are now more than 10,000 Muslims, around 60 mosques, many of them established in former private homes.
Japan Times Mohsen Bayoumy, 55, the imam of one such mosque and a central figure in the Japan Halal Association, says awareness of the faith is on the rise. Not only are there more restaurants serving halal meals cooked in accordance with Islamic dietary laws, but waiters at nonhalal restaurants often ask Muslim customers about their needs, he said.
Bayoumy was born in a Cairo suburb in 1964 and achieved the feat of memorizing the Quran, Islam’s central holy book, when he was 9 years old, under the influence of his devout civil servant father. He studied Islamic learning at Cairo’s Al-Azhar University, one of the world’s premier centers of Islamic scholarship.
Bayoumy knew little about the nation except that it had achieved rapid economic development after World War II — and had only a small number of Muslims. There were only a few mosques in postwar Japan, but the oldest, founded in 1935, was in Kobe.
Muslims began arriving in significant numbers during Japan’s late-1980s bubble economy, in search of jobs. They included young people from Pakistan and Indonesia. Some of them subsequently married Japanese citizens and became permanent residents. They then began raising funds to convert ordinary homes into mosques and community centers, or to buy low-cost prefabricated homes for the same purpose.
That was the environment which Bayoumy found when he arrived. Over the course of the 10 years he spent in Kobe he saw an increase in Japanese people adopting Islam after marrying Muslims or otherwise being exposed to Islamic culture. “I have witnessed around 600 Japanese citizens converting to Islam,” Bayoumy said.
Islam has various disciplines that seem far removed from Japanese dietary traditions, such as a ban on the consumption of pork and alcohol. When a Japanese follower asked if he might attend his family’s Buddhist memorial service, Bayoumy said he should attend but without reciting the Buddhist sutras. “Allah orders us to have good relations with families and neighbors,” Bayoumy said.
Following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, the Kobe mosque received a number of telephone calls denouncing Islam. Bayoumy would speak with the callers calmly, saying: “We have nothing to hide. Please come here and talk with us.”
He wears another hat, too, as head of the screening committee of the Japan Halal Association, a position he assumed several years ago. The role requires Bayoumy to visit food processing plants across Japan to examine whether their products are handled in accordance with Islamic dietary laws.
I live in Japan. Have been here 17 years. So listen to me when I say the moment there are any Muslim shenanigans, the Japanese will respond with swift brutality. There won’t be any drama — it’ll just be stone-cold eradication.
King, I hope so, but have my doubts because of their recent efforts to welcome muslims there.
Not 10.000, there are more than 100.000 Muslims in Japan.
I’ve always heard 10,000.
10000 or 100000 is not such a big number when you consider that Japan is home to more than 126 Million people. That is still quite tolerable amount of Muslims – They can be kept in check and, if necessary, to deport.
However, unfortunately it seems that there’s no organized opposition to Islam in Japan. The Japanese Prime Minister, who is considered to be a right-wing nationalist, is an Islamophile: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/08/01/national/politics-diplomacy/abe-hosts-iftar-dinner-party-for-muslim-nations-2/#.VHeyw8mfvhk
Islam is growing rapidly all over the world, and only a few people understand that it is a real threat. This is a sad and unfortunate and will lead to extensive destruction when the global jihad begins again in full force.
This is Bad news for the US government, after all their Brainwashing experiment on the Japanese population after WW2 will now become INFERIOR to the ultimate Brainwashing known to mankind – (islam).
So there are pinheads in every nation on the globe and it is very worrying to learn that even Japanese turn themselves into mindless, bloodthirsty zombies.
Oncologists …. should study the spread of Islam …. as a model …. for understanding how cancer spreads ?
You won’t let us export beef to your country because we had one lousy case of mad cow disease, but then you invite something in ( Islam ) that’s so horrid that it makes your last tsunami look like high tide. You better wake up Japan.
Take care of your own country. The tsunami is much bigger .
Our population is well armed, the Japanese are not. It will take one big Islamic attack in this country, then bye bye muslim scum.
Basil
I wish you are right . But do you need more than what is happening now ?
I think the Europeans used to say so and so fast it is over .
Sod, I hope you’re wrong when you say Europe ( West ) has surrendered. Although when I look at how Spain and England did nothing to curtail the malignant growth of Islam after their terror attacks, I begin to see your point. Even in the U.S. after 9-11 our government encouraged more muslim immigration to show its good faith.
I do think if we have a mass slaughter of children like Russia had at Beslan there will be dead muslims and burned to the ground mosques in many cities.
It’s sad that something like this will happen and our “shit for brains” politicians wine and dine, play golf, have sex with their interns, then fly home for a family Christmas.
They turn my stomach almost as much as ISIS.
And do you need bigger than 9 / 11 . Do you need more than slaughtering Americans in America not Iraq
I laugh at those do gooders and news corespondents getting their heads lopped off, they were aiding the enemy.
9-11 stunned people at the time, most were as dumb as George Bush thinking it was a fringe element of the peace loving muslims. I know that where I work about 65-70 out of 80 employees know how evil Islam is. That figure before 9-11 was 2 out of 80.
I’ve used this website to inform dozens of people at work and now I’m sending it to all my relatives and friends. We need to get a ground swell of informed and pissed off people asap!
Thanks Basil, for you help.
In my mind, Islam and Japan are something like sh*t and wedding cake.
what the hell is that little girl child doing with that slug don’t they outlaw child brides in japan ?
BLR, I don’t know if that’s his wife, but it is a possibility. Why would they care about Japanese laws? They don’t care about any other country’s laws.
“Imam Mohsen Bayoumy with wife and baby?”
Wife and new girlfriend?
I laughed out loud when I saw that caption at the bottom of the picture, wife and daughter, BNI taking the piss, and I suppose that little girl running across the Imam in the other picture was later beheaded for disrespecting Allah?.
If you ever read a script from a Christian warrior of earlier time, most did not write, but one I read was at a Catholic church, where the same thing was said as said here, that they bred like insecta, average 8 kids per woman and many white women slaves, they spread and many years later they kill everyone claiming everything, therefore they must be …. anyway you get it…
Christians at the time mostly farmers and live stockers where not professional warriors and where led by those whom where and of faith….
We today fight communism, Muslim-ism and a Caliphate driving things…. A congress person I’ll leave UN-named has this info from extreme good sources I also leave UN-named, explains it in a way I won’t do here, where it implies we should have our Military at a ready up status, oh wait I forgot we have no more military or like other department of gov are contaminated.
So whats going on in the USA is rhetoric with our gov, this does nothing but wake people to the things going on, The ones to do things are Congress or lawsuits and if you are calling the House and emailing them and threatening Boehner to replaced, nothings going to happen, and into January we will still be at Parade rest…
Here’s a sample I just sent…. Please for this to the house Speaker….
We are going to consult Congress members to replace you Boehner !
We realize, We the people are on our own, while the speaker of the House
cooks turkey, while our attention was diverted to Ferguson and Marxist
causing problems, the Obama administration slips the Lower House a Mickie,
shoving over 3000 executive regulation orders upon us, so we may as well
swap out Boehner for someone who is smarter than this and lets prosecute this
president and get Biden in. Obama is too smart for Boehner or Boehner is
supporting the communist, take your pick, we are done !
So a bunch of us are now going to consult in your Congress ranks, someone
with a pair to take the communist President on for a fight. So either step up
or better yet just resign as Speaker… Will make less work for us.
We don’t care if Obama pulls some crap for a take-over, if he sues, lets divert
his attention, lets start it now to see just how bad he is.
Representing some Military and a whole bunch of pissed off people…
JOHN ROWE USMC
Where are the Samurai when you need them. May they rise again to the occasion and save Japan and it’s people from the clutches of this evil cult.
it looks like that muzz is getting ready to do something horrid to that infant
Sadly if their (muslims) numbers grow, instead of being known as “The Land of the Rising Sun,” Japan will be known as “The Land of the Setting Sun.” Either that or “Land of the Rising Moon.” *(m)uhammad’s lunar deity, *(a)llah will then reign supreme.
“(m)uhammhock, porcine prophet of *(p)igslam.” (May Pork Be Upon *(h)im)
* Parenthesis and small caps intended to inflict maximum disrespect, blasphemy, and insult.
“…when Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him reached the Holy City of Madina from the Holy City of Mecca with his best friend Abu Bakr; may Allah Almighty always be pleased with him, the Muslims played music and sang the famous Islamic song “Talaa El-Badru Alayna” which means “The full moon had come upon us.”
Hmmm.
It was the Muslim women who sang talaa el Badru meaning men are here so will enjoy sex now
disturbing that there is no place on this planet that islam has not polluted
Haven’t heard of any mudslimes or mosques in Verkhoyansk or Oymyakon. (for, I should think, obvious reasons)
dragon – this is true. I Googled ‘is there any country where there are no mosques” and not one country came up!
Japan is a tiny place. Let’s hope the Japanese will come back to their warrior roots.
Not to mention demographics even worse than the West. Japanese Muslims may be few in number for now, but my bet is like their compatriots, they too have a much higher birth rate than the indigenous population. Japan’s in much better shape than most Western countries, but as we’ve seen in formerly proud nations like Britain and France, it only takes a few short decades for disaster to unfold.
I agree. Muslims take full advantage of liberal laws of Democracies and wreak havoc with their lawless, medieval ways.