Is Julian Assange a Muslim? The Australian activist’s religious identity is unclear, raising concerns about his beliefs. Julian Assange is a controversial figure who has been in the public eye for more than a decade as the creator of Wikileaks, a website that publishes secret and classified materials from various sources. Assange is currently in prison in the UK pending a decision on his extradition to the United States, where he faces espionage and hacking charges.
Is Julian Assange Muslim or Jewish?
One of the most frequently asked topics about Assange is his religious devotion. Is he a Muslim or a Jew? The answer is neither. Assange describes himself as an agnostic and a critic of organized religion. He also challenged the idea of a monotheistic God as a dictatorial and repressive force. Assange interviewed Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, a terrorist organization based in Lebanon, and asked him: “You fought against the hegemony of the United States.”
“The idea of God, or Allah, is the ultimate superpower, so as a freedom fighter, shouldn’t one of your goals be to free people from the oppressive idea of a monotheistic God?”
Nasrallah said that opposing American hegemony is a religious obligation since morality comes from God and human values are in accordance with the laws of heaven. Despite claims of Jewish ancestry, Assange has denied any connection to Judaism. In an interview with The New Statesman, he said: “I am not Jewish and there is no Jewish blood in my family.”
Ethnicity and family background of Julian Assange
Assange was born Julian Paul Hawkins on July 3, 1971 in Townsville, Queensland, Australia. His mother, Christine Ann Hawkins, is a visual artist and his father, John Shipton, is an anti-war activist and builder. Assange’s parents separated before he was born, and he didn’t meet his real father until he was 25. He was raised mainly by his mother and her lover Brett Assange, who gave him his last name. When Assange was young, his family traveled a lot, living in more than 30 places around Australia. He attended different schools and was educated at home for a while.
He became interested in computers and hacking at a young age and participated in several cyber attacks in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was convicted of hacking in 1996, but received a light sentence. Assange has four children from different partnerships. He married Teresa Assange in 1989 when he was 18 and they had a son, Daniel. They divorced in 1999.
He also has another son with Sarah Harrison, a former WikiLeaks colleague who helped him escape to the Ecuadorian embassy in London in 2012. He has two other children with Stella Morris-Smith Robertson, a lawyer who defends him in legal disputes. They got married in 2022 while he was in prison. Assange’s ancestry is mostly European, with elements of Aboriginal Australian ancestry on his grandmother’s side. He said he identifies as Australian and has no citizenship other than his native one. He received Ecuadorian citizenship in 2017, but it was revoked in 2021 when the Ecuadorian government canceled his asylum.
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Source: vcmp.edu.vn