Eurabia

[Petronas]

Borrowing the title of the book by Bat Ye'Or, I start this thread to capture news about the descent of Europe into "dhimmi" status. Is seems that freedom of speech is the first freedom to go as part of that process.

The Fall of Europe
Ali Sina
May, 25, 2005

In an act of total insanity, the Council of Europe, decided to ban criticism of Islam equating it to anti-Semitism.

Selcuk Gultasli in zaman.com wrote: “Anti-Islamism has been included in the text as a “dangerous inclination” that has to be fought against upon the insistence of Turkey at the summit that 46 Council members attended. The conclusion draft of the summit included the notion of "Islamophobia". The inclusion of this notion in the European organizations' documents for the first time is described as the success of Turkey.

The 3rd Council of Europe summit has for the first time mentioned "Islamophobia" in the 9th paragraph of the Warsaw Declaration that was accepted on Tuesday, May 17. The Council has reached the following decisions regarding the issue: Condemnation of any kind of intolerance and discrimination based on gender, race and religious beliefs in particular, including Islamophobia and anti-Semitism, the fight against these within the framework of the Council of Europe and the use of effective mechanisms and rules to combat these problems.

Thus, anti-Islamism as well as anti-Semitism will be dealt with within the framework of legal proceedings. The Council reports will include anti-Islamist movements. The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) will closely monitor these movements. The Commission will record in which country anti-Islamism increases or how it is reflected.”

This is the beginning of the fall of Europe. Anti-Islamism is not the same as anti-Semitism. Islam is a belief system, Semites are a race. We can’t equate a race to a doctrine. Racism is sheer evil. Apart from the fact that no race is better or worse than other races, unless one is Michael Jackson, one can’t change his race. Instigating hate against a race is instigating hate against mankind. Doctrines that instigate racial hate must be condemned and those who engage in racial slurs must be brought to justice.

Prohibiting criticism of Islam is like prohibiting criticism of Judaism or Christianity. No one in his right mind would suggest criticism of these religions should be banned. The very fact that these religions have reformed and have adapted to modern times is because they were criticized. Only during the inquisition, criticism of Christianity was against the law. Are we trying to introduce Islamic inquisition to appease Muslims? Are we trying to institute the blasphemy law that is practiced in Saudi Arabia , Pakistan and Iran to make Muslims happy? This is insane!

Islam advocates the hatred of the Jews in particular but also of Christians who according to the Quran have corrupted their Scripture and call Jesus the son of God. The Quran’s biggest condemnation is reserved for the people of other religions and of no religion. All these people, including Jews and Christians are considered to be najis and fuels of hellfire. This is hate. This is hate-mongering. There is no other way to put it. Why are we not banning the Quran? Why are we not condemning Islam for blatantly advocating hate?

The decision of the Council of Europe is oxymoronic. How can we condemn anti-Semitism if we are not allowed to criticize Islam that incites hatred of the Jews and says God transformed them into swine and apes? Is this not insult?

There is a fundamental difference between religions and people. One is made of flesh and bones and the other is merely a doctrine. People must be protected, but doctrines don't need to be protected. They have to be scrutinized, questioned and if found dangerous or wrong, rejected. Doctrines that advocate the hatred of people must be criticized and banned, not protected. How can we protect the rights of people to life and to freedom if at the same time we protect doctrines that incite hatred against them? If someone calls Muslims filthy, untouchable, impure, he is inciting hate. He should be stopped. This is clearly a racial insult. But the Quran calls all of us who are not Muslims najis. Najis means filthy, untouchable, impure. Why criticizing this book of hate should be against the law? Is this not double standard? is this not hypocrisy? Is this not dhimmitude? Why Muslims should be allowed to insult everyone else but criticizing their hateful doctrine should be against the law?

This decision simply makes no sense. It is a contradiction. You can’t ban anti-Semitism and anti-Islamism at the same time. Islam is anti-Jew and anti-Human. The two don’t go together. They are mutually exclusive.

Today May 25, 2005 an Italian judge, Armando Grasso, in city of Bergamo, ordered the best-selling writer and journalist Oriana Fallaci to stand trial in her native Italy on charges she defamed Islam in her book “La Forza della Ragione” (The Force of Reason)

In it, Ms Fallaci. argues that Europe is turning into "an Islamic province, an Islamic colony" and that "to believe that a good Islam and a bad Islam exist goes against all reason".

Fallaci wrote that terrorists had killed 6,000 people over the past 20 years in the name of the Quran and said the Islamic faith "sows hatred in the place of love and slavery in the place of freedom." Fallaci spoke the truth. These are facts, not her opinion.

Adel Smith, president of the Muslim Union of Italy, sued the writer, claiming that Ms Fallaci’s book is offensive to Muslims.

So what? The Quran is offensive to all Mankind. No one, including Ms. Fallaci, can go far enough to insult Muslims the way the Quran insults non-Muslims, calling them, kafir (blasphemers), najis, fuels for hellfire, enemies of God, etc. But the Quran does not stop there. It actually incites violence against the non-Muslims. Muhammad asked his followers to instill terror in the hearts of the unbelievers, to wage war against them, to smite their heads from above their necks, to deceive them, to kill them wherever they find them, even to rape their wives. Why such a book should be protected and why criticizing it should be banned?

Europe is threading a very dangerous path. Two things can happen in Europe:

Islam is left alone to grow unchecked, which means Europe will succumb to Islamism before the end of this century. Or

The Europeans sense the danger too late, panic, and give birth to Eurofascism to counter Islamofascism.

In either case Europe will be destroyed.

Curtailing freedom of speech, specially banning criticism of a doctrine of hate is foolishly dangerous. Europe is playing with fire. The path that Europe has taken today will lead to its fall before the end of this century, but more likely it will auto disintegrate in a civil war in the next two or three decades. ...

http://www.faithfreedom.org/oped/sina50525.htm

[Petronas]

Saudi paper: U.S. studies Islam in Europe
May 24, 2005

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia -- A Saudi newspaper said Tuesday the United States is working on a plan to protect Europe from Islamization. The semi-official daily al-Watan quoted an unidentified Dutch political source as saying the initiative was drawn up by a team of 15 political experts, security, science and social advisers, and led by a former CIA official who headed the Middle East department for several years. The source told the pro-government paper the initiative would deal with the actual number of Muslims in Europe and the effect their population growth will have on European demographics. He said the project is the result of American fears of the effect of Muslims on the European political systems and governments, "especially with the trend of Europeans to choose leftist and socialist governments in the aftermath of growing violence and Islamic threats." The U.S. State Department declined comment.

http://www.wpherald.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20050524-022132-6647r

[Petronas]

Continuing down the road toward loss of freedom of speech in Europe...

New effort to ban religious hate
Thursday, 9 June, 2005, 20:00 GMT 21:00 UK

The new offence gives equal protection to all faiths. Jews and Sikhs are already covered by race hate laws. Critics say the reintroduced plans - which cover words or behaviour intended or likely to stir up religious hatred - will stifle free speech. Ministers insist the new law would not affect "criticism, commentary or ridicule of faiths".

The Racial and Religious Hated Bill would create a new offence of incitement to religious hatred and would apply to comments made in public or in the media, as well as through written material. The aim is to protect people from incitement to hatred against them because of their faith. But ministers insist it will not ban people - including artists and performers - from offending, criticising or ridiculing faiths. Home Office Minister Paul Goggins said: "It is about protecting the believer, not the belief."

Mr Goggins said he did not expect many prosecutions under the new laws, but said it was important for Parliament to send out a clear message. He said: "This will be a line in the sand which indicates to people a line beyond which they cannot go... People of all backgrounds and faiths have a right to live free from hatred, racism and extremism." Mr Goggins said police had told him they believed the new law could have prevented some of the riots in northern English towns in 2001.

Religious hatred is defined in the Bill as "hatred against a group of persons defined by reference to religious belief or lack of religious belief" - showing it will also cover atheists. The maximum penalty for anybody convicted of the new offence would be seven years imprisonment. Mr Goggins said there was a "high test" and the attorney general would also be able to veto any prosecutions. Race hatred laws had resulted in 76 people being prosecuted in nearly 20 years, with 44 convictions.

The plans are exactly the same as those opposed in the House of Lords before the general election, with some peers claiming it could put freedom of speech at risk. This time they form a stand alone Bill, instead of being part of a much bigger Bill. Mr Goggins refused to say whether ministers would use the Parliament Act to force the plans through the Lords but he stressed Labour had promised the new laws in its election manifesto.

Conservative shadow Home Secretary David Davis said the proposed law would "seriously undermine freedom of speech" and would be "massively counter-productive. Religion, unlike race, is a matter of personal choice and therefore appropriate for open debate," he argued. Aggravated crimes against religious groups were already protected through existing legislation, he said. "Whilst this new law would technically prevent what many people may regard as reasonable criticism of devil worshippers and religious cults."

Liberal Democrat MP Evan Harris argued the plans would jeopardise precious freedom of expression. "The government's measure would stifle religious debate and feed an increasing climate of censorship," he said. Dr Harris said his party recognised the problem of Islamophobia. He proposed changes to ensure religious words could not be used to get around race hate laws.

The government says the legislation is a response to the concerns of faith groups, particularly Muslims. The Muslim Council of Britain has welcomed the move, arguing that the courts have already extended such protection to Sikh and Jewish people. Sher Khan, a council spokesman, said to protect some groups but not others contravened the European human rights laws. "This is not protection of faith, it is a protection of those who are attached to a particular identity marker," Mr Khan said.

Keith Porteous Wood, of the National Secular Society, also said the legislation would curtail free expression. Similar laws in Australia had stirred up tensions between different religious groups, he argued.

BBC home affairs correspondent Daniel Sandford said some British Muslims believed religions must be allowed to criticise each other, and that the proposed new law could open a Pandora's box of prosecutions between faiths.

Actor Stephen Fry said the plans were a sop to the Muslim community, whose problems really centred around race, not religion. "Religion, surely if it is worth anything, doesn't need protection against anything I can say," he said.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4075442.stm

[Petronas]

Muslim Target
June 14, 2005

Oriana Fallaci is 75 years old. The renowned Italian journalist lives in hiding because of death threats she received after the publication in 2001 of her book The Rage and the Pride. She is dying of cancer. And now she is going to go on trial for “defaming Islam.”

The complaint comes from Adel Smith, president of the Muslim Union of Italy, who was never charged with defaming Christianity after he referred to a crucifix as a “miniature cadaver” during his 2003 efforts to have depictions of Christ on the Cross removed from Italian schools.[1] He has amassed a reputation as something of a crank after demanding that Christians deny aspects of their faith that offended his Islamic sensibilities: he has called for the destruction of Giovanni da Modena’s fresco The Last Judgment in the 14th-century cathedral of San Petronio in Bologna, Italy, because that priceless expression of Medieval Christianity depicts the Muslim Prophet Muhammad in hell.[2] And in the mother of all frivolous lawsuits, Smith in February 2004 he brought suit against Pope John Paul II and Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, for offending Islam by expressing in various writings their opinion, utterly unremarkable from two Christian leaders, that Christianity is unique and superior to other religions, including Islam.[3]

His new suit against Fallaci is hardly less frivolous, but Smith was able to find a judge willing to play along. Judge Armando Grasso of the Italian city of Bergamo ruled in a preliminary hearing that Fallaci’s latest book, La Forza della Ragione (The Force of Reason), contained eighteen statements “unequivocally offensive to Islam and Muslims,” and that therefore she must be tried.[4] He was working from a list compiled by Smith, who complained that Fallaci has “propagated hate against Islam and Muslims, distorting real historical facts and inventing others, lying, offending, and defaming Muslims around the world.”[5] Smith exulted at Grasso’s decision: “It is the first time a judge has ordered a trial for defamation of the Islamic faith. But this isn’t just about defamation. We would also like (the court) to recognize that this is an incitement to religious hatred.”[6]

Italian Justice Minister Roberto Castelli was unhappy with Grasso’s decision. “In Europe,” he declared, “we are seeing the birth of a movement that is looking to silence those who don’t follow a single mindset, within which it is forbidden to speak ill of Islam….In Fallaci’s book there is very strong criticism but not defamation.”[7]

The trial will need to employ a battery of historians: several of Fallaci’s offending eighteen statements are simply assertions of historical fact. If they were false, Smith might have a case, although he would do better in a free society to provide documentation of their falsehood than to run to the courts to silence Fallaci. Of course, Islamic groups in the West have not hesitated to object to true characterizations of Islam when they find them inconvenient: last March the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) waged a successful campaign to have National Review remove from sale by its book service a “virulently Islamophobic” book, The Life and Religion of Mohammed by J. L. Menezes. CAIR objected to the book’s unfavorable depiction of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad as a licentious and bloodthirsty warrior. However, during the entire campaign CAIR wisely never asserted that anything the book said was actually false — and it wasn’t.[8] The point of their campaign, like Smith’s, may have been to silence voices that dare to point out the role that Islam has played in the rise of modern-day global terrorism. But Smith has gone beyond CAIR in claiming that Fallaci is “distorting real historical facts and inventing others,” and “lying.” One good result of her trial would be the establishment in court that Fallaci was telling the truth all along.

It is useful to go through Fallaci’s eighteen outrages, as specified in Smith’s complaint, in order to see just how devious and devoid of substance Smith’s suit is:

1. Fallaci asserts that when jihad warriors occupied the Abbey of Montecassino in Italy in 883, “the Muslims amused themselves by sacrificing each night the virginity of a nun. Do you know where? On the altar of the cathedral.”[9] I have been unable to find historical corroboration of this without unduly delaying the completion of this article; Fallaci, who is not a historian, does not footnote her work. It is, however, well established that the invading jihadists sacked and burned the Abbey, killing its abbot, St. Bertarius.

Would they have stopped short of raping nuns and defiling the cathedral altar? Islamic law suggests otherwise. The Qur’an permits Muslim men to have intercourse with their wives and their slave girls: “Forbidden to you are ... married women, except those whom you own as slaves” (Sura 4:23-24). The slave girls are understood to be the wives of men slain in battle by the warriors of jihad. The Islamic legal manual ‘Umdat al-Salik, which carries the endorsement of Al-Azhar University, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam, stipulates: “When a child or a woman is taken captive, they become slaves by the fact of capture, and the woman’s previous marriage is immediately annulled.”[10] Why? So that they are free to become the concubines of their captors.

The Prophet Muhammad originated such legislation. After one successful battle, he told his men, “Go and take any slave girl.” He took one for himself also. One well-attested Islamic tradition records that “the Prophet had suddenly attacked Bani Mustaliq without warning while they were heedless and their cattle were being watered at the places of water. Their fighting men were killed and their women and children were taken as captives; the Prophet got Juwairiya on that day.”[11] Juwairiya bint Harith became the Prophet’s seventh wife.

After his notorious massacre of the Jewish Qurayzah tribe, he did it again. According to his earliest biographer, Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad “went out to the market of Medina (which is still its market today) and dug trenches in it. Then he sent for [the men of Banu Qurayza] and struck off their heads in those trenches as they were brought out to him in batches.” After killing “600 or 700 in all, though some put the figure as high as 800 or 900,” the Prophet of Islam took a woman whom he had just widowed, Rayhana bint Amr, as another concubine.[12] There is no tradition recording the consent of either Juwairiya or Rayhana.

According to a generally accepted Islamic tradition, when Muhammad’s men emerged victorious in another battle, they presented him with an ethical question: “We took women captives, and we wanted to do ‘azl [coitus interruptus] with them.” Muhammad told them: “It is better that you should not do it, for Allah has written whom He is going to create till the Day of Resurrection.’”[13] When Muhammad said “it is better that you should not do it,” he was referring to coitus interruptus, not to raping their captives. He took that for granted.

There is abundant evidence that Muslims behaved this way even when nuns were involved. When jihadists captured Thessalonica in 904, just over twenty years after sacking Montecassino, an eyewitness recorded that “nuns, petrified with fear, with their hair disheveled, tried to escape, and ended up by the thousands in the hands of the barbarians, who killed the older ones, and sent the younger and more attractive ones into captivity and dishonor… The Saracens also massacred the unfortunate people who had sought refuge inside churches.”[14] And when the children and spiritual heirs of those jihadists streamed into Constantinople on May 29, 1453, historian Steven Runciman notes that “some of the younger nuns preferred martyrdom to dishonour and flung themselves to death down well-shafts.”[15] It is unclear whether these sisters had been reading dastardly Islamophobic propaganda or the life of the Prophet.

As for Fallaci’s assertion about altars, Runciman suggests that such things happened in churches in fallen Constantinople, noting primly that “there were scenes of ribaldry in the churches.”[16]

2. I do not know Fallaci’s source for her assertion that in Constantinople in 1453 the Muslims “decapitated even newborns. And extinguished candles with their little heads.” Runciman does note that the Muslim conqueror Mehmet was hardly a strong advocate of children’s rights: “Mehmet was said himself to have sent four hundred Greek children as a gift to each of the three leading Moslem potentates of the time, the Sultan of Egypt, the King of Tunis and the King of Grenada.”[17] Or is Smith offended not at the idea that Mehmet would have killed children, even newborn babies? According to Runciman, the conquerors “slew everyone that they met in the streets, men, women and children without discrimination.”[18] Or is Smith’s problem with Fallaci’s statement the idea that the Muslims would have treated the corpses in so barbarous a fashion? In that case, he should sue not Fallaci, but the Muslim scholars and spokesmen who justified the mutilation of corpses in Fallujah in 2004.[19]

3. Fallaci aroused Smith’s ire also by asserting that “in a woman the Qur’an sees above all a womb to give birth.” Yet the Qur’an does liken a woman to a field (tilth), to be used by a man as he wills: “Your women are a tilth for you (to cultivate) so go to your tilth as ye will” (2:223). The Prophet Muhammad added that “if a woman spends the night deserting her husband’s bed (does not sleep with him), then the angels send their curses on her till she comes back (to her husband),” and “The right a husband acquires over the wife is that she should not keep herself away from him [even] if they were on the back of a camel and he desired her and tried to take her.”[20] Hardly ringing endorsements of the equality of dignity of women with men.

4. Fallaci declares: “In the dream that the sons of Allah have been nurturing for years, the dream of blowing up Giotto’s Tower or the Tower of Pisa or the cupola of St. Peter’s or the Eiffel Tower or Westminster Abbey or the cathedral of Cologne and so on...” This element of Smith’s complaint seems predicated on the world forgetting that 9/11 ever happened. Smith evidently is banking on Italian officials also forgetting the numerous jihad terrorists who have been arrested in Europe — notably the Algerian jihadists who were arrested in February before they could carry out their plan to blow up the Eiffel Tower.[21]

5. “Halal butchery is barbarous,” opines Fallaci, and criticizes Jewish butchery laws in the same breath. If such opinions are to be designated “hate speech,” I expect PETA activists will soon be rounded up and jailed.

6. In France, says Fallaci, “Islamic racism, that is the hatred of the infidel-dogs, reigns supreme and is never put on trial, never punished. Where the Muslims declare openly: ‘We must take advantage of the democratic space that France offers us, we must exploit democracy, that is, make use of it to occupy territory.’ Where not a few of them add: ‘In Europe the Nazi position was not understood. Or not by all. It was judged a vehicle of homicidal folly, when actually Hitler was a great man.’”

Why, what Muslim would have said such a thing in France? Hmm. Maybe Rabah Zehani, who in Lyon pelted his Jewish neighbors with a stone while shouting, “Dirty Jew, Hitler didn’t finish the job”? Or the Muslim schoolchildren who scrawled “Death to the Jews” on their school walls outside Paris?[22]

7. Fallaci: Muslims think that “biology is a shameless science because it is occupied with the human body and sex.” Here again Smith seems to have difficulty with the challenges that will come from living in a free society. Charges like this have been leveled against Christianity for years, and no one has brought any lawsuits.

8. Fallaci: “We will have to resign ourselves to the yoke of a creed that...instead of love spreads hatred and instead of liberty slavery.” Here again, Smith’s complaint founders on the facts. The Qur’an tells Muslims not to love their enemies, but to be “merciful to one another” and “ruthless to the unbelievers” (48:29). The notorious and now-disbanded jihadist group in England, Al-Muhajiroun, in March 2004 held a seminar entitled “The obligation of inciting religious hatred.”[23] Or as a young Muslim recently wrote to me: “I hate you for the sake of Allaah and I make du’a [i.e., I pray] for your destruction.”[24]

And slavery? Practiced today only in Muslim countries (notably Sudan and Mauritania), where it is justified on Islamic grounds (it is taken for granted in the Qur’an).

9. Fallaci complains of “a Right and a Left . . . that (in Italy) are both on the side of the enemy (Islam).” Is Smith’s problem with this that Islam is characterized as the enemy? That characterization originated with jihad warriors such as Osama bin Laden, who declared war against the West in the 1990s, not with Fallaci.

10. Fallaci: “The demands of the Islamics with regard to school curricula mean that in literature classes ‘we will not be allowed to include for example The Divine Comedy...nor the Canticle of Creatures nor the Sacred Hymns of Alessandra Manzoni...” Coming from a man who has demanded the destruction of Modena’s fresco in Bologna, this is a curious element of the complaint.

11. Fallaci disdains “...the uncouth wailing of the muezzin...” Apparently now even matters of taste are to be subject to the Thought Police.

12. Fallaci: Over the last twenty years terrorists have killed six thousand people “to the glory of the Qur’an. In obedience to its verses.” Does Smith know that Osama bin Laden praised Allah for the Verse of the Sword (Qur’an 9:5) in a 2003 sermon?[25] Or that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has published a detailed defense of his actions, based on the Qur’an and Islamic tradition?[26] Or that jihadists are making recruits around the world among Muslims by appealing to the Qur’an and presenting themselves as the exponents of “pure Islam”?[27]

13. Fallaci: “Our Jesus of Nazareth . . . they put him in their Danna where he eats like Trimalchio, drinks like a drunkard, screws like a sexual maniac.” “Danna,” or jannah, is Islamic Paradise, where the food, drink, and women are indeed plentiful (cf. Qur’an 13:35, 44:54, 47:15, etc.). As Jesus is considered a prophet of Islam, he would indeed be considered to be in Paradise. Fallaci’s description of that Paradise is pejorative but undeniably accurate.

14. Fallaci: “The revolting, reactionary, obtuse, feudal Right is found today only in Islam. It is Islam.” Although Smith objects to this, he doesn’t seem to have said anything about Hani Ramadan, the Muslim scholar who defended stoning adulterers in a Paris magazine.[28]

15. Fallaci decries “the mutilation that the Muslims force on little girls to prevent them, once they are grown...from enjoying the sexual act. It is a female castration that the Muslims practice in twenty-eight countries of Islamic Africa and because of which two million persons die each year from sepsis or loss of blood...” Would Smith have us believe that Fallaci invented this? When Norway’s Parliament, faced with ever-increasing evidence of the practice among Muslim immigrants, just this week introduced legislation to make examinations for female genital mutilation mandatory?[29]

16. Fallaci: Italians, resigned to their Islamization and thoroughly secularized, “are not offended when Islamic immigrants urinate on their monuments or soil the sacristies of their churches or toss their crucifixes out the window of a hospital.” They won’t be able to toss them out of schools — Adel Smith has made sure of that. But does this sort of thing happen? Certainly — and Italians do indeed meet it passively. One school in Rome last year even scrapped its annual Christmas play in favor of “Little Red Riding Hood” in order to avoid offending Muslims.[30] The better to eat you with, indeed.

17. Fallaci: “Islam is a pond. And a pond is a trough of stagnant water...it is never purified...it is easily polluted, like a watering hole for livestock of little value. The pond does not love life: It loves death...” Perhaps Smith should direct his complaint to Maulana Inyadullah of al-Qaeda, who bragged shortly after 9/11: “The Americans love Pepsi-Cola, we love death.”[31]

18. Fallaci: “Despite the massacres through which the sons of Allah have bloodied us and bloodied themselves for over thirty years, the war that Islam has declared against the West...is a cultural war...they kill us in order to bend us. To intimidate us...Their goal is not to fill cemeteries. Not to destroy our skyscrapers...It is to destroy our soul, our ideas. Our feelings and our dreams. It is to subjugate the West once again.”

Smith doubtless hopes that we have never heard of the Saudi Sheikh Muhammad bin Abd Al-Rahman Al-‘Arifi, Imam of the King Fahd Defense Academy, who declared recently: “We will control the land of the Vatican; we will control Rome and introduce Islam in it. Yes, the Christians, who carve crosses on the breasts of the Muslims…will yet pay us the Jiziya [poll tax paid by non-Muslims under Muslim rule], in humiliation, or they will convert to Islam…”[32] Smith is betting that most Westerners will never hear of the influential Sheikh Yusef Al-Qaradawi, who has been praised as a reformist by dhimmi academic John Esposito.[33] Qaradawi has written that “Islam will return to Europe as a conqueror and victor, after being expelled from it twice…I maintain that the conquest this time will not be by the sword but by preaching and ideology…”[34]


Fallaci remains defiant: “This trial is not against me. Nor is it a trial brought by a judge in search of publicity. It is a trial aimed at creating a Precedent, the Fallaci Case. I will not deign to honor them with my presence. This lawsuit is unacceptable, unpardonable. To distort a person’s thought, pick at a word here and another there, sew it all together with little dots, is illegitimate. Illicit. Illegal. Criminal. Contrary to every moral and intellectual decency. For shame!”[35]

During a speech in Washington in 2002, Fallaci said: “The hate for the West swells like a fire fed by the wind. The clash between us and them is not a military one. It is a cultural one, a religious one, and the worst is still to come.” The suit against her is just one hint of that terrible denouement.

Notes:

[1] “Italian Judge Bans Crucifix From School,” Associated Press, October 27, 2003.

[2] “Paper: Italian Church Attack Plotted,” Associated Press, June 23, 2002.

[3] “Muslim Activist Sues Pope, Cardinal,” Associated Press, February 29, 2004.

[4] “Fallaci To Go On Trial For Defaming Islam,” AGI, May 24, 2005.

[5] Ibid.

[6] “Italian Author To Face Charges Of Defaming Islam,” Reuters, May 25, 2005.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Robert Spencer, “CAIR’s War on National Review, FrontPageMagazine.com, March 30, 2005.

[9] Translations of the material in the complaint by Chris Newman, “The 18 things you can't say about Muslims in Italy,” Dagger In Hand, May 26, 2005. http://cmnewman.blogspot.com/2005/05/18-things-you-cant-say-about-muslims.html.

[10] Nuh Ha Mim Keller, editor and translator, Reliance of the Traveller (‘Umdat al-Salik), Amana Publications, 1994, o9.13.

[11] Sahih Bukhari, vol. 3, book 46, no. 717.

[12] Ibn Ishaq, The Life of Muhammad, A. Guillaume, translator, Oxford University Press, 1955, p. 464.

[13] Sahih Bukhari, vol. 5, book 59, no. 459.

[14] O. Tafrali, Thessalonique – Des Origines au XVI Siecle, pp. 151-154, as quoted in Andrew G. Bostom, “Jihad Killings of POWs and Non-Combatants,” FrontPageMagazine.com, September 9, 2004.

[15] Steven Runciman, The Fall of Constantinople 1453, Cambridge University Press, 1965, p. 147.

[16] Runciman, p. 148.

[17] Runciman, p. 151.

[18] Runciman, p. 145.

[19] See Jeff Jacoby, “Mutilation of victims and Muslim law,” Boston Globe, June 13, 2004.

[20] Abu Hamid al-Ghazzali, Ihya' ulum al-din (Cairo, n.d.), 4:747. Cited in Hamdun Dagher, The Position of Women in Islam, Light of Life, 1997.
[21] “Officials: Militants Targeted Eiffel Tower,” Associated Press, February 16, 2005.

[22] “Holocaust Lessons Meet Muslim Rebuff in France,” Reuters, January 20, 2005.

[23] “The obligation of inciting religious hatred,” Dhimmi Watch, March 15, 2004.

[24] “we make dua Allah allows your blood to spill over our hands," Jihad Watch, May 31, 2005.

[25] Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), “Bin Laden’s Sermon for the Feast of the Sacrifice,” MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 476, March 5, 2003.

[26] “Zarqawi Statement May 20, 2005 Part 1,” Jihad Unspun, May 26, 2005.

[27] “Fears as young Muslims ‘opt out,’” BBC, March 7, 2004.

[28] “Swiss Court Reinstates Muslim Teacher To His Job,” IslamOnline, April 4, 2004.

[29] “Doctors warn against child exam,” Aftenposten, June 3, 2005.

[30] “Furor Over Scrapping of Christmas Play,” Reuters, December 9, 2004.

[31] David Brooks, “Among the Bourgeoisophobes: Why the Europeans and Arabs, each in their own way, hate America and Israel,” The Weekly Standard, April 15, 2002.

[32] Steven Stalinsky, “The Next Pope and Islamic Prophecy,” FrontPageMagazine.com, April 14, 2005.

[33] John L. Esposito, “Practice and Theory,” Boston Review, April/May 2003.

[34] Stalinsky, “The Next Pope and Islamic Prophecy.”

[35] “Fallaci: ‘Processo non contro di me,” Tgcom, May 27, 2005. Translation by Chris Newman, “Oriana’s trial date set,” Dagger In Hand, June 3, 2005. http://cmnewman.blogspot.com/2005/06/orianas-trial-date-set-in-case-you.html.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=18413

[Petronas]

What an irony! Thank God for freedom of speech in the United States of America

ADEL SMITH, 6 MONTHS SENTENCE FOR DEFAMING RELIGION
Padua, Italy, Jun 14 - Adel Smith, President of the Union of Italian Muslims, was sentenced by the Padua court to 6 months in prison, converted to a fine (over 6,000 euro), for the crime of defaming religion. On January 4, 2003, Adel Smith, during a TV program broadcast live on the Paduan channel 'Serenissima Tv' made accusations against the Catholic church defining it as "criminal association" and against Pope John Paul II, defined as "a foreign man who heads the church" and "able double-crosser. [...] I declared undeniable modern historic facts: for this reason I do not regret my declarations. It seems to me that the sentence is political. I am very curious to know what those think who yesterday invoked the freedom of judgment and criticism today: is it so for me too?" Smith said he will appeal against the sentence and if necessary will resort to European courts "until he is acquitted." "I am confident and sure that at the end I will have justice."

http://www.agi.it/english/news.pl?doc=200506141833-1282-RT1-CRO-0-NF11&page=0&id=agionline-eng.oggitalia

[Petronas]

I am not posting the whole interview, because it is nine pages long. I highly recommend, however, that you take the time to read it, as well as the book "Eurabia" itself.

Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis
An interview with Bat Ye'or
06/09/05

“I wrote these books,” said Bat Ye’or, “because I had witnessed the destruction, in a few short years, of a vibrant Jewish community living in Egypt for over 2,600 years and which had existed from the time of Jeremiah the Prophet. I saw the disintegration and flight of families, dispossessed and humiliated, the destruction of their synagogues, the bombing of the Jewish quarters and the terrorizing of a peaceful population. I have personally experienced the hardships of exile, the misery of statelessness−and I wanted to get to the root cause of all this. I wanted to understand why the Jews from Arab countries, nearly a million, had shared my experience.”

Bat Ye’or’s wide historical research details the inferior condition accorded to Jews and Christian “dhimmis” (non-Muslim subjugated people) in Muslim lands, where they have survived through hardships and persecution ever since the rise of Islam in the 7th century. She pioneered the study of “dhimmitude” and the history and conditions of life of non-Muslims in their own lands, conquered by jihad and Islamized. According to Ye’or, “The conditions of Jews varied, but in general it was one of insecurity, humiliation and degradation for over 1,300 years, particularly in their own country, the Land of Israel.”

In 1997, Ye’or testified at a U.S. Congressional Hearing and the Human Rights Caucus on the subject “Past is Prologue: The Challenge of Islamism Today−An Historical Overview of the Persecution of Christians Under Islam.” “I discovered in my research that the Christian condition under Islam is similar and remarkably parallel to that of the Jews,” said Ye’or. “A historical tragedy has been going on for both religious groups. I realized that the fight for freedom from jihad and dhimmitude concerns us all, especially now in the 21st century. My research demonstrates that this is a very old problem, and it must be confronted now.”

Bat Ye’or has written three books on the jihad, Islam and dhimmitude. Her latest book is Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2005). In it, she details the cooperation and collaboration between European countries and Arab League countries in every area, from foreign policy, economy, culture, media and immigration. She examines the economic, political and ideological factors that are leading a whole continent to choose dhimmitude and gradually abandon its culture and freedom. This choice and the increase of Muslim immigration, as well as the pressure of Islamic terrorism, Ye’or argues, have concurred to widen the rift between America and a sinking Europe. Eurabia is Europe’s future, Ye’or believes, and it is the agent of the extension of dhimmitude worldwide.

“I believe that we are living in a very crucial period, in which much of Western Civilization is at stake,” said Ye’or. “People do not fully comprehend the emergence of this new danger: the jihadist geostrategy of terror. Rather they analyze this new situation in the framework of the last conflict, the Cold War, and that is a dire mistake.”

Bat Ye’or was born in Cairo. In 1955, her Egyptian nationality was revoked because she was Jewish. She found asylum in 1957 with her parents in London as a stateless refugee, acquiring British citizenship in 1959 after her marriage. In 1958, Ye’or attended the Institute of Archeology at London University and moved to Switzerland in 1960 with her husband, where she continued her studies at the University of Geneva until the birth of three children. She has worked alone in a groundbreaking field of historical research and on numerous publications for the past 35 years.

oldSpeak recently sat down with Bat Ye’or to discuss the ideas in her new book. ...

http://rutherford.org/oldspeak/blog/articles/interview/bat-yeor.html

[Petronas]

Sculpture banned from the Venice Biennale
14.06.2005

A sculpture by German artist Gregor Schneider was banned from the 51st Venice Biennale because the event’s organisers said it might be offensive to Muslims. The sculpture was a 15-metre-high cube covered in black fabric modelled after the Ka’ba in Mecca and was set to be displayed in St. Mark’s Square. A spokesman for the Venetian arts authority said there was a danger that Muslims would feel provoked by the work, heightening the risk of the city being vulnerable to terrorist attacks. Schneider insisted that the artwork was not meant as a provocation. He said he wanted to symbolise a connection between European and Arab cultures. The organisers tried to place the sculpture at another site, but finally decided not to display it at all. Instead, Schneider showed a video explaining his failed attempt.

http://www.indexonline.org/en/indexindex/articles/2005/2/italy-artist-s-sculpture-banned-from-the-ven.shtml

[Petronas]

Fitzgerald: Let's misbehave
June 20, 2005

Statues, like paintings of any living creature, are forbidden in Islam. If the Bamiyan Buddhas managed for centuries to survive in Islam, it was only because the technical wherewithal was lacking. Once the Taliban acquired enough Western-produced explosives, they could finish the job.

A little booklet, possibly the most pathetic guide to an art museum ever published, is the "Guide to the Kabul Museum." I have a copy, published in 1964, long before the Taliban arrived on the scene to see Islamic justice done. There are a few dozen pages, a handful of photographs. It is clear that the ancient Greco-Buddhist civilization of Afghanistan, and of all other non-Islamic civilizations, were reduced mostly to rubble -- the flying rubble that we see whenever we see pictures of Afghanistan.

For in Islam, the pre-Islamic or non-Islamic artifacts are of no interest, no valuable. They can be destroyed, they should be destroyed. The tens of thousands of Hindu temples destroyed by the Muslim invaders, a partial list of which was compiled by Sita Ram Goel, are perhaps the best-known example. But what of everything that might have gone into that Kabul Museum but never made it? The greatest destruction of art works in human history is that wrought by Muslim conquerors on the non-Muslim lands and peoples they invaded, conquered, and subjugated.

What will happen in Europe if it is islamized? If there are already people removing statues, however banal those statues may be, from art expositions now, what will happen in 10 years? In 20 years? Already statues have been vandalized or destroyed by Muslims -- in the Piazza del Popolo, and in a church in northern France (a statue of Mary and Jesus). Muslims have been recorded discussing their plans to destroy a celebrated fresco in Bologna that depicted Muhammad in Hell. What else is happening, and is being suppressed from us by worried European governments, whose elites, having been responsible for permitting millions of what are clearly enemy aliens, a classic fifth column, behind our own lines, cannot bring themselves to recognize the problem, and instead are intent on hiding the full truth from their own populations -- populations that are getting fed up?

In France, one out of every three babies born is now a Muslim. In 20 years, one out of every three 20-year-olds will, therefore, be a Muslim. What is to be done? Anything? Nothing?

In 1946, the most advanced and tolerant government in Central or Eastern Europe, a model of right-thinking, the government of Czechoslovakia, issued the Benes Decree. By that decree, because of their actions in the recent war (taking the enemy's side) 3 million ethnic Germans (many, but not all, had been supporters of Hitler and Deutschtum) were expelled from lands that had been populated by ethnic Germans for 600 years. No one in the Western world dropped a tear or uttered a protest. Everyone understood. Everyone still understands today, save for a handful of German revanshisty (as they used to be called in Krokodil cartoons).

When will the Western world begin to realize it faces a mortal threat, small now but growing, and growing precisely to the extent that its Muslim population grows, learns the local languages, learns to present itself with all the cunning suavity of Tariq Ramadan, to ensure the constant confusion and fear that is easy to spread, apparently, among Infidels -- all too willing to deny the evidence of their senses.

The Venice Biennale has long been one of those places that prides itself on its daring, its refusal to kowtow to the narrow-mindedness of entirely imaginary bourgeois prejudices. It has long been the butt of jokes for the kind of stuff it has sometimes put on display.

The most famous mocking of the Biennale occurs not in some ArtForum magazine, or one of those that Catherine M. (of "La vie sexuelle de..." fame) ran or runs in Paris, but rather on the silver screen. In "Le vacanze intelligenti" Alberto Sordi, playing a Roman pizza-maker, and his plump wife are sent off by their presumptuous three children (who pay for the trip) on a kind of cultural tour, when all they really want is to lie around and stuff themselves (as, in the end, they do). Among the most memorable scenes is one at the Biennale, where the fat wife slumps, exhausted, in a chair. As she sleeps, a guide comes by with his docile herd of visitors to the exhibition, and they stand solemnly in front of the dead-to-the-world wife, as he discusses her as one more of the art objects to be found.

So here we are, sans Sordi, sans wife, sans anything humorous at all. And the Biennale, with all those people -- the same kind who take the contents of the Saatchi collection, or that of Eli Broad, seriously -- who are delighted to mock, oh -- the Americans, or the benighted Vatican, or some such obvious target. But the mere hint that "Muslims" might be offended -- ah, those "tolerant" and "peaceful" Muslims we hear so much about -- and this piece must be quickly taken away.

Let no one, ever again, in the so-called Art World start prating about "transgressive" art. They are complete cowards when it comes to any real transgression, the real misbehavior -- in this case, the greatest transgression or misbehavior in the Western world is to do anything, anything, that might offend Muslims.

Well, let's misbehave.

Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/006771.php

[Petronas]

Quoting Koran Could Be Illegal Under Proposed UK Bill, Lawmaker Says
June 22, 2005

(CNSNews.com) - A British lawmaker says reading excerpts from the Koran that advocate harsh treatment for Christians, Jews and unbelievers would violate a religious hatred bill currently before parliament.

"If this bill makes any sense at all, it must mean banning the reading, in public or private, of a great many passages of the Koran itself," Conservative MP Boris Johnson said. And that, he added, was "absurd and paradoxical, given that the measure is intended to be a protection against Islamophobia."

The Racial and Religious Hatred Bill edged closer to becoming law Tuesday, after a House of Commons debate and second reading vote. Lawmakers from both parties who oppose the bill backed a compromise amendment, which would have allowed prosecution only in cases where attacks on religious beliefs were seen to be masking a deeper motivation of inciting racial hatred. However, that amendment was tabled.

During the debate, Johnson read out various excerpts from the Koran regarding the treatment of non-Muslims, including sura 22:19, which read in translation: "As for the unbelievers, for them garments of fire shall be cut and there shall be poured over their heads boiling water whereby whatever is in their bowels and skins shall be dissolved and they will be punished with hooked iron rods."

Johnson said while the Koran was not "unique in its hostility to other creeds," he challenged a government minister to explain "why and how you think the repetition of those words in a public or a private place does not amount to an incitement to religious hatred of exactly the kind this bill is supposed to ban." The proposed legislation, which has been introduced in a bid to protect Muslims, would apply to "words, behavior, written material, recordings or programs that are threatening, abusive or insulting [and] likely to stir up racial or religious hatred." Convictions under the law could lead to a seven-year jail sentence.

Home Secretary Charles Clarke told lawmakers the bill was about "hatred and incitement to hatred," assuring them it would not be "stopping anybody telling jokes about religion, stopping anybody ridiculing religions or engaging in robust debate about religion." It would protect "people, not faiths," he added and assured opponents that proposed amendments would be considered "constructively" in committee. Critics say the bill in its present form is dangerous and vague, would threaten freedom of speech, and breed more hostility in British society.

This is the third time in as many years that Prime Minister Tony Blair's government is trying to push through the controversial measure. A first attempt was withdrawn in 2002 because of fierce opposition in the upper House of Lords; a second failed earlier this year when the government removed the religious hatred clause from a broader piece of legislation it wanted to see passed into law before parliament dissolved for the general election in April. This week, the government argued that while it did not believe there would be many prosecutions under any new laws, parliament needed to make it clear that "hatred, racism and extremism" would not be tolerated.

But Johnson said Islamophobia in Britain was "in danger of being exaggerated" and accused the government of serving its own political ends. "If a religion is worth believing it ought to be strong enough, frankly, to withstand the most scurrilous and monstrous attacks and, if a religion is worth believing in, those assaults should diminish the critics and not the religion itself," he said.

Artists and writers have responded with skepticism to repeated government assurances that they would not face prosecution because only complaints approved by the attorney-general would go to court. "Mr. Bean" actor Rowan Atkinson has voiced reservations that a politician "subject to the political agendas of the day" should hold such discretionary powers. The government may see it as desirable at some point "to prosecute a few writers or journalists or playwrights in their desire to ingratiate themselves with a particular religious community," he said this week.

Christian groups and civil liberties campaigners have also expressed concerns about the bill. The bill also aims to protect people defined by their lack of faith, such as atheists and humanists, as well as satanists, pagans and members of religious sects.

http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewForeignBureaus.asp?Page=%5CForeignBureaus%5Car chive%5C200506%5CFOR20050622b.html

[rectar]

Urgent: 10 killed, 7 wounded in Makhachkala blast (http://en.rian.ru/russia/20050701/40828625.html)
01-07-2005 15:12 MAKHACHKALA, July 1 (RIA Novosti) - According to preliminary reports, 10 soldiers were killed and seven wounded in a blast in Makhachkala, the capital of Daghestan, a Russian republic bordering on Chechnya. (http://en.rian.ru/russia/20050701/40828625.html)

[rectar]

Airport Policeman Sentenced to 7 Years in Jail Over 2004 Double Plane Disaster

Created: 30.06.2005 19:42 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 19:43 MSK document.write(get_ago(1120146182)); , 20 hours 51 minutes ago

The Domodedovo court has found Police Captain Mikhail Artamonov figuring in the case of the bombings of two Russian airliners last summer guilty of negligence, “which results in the death of two or more people” and sentenced him to seven years in jail, Interfax news agency reported.

The judge stated that if Capt. Artamonov, employee of the Domodedovo airport police, had checked female suicide bombers more carefully, they would not be able to carry out the terror act.

Two acts of terrorism on the Tu-134 and Tu-154 passenger planes committed on Aug. 24, 2004, led to death of 90 people.

The prosecutor also claimed that because of Artamonov’s negligence the terrorists were able get on board the planes and demanded six years in jail for him.

The investigation established that after the two female suicide bombers arrived at the airport they were detained by policemen and their passports were taken from them. Then Artamonov was entrusted with checking their luggage and establishing whether they could be involved in terrorist activity. At the time he was part of the airport’s unit for fighting terrorism. However, he let the women go without checking anything and they went on board.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
2 Russians Imprisoned for Part in Double Terrorist Attack on Planes

Created: 15.04.2005 14:21 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 16:47 MSK document.write(get_ago(1113569234));



MosNews



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A Russian court sentenced an airline employee and a ticket scalper to 18 months at a trial linked to the terrorist attacks on two airliners last August. Both were found guilty of accepting bribes. The attacks claimed the lives of all 90 people on both planes.

Earlier this week the accused, Armen Arutyunian and Nikolai Korenkov, were charged with aiding and abetting terrorism and commercial bribery in connection with the nearly simultaneous explosions on two Russian passenger jets last summer that killed all 90 people aboard the planes.

The Aug. 24 bombings were the first in a series of terror attacks in August and September that killed more than 400 people and shocked the country.

During the trial Armen Arutyunian and Nikolai Korenkov partially admitted their guilt.

Two Chechen women are believed to have blown up a Sibir Airlines Tu-154 and a Volga-Aviaexpress Tu-134 after buying scalped tickets, allegedly from Arutyunian. Korenkov, a Sibir employee, allegedly accepted a 1,000 ruble (US$36) bribe for helping one of the women get on one of the planes after flight registration had ended.

Both planes took off from Moscow’s Domodedovo airport.

A police officer has also been charged with negligence after he let the two women get on the plane without inspecting their belongings.

Authorities have said traces of explosives were found in the wreckage of both planes.

[NYer]

AQ Raises ...

Qaeda warns European nations to quit Iraq by August 15 or risk attacks

Tue Jul 19, 8:05 AM ET

DUBAI (AFP) - The Al-Qaeda terror network warned European nations to pull their troops out of Iraq within a month or face more attacks like the London bombings, according to an Internet statement.


"This message is the final warning to European states. We want to give you a one-month deadline to bring your soldiers out from the land of Mesopotamia (Iraq)," said the statement signed by Al-Qaeda group the Brigades Abu Hafs al-Masri and dated July 16.

After August 15, "there will be no more messages, just actions that will be engraved on the heart of Europe.

"It will be a bloody war in the service of God," said the statement, the authenticity of which could not be verified.

"It's a message we are addressing to the crusaders who are still present in Iraq -- Denmark, the Netherlands, Britain, Italy and those other countries whose troops continue to criss-cross Iraqi territory.

"These are our last words. The mujahedeen, who are on the lookout, will have other words to say in your capitals."

A statement issued in the name of the "Europe Division" of the same Al-Qaeda group claimed responsibility for the July 7 bombings on London's public transport system which killed at least 56 people and wounded some 700.

The same group also claimed the 2004 train bombings in Madrid and the 2003 attacks in Istanbul.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050719/ts_afp/britainattacksiraqqaedaeurope_050719120535;_ylt=At vvXaINvYjjDXcFmpQUn09bbBAF

[NYer]

A start ...

London to extradite Dutch suspect


A man suspected of being part of a group linked to the murder of Dutch film-maker Theo van Gogh is to be extradited to the Netherlands.

Racid Belkacem, 32 was arrested in London in June after a request from Dutch authorities.

He agreed on Wednesday to be sent back to the Netherlands after being warned he could face additional charges.

Prosecutors say the Dutch national is a Muslim extremist who had "maintained contact" with members of Hofstad group.

More than a dozen suspected members of the network are awaiting trial in the Netherlands on terrorism charges.

Mr Van Gogh, 47, was shot and stabbed to death in Amsterdam in November last year.

The man currently on trial for the murder, Mohammed Bouyeri, is also said to have Hofstad links.

He said he acted out of his religious beliefs and that he would do "exactly the same" if he were ever set free.

The court has heard claims Mr Bouyeri killed Mr Van Gogh in a ritualistic murder committed in the name of radical Islam.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4701277.stm

[NYer]

Within the Gates - Eurabia
US News ^ | 7/25/05 | Fouad Ajami



'The whole Arab world was dangerous for me; I went to London," an Egyptian Islamist, Yasser Sirri, a man 41 years of age, with three convictions against him in his native land, recently said of his decision to move to England. An opponent of the autocracy of President Hosni Mubarak, Sirri had initially fled to Yemen, then to Sudan. He found refuge in London, where he runs an "Islamic observation center" and carries on with the "holy struggle" against "ungodly" Arab regimes and their supporters in the West.

The Islamists are now within the gates. They fled the fires and the terrors of the Arab-Islamic world but brought ruin with them. This new Islamism mocks the borders of nations and the very idea of nationality. "We may carry their nationalities," a Wahhabi preacher decreed recently, "but we belong to our religion." The geography of Islam has altered. A religion of Afro-Asia has migrated westward. It arrived in Europe, timid at first, carried by migrants glad to escape the failing lands of the Islamic world. Then the migrants were joined, in the 1980s, by preachers and militant men who had fought and lost cruel, bloody wars against the regimes in Syria, Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, and other despotic lands. These plotters were merciless men; they had been shown no mercy in their native lands. They hated the West but were drawn by its magnetic power. There were liberties in western Europe to be used, and welfare subsidies, and laws against extradition. There were the new technologies--developed by "infidels" but available to the holy warriors. It was easy for the preachers of hate to find foot soldiers in Amsterdam, Antwerp, London, and the suburbs of French cities. There were second-generation children who were in no man's land, on the fault line between the civilization of Islam that they did not know and the civilization of the West to which they did not fully belong.

These lands in the West were bilad al-kufr, lands of infidelity and unbelief. In these new extensions of Islam, London was the most accommodating of cities. It was there that the big Arabic newspapers, denied oxygen by the repressive regimes of Araby, were published. And it was there that men and women from Arab and Islamic lands built new lives, free to live the life of the faith. The terrorism against London is thus a singular act of betrayal.

A fanatic London-based preacher from Syria by the name of Omar Bakri Muhammad tells the tale of this great betrayal. A man of Aleppo, Bakri fled his native Syria in the 1980s and turned up in England in 1996. Since then, he has given his host country nothing but grief and sorrow, calling openly for "holy war" against the West, exhorting young Muslims of Britain to join the insurgency in Iraq. He hailed the death pilots of 9/11 as the "magnificent 19 who changed the world," and he called on Muslims to give the "infidels a 9/11 day after day after day."

"Eurabia." The vulnerability of Europe to the furies of this malignant Islamism is a defining feature of its contemporary life. There are the young men "next door" in Leeds and Madrid, and there are the burning grounds of the Middle East and North Africa hurling their disinherited young people across the Straits of Gibraltar to an aging European continent. We are not in "Eurabia" yet; that great city is still London and not "Londonistan," and no reverse reconquista of the Iberian peninsula by the Moors of North Africa looms on the horizon. Still, liberty is not a suicide pact. We should be done with the search for "explanations" that dignify the hatreds, that attribute them to western deeds and policies. We should see the new hatred dressed in religious garb for what it is: a war against the very order of contemporary life. A man of Moroccan origin, Muhammad Bouyeri, who killed the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, shot him, then slit his throat, and with his knife attached on his body a message of unadorned barbarism. "I knew what I was doing," Bouyeri said. "I slaughtered him."

It would have been nice to think that in the new lands of the West, a more tolerant version of Islam might have taken root. Instead, a neurotic zealotry has made its appearance. In Scotland the leaders of the industrialized world had assembled to discuss disease and poverty. Then a more deadly animus struck, reminding all of us of more atavistic furies still on the loose.

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/050725/25fouad_2.htm

[NYer]

High court throws out anti-terror wiretapping law


27 July 2005

KARLSRUHE, GERMANY - In a setback for anti-terror investigators, Germany's high court Wednesday ruled that a state law giving authorities sweeping powers to tap phones is unconstitutional.

The Federal Constitutional Court said the law violates the Germany constitution's guarantees of freedom from official eavesdropping.

At issue was a 2003 law in the state of Lower Saxony enacted in the wake of the September 11 attacks. The attacks were plotted and carried out by Islamic terrorists based in Hamburg, adjacent to Lower Saxony.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=26&story_id=22290&name=High%20court%20throws%20out%20anti%2Dterror%2 0wiretapping%20law

[NYer]

Jihad Made In Europe

From the July 25, 2005 issue: There may be more to fear from a mosque in Leeds than a madrassa in the Middle East.
by Reuel Marc Gerecht
07/25/2005, Volume 010, Issue 42


THE JULY SUICIDE BOMBINGS IN London--some or all of whose perpetrators were Muslims born and reared in Britain--are likely to produce in the United Kingdom the same intellectual reflection on Muslim identity in Europe that is already underway in nearby countries. The French began this reflection in earnest ten years ago, after bomb-happy, lycée-educated, French-born Islamic holy warriors terrorized France. The Spanish began it after their own train bombings in March 2004, and the Dutch after the brutal slaying of the film director Theo van Gogh by a Muslim militant in November 2004. Quite likely the British will reach the same conclusion the French already have, to wit: Islamic terrorism on European soil has its roots in the Middle East. "British Islam"--the behavior and spiritual practice of Muslims in the United Kingdom--it will be said, is by and large a progressive force standing against pernicious and retrograde ideas emanating from the Middle East. There are big problems of acculturation at home in mother England, all will confess, but the holy-warrior mentality is imported.

This view, however, may turn out to be dead wrong. What was once unquestionably an import has gone native, mutated, and grown. Some of what the Europeans are now confronting--and for the United States this is very bad news--is probably a locally generated Islamic militancy that is as retrograde and virulent as anything encountered in the Middle East. "European Islam" appears to be an increasingly radicalizing force intellectually and in practice. The much-anticipated Muslim moderates of Europe--the folks French scholar Gilles Kepel believes will produce "extraordinary progress in civilization," a new "Andalusia" (the classical Arabic word for Moorish Spain) that will save us from Osama bin Laden's jihad--have so far not developed with the same gusto as the Muslim activists who have dominated too many mosques in "Londonistan" and elsewhere in Europe. Moderates surely represent the overwhelming majority of Muslims in Europe, but like their post-Christian European counterparts, they usually express their moderation in detachment from religious affairs.

Though Europeans often fail to see it, the secularization of the Muslims living in their midst has been, by and large, a great success. It explains why Muslim activists gain so much attention, be they arch-conservatives, like the devotees of the Tabligh movement in Britain and on the continent who espouse segregation in Europe, or "progressives," like the Switzerland-based intellectual Tariq Ramadan, who refuses forthrightly to declare the Muslim Holy Law null and void as a political testament for Muslims in a European democracy. The moderates have abandoned the field. They have become European. The militants, who perhaps should be seen as deviants from a largely successful process of secularization, are the only ones left ardently praying.

For organizations like al Qaeda, this may mean that the future will be decisively European. From its earliest days, al Qaeda viewed Europe as an important launching platform for attacks against the United States and its interests. Now, Western counterterrorist forces, which have traditionally tried to track Middle Eastern missionaries in Europe, would be well advised to start searching for radical European Muslim missionaries in the Middle East and elsewhere. Some Europeans--and they are mostly French--have seen the future. Always ahead of his time, the French scholar Olivier Roy has written:

When we consider the [Islamic] movements that embrace violence, we can see that they are not expressions of an outburst in the West of the [Israeli-Palestinian] conflict in the Middle East. Most of the young Muslims radicalize in the West: They are "born-again Muslims." It's here that they are Islamicized. Almost all separate from their families and many have marriages with non-Muslims. Their dispute with the world isn't imported from the Middle East: It is truly modern, aimed against American imperialism, capitalism, etc. In other words, they occupy the same space that the proletarian left had thirty years ago, that Action Directe had twenty years ago. . . . They exist in a militant reality abandoned by the extreme left, where the young live only to destroy the system. . . . [This radicalization] isn't at all the consequence of a "clash of civilizations," that is to say, the importation of intellectual frameworks coming from the Middle East. This militant evolution is happening, in situ, on our territory. It partakes henceforth of the internal history of the West.

Roy may overstate the autonomy of Islamic radicalism in Europe from the militancy in the Middle East; he surely diminishes too much the religious ingredient in the emerging radical Muslim European identity. But my own visits to numerous radical mosques in Western Europe since 9/11 suggest that he is more right than wrong about the Europeanization of Islamic militancy. The Saudis may pay for the mosques and the visiting Saudi and Jordanian imams, but the believers are often having very European conversations in European languages. In France, Belgium, or Holland, sitting with young male believers can feel like a time-warp, a return to the European left of the 1970s and early 1980s. Europe's radical-mosque practitioners can appear, mutatis mutandis, like a Muslim version of the hard-core intellectuals and laborers behind the aggrieved but proud Scottish National party in its salad days. These young men are often Sunni versions of the Iranian radicals who gathered around the jumbled, deeply contradictory, religious left-wing ideas of Ali Shariati, one of the intellectual fathers of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's "red-mullah" revolution of 1979, and the French-educated ex-Communist Jalal Al-e Ahmad, who became in the 1960s perhaps the most famous theoretician of Muslim alienation in the Western world.

The Shiite parallel is also pertinent since it elucidates the motives of Sunni believers who see murder as a martyr's expression of devotion to God. The thousands of Iranians who gleefully went to their deaths in suicidal missions against the Iraqis in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war did so in part, as the Franco-Iranian scholar Farhad Khosrakhavar has written, because the "liberty to die as a martyr served to maintain the phantasm of revolutionary possibilities." Death is both the ultimate expression of a very Western idea of individual freedom and self-creation and a very Islamic conception of self-abnegation before God's will. Talk to young radical Muslims in Europe--young men who in all probability have no desire whatsoever to kill themselves or others for any cause--and you can often nevertheless find an appreciation of the idea of martyrdom almost identical to the Iranian death-wish of yesteryear. In the last three centuries, Europe has given birth and nourishment to most of mankind's most radical causes. It shouldn't be that surprising to imagine that Europe could nurture Islamic militancy on its own soil.

In Europe as elsewhere, Westernization is the key to the growth and virulence of hard-core Islamic radicalism. The most frightening, certainly the most effective, adherents of bin Ladenism are those who are culturally and intellectually most like us. The process of Westernization liberates a Muslim from the customary sanctions and loyalties that normally corralled the dark side of the human soul. Respect for one's father, an appreciation for the human need to have fun, a toleration of eccentricity and naughty personal behavior, the love of art and folk music--all are characteristics of traditional mainstream Muslim society wiped away by the arrival of modernity and the simultaneous spread of sterile, esthetically empty, angry, Saudi-financed Wahhabi thought. In this sense, bin Ladenism is the Muslim equivalent of Western totalitarianism. This cleaning of the slate, this break with the past, is probably more profound in the Muslim enclaves in Europe--what Gilles Kepel called les banlieues de l'Islam--than it is in the urban sprawl of Cairo, where traditional mores, though under siege and badly battered by modernity, nevertheless retain considerable force. Cairo gave us Ayman al-Zawahiri, al Qaeda's great intellectual; it's not unreasonable to fear that London or Paris or Berlin will give us his successor.

This view understandably receives a poor reception in Europe. Most intellectuals and politicians would prefer to see Islamic terrorism in Europe as a by-product of accumulated foreign grievances. There are the aftershocks of the second Algerian civil war--the guerre à outrance that started in 1991 between the Islamists and the election-aborting military regime--and especially the Israeli-Palestinian confrontation, which most in the European intelligentsia have viewed as the spur to Islamic radicalism and the cause of the bad blood between the Arabs and the West. The American war against Saddam Hussein in 1990-91 exacerbated the division between Islamic militants in Europe, who for the most part opposed an infidel "invasion" of Iraq, and European governments, which (often tepidly) backed the American-led ejection of Saddam from Kuwait. This view reappeared in Western Europe with the Second Gulf war against Saddam in 2003. European domestic peace was thus increasingly held hostage by American foreign policy, especially America's wars and its unwillingness to force Israel to make concessions to the Palestinians. Talk to European counterterrorist officials and they go apoplectic enumerating the ways America, notably the Bush administration, has made their work more difficult.

Although some of the reasons put forth by Europeans to explain their Muslim problems are undoubtedly valid, a wise U.S. counterterrorist policy would downplay the external causes of Islamic activism in Europe. We should prepare for the worst-case scenario and assume that European society itself will continue to generate the most lethal holy warriors. In doing so, American officials should be skeptical of their own ability to identify through profiling which Muslim Europeans might engage in terrorism against the United States. Stamps in passports indicating travel to Middle Eastern countries can't tell you much, since holy-warrior pilgrimages are not required to fortify jihadist spirits and networks. Living in London, Leeds, or Manchester can be more than enough.

This means, of course, that the Bush administration ought to preempt fate and suspend the visa-waiver program established in 1986 for Western Europeans. It is true that consular officers were a poor frontline defense before 9/11 against Muslim extremists trying to enter the United States. But the United States would be safer with some screening mechanism, however imperfect, before Europeans arrive at our borders. The transatlantic crowd in Washington--the bedrock of America's foreign-policy establishment--might rise in high dudgeon at the damage this could do to U.S.-European relations. The State Department's European and consular-affairs bureaus might add that they no longer have the staff to handle the enormous number of applicants. Ignore them. American-European relations were just fine when we required all Europeans to obtain visas before crossing our borders. Consular officers are among the most overworked personnel in the U.S. government. So draft poorly utilized personnel from the Department of Homeland Security until the consular corps at the State Department can grow sufficiently. Issuing visas to Europeans would be an annoying inconvenience for all; it would not, however, be an insult. Given the damage one small cell of suicidally inclined radical Muslim Europeans could do in the New York City or Washington metro or on Amtrak's wide-open trains, it's not too much to ask.

THERE IS GOOD NEWS from Europe, however. By now, Great Britain and the United States should have been struck repeatedly by cells of Europeanized Muslims. The training and education required for such attacks is minimal. It is difficult not to conclude that we have avoided this calamity because al Qaeda and its allied extremist groups have so far been somewhat lame in recruiting militants in Europe, even though the pool of possible recruits, given the enormous social and economic problems within its Muslim communities, ought to be fairly large. One catastrophic hit (the London attacks don't qualify) is certainly enough to skewer our entire perspective on what constitutes successful recruitment operations. Nevertheless it is astonishing how poorly al Qaeda and its friends have done in Europe. We have the war in Iraq, which according to most terrorist experts, Republican realists, Democratic senators, and just about every European expert on Islam has been a boon to jihadist recruitment worldwide. We also have the supposed boon to the Islamists from our ignominy at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, plus the very evident friendship between President Bush and the villain of all villains, Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon. And yet the attack on London's transportation system is the best that the holy warriors can do to punish the Anglo-American infidels for their sins in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere?

And what isn't happening in Europe isn't happening either in Iraq. If the Bush administration weren't so rhetorically maladroit, it might point out that the Islamist holy war against us in Iraq is going rather poorly. Jihadist suicide bombers have inflicted significant losses upon us and especially upon the Iraqi people, but again what is striking about the Iraq campaign, as about jihadist recruitment efforts in Western Europe, is how few holy warriors have come calling. Historically, Afghanistan was a sideshow, while Mesopotamia is at the center of both Arab and Muslim history. In the fundamentalist imagination, the former Soviet Union was a distinctly smaller devil than insidious America, which has been central to Islamist ideology since the collapse of Britain as a world power. Diehard "Arab Afghans" in the Soviet-Afghan war could regularly complain about how weak support was for the mujahedeen in Muslim, and especially Arab, lands.

Yet if one compares the number of Muslim volunteers who went to fight the Soviets (and let us assume that no more than 10,000 went, most of them after 1984, even though many analysts think the number of "Arab Afghans" was much higher) with the highest figures one hears for foreign holy warriors in Iraq (one to two hundred entering Iraq each month), the result is astonishing, and for would-be jihadists depressing. Traveling to Iraq from anywhere in the Arab world is easy. Language isn't a problem. Iraqi Sunni Arab fundamentalist groups are much better plugged into the larger Arab Sunni world than were their Afghan Islamist counterparts in the 1980s. The Syrian government, and probably others in the region, would love to help all comers. We should have seen by now thousands of holy warriors coming to Iraq. Suicide bombers have clouded our accounting by magnifying the individual commitment of each jihadist and the damage he can do.

We can only guess why Iraq has been so much less of a draw than Afghanistan. A reasonable guess, however, is that the Muslim, and especially Arab, world doesn't have its heart in this fight. Although Sunni Arabs rarely rose to denounce Saddam Hussein's slaughtering of Arab Shiites and Kurds, they knew full well the horrors of his rule. Although many are loath to say so publicly, they know the American invasion of Iraq and George W. Bush's rhetoric in favor of democracy have shaken the established order in the Arab world, and they are content to see it so. This is probably as true for Arab Sunni fundamentalists as it is for Arab liberals. Both, in their own ways, want to overturn the status quo. Emotions about Iraq, and the rise of democracy within its borders and beyond, are too complicated and conflicted to produce any broadly popular and effective global jihad against the Americans.

There is no satisfying, expeditious answer to Europe's Muslim problems. If Olivier Roy is right--European Islam, for better and for worse, is now independent of the Middle East--then democracy could come to Muslims' ancestral homelands even as a virulent form of Islamic militancy persisted for years in Western Europe. But the intellectual and family ties with the Middle East are probably still sufficient to ensure that if the Middle East changes for the better, the ripples will quickly reach Europe. The democratic discussion in the Middle East, which is often broadcast through media headquartered in Europe, is becoming ever more vibrant and powerful. If Hosni Mubarak's regime in Egypt begins to give way to democracy, it's a very good bet that the discussion in every single mosque in Western Europe will be about the popular triumph and the democratic experiment beginning in the Arab world's most important country.

Amid all the ensuing political and religious debates and arguments, in the expectant hope that other dictators would fall, al Qaeda and its allied groups might find it even harder to attract recruits who would incinerate themselves for a revolutionary ideal increasingly at odds with reality. If the Bush administration wants to help Europe, it should back as forcefully as possible the rapid expansion of democracy in the Middle East. It would be a delightful irony if the more progressive political and religious debates among the Middle East's Muslims saved their brethren in the intellectually backward lands of the European Union.

Reuel Marc Gerecht is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a contributing editor to The Weekly Standard.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/005/836esgwz.asp

[NYer]

Conflicting Advice

Islamic Justice Finds a Foothold In Heart of Europe
Religious Opinions From Afar Make Integration Tougher
For Big Muslim Population

Ruling on a Drunken Divorce

By IAN JOHNSON
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
August 4, 2005; Page A1

WATFORD, England -- Last year, a woman wrote an anonymous letter to a council of Muslim scholars meeting in this small town near London. She had a problem: Her husband was an alcoholic and in a drunken fit had divorced her according to Islamic law, reciting the phrase "I divorce you" three times. Was the divorce valid?

Such questions have occupied Muslim scholars since the religion's inception more than 13 centuries ago. But usually the interpretation of sharia, or Islamic law, occurred in predominantly Muslim lands. The woman's situation was different. She was a resident of France, a non-Muslim country governed by its own laws. And the answer to the question, in the form of a fatwa, or religious opinion, directly conflicted with the French legal code.
[Islam and Europe]

"The four schools [of Islamic jurisprudence] consider this an irreversible divorce," wrote the 35-member group, known as the European Council for Fatwa and Research, in a ruling posted on the group's Web site earlier this year. The husband may have been angry, "but not to the extent that he was not aware of what he said, because when asked later he repeated what he said," the opinion added.

Across Europe, Muslims are hungry for advice about how to integrate in their new countries while remaining true to their faith. Questions range from the complex (Can I pay into a pension system that is based on interest, which is forbidden by Islam?) to the mundane (When do sunset prayers take place during the summer solstice in Scandinavia, when the sun doesn't set?). In response, councils, television shows and Internet sites have issued a flood of fatwas aimed at aiding the residents of Islam's newest frontier, Europe.

But as the French woman found out, this avalanche of advice is heavily skewed toward interpretations of Islam that can make integration harder, not easier. Well-financed organizations based in the Middle East dominate the discussion in Europe, promoting scholars who display little understanding of the problems facing European Muslims. Some advice contradicts local laws, especially in questions of marriage and divorce. And even in an Islamic context, much of the advice is issued by self-appointed experts with a shallow grounding in Islamic law. Says Khaled Abou El Fadl, a professor of law at the University of California in Los Angeles, Islamic law has become the "playing field for shabby scholarship, political sloganism and ideological demagogues."


Europe's most influential Muslim rule-making body is known as the European Council for Fatwa and Research. It was set up by an organization and scholars tightly allied with the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist group that has widely penetrated Muslim life in Europe. Its stated goal is to help Muslims integrate into Europe by offering moderate religious opinions. Some of its opinions do that: Despite criticism from many scholars in the Middle East, it issued an opinion allowing European Muslims to buy houses with mortgages, which are usually forbidden due to the traditional Islamic ban on interest.

But the group is also dominated by outsiders with little idea of what is acceptable in the West. At one meeting attended by a Wall Street Journal reporter, a council member cited "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," a notorious anti-Semitic forgery written in czarist Russia, in a position paper on how Muslim families are under threat in Europe. The Protocols, the speaker said, was evidence of a Jewish plot to undermine Muslim moral values through sexual permissiveness.

The council's founder, Youssef Qaradawi, sets the bifurcated tone: He advocates that European Muslims participate in their home countries' political life and says that women should be allowed to work. He has condemned suicide bombings in the West, such as the recent attacks in London. But he also has issued fatwas backing suicide bombings against civilians in Israel and U.S. troops in Iraq. And he has defended the death penalty under sharia law for homosexuals, writing: "While such punishments may seem cruel, they have been suggested to maintain the purity of the Islamic society and to keep it clean of perverted elements." Mr. Qaradawi refused repeated requests for comment.


The fatwas are part of the broader issue of how Islam can adapt to Europe. A few decades ago, European Islam was the province of a few merchants and converts. Waves of immigration, however, have changed this. Now it is the continent's fastest-growing religion, with 15 to 20 million adherents concentrated in a handful of countries.

Many Muslims have integrated seamlessly into Europe. But sizable numbers wonder if they can live as good Muslims in societies dominated by other faiths with other laws. For some, the advice they get leads to an inescapable conclusion: They must shun the West and build separate communities where Western norms do not apply.

Even if fatwas don't advocate violence, they can pave the way for violence by offering advice that caricatures the West as decadent and contaminating. In the English city of Leeds, the London suicide attackers were inspired by imported ideologies, which look down on the West and glorify "martyrdom." Among terrorists, the indoctrination usually comes in the form of books, videos and visiting preachers, who argue that violent jihad against the West is the only answer to Muslims' problems.

The search for religious authority among European Muslims comes as European countries have done little to integrate their new immigrants. Double standards often exist; in Germany, for example, Christian and Jewish organizations are allowed to offer religious instruction in public schools but Muslim groups aren't. Authorities say this is because Islam is so fragmented that they don't know which group to pick to offer courses, but the result is that European Muslims have been left to their own devices to decide what is appropriate Islamic behavior.

These struggles are mirrored throughout the Muslim world, where traditional forms of religious authority are breaking down as people become better educated and decide for themselves how to interpret the Quran and the Prophet's sayings. That is weakening the ability of authoritarian states to use religion to control their populations. But as the turmoil among Europe's Muslims shows, the loss of tradition does not necessarily mean moderation. Instead, it often sets the stage for efforts to create a new, more strident form of religion -- one that can be intolerant of anyone, ordinary Muslims included, who does not follow their vision of Islam.

Since it was founded in the seventh century, Islam has become a religion with rules that define daily life. Muslims have regulations governing food and prayer, as well as financial transactions, marriage law, criminal penalties and dress codes.

Interpreting such a comprehensive code of life has fallen on experts who advise ordinary believers. For Westerners, the most famous fatwa was issued by Iran's supreme spiritual leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, in 1989 against the British writer Salman Rushdie. Most, though, are about more ordinary topics, such as marriage, divorce, clothing and prayer. Fatwas aren't binding, but from the questioner's perspective the advice is given in God's name, so it is usually taken seriously.

For most of its history, Islam has been decentralized. Its dominant Sunni strain has only sporadically had a single spiritual leader, akin to the Roman Catholic Pope, who can issue rules on theological, moral or ethical questions. So religious opinions have usually come from local authorities, such as the neighborhood imam, based on a specific question by a specific individual -- not universal rules. This has been one of Islam's historic strengths, allowing it to spread to vastly different cultures around the world.

Today, most Middle Eastern states have taken firm control of religious opinion-making. In Egypt and Turkey, for example, fatwa councils are extensions of the government. Some of these experts, known as muftis, oversee religious opinion in their country.

Europe is different. No country has a national system of interpreting Islamic law. For several decades, Europe's lack of religious authority was of little concern to Islamic scholars. Most held that Europe was not part of the Islamic world. Their conclusion was simple: Muslims simply shouldn't reside in non-Muslim parts of the world because of the impossibility there of living a true Muslim life in conformity with Islamic law.


But starting in the late 1980s and through the 1990s, Europe became accepted as part of the Muslim world. The growing number of Muslims in Europe made it impossible to ignore. That implied that Muslims there had to live according to Islamic law. But how?

"It has created a remarkable amount of confusion about what exactly is defined as Islamic," says Professor Fadl, one of the leading experts on Islamic law. "Is it enough to find some quote by the Prophet? Is it enough to say 'in the name of God, most gracious, most merciful'? What are the criteria?"

The Founder

The man trying to redefine and spread the reach of orthodox Islamic law is Mr. Qaradawi, who founded the European fatwa council. Mr. Qaradawi made his name in the 1960s by publishing one of the most widely reprinted and translated popular Islamic works: "The Lawful and the Prohibited in Islam," a series of do's and don'ts for Muslims. He has built on that with two of the Islamic world's most popular Web sites, IslamOnline.com and qaradawi.net. He also has a weekly fatwa show on al-Jazeera, the popular Arabic-language television news station. Most recently, he set up an international group of scholars to bypass national hierarchies in the Islamic world -- a direct challenge to the religious authorities in Saudi Arabia, which sees itself as the guardian of Islamic standards.

Mr. Qaradawi's internationalism is in keeping with the ideals of the Muslim Brotherhood. Founded in Egypt 80 years ago, the group has spread throughout the Muslim world, advocating an all-embracing brand of Islam that has spurred reformers but also terrorist organizations. Mr. Qaradawi, an Egyptian, was once viewed as a leading candidate to head the group but preferred to stay in Qatar, where he has the freedom to speak his mind and travel the world building his influence. Mahdy Akef, the Brotherhood's Egypt-based supreme guide, calls Mr. Qaradawi "our professor."

"He is recreating a modern-day version of the global Islamic community," says Bettina Gräf, who studies Mr. Qaradawi at Berlin's Center for Modern Oriental Studies, a leading academic center established by the German government. "People in Mecca and elsewhere are watching him very closely."

Around the Muslim world, Mr. Qaradawi is seen as a force for moderation. His daughters work and drive cars. He castigates the lack of democracy in the Middle East. Officials in his adopted homeland of Qatar laud his positive contribution, boasting that he is as influential as Mecca.

Over the past decade, he has worked to project his influence into Europe. In a Cairo apartment complex, for example, a group of young men working on Compaq computers makes up IslamOnline's "sharia department." Its head is Ali Al-Halawani, a 34-year-old with a pencil-thin moustache and impeccable English. He says his team has posted more than 3,000 fatwas from around the world, all available on a searchable "fatwa bank" in English and Arabic. Many of the people asking questions, he says, are European Muslims unsure of how to apply Islamic law.

"We do not intend to replace the imams in Western countries," Mr. Halawani says. "They are well-versed in the local conditions. We intend to back them up, to be a resource for them. They can look up fatwas and get ideas."

As is often the case with Mr. Qaradawi's other ventures in the West, most of IslamOnline's advice comes from scholars who reside in the Middle East, not the West. The fatwa council, too, is drawn primarily from this part of the world, although when he founded it in 1997, Mr. Qaradawi said he wanted most scholars to reside in the West so they would better understand the problems Muslims have there.

The council is part of a web of organizations that spread ideology close to the Muslim Brotherhood throughout Europe. Mr. Qaradawi launched it in conjunction with the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe, an umbrella group that unites like-minded groups across the continent.

Unlike Mr. Qaradawi's television or Internet ventures, the council is aimed at opinion-makers -- the imams who run mosques and officials in religious organizations. The council sponsors training sessions for imams, where its rules are explained. And all of its rulings are available online in Arabic and English on the council's own site or IslamOnline.

The council usually gathers twice a year. Its meetings are closed to the public but last year it allowed a journalist to attend some sessions when key issues were discussed and position papers presented. That meeting was held in the small town of Watford, a suburb of London.

About 60 people gathered in a Ramada Inn conference room, including the 35 members of the council, mostly from Middle Eastern countries, and about 25 observers, including members of the imams' staffs. Nearly everyone wore traditional garb, such as white robes for the Sudanese delegation.

Members of the group say Mr. Qaradawi has final say over all fatwas, and he listened carefully to the long, often droning position papers that set forth the orthodox views of the group. Dressed in a long cotton gown and wearing a red-peaked cap with white trim, he kept a severe expression on his face as members, speaking in Arabic, explained how European Muslim family life was under attack.

"Extremist fundamentalist powers based on aggression on the part of the Crusader and Zionist alliance in the West are now preparing their cultural strategy according to a new wave of secular tendencies," said Ahmed Ali Al-Imam, a Sudanese religious figure who advocates the implementation of sharia in his religiously divided country.

Other papers accepted traditional norms that directly contradict Western law and society, especially regarding women and marriage. Women should only cut their hair with their husbands' permission, and "any woman who would marry without a male guardian's consent, her wedding is invalid," declared Muhammad Hawari, a Germany-based member of the group.

Sometimes the group's advice seems aimed at Muslims from another era. "Children should eat clean food and use clean water. They should not urinate in water wells," Mr. Hawari wrote in a paper. Adoption, he added, was forbidden, because a woman might be seen in a state of undress by a child other than her biological offspring. And if a child is adopted, Mr. Hawari said they should not be given equal rights to biological children.

Messrs. Hawari and Imam, like Mr. Qaradawi, refused to comment for this article.

Some members of the council quietly say Mr. Qaradawi is probably not the best public face for the group, although his reputation and personality created the organization. One member, Mustafa Ceric, the Grand Mufti of Bosnia, said the council reflects European Muslims' difficulties of knowing what standards apply to them: "We are in a transitional phase where we live in Europe but we think of an abstract Islam."

A Garbled Message

For many at the grassroots, the message seems to be two-fold: that Muslims need special rules to fit into European society; and that anyone with a copy of the Quran and the Prophet's sayings can be a mufti.

The gap with Western society was on display at Berlin's Bilal mosque recently when a well-known religious authority, Amir Zaidan, attracted about 100 listeners for a talk on Islamic law. Afterward, men crowded around Mr. Zaidan with anxious questions, especially concerning sharia's ban on interest. Carried to its logical conclusion that rules out mortgages, life insurance and most retirement plans.

One man in his 50s asked if he may participate in a new retirement program being promoted by the German government. It is based on compounded interest and is voluntary, but in an era of shrinking pensions is considered a good idea by personal-finance experts.

Mr. Zaidan sat on the ground and assumed the role of a mufti, questioning the man about the specifics of his case. After a lively discussion with other men in the room, Mr. Zaidan ruled. The payments the man has made are "halal," or allowed. But the interest is "haram," forbidden. "Deduct the interest that is accrued and refuse to accept it," he said.

The questioner sat slack-jawed for a minute. Without the interest, the plan will not give him the returns he needs to retire. He shook his head, worried at the advice he had received. Contacted several weeks later, he says he has decided to forgo the pension plan and use his savings to help his son buy a house. "My children are my retirement," he says.

After Mr. Zaidan left, a group of younger men picked up the topic of Islamic law. In their 20s and 30s, most were born in Germany to immigrant parents. They all go by their first names; surnames are a Western invention, they say.

One is Mahmoud, a 29-year-old Palestinian who came to Germany as a 3-year-old and is struggling to find a role here. Tall and heavy with slicked-backed shoulder-length hair, he has a job cleaning buildings, the best he could do with just a basic-level high-school degree.

Like several other members of the group, he is familiar with Mr. Qaradawi's fatwa council and consults online Web sites such as IslamOnline. His views mirror these influences, with a desire to fit in but an underlying intolerance of others.

One of his friends, a convert, started to tell the group about how his Christian mother likes him to give her flowers on her birthday. Mahmoud wagged his finger at him and declared that birthday celebrations are forbidden. Muslim moderates argue that Islamic law is neutral about birthdays. However, Arabs traditionally don't hold birthday parties and there is no evidence in reading the Quran that Mohammad celebrated his. So young European fundamentalists who want to imitate the Prophet's life consider such parties to be out of bounds.

Then a man who had been hugging his knees in the corner piped up. He had read about the Prophet's condemnation of polytheism. Now, he said, he is angry at Buddhists and Taoists. "I'd love to just go into their temples and sweep out all those statues and toss them onto a dump," he said with a grin. "Yeah, then let's see how their gods deal with that."

The group looked embarrassed for a moment. Then Mahmoud described how he badgered an uncle into removing a picture from his wall. Islam bans human representation in art and Mahmoud believes that means all decorative art. The picture was a verse from the Quran written in calligraphy, which is widely used as artwork around the Muslim world. No matter to Mahmoud. "I said, 'No, it's forbidden. Read the Quran.' "

A couple of men in the group were puzzled, but they began to nod in agreement as Mahmoud continued.

"My uncle, he really liked that thing and wouldn't take it down. So I asked him to make it a gift to me. He did and I destroyed it in front of him. He was really upset but it had to happen. He has to understand what sharia is about."

Write to Ian Johnson at ian.johnson@wsj.com
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112311814949504607,00.html?mod=home%5Fpage%5F one%5Fus

[NYer]

France boots al-Qaeda operative

French authorities have expelled an Algerian man believed to have links to a terrorist network, the French interior ministry has announced. Khellaf Hamam, 38, was repatriated by boat from the port city of Marseilles. Hamam was arrested in 2003 and convicted of recruiting and training youths for the jihad - the Holy War - in Bosnia and Afghanistan.

France has expelled four radical Islamists in the wake of the July bomb attacks in London. French authorities are currently planning to expel 10 more people over the next few weeks. The zero-tolerance policy towards religious figures who preach hatred and other Islamic extremists was introduced as a preventive measure against possible attacks in France. The country has also restored border controls with its EU neighbours.

In July, French interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy told a newspaper that at least seven French citizens had died fighting "for al-Qaeda's cause" in Iraq and elsewhere, some of them in suicide attacks.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4189756.stm

Of course to the BBC, he's an Islamist militant.

[NYer]

Dutch Mosques Launch Code of Conduct to Fight Extremism
Three Dutch mosques launched a code of conduct yesterday to help fight radicalism, promote democratic values and encourage imams to speak Dutch in return for tougher action on discrimination against Muslims. Three mosques from De Baarsjes district of Amsterdam, which started work on the code shortly after the murder last November of outspoken filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a Dutch-Moroccan man, presented the text to Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende. “It is in all our interests that we fight extremism and radicalization. Freedom of speech and democracy only work when everybody plays by the rules of the game,” Balkenende said. “We need each other in this country. We have always been open and tolerant. The Netherlands is a country to be proud of. But it is not automatic. We need to work at it.”

The code commits mosques to promote the Dutch constitution and be on the look out for those who express “extremist ideas”. Mosques that sign up will consult with the family of any potential militant and offer support and advice, but if such a discussion does not lead to a change in behavior, the mosque pledges to report the person to the Dutch authorities. Fatih Dag from the Turkish Aya Sofya mosque said: “We are also threatened by terrorism just like every other Dutch citizen.”

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4&section=0&article=69586&d=6&m=9&y=2005&pix=world.jpg&category=World

[Petronas]

Muslims win toy pigs ban
Monday, October 3, 2005

NOVELTY pig calendars and toys have been banned from a council office — in case they offend Muslim staff. Workers in the benefits department at Dudley Council, West Midlands, were told to remove or cover up all pig-related items, including toys, porcelain figures, calendars and even a tissue box featuring Winnie the Pooh and Piglet.

Bosses acted after a Muslim complained about pig-shaped stress relievers delivered to the council in the run-up to the Islamic festival of Ramadan. Muslims are barred from eating pork in the Koran and consider pigs unclean. Councillor Mahbubur Rahman, a practising Muslim, backed the ban. He said: “It’s a tolerance of people’s beliefs.”

http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2005450600,00.html

[Petronas]

School bans pigs stories
Tuesday, 4 March, 2003, 15:32 GMT

A West Yorkshire head teacher has banned books containing stories about pigs from the classroom in case they offend Muslim children. The literature has been removed from classes for under-sevens at Park Road Junior Infant and Nursery School in Batley. Head Barbara Harris said the books would remain in the school library for children to read. Sixty per cent of the school's pupils are of Pakistani or Indian origin and 99% of these pupils are Muslims.

Mrs Harris said in a statement: "Recently I have been aware of an occasion where young Muslim children in class were read stories about pigs. We try to be sensitive to the fact that for Muslims talk of pigs is offensive."

The head teacher sent a memo to staff saying fiction books containing stories about pigs should be removed from early years and key stage one classrooms. Mrs Harris added: "The books remain in the school library and there is nothing to stop our younger children having stories such as 'The Three Little Pigs' in small groups."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/2818809.stm

[Petronas]

Race fears spark St. George ban
Tuesday, October 4, 2005 Posted: 1249 GMT (2049 HKT)

LONDON, England (CNN) -- British prison officers who wore a St. George's Cross tie-pin have been ticked off by the jails watchdog over concerns about the symbol's racist connotations. The pins showing the English flag -- which has often raised hackles due to its connection with the Crusades of the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries -- could be "misconstrued," Chief Inspector of Prisons Anne Owers said in a section on race in a report on a jail in the northern English city of Wakefield.

The banner of St. George, the red cross of a martyr on a white background, was adopted for the uniform of English soldiers during the military expeditions by European powers to recapture the Holy Land from Muslims, and later became the national flag of England.

A section on race relations in Owers' report said: "We were concerned to see a number of staff wearing a flag of St. George tie-pin. While we were told that these had been bought in support of a cancer charity there was clear scope for misinterpretation, and Prison Service Orders made clear that unauthorized badges and pins should not be worn." As one of her formal recommendations Owers said: "Staff should not wear unauthorized badges or pins."

Chris Doyle, director of the Council for the Advancement of Arab-British Understanding, said Tuesday the red cross was an insensitive reminder of the Crusades. "A lot of Muslims and Arabs view the Crusades as a bloody episode in our history," he told CNN. "They see those campaigns as Christendom launching a brutal holy war against Islam. Muslim or Arab prisoners could take umbrage if staff wore a red cross badge. It's also got associations with the far-right. Prison officers should be seen to be neutral."

Doyle added that it was now time for England to find a new flag and a patron saint who is "not associated with our bloody past and one we can all identify with."

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/10/04/britain.redcross/index.html

[Petronas]

Dhimmitude in Holland
October 06, 2005

A Dutch dhimmitude update from Leveller of the Dutch Disease blog. The links are in Dutch:

An elementary school in the Dutch city of Lelystad is going to teach children every week for half an hour about Islam.
http://www.dutchdisease.com/blog/index.php?p=2235

Dutch Prime-Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende wishes Dutch Muslims a happy Ramadan. Notice the symbolic Muslim family in the picture, the woman seems to be wearing a burka. Balkenende talks about the purifying effects of Ramadan.
http://www.dutchdisease.com/blog/index.php?p=2233

Minister of Integration Rita Verdonk says radicalism is not part of Islam. Muslim children glorifying Theo van Gogh’s killer are just searching for their identity and act provocative to get attention. Negative stereotypes in the media only make things worse. To combat polarisation a bus called ‘Netherlands New Land’ will drive across the country with imams and people of other faiths and cultures onboard. There will be an annual debate between politicians, journalists, pundits (all of the politically correct variety, of course) and people from various (heavily subsidised) organisations to address ‘negative stereotyping’.
http://www.dutchdisease.com/blog/index.php?p=2231

A Turkish member of GroenLinks (communist party) wants streets in the Dutch city of Amersfoort to carry Turkish and Moroccan names. “This will help integration,” he says.
http://www.dutchdisease.com/blog/index.php?p=2230

The number of sexist (that’s a mild way of putting it), homophobic and anti-Semitic incidents has gone up, says the Dutch secret service. To blame are the usual suspects. Thank God there is a Bureau for Muslim Discrimination in Amsterdam where Muslims can complain about the Islamophobic secret service.
http://www.dutchdisease.com/blog/index.php?p=2224

Radical Dutch Muslim can’t find a job. He refuses to shake a woman’s hand. He sports a long beard. He thinks Dutch people are immoral. Instead of leaving this sordid den of kufr and moving back to Morocco, the country his parents are from, he got himself a Moroccan bride and brought her back to Holland. The poor girl is wearing a veil, has to eat her cake alone in the kitchen whenever there’s another man in the house and she’s only allowed to work with other women. That kind of narrows your chances of finding a job. But no worries: Holland has a very nice welfare system.
http://www.dutchdisease.com/blog/index.php?p=2218

That’s just from the last two days. I haven’t even mentioned the scores of Muslims and other scallywags of foreign descent beating up Dutch natives and each other in places like Weert, Amsterdam, The Hague, Nieuw-Vennep and Utrecht.

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/008451.php

[NYer]

Unicef bombs the Smurfs in fund-raising campaign for ex-child soldiers
By David Rennie in Brussels
(Filed: 08/10/2005)

The people of Belgium have been left reeling by the first adult-only episode of the Smurfs, in which the blue-skinned cartoon characters' village is annihilated by warplanes.

The short but chilling film is the work of Unicef, the United Nations Children's Fund, and is to be broadcast on national television next week as a campaign advertisement.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/graphics/2005/10/08/wsmurf08.jpg
The Unicef advert, which shows the Smurfs' village being bombed

The animation was approved by the family of the Smurfs' late creator, "Peyo".

Belgian television viewers were given a preview of the 25-second film earlier this week, when it was shown on the main evening news. The reactions ranged from approval to shock and, in the case of small children who saw the episode by accident, wailing terror.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/10/08/wsmurf08.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/10/08/ixhome.html

[Petronas]

Anglican Bishops' Report on Terrorism
October 3, 2005

(AgapePress) - A committee of bishops commissioned by the Church of England recently issued a report responding to the Iraq war and the war on terror. A Protestant renewal group in America is dismissing the report as "absurd."

The five Anglican bishops suggested that Christians should apologize to Muslims for the U.S.-British invasion of Iraq and the subsequent overthrow of dictator Saddam Hussein. The report -- entitled "Countering Terrorism: Power, Violence and Democracy Post 9/11" -- includes a 13-point schedule of "Christian principles" in response to the threat of terrorism, in which the writers call for states to "understand" the perspective of their terrorist antagonists. The September 19 report also alleges that U.S. evangelical Christians promoted and facilitated the war in Iraq because of their purported belief that the United States has a manifest destiny for military conquest. ...

http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/10/32005e.asp

[NYer]

Dutch unveil the toughest face in Europe with a ban on the burka
From Anthony Browne in Brussels



THE Netherlands is likely to become the first country in Europe to ban the burka, under government proposals that would bring in some of the toughest curbs on Muslim clothing in the world.

The country’s hardline Integration Minister, Rita Verdonk, known as the Iron Lady for her series of tough anti-immigration measures, told Parliament that she was going to investigate where and when the burka should be banned. The burka, traditional clothing in some Islamic societies, covers a woman’s face and body, leaving only a strip of gauze for the eyes.

Mrs Verdonk gave warning that the “time of cosy tea-drinking” with Muslim groups had passed and that natives and immigrants should have the courage to be critical of each other. She recently cancelled a meeting with Muslim leaders who refused to shake her hand because she was a woman.

The proposals are likely to win the support of Parliament because of the expected backing by right-wing parties. But they have caused outrage among Muslim and human rights groups, who say that the Government is pandering to the far Right.

Mrs Verdonk admitted that a complete ban on the garment would be legally tricky because of freedom of religion legislation. However, she said that she would prohibit the garments “in specific situations” on grounds of public safety. The ban is likely to be enforced in shops, public buildings, cinemas, train and bus stations and airports, as well as on trains and buses.

The Netherlands has become preoccupied by Islamic terrorism after the investigation into the murder of the film-maker Theo van Gogh uncovered a network of Muslim extremists dedicated to destroying the country. Attention has turned to the burka because police authorities have become concerned that a terrorist could use one for concealment.

A government spokesman said: “We want to investigate when, how, in which places the burka should be banned. It is a safety measure — you don’t see who is in it.” The Government cites as a precedent existing football legislation, which bans people from entering football grounds covering their faces in scarves.

Yassim Hertog, a vice-president of the Muslim School Boards Union, said: “Can you prohibit someone from wearing a certain type of dress? They are trying to test what a government can forbid, and how far you can go trampling on people’s rights. They want to show all these Dutch citizens who are sick and tired of all these ‘mutant’ citizens, this is where we draw the line — get normal.”

Muslim groups insist that only a few dozen women in the Netherlands wear the burka, and that the ban is a distraction. The Muslims and Government Contact Body said: “Only a handful of Muslims actually wear burkas. Let us focus our energy on what we have in common. This is not a big problem.”

Last year two Muslim women lost a court case against their college that had banned them from wearing burkas during their social work and childcare course. The judge backed the college in its claim that children had to be able to see who was caring for them, prompting the women to drop the course.

Famile Arslan, the women’s lawyer, told The Times:

“Women have a very strong opinion about the burka. If you ban it they won’t leave the house. It is not a good way to integrate and emancipate Muslim women. Everything Muslims do is criticised by Verdonk. She is doing it to get votes. She doesn’t care about Muslims and their problems.”

Mrs Verdonk made the proposals after Geert Wilders, the right-wing MP, requested the ban. Mr Wilders claimed that the garment was unfriendly towards women and a threat to security.

Baroness Sarah Ludford MEP, on the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee, who has been active in opposing bans on the hijab, or scarf, said that there were no arguments for banning the burka. “If there is a genuine belief that someone under a burka is a terrorist, then you invoke stop-and-search laws on the grounds of reasonable suspicion.”

The Netherlands would become the first European country to ban the wearing of the burka in public situations, although there are already some local bans. Last year several Belgian towns, including Antwerp and Ghent, banned the wearing of the burka in public, and recently started issuing £100 spot fines for breaking the municipal ordinance. Several towns in Italy, including Como, have invoked legislation introduced by Mussolini that bans hiding one’s face in public to impose fines on burka-wearers. France and several regions of Germany have followed Turkey and Tunisia in banning the wearing of the hijab, which leaves the face visible, in public buildings, most controversially in schools.

The French ban applies only inside government-owned buildings and was imposed to preserve the secular nature of the state.

SHIFT TO THE RIGHT

How the Netherlands has become less liberal:

Immigrants must pass an exam on Dutch language and culture before being allowed to move to the Netherlands. That does not apply to immigrants from US, Canada, Australia, Japan and other EU states.

Legal immigrants already there must take a Dutch language course at their own expense.

Immigrants guilty of any minor crime, such as shoplifting, during their first three years in the country can be deported.

People can bring in a husband or wife only once they are 24 years old, and do not depend on welfare benefits. The measures are aimed at curbing international arranged marriages.

26,000 illegal immigrants are being deported, some of whom have been in the country for ten years and have established families.

Clampdown on foreign imams working in mosques. They must show their appreciation of Dutch values.

Increase in sentences for a range of crimes, and introduction of “zero tolerance” policing to cities such as Rotterdam.


Tightening of rules on cannabis-selling coffee-shops and zero-tolerance approach to infringements. About half the coffee shops in Amsterdam have closed.

The Netherlands is still liberal in some ways, however. In 2001, the country became the first in the world to legalise gay marriages. The Netherlands still has liberal rules on euthanasia, recently extending it to severely handicapped babies and children.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,13509-1823334,00.html

[Petronas]

Second night of rioting in Paris
Saturday, October 29, 2005

Silent march follows Paris riots

Hundreds of people have taken part in a silent march through a suburb of Paris in memory of two teenage boys whose deaths sparked two nights of violence. Angry crowds clashed with police on Thursday and Friday nights, throwing stones and setting cars alight in the suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois. The crowds blamed police for the deaths of the two boys, electrocuted when they climbed into an electrical station. Reports said the boys had been trying to evade police - who deny this. The authorities in Paris say no officers were chasing them at the time of their deaths. Police detained 14 people after Friday night's clashes, which officials said saw 15 police officers and one journalist injured, and a shot fired at a police van. Thursday's violence broke out after youths attacked firefighters who had been called in to help the two victims, who were aged 15 and 17, and a third youth who received serious burns.

Second night of rioting in Paris

Hundreds of French youths fought with police and set cars ablaze in a suburb of Paris early Saturday in a second night of rioting which media said was triggered when two teenagers died fleeing police. Firefighters intervened around 40 times on Friday night in the northeastern suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois where many of the 28,000 residents are immigrants, mainly from Africa, police and fire officers said. Unidentified youths fired a shot at police but no one was hurt, police said. A police trade union called for help from the army to support police officers. "There's a civil war underway in Clichy-Sous-Bois at the moment," Michel Thooris, an official of police trade union Action Police CFTC, said. "We can no longer withstand this situation on our own. My colleagues neither have the equipment nor the practical or theoretical training for street fighting," he said.

September Diary

In Le Figaro daily dated Feb 1, 2002, Lucienne Bui Trong, a criminologist working for the French government's Renseignements Generaux (General Intelligence — a mix of FBI and secret service), complains that the survey system she had created for accurately denumbering the Muslim no-go zones was dismantled by the government. She wrote: 'From 106 hot points in 1991, we went to 818 sensitive areas in 1999. That's for the whole country. These data were not politically correct.' Since she comes from a Vietnamese background, Ms. Bui Trong cannot be suspected of racism, of course, otherwise she wouldn't have been able to start this survey in the first place. The term she uses, 'sensitive area,' is the PC euphemism for these places where anything representing a Western institution (post office truck, firemen, even mail order delivery firms, and of course cops) is routinely ambushed with Molotov cocktails, and where war weapons imported from the Muslim part of Yugoslavia are routinely found. The number 818 is from 2002. I'd go out on a limb and venture that it hasn't decreased in two years. Note the French govt's response to these unpleasant statistics — they stopped collecting the statistics!

The unreported race riot in France

Fredric Encel, Professor of international relations at the prestigious Ecole Nationale d'Administration in Paris and a man not known for crying wolf, recently stated that France is becoming a new Lebanon. The implication, far-fetched though it may seem, was that civil upheaval might be no more than a few years off, sparked by growing ethnic and religious polarization. In recent weeks, a series of events has underlined this ominous trend. On March 8, tens of thousands of high school students marched through central Paris to protest education reforms announced by the government. Repeatedly, peaceful demonstrators were attacked by bands of black and Arab youths--about 1,000 in all, according to police estimates. The eyewitness accounts of victims, teachers, and most interestingly the attackers themselves gathered by the left-wing daily Le Monde confirm the motivation: racism. Some of the attackers openly expressed their hatred of "little French people." One 18-year-old named Heikel, a dual citizen of France and Tunisia, was proud of his actions. He explained that he had joined in just to "beat people up," especially "little Frenchmen who look like victims." He added with a satisfied smile that he had "a pleasant memory" of repeatedly kicking a student, already defenseless on the ground. Another attacker explained the violence by saying that "little whites" don't know how to fight and "are afraid because they are cowards." Rachid, an Arab attacker, added that even an Arab can be considered a "little white" if he "has a French mindset." The general sentiment was a desire to "take revenge on whites."

Stoning in France

The alleged murderer of a 23-year-old Tunisian woman, whose stoned body was discovered on October 20, has been placed in police custody. The suspect, 18, arrested Sunday at his home, is an old acquaintance of the victim. He will be presented before the examining magistrate today.

Is France on the way to becoming an Islamic state?

France is facing the problem that dare not speak its name. Though French law prohibits the census from any reference to ethnic background or religion, many demographers estimate that as much as 20-30 per cent of the population under 25 is now Muslim. The streets, the traditional haunt of younger people, now belong to Muslim youths. In France, the phrase "les jeunes" is a politically correct way of referring to young Muslims. Given current birth rates, it is not impossible that in 25 years France will have a Muslim majority. The consequences are dynamic: is it possible that secular France might become an Islamic state?


Holocaust lessons meet Muslim rebuff in France

"Filthy Jew!" schoolchildren howl at a classmate. "Jews only want money and power," they tell their teachers. "Death to the Jews" graffiti appear on school walls outside Paris and other French cities. These are not scenes from the wartime Nazi occupation or a fictional France where the far-right has taken control. Outright anti-Semitism like this is a fact of life these days in the poor suburbs where much of France's Muslim minority lives. The outspoken book "The Lost Territories of the Republic" opened France's eyes to classrooms where some Muslim pupils openly denounced Jews, praised Hitler and refused to listen to any non-Muslim teacher talking about the history of Islam.

Will Muslim Immigration Trigger Wars in Europe?

Yes, I’m pretty sure this immigration will trigger wars in Europe. This continent has simply lost control over its own borders, and the native population is being replaced at an astonishing rate in many of its major cities. Europe has a rather violent history, and migrations of this magnitude have usually triggered wars between the original population and the newcomers. The situation becomes even worse when we enter another factor: Islam. The Islamic world is at war with pretty much everybody, everywhere. Both Thailand and the Philippines, countries where the Muslim population is not much larger than it is in some Western European countries, are facing war.

http://fjordman.blogspot.com/2005/10/second-night-of-rioting-in-paris.html

[Petronas]

Six charged for honour slaying
Published 27.10.05 09:30

A Pakistani family has been arrested for planning and carrying out the murder of a 19-year-old woman last month. The girl had married without her family's consent. Police have arrested six members of a Pakistani family for hunting down and killing a 19-year-old girl, who had married against the family's wishes. Daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten reported that with two further arrests in the case, five men and one woman were now in remand for the suspected honour killing of Ghazala Abbas, who was shot to death in front of the central station in the western Zealand town of Slagelse on 23 September. The day before, Abbas had married a 27-year-old Afghan-born man.

'We arrested two men from the deceased's family on Wednesday morning. The arrests were made in Copenhagen, and we can't rule out the possibility that there will be more arrests. We continue a massive investigation on the family, amongst others,' said Crime Inspector Flemming Madsen of the Slagelse Police. Police said the investigation was hampered by the implicated persons' reluctance to talk, but that the last four arrests had led to a breakthrough in the investigation.

Five of the people arrested are Ghazala's close relatives, including her father and her older brother, who was the one that shot her to death and severely injured her husband in front of a large group of witnesses in broad daylight in Slagelse. The couple was married the day before they were attacked, supposedly without the bride's family's consent.

Daily newspaper BT reported that a network of Pakistani taxi drivers and the woman arrested had helped the brother track his sister down. The couple had fled from the family's home in Copenhagen's Amager district and gone into hiding in Jutland, there, they were married in secret at a city hall. Ghazala, however, decided to trust the female relative with her secret, and called her to tell her the news. The woman betrayed her, BT reported, and told the family what she had done.

Pakistani taxi drivers told BT that Ghazala's brother had asked them to keep an eye out for his sister, and ordered everyone in the family and its circle of friends to tell him if they heard from her. The network tracked the newlyweds down a few hours after their wedding. A source said to BT's reporter that Ghazala had told her female relative that she had left her hiding place in Jutland and sought refuge with her friends in Slagelse.

'The friend must have known that if she passed the information on to Ghazala's family, she would help the honour killing being planned to take place,' the source said, adding that she must also have feared retribution if the word ever got out that she had known of the couple's whereabouts without telling the family.

Ghazala's brother was so intent on finding and killing his sister in order to save the family's honour that he left his wife and family only a few days after the birth of his second child to carry out the death sentence, BT reported. Armed with the female relative's information, a confirmation from Pakistani taxi drivers, and a gun, he arrived at the central station to find his sister standing right outside, waiting for a taxi. He shot her three times, then attacked her husband, beat him, and forced him down on the ground, where he shot him. The husband survived by a hair's breadth.

The newspaper said the liquidation of Ghazala Abbas demonstrated the enormous conspiracy and pressure immigrant women were faced with if they broke away from their families and tried to make independent choices in their lives.

Anne Mau, secretary of the National Association of Women's Crisis Centres, which accept many immigrant women on the run from their families, said the Pakistani taxi network worked systematically to find women who had fled their families, and alerted their whereabouts to their relatives. 'Taxi drivers are mobile, they now one another and the community, and they work systematically. The family uses a mobile telephone to send a picture around of the wanted woman. Then the hunting begins,' Mau said. 'This way many women have been discovered on the street, caught, and delivered back to their families.'

http://www.jp.dk/english_news/artikel:aid=3347628/

[Petronas]

The official estimate of the number of Muslims in Great Britain is about 1.6 million. I always thought that was an underestimate.

Islam in the heart of Europe

When mentioning Ramadhan, most attention is focused on Muslims of the Middle East or Southeast Asia. What is forgotten is how the millions of Muslims in the western world spend this holy month of Ramadhan. Here, we will put the light on Britain and the beauty of Islam during this precious month.

The major Muslim migration to Britain began from the mid-nineteenth century. Yemeni’s were the first group of migrants who arrived in the ports of Cardiff, Liverpool, and London. At the beginning of the migration a language barrier existed and was a serious issue that Yemeni’s faced. Therefore many misunderstandings between Yemeni and British citizens existed. Nowadays Muslims from over 75 countries live in Britain, most of which are from the sub-continent of India and Pakistan. Many places in Britain are also loaded with the presence of Muslims from Tunisia, Morocco, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and many other countries. The Muslim population is estimated to reach over 5 million in the present day. Cities with the biggest Muslim population are London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Sheffield, Manchester, and Bradford.

The fast growth of Muslims in Britain has created a greater chance for British people to learn more about Islam. In the early days of migration, Muslims had to call foreign Imams (Muslim scholars) to run local mosques, and teach their children basic Islamic education. These days native Muslims are replacing many foreign Imams for this post.

To many Muslims in Britain, Ramadhan is not a difficult issue to cope with. Days are much shorter then that of the Middle East, and fits perfectly with everyday life. Fajr prayer is usually held at 5:30am which is a good time for many in Britain to have breakfast, while Iftaar (fast breaking) time is sometimes around 4:00pm in the afternoon, which is also a good lunch time. The pressures of Ramadhan, is less felt then that of other countries. But the negative aspect to this issue is that many people are forced to have iftaar at work while not having the opportunity to have it with friends or family at home. Unfortunately, the only available time to have iftaar with family is on weekends or holidays. “ You could never find time to enjoy iftaar with family during Ramadhan. We are always busy and work in this part of the world is much more different back home”, said Aman Qureshy, an Afghan Muslim residing in London. “ This is probably the only negative aspect of Ramadhan in Britain”.

For those at home or even at work during Ramadhan, they could at least enjoy the beautiful reciatation of the Quran on “Radio Ramadhan”. It is a special radio station, which offers a 24-hour service, giving lessons on Tafseer of the Quran, Hadith, Quranic recitation and many lectures during the length of the day. Many people have embraced Islam in Britain due to the listening of this radio station. It is seen as a door for people in Britain to get a better look at Islam and what it really stands for.

People from all age groups flock local mosques to learn more about Islam. Special classes for Quranic recitation are available in almost every mosque. Lessons in Fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence) are also given during the afternoon period of the day. For those who want to learn more about Arabic, classes are also available. Many mosques open their doors to Non-Muslims who would like to learn more about the beauty of Islam from within, and the love and brotherhood it calls for. Many British citizens embrace Islam during this great month of Ramadhan, for they see the reality of Islam and what it teaches. An estimated 16% of Muslims in Britain are English (native Britain’s).

Most of Britain’s Arabs live around Edgware Road, in the heart of London. This street is filled with Arab culture as many Arab restaurants and cafes are available. Most shops on this street are open 24hrs a day. When walking on this Arab culture rich street of London, you will feel that you are spending Ramadhan in a Middle Eastern country and not in Europe. ...

http://yementimes.com/article.shtml?i=890&p=report&a=1

[Petronas]

Paris, Dijon, Rouen, Marseilles, Aarhus burning; shots fired through the office window of the Dutch Immigration Minister. This is a chilling preview of the first 9fictional) chapter of Tony Blankley's recent book "The West's Last Chance". It is well worth reading.

[Petronas]

WHY PARIS IS BURNING
By AMIR TAHERI
November 4, 2005

...Some are even calling for the areas where Muslims form a majority of the population to be reorganized on the basis of the "millet" system of the Ottoman Empire: Each religious community (millet) would enjoy the right to organize its social, cultural and educational life in accordance with its religious beliefs. In parts of France, a de facto millet system is already in place. In these areas, all women are obliged to wear the standardized Islamist "hijab" while most men grow their beards to the length prescribed by the sheiks. The radicals have managed to chase away French shopkeepers selling alcohol and pork products, forced "places of sin," such as dancing halls, cinemas and theaters, to close down, and seized control of much of the local administration.

A reporter who spent last weekend in Clichy and its neighboring towns of Bondy, Aulnay-sous-Bois and Bobigny heard a single overarching message: The French authorities should keep out. "All we demand is to be left alone," said Mouloud Dahmani, one of the local "emirs" engaged in negotiations to persuade the French to withdraw the police and allow a committee of sheiks, mostly from the Muslim Brotherhood, to negotiate an end to the hostilities.

President Jacques Chirac and Premier de Villepin are especially sore because they had believed that their opposition to the toppling of Saddam Hussein in 2003 would give France a heroic image in the Muslim community. ...

... That illusion has now been shattered — and the Chirac administration, already passing through a deepening political crisis, appears to be clueless about how to cope with what the Parisian daily France Soir has called a "ticking time bomb." It is now clear that a good portion of France's Muslims not only refuse to assimilate into "the superior French culture," but firmly believe that Islam offers the highest forms of life to which all mankind should aspire.

So what is the solution? One solution, offered by Gilles Kepel, an adviser to Chirac on Islamic affairs, is the creation of "a new Andalusia" in which Christians and Muslims would live side by side and cooperate to create a new cultural synthesis. The problem with Kepel's vision, however, is that it does not address the important issue of political power. Who will rule this new Andalusia: Muslims or the largely secularist Frenchmen? ...

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/008844.php

[Petronas]

WHY AN INTIFADA IN FRANCE?
John Derbyshire
Saturday, November 05, 2005

An acquaintance of mine -- French, currently resident in North Africa -- sent a long post about the French riots to an email group I belong to. It is a fascinating post, but much too long to paste here. I did think, though, that the following passage would interest NRO readers, so with his permission, I pass it on. It is from a passage headed: "Why an Intifada in France?" It is among a long list of reasons given as answers to the question.

"The Iraq war: as I had noticed very strongly in Tunisia a little more than 2 years ago, the opposition of France to intervention in Iraq has been perceived as a sign of weakness, and French are since considered as Dhimmis. The change of attitude from Arabs against French has been dramatic: now I know problems of security in Tunisia, and even in the French planes to go and come from there, and in Nice (French Riviera) Airport! This opposition, probably motivated by the money earned in Oil For Terror program and by threats from Saudi Arabia and Iran, has marked the end of France as a Western country (whatever one thinks about the Iraq war per se!)."

http://corner.nationalreview.com/

[NYer]

Cars ablaze in third night
of arson attacks in Belgium


8 November 2005 - 11pm

BRUSSELS — The Belgian government's crisis centre confirmed on Tuesday night vandals had set cars ablaze in the cities of Antwerp, Ghent and Brussels.

It is the third night in succession that cars have been torched, but a spokesman for the national crisis centre said each case was an "isolated" incident.

"There were no injuries and there was no certainly no gathering [of youths]. The culprits cannot yet be found," spokesman Fernand Koekelberg said.

The ongoing unrest in Belgium has fuelled concerns of a spillover of the violence witnessed in France in the past two weeks, news agency AFP reported.

"We hoped that [the initial incidents on Sunday night] were isolated cases, but apparently it's continuing," police spokesman Albert Roossens said earlier on Tuesday.

And as night closed in on Tuesday, the national crisis centre said an arson attack took place in the Van Kerckhovenstraat in Antwerp at 7.30pm.

The street is located in a problem district on the edge of the city.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=25172&name=Cars+ablaze+in+third+nightof+arson+attacks+in +Belgium

[Petronas]

"Islam is now a European religion"
November 12, 2005 10:00 AM

Swiss intellectual Tariq Ramadan tells swissinfo that Muslims in Europe should not be defined by religion, but seen as members of the society in which they live. Ramadan, who recently took up an advisory role for the British government on Islamic extremism, says that Islam is now a European religion, and should be recognised as such.

The Geneva-born philosopher is visiting fellow at St Antony's College at Britain's Oxford University. A controversial figure, Ramadan had his visa to the United States revoked last year, preventing him from taking up a professorship at Notre Dame University in Indiana. Ramadan said the ban was unjustified and rejected the "untrue and humiliating" claims that he was barred because of ties to terrorism.

The 43-year-old is the grandson of Hassan al-Banna, who founded the prominent Islamic movement the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928. Accused of supporting attacks in Israel and Iraq, Ramadan has publicly condemned the September 11 and London attacks and says he is against the taking of innocent life. While he has a popular following among European Muslims - especially in France - Ramadan has been banned from Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Tunisia. ...

[Interview with Tariq Ramadan follows]

http://www.swissinfo.org/sen/swissinfo.html?siteSect=106&sid=6232522&cK

[Petronas]

In 1565 Grandmaster Jean Parisot de la Vallette conducted a heroic and successful defense of Malta against an overwhelming Turkish Muslim invasion. It looks like the Muslims are beginning to return with help from our good friend Qhadhafi.

Ramadan and Islam in Malta
Issue: (893), Volume 14 , From 10 November 2005 to 13 November 2005

Am I a muezzin in Malta? This expression is said by an exasperated speaker who is being ignored by his or her audience. An expression which probably stems from the observation that very few people in Malta, if any, are Muslim. The call of the muezzin there is assumed to fall on deaf ears.

However this assumption does not hold true any longer. There is nowadays a small but thriving Muslim community in Malta. It numbers a few thousands out of a national population of about 400 000. It also includes many expatriates hailing from all Muslim countries of Africa and the Middle East as well as Asia and Europe. The Muslims in Malta form a multicultural group. The individual members of this group retained the traditions and the customs of their respective ethnic and cultural backgrounds. But at the same time, these differences have gradually combined to make one distinct community. Islam is, of course, the common denominator which holds the different members together. This unity and the manifestation of Islam are most evident during the Holy Month of Ramadan.

Now that Ramadan has begun, the daily routines of people in Muslim societies change. However the Muslims in Malta are a minority, and a relatively new one at that, within a mostly Roman Catholic populace. Thus the everyday pace of everyday life is not affected on a national scale: people must still to go to work at normal working hours; children still need to go to school. This poses significant difficulties to Muslims who seek to fulfill all their rigorous religious obligations of fasting and prayers. Nonetheless, most manage to do just that, a behaviour admired even by many non-Muslims.

The Islamic Cultural Centre in Malta is the fulcrum around which all major religious activities turn. It was founded by the Islamic Call Society whose headquarters are in Tripoli, Libya. The Centre comprises the mosque, administrative offices, a primary school and the Imam's house. Since its cornerstone was laid by Colonel Mu'ammar Al-Qadhafi, the Libyan head of state and leader of the Revolution, on 2nd July, 1978, the Centre has aimed at rendering service to the Muslim community in Malta by the performance of religious rites, the celebration of religious occasions as well as the promotion of the Arabic language and the Islamic culture. The Centre also aims at acquainting the general Maltese public with Islam while enhancing dialogue and cooperation for the benefit of all. The Centre's helping hands extend to the poor, the refugees and prisoners. The Islamic Centre is the most important meeting point for Muslims in the country.

At the end of Ramadan, the Centre organises the Eid el-Fitr festival. The adjacent primary school is allowed a few days of holidays so that the students can celebrate the Eid with their families. Moreover, a formal reception is held at the Centre to which the Prime Minister of Malta and other honourable guests are invited. This annual event reinforces the excellent relations which the Centre, representing the Muslim community, has with the local authorities.

The Maltese islands with a total area of 316 km_ make up a small republic in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. The capital city is Valletta. Their history has been described as chequered because all the powers that were ever present in the Mediterranean region have left their impact. Prior to independence in 1964, the Maltese islands have ended up as possessions or colonies of foreign powers including the Arabs in 870. The Maltese language is a direct result of this mixture of cultures. After 1090, European powers secured the Maltese islands into their realms and the islands eventually served as Europe's southern border and a bulwark of Christianity. Meanwhile new words from Italian and other European languages were assimilated into the Maltese language but the Semitic background prevailed.

The Maltese word Randan illustrates this fact. It means Lent, the Christian time of fasting, and lasts forty days. Its first day is called Ras ir-Randan. A number of language scholars believe it to be an interesting relic of a time when Christianity and Islam co-existed on the island. The word Randan, the Christianised version of the Muslim Ramadan thus dates back to a time when the Christian period of fasting was much more rigorous than it is today and comparable to the present Islamic Ramadan. This word is common to both Christianity and Islam (although rather altered after nearly 900 years) but for the Maltese it has no Islamic connotations or undertones. Similarly, common to both religions are the words Alla (Allah) and Ghid (pronounced 'eid, meaning festival.)

http://yementimes.com/article.shtml?i=893&p=report&a=2

[Petronas]

No 'cheap souk'
November 19, 2005, Vol. 20, No. 45

Egyptian-born scholar Bat Ye'or has written extensively about the treatment of dhimmis, or non-Muslims, under Muslim domination. Her latest book, Eurabia (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2005), chronicles Arab determination to subdue Europe as a cultural appendage to the Muslim world—and Europe's willingness to be so subjugated. It is her first book to be published in English before French, a decision Bat Ye'or now says took into account U.S. terror threats but did not foresee the dramatic spike in Muslim-led violence in France. Its publication in French is soon due out.

WORLD: Have the intensity and longevity of the uprisings in France surprised you?

BAT YE'OR: Yes, I was surprised. I did not expect such violence for the accidental deaths of two youths, a tragedy that can happen at any moment in any city, including in Muslim countries; in fact, such a reaction in a Muslim country is not conceivable. Nor did I expect the lethargy and incapacity of parents and the people in the suburbs to control the youth. However, it is the state of total unpreparedness to deal rapidly with an intifada that is worrying.

WORLD: Please explain how its roots go back to the 1970s and even further.

BAT YE'OR: In the 1960s after decolonization, France and Great Britain wanted to establish good relations with their former Arab colonies, while the Arab League was trying to bring Europe to adopt an anti-Zionist and pro-Arab line. The nine countries of the European Community (EC) made a deal with the Arab League countries based on a strategy: the creation of a Mediterranean multicultural and united society. This Euro-Arab alliance was based on three pillars: anti-Zionism and the promotion and support by Europe of Arafat; anti-Americanism and a European policy contrary to that of America; the guaranty of oil supply to Europe. Within this framework, specialists set up numerous unofficial agreements. Muslim immigration is a part of these agreements with a view to create a multicultural Mediterranean society where Christians and Muslims would be reconciled—on the base of anti-Zionism and the delegitimation of Israel and its withering away.

WORLD: Is Europe's Muslim population seeking to be ghettoized?

BAT YE'OR: The radicalized youths of the suburbs of Paris and elsewhere want to control their "territory." [They see] state control as an occupation and an infringement on their rights.

WORLD: Muslim leaders are, according to press reports, working as mediators between angry youths and authorities. Can Islamic leaders come alongside a secular state?

BAT YE'OR: This would make of France an Islamic-type state, or two states: one ruled by French law, with extraterritorial entities ruled by Islamic laws.

WORLD: With these uprisings spreading through Europe, what can European leaders do to halt the violence?

BAT YE'OR: The first thing to do is to stop immigration, and this is not in the cards. Then they should reassess European laws, values, and identity. These have been depreciated by our leaders, fascinated by multiculturalism—the Andalusian utopia, the greatness of Islam—and business profits. We need to re-valorize Europe and stop making it a cheap souk open to anyone. Europe must stop its antisemitism and anti-Zionism, because the biblical values are at the root of Christianity and of Europe's civilization.

WORLD: You have a provocative chapter in Eurabia on "The Islamization of Christianity" . . .

BAT YE'OR: There are many processes of Islamization. One of them is through theology and the adoption of the Muslim replacement theology, whereby the biblical figures from Adam—Abraham, Moses, down to Mary and Jesus—are all considered as "Muslim prophets." Hence, Israel's history is transferred to the Muslim Palestinians, and it is easy to see from there the final transition to Islam where the Jewish Jesus becomes an Arab-Palestinian-Muslim prophet.

WORLD: How is Eurabia being received in Europe?

BAT YE'OR: It brought me enemies, and I was calumniated in The New York Times. A major French weekly ran several articles against me, forcing me to take a lawyer, obliging them to publish my response. Half a dozen European publishers have shown interest to publish it in different languages, and there is a great interest from the public as well.

http://www.worldmag.com/subscriber/displayarticle.cfm?id=11271

[Petronas]

French minister says polygamy to blame for riots
Last updated: November 15 2005 20:30

France’s employment minister on Tuesday fingered polygamy as one reason for the rioting in the country. Gérard Larcher said multiple marriages among immigrants was one reason for the racial discrimination which ethnic minorities faced in the job market. Overly large polygamous families sometimes led to anti-social behaviour among youths who lacked a father figure, making employers wary of hiring ethnic minorities, he explained.

The minister, speaking to a group of foreign journalists as the government stepped up efforts to improve its image with the foreign media, said: “Since part of society displays this anti-social behaviour, it is not surprising that some of them have difficulties finding work ... Efforts must be made by both sides. If people are not employable, they will not be employed.”

The riots, and the government’s slow reaction to the violence, has led to widespread criticism that France’s ruling class is out of touch with the rest of the country. Mr Larcher’s comments could further fuel the debate and are likely to outrage Muslim and anti-racism groups in France. They also come as the government considers tightening visa-granting rules and a possible clampdown on polygamous families already living in France.

Although polygamy is illegal in France, visas were granted freely to family members of immigrants until 1993, when visas were banned for more than one spouse. Many wives continued to enter illegally, however and a clampdown, if enforced, could affect families that entered the country before 1993.

Politicians estimate there are 10,000-20,000 polygamous families in France, most from North and sub-Saharan African countries such as Algeria, Mali and Senegal, where the practice is legal. Polygamy is a taboo subject for most mainstream French politicians. Far-right groups, however, have seized on it to argue that immigrants abuse the French social security system by collecting state benefits for several wives. ...

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/d6f1fe0a-5615-11da-b04f-00000e25118c.html

[Petronas]

Bishop: Turkey is a 'bomb' under the EU
16 November 2005

AMSTERDAM — The Roman Catholic Bishop of the Dutch city of Roermond has spoken out against Turkey joining the European Union. Bishop Frans Wiertz expressed fear that Muslims in the Netherlands often don't accept democratic principles. He made his comments in the Limburg magazine 'Chapeau!' which was published on Wednesday.

"Politicians underestimate the problem of Islam in Europe," Wiertz said. "We are surrendering our own norms and values of mutual esteem and respect. On the other hand, there is barely any or no freedom of religion in Turkey. With the coming of a hundred million Turks you are planting a democratic bomb under Europe," the bishop said.

Wiertz went on to say: "In our own country we have dropped the principle of the majority decides. Because we want to put everything and everyone on an equal footing, a small minority has actually got an enormous grip on society. But for very many Muslims - even in this country - the democratic principle is alien to them. They have never learned to accept it". The bishop said newcomers had to be taught to accept democratic principles. He expressed doubt whether Islamic schools were doing enough to promote this. "We must not be so naive, otherwise the bottom of our society threatens to collapse".

Wiertz said he was worried about the rise of Islamic orthodoxy in Turkey. He said it was very difficult for Roman Catholics to be open about their faith in Turkey, while there was absolutely no religious freedom in most 'Arabic' countries.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=1&story_id=25363&name=Bishop%3A+Turkey+is+a+%27bomb%27+under+the+EU

[Petronas]

The accelerating march to dhimmitude... On the other hand, with Theo van Gogh's example at hand, can one really blame Simon Reade if he wanted to keep his head attached to his neck?

Marlowe's Koran-burning hero is censored to avoid Muslim anger
November 24, 2005

IT WAS the surprise hit of the autumn season, selling out for its entire run and inspiring rave reviews. But now the producers of Tamburlaine the Great have come under fire for censoring Christopher Marlowe’s 1580s masterpiece to avoid upsetting Muslims. Audiences at the Barbican in London did not see the Koran being burnt, as Marlowe intended, because David Farr, who directed and adapted the classic play, feared that it would inflame passions in the light of the London bombings.

Simon Reade, artistic director of the Bristol Old Vic, said that if they had not altered the original it “would have unnecessarily raised the hackles of a significant proportion of one of the world’s great religions”. The burning of the Koran was “smoothed over”, he said, so that it became just the destruction of “a load of books” relating to any culture or religion. That made it more powerful, they claimed. Members of the audience also reported that key references to Muhammad had been dropped, particularly in the passage where Tamburlaine says that he is “not worthy to be worshipped”. In the original Marlowe writes that Muhammad “remains in hell”.

The censorship aroused condemnation yesterday from senior figures in the theatre and scholars, as well as religious leaders. Terry Hands, who directed Tamburlaine for the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1992, said: “I don’t believe you should interfere with any classic for reasons of religious or political correctness.”

Charles Nicholl, the author of The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe, said it was wrong to tamper with Marlowe because he asked “uncomfortable and confrontational questions — particularly aimed at those that held dogmatic, religious views”. He added: “Why should Islam be protected from the questioning gaze of Marlowe? Marlowe stands for provocative questions. This is a bit of an insult to him.”

Marlowe rivalled Shakespeare as the most powerful dramatist of the Elizabethan period. He died aged 29 in a brawl over a tavern bill. Tamburlaine the Great was written not later than 1587. It tells the story of a shepherd-robber who defeats the king of Persia, the emperor of Turkey and, seeing himself as the “scourge of God”, burns the Koran.

Mr Farr reworked the text after the July 7 attacks. The production closed last week. Mr Farr said in a statement: “The choices I made in the adaptation were personal about the focus I wanted to put on the main character and had nothing to do with modern politics.” But Mr Reade said that Mr Farr felt that burning the Koran “would have been unnecessarily inflammatory”. The play needed to be seen in a 21stcentury context, he believed.He said: “Marlowe was not challenging Muslims, he was attacking theism, saying, ‘I’m God, there isn’t a God’. If he had been in a Christian country, a Judaic country or a Hindu country, it would be their gods he’d be attacking.” He said more people would be insulted by broadening the attack.

Inayat Bunglawala, the media secretary of the Muslim Council of Britain, disagreed, saying: “In the context of a fictional play, I don’t think it will have offended many people.”

Park Honan, Emeritus Professor at the School of English, University of Leeds, and author of Christopher Marlowe: Poet & Spy, said: “It is wrong to tamper with the play, wrong to shorten it and wrong to leave out the burning of the Koran because that is involved with the exposition of Tamburlaine’s character. He’s a false prophet. This is meant to horrify the audience.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1887902,00.html

[Petronas]

Christian doctor 'was forced out'
November 30, 2005

An eye specialist has accepted undisclosed damages after claiming that he was forced out of his job by Muslim colleagues. Joseph Erian took the United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust to an employment tribunal, stating that he was made to resign from the ophthalmology department of Pilgrim Hospital, Boston, after staff there discovered that he was a Christian. The tribunal, which started earlier this month, ended when the trust offered an out-of-court settlement and admitted that the problems surrounding Dr Erian’s case “were not his fault”. Dr Erian pursued his claim privately after the British Medical Association refused to back the case, Jane Jelly, his lawyer, said. He brought his case under the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003, which make it illegal to discriminate against someone on the grounds of their religion or beliefs.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1897087,00.html

[Petronas]

EU agrees plan to combat European terror recruiting
2 December 2005

BRUSSELS — EU justice and interior ministers agreed on Thursday on methods to combat the recruitment of Europeans into terrorist groups. The agreement was reached on the same day Belgian authorities charged five people with involvement in a network that sent volunteers to Iraq. One of the volunteers, 38-year-old Muriel Degauque, blew herself up in a failed attack on US troops near Baghdad last month.

"We face a threat from people who come to Europe from the outside and we face a threat from people who live in Europe," EU anti-terror chief Gijs de Vries said. "These threats are well known and are taken extremely seriously." The new strategy will involve EU governments adopting the best way to combat everything from internet sites promoting extremist Islamic ideas to fostering better community relations with Muslim groups. "We need to spot such behavior by, for example, community policing, and effective monitoring of the internet and of travel to conflict zones," the strategy said.

Ministers adopted the strategy at talks on counter terror measures. The strategy is one of 12 priority measures being fast-tracked by EU governments. One of the most contentious of the planned measures is an EU agreement on Friday compelling mobile phone companies to retain call and internet records for use in anti-terror investigations. Records will be kept for up to two years under the new rules, which need to be approved by the European Parliament. Police will have access to information about calls, SMS messages and internet data, but not the exact call content. Justice and interior ministers agreed governments can decide how long to hold data, ranging from six months to two years. Other measures up for discussion include a European Evidence Warrant and better exchange of intelligence.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=25887&name=EU+agrees+plan+to+combatEuropean+terror+recru iting

[Petronas]

School ban on girl wearing cross 'discriminatory'
06/12/2005

A mother accused her daughter's school of discriminating against Christians yesterday after the teenager was suspended for refusing to take off a crucifix necklace. Sam Morris, 16, was sent home from Sinfin Community School in Derby for breaking a school policy that bans jewellery. Last night her mother, Debra, said that Sikh children were allowed to wear a steel bracelet, known as a kara, for religious reasons and said her daughter had every right to express her faith. Education officials were unrepentant, however, and said that Sikhs are required by religion to wear items of jewellery, whereas Christians are not. ...

Derby city council urged any school imposing such regulations to look carefully at individual circumstances before issuing a total ban. A spokesman said: "It is lawful to ban crucifixes while allowing other religious symbols, but whether it is desirable is another matter. ...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=ZJ20UHHQEVBENQFIQMFSFF4AVCBQ 0IV0?xml=/news/2005/12/06/njewel06.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/12/06/ixhome.html

[Petronas]

This Shameful Ranting Must Stop
Wednesday 7th Dec 2005 at 02:00

Just before going back to the USA after five months in the UK I attended the ‘Global Peace and Unity’ Conference at London’s Excel Centre presented by the new Islam Channel and sponsored by Emirates Airlines, Western Union (hmm??) and the Metropolitan Police. It was advertised as a diverse event to which non-Muslims were invited and the impression one got from the website was of a celebration of Middle Eastern culture, food, music and children’s activities in a London milieu.

To my utter horror -- and I should have written this report two days ago but my physical and emotional shock have rendered me nearly inert -- it was a seven-hour call to Jihad by a succession of ranting and shouting rabble-rousers.

The eminent barrister Michael Mansfield QC, wearing black and white keffiyah scarf, shouted into the mike about the heinous crimes of the Western coalition countries. The crowd chanted and thundered its appreciation.

The terrifying demagogue George Galloway ascended the podium and exhorted the crowd to stand up for the redemption of the oppressed Muslim world or else the nation had better get ready for ‘rioting in every street in Britain.’.

The ‘slaughter in Palestine and Iraq’ being only part of the equation, Chechnya, Bosnia and Kashmir were also mentioned all day by every speaker including a crazed, chador-clad Yvonne Ridley, who at any moment I expected to self-immolate, such was her fury at the Zionists, the Americans and her fellow Britons. To my utter disbelief, she condemned the British police force as some form of fascist brigade in ‘jackboot Britain.’

To all of these exhortations came cries of ‘Alllahu Akhbar’ from the enormous, simmering crowd of what looked to me like the angriest gathering of young men and women with whom I have ever had the misfortune to be seated in my lifetime.

It must be noted for non-British and non-Commonwealth readers that legendary cricketer Imran Khan’s arrival from Pakistan to give a speech would be the equivalent of a sporting megastar doing similar in an American arena. The crowd of some 20,000 adoring, mostly young British Muslims went mad with joy when he ascended the stage and took to the dais. What followed was a stream of invective about his own leader, Parvez Musharraf, Egypt’s leader Hosni Mubarak, and of course the ‘axis of evil’ Bush, Blair and allies. (It must be noted here that in May, when the controversy arose about American soldiers allegedly flushing a Koran down a lavatory, Khan’s power over world Islam was such that he gave one short speech and riots ensued across the globe, including the horrifying flag-burnings in London’s Grosvenor Square. )

Khan actually said we should feel the degradation of modern Muslims in the context of Hitler and the Germans after Versailles. He used this example to accentuate the reason for ‘Muslim rage’ -- there was poor Germany belittled and humiliated, like the Muslim world today. He recounted being confronted by a fellow Pakistani after 9/11 who asked, ‘Do you not feel ashamed?’ and he told the adoring crowd he did not see what there was to be ashamed of, and anyway, 9/11 was an excuse for the criminal Washington neocons to start a New Crusade against Islam.

To illustrate the level of extremism to which this event had degenerated, one of the organisers actually took the mike and said the event team wished to distance themselves from Khan’s 9/11 views.

Various ‘artists’ whom I had thought would offer a variety of musical numbers gave loud, piercing renditions of what seemed the same chant about Allah. OK, that is fine, but where are the Muslim Placido Domingos, Joan Sutherlands, Isaac Sterns and George Balanchines? Why were there no Muslim educators present at this ‘cultural festival’ asking this vast multitude of young people to sign up for music, theatre and art programmes?

An elderly sheikh in Pakistan, Qazi Hussain Ahmad, was beamed in live to tell this excited crowd that he could hardly bring himself to articulate the word ‘Israel’ as this is not a country that even exists. (How would British Muslims like it if a rabbi got up and said partition had produced a country called Pakistan, a word he could barely utter because it is not a real country?)

The sheikh's English was barely comprehensible but he appeared to imply that Jews from ‘eighty nations’ were brought to Palestine to drive the Arabs away and to commit murder, torture, imprisonment and theft of land and homes over fifty-odd years. The young and impressionable crowd seemed ready for a collective Jihad at this point.

What was interesting was the repeated theme by a string of sheikhs from across the globe that the leaders of Arab nations were a weak, spineless bunch of puppets of the Americans who did not have the guts to stand up to Israel and the United States. This theme caused tremendous excitement in the crowd, as if a global Intifadah might just start in this London arena.

After the event I went to get some fresh air upstairs and as I looked out at a quaint old mill on the Quay a young English Muslim in a long robe and head covering asked me about this place where we stood, Canary Wharf. I told him it had been decimated and nearly obliterated by the Luftwaffe in the Blitz and that the conflagration could be seen as far away as Hertfordshire. I pointed out the lone mill and said it had miraculously survived the relentless wartime bombing raids. He looked at me and said, ‘Who did you say did the bombing?’ I replied, ‘The Luftwaffe.’ He said ‘Who are they?’ I said, ‘The Germans.’ He said ‘Really? Well, I’ve learned something today.’ Like the Muslim cab driver who last week asked me what St Paul’s Cathedral was, this young Englishman had no sense of British history or identity.

Shame on the Muslim Community of Great Britain for organising an event that can serve only to further agitate an already-radicalised segment of the British population. The anger, aggression and totally obsessive nature of the day left me feeling shocked and personally assaulted. How far would a white Christian group get holding such a rally? Cries of racial incitement would ring far and wide and the police would be summoned.

When the Muslim community of Great Britain, with its multitude of organisations, mosques and even its own Parliament, can organise an enlightened and civilised event that makes Jews, Christians , Hindus and all nationalities -- including Israelis and Americans -- feel welcome, then Britain will have achieved a true multiculturalism.

Until then, I am not ashamed to say I am scared out of my wits and would suggest said Americans, Jews, Israelis and Hindus get out of here as soon as possible. British Christians? They have expended boundless energies on condemnations of Israel and the USA but the anger I saw on Sunday will also decimate them. ...

http://www.currentviewpoint.com/cgibin/news.cgi?id=11&command=shownews&newsid=826

[Petronas]

France Issues Hajj Guide, Media Showing Interest
Mon., Dec. 19, 2005- Dhul-Qi`dah 17 - 17:15 GMT

PARIS, December 17, 2005 (IslamOnline.net) – The French Foreign Ministry has issued thousands of brochures on hajj in French and Arabic to make the spiritual journey easier for its Muslim citizens. The five-page guide contains key advice for the pilgrims during their stay in Saudi Arabia, like avoiding deadly stampedes. It also features basic information on their legal rights if their travel agents did not meet the announced program. ...

http://islamonline.net/English/News/2005-12/17/article06.shtml

[KAOSKTRL]

You are doing a hell of a job Pet.

[Petronas]

British Cop Coming to Study Haj Crowd Management
Thursday, 22, December, 2005 (21, Dhul Qa`dah, 1426)

British police will have a close look at the security arrangements in Makkah and Madinah during this year’s Haj in order to gain first hand knowledge of the massive operation. The British Embassy announced here on Tuesday that Jawaid Akhtar, an assistant chief constable with West Yorkshire Police (WYP), has been invited to Kingdom by the Saudi Ministry of Interior. “He wants to see first hand how the Saudi police manage over two million pilgrims coming from around the world for the annual pilgrimage to Makkah,” an embassy official said.

Speaking to Arab News from London, Akhtar said: “The Saudi authorities have policed this massive annual undertaking with great success.” He added that he was interested to learn about the arrangements made for pilgrims from all parts of the globe. “The Haj brings together people from various backgrounds with different cultures and languages.” In the United Kingdom, he said, there was little experience in handling massive operations of this nature.

Akhtar performed Umrah earlier and said he has no intention to perform Haj during this visit since he needs to concentrate on studying the whole chain of operations undertaken by the local police in Makkah and Madinah. He has been in the police since 1982 and currently works in partnership programs with local authorities. He is one of the four WYP’s Assistant Chief Constables who is in charge of criminal justice support and community safety.

About 25,000 British Muslims are expected to perform Haj this year. The UK delegation will be led by Lord Patel. A medical clinic for British pilgrims will be based at the Al-Hateem hotel on Ibrahim Al-Khalil Street. It will have separate clinics and waiting areas for male and female pilgrims and will provide medical treatment free of cost to those who need it. Also on Tuesday, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw met the 2006 British Haj delegation at the Islamic Cultural Center in London. “Performing the Haj is an experience which is both emotionally and physically demanding. It can mean walking for long distances in fierce heat and in large crowds,” he told the pilgrims. According to Straw, of the 25,000 British Muslims who performed the Haj last year, about 4,100 received government help.

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1&section=0&article=75065&d=22&m=12&y=2005

[NYer]

Hopefully not this sort of crowd control... (http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/002157.html)

[Petronas]

Why European women are turning to Islam
December 27, 2005

PARIS – Mary Fallot looks as unlike a terrorist suspect as one could possibly imagine: a petite and demure white Frenchwoman chatting with friends on a cell-phone, indistinguishable from any other young woman in the café where she sits sipping coffee. And that is exactly why European antiterrorist authorities have their eyes on thousands like her across the continent. Ms. Fallot is a recent convert to Islam. In the eyes of the police, that makes her potentially dangerous.

The death of Muriel Degauque, a Belgian convert who blew herself up in a suicide attack on US troops in Iraq last month, has drawn fresh attention to the rising number of Islamic converts in Europe, most of them women. "The phenomenon is booming, and it worries us," the head of the French domestic intelligence agency, Pascal Mailhos, told the Paris-based newspaper Le Monde in a recent interview. "But we must absolutely avoid lumping everyone together."

The difficulty, security experts explain, is that while the police may be alert to possible threats from young men of Middle Eastern origin, they are more relaxed about white European women. Terrorists can use converts who "have added operational benefits in very tight security situations" where they might not attract attention, says Magnus Ranstorp, a terrorism expert at the Swedish National Defense College in Stockholm.

Ms. Fallot, who converted to Islam three years ago after asking herself spiritual questions to which she found no answers in her childhood Catholicism, says she finds the suspicion her new religion attracts "wounding." "For me," she adds, "Islam is a message of love, of tolerance and peace."

It is a message that appeals to more and more Europeans as curiosity about Islam has grown since 9/11, say both Muslim and non-Muslim researchers. Although there are no precise figures, observers who monitor Europe's Muslim population estimate that several thousand men and women convert each year. Only a fraction of converts are attracted to radical strands of Islam, they point out, and even fewer are drawn into violence. A handful have been convicted of terrorist offenses, such as Richard Reid, the "shoe bomber" and American John Walker Lindh, who was captured in Afghanistan.

Admittedly patchy research suggests that more women than men convert, experts say, but that - contrary to popular perception - only a minority do so in order to marry Muslim men. "That used to be the most common way, but recently more [women] are coming out of conviction," says Haifa Jawad, who teaches at Birmingham University in Britain. Though non-Muslim men must convert in order to marry a Muslim woman, she points out, the opposite is not true.

Fallot laughs when she is asked whether her love life had anything to do with her decision. "When I told my colleagues at work that I had converted, their first reaction was to ask whether I had a Muslim boyfriend," she recalls. "They couldn't believe I had done it of my own free will." In fact, she explains, she liked the way "Islam demands a closeness to God. Islam is simpler, more rigorous, and it's easier because it is explicit. I was looking for a framework; man needs rules and behavior to follow. Christianity did not give me the same reference points." Those reasons reflect many female converts' thinking, say experts who have studied the phenomenon. "A lot of women are reacting to the moral uncertainties of Western society," says Dr. Jawad. "They like the sense of belonging and caring and sharing that Islam offers."

Others are attracted by "a certain idea of womanhood and manhood that Islam offers," suggests Karin van Nieuwkerk, who has studied Dutch women converts. "There is more space for family and motherhood in Islam, and women are not sex objects." At the same time, argues Sarah Joseph, an English convert who founded "Emel," a Muslim lifestyle magazine, "the idea that all women converts are looking for a nice cocooned lifestyle away from the excesses of Western feminism is not exactly accurate." Some converts give their decision a political meaning, says Stefano Allievi, a professor at Padua University in Italy. "Islam offers a spiritualization of politics, the idea of a sacred order," he says. "But that is a very masculine way to understand the world" and rarely appeals to women, he adds.

After making their decision, some converts take things slowly, adopting Muslim customs bit by bit: Fallot, for example, does not yet feel ready to wear a head scarf, though she is wearing longer and looser clothes than she used to. Others jump right in, eager for the exoticism of a new religion, and become much more pious than fellow mosque-goers who were born into Islam. Such converts, taking an absolutist approach, appear to be the ones most easily led into extremism.

The early stages of a convert's discovery of Islam "can be quite a sensitive time," says Batool al-Toma, who runs the "New Muslims" program at the Islamic Foundation in Leicester, England. "You are not confident of your knowledge, you are a newcomer, and you could be prey to a lot of different people either acting individually or as members of an organization," Ms. Al-Toma explains. A few converts feel "such a huge desire to fit in and be accepted that they are ready to do just about anything," she says.

"New converts feel they have to prove themselves," adds Dr. Ranstorp. "Those who seek more extreme ways of proving themselves can become extraordinarily easy prey to manipulation." At the same time, says al-Toma, converts seeking respite in Islam from a troubled past - such as Degauque, who had reportedly drifted in and out of drugs and jobs before converting to Islam - might be persuaded that such an "ultimate action" as a suicide bomb attack offered an opportunity for salvation and forgiveness. "The saddest conclusion" al-Toma draws from Degauque's death in Iraq is that "a woman who set out on the road to inner peace became a victim of people who set out to use and abuse her."

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/1227/p01s04-woeu.html

[Petronas]

EU Reacts Against Insulting Caricatures: Sheer Foolishness!
Saturday, December 24, 2005

The European Union (EU) seriously reacted on Friday for the first time against a Danish newspaper’s publication of insulting caricatures of the Prophet, Mohammed. Franco Frattini, the Deputy EU commissioner for Justice, Freedom, and Security, noting the publication as "foolishness and indiscretion" condemned the cartoons Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rassmussen backed up on the grounds of "freedom of speech and thought". Such publications, Frattini emphasized, will serve to radicalism by fomenting hostility against Islam and foreigners.

In response to the "freedom of press" that Mr. Rasmussen used as an excuse, the EU official said the media is not free to make a news story out of anything. Frattini assessing the issue in his personal perspective said if the publication were about his own values, it would hurt him personally as a Catholic Christian and he would have taken great offence. To be honest, such codes of behavior will accelerate Islamophobia across Europe, said Frattini, emphasizing his respect for the freedom of speech.

Frattini emphasized the cartoons published in Jyllands Posten did not affect people's ideas on Islam and noted despite everything he is against restricting the freedom of the press. Journalists and caricaturists of course, he said, have the right to publish such materials; however, when the case is evaluated in political terms the situation is not so proper. Frattini said he sees the point of Muslims who expressed offense and hurt and termed the incident as a scandal.

EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso had replied to previous questions about the topic by saying, ”The commission does not want to comment on this issue. “ The European Union Enlargement Commissioner, Olli Rehn, had evaluated the participation of Turkish ambassador's among 11 ambassadors wanting to talk to Rasmussen about the caricatures as a misfortune. He cannot reconcile this with the negotiations process, the commissioner said.

Danish Prime Minister had rejected the request of 11 ambassadors to meet about the caricature issue and suggested them to resort to the judicial process claiming that particular caricature could be published in the frame of freedom of the press. In recent days, 22 retired ambassadors in Denmark sent a protest letter to Rasmussen. The letter was supported by former prime ministers and foreign ministers. Rasmussen prefers not to react to criticisms in any way coming from his own party, the opposition, the United Nations (UN), The Council of Europe, European Commission, and The Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC).

On the other side, Carsten Juste, Jjllands Posten's Editor in Chief, which published the cartons, defended the criticisms became uncontrollable and added: "The next step will be giving orders to suppress the newspaper." Juste said he especially cannot understand the reaction of conservative wing of the coalition government.

http://www.zaman.com/?bl=international&alt=&hn=27920

[Petronas]

I am only posting the link, because the article is 12 pages long. Read it, your time spent will be well repaid.

It’s the demography, stupid
By Mark Steyn
The New Criterion, Volume 24, January 2006, on page 10

http://www.newcriterion.com/archives/24/01/its-the-demography/

[Petronas]

Wanted: Polish Muslim butchers
04/01/2006 14:59 - (SA)

Warsaw - After dentists, nurses, bus drivers, catering workers and handful of plumbers, Britain is now turning to fill another gap in its market. Muslim halal butchers are being requested from Poland, said an ad posted in Poland. The ad, published on the website of Poland's Association of Muslims and in the press in the northeastern Bialystok region, home to a sizeable Muslim community in overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Poland, was seeking to recruit "Muslims... who pray five times a day and adhere to the principles of halal cuisine, with no pork or alcoholic beverages". ...

http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1858335,00.html

[Petronas]

Western Muslims' Racist Rape Spree
By Sharon Lapkin
FrontPageMagazine.com | December 27, 2005

In Australia, Norway, Sweden and other Western nations, there is a distinct race-based crime in motion being ignored by the diversity police: Islamic men are raping Western women for ethnic reasons. We know this because the rapists have openly declared their sectarian motivations.

When a number of teenage Australian girls were subjected to hours of sexual degradation during a spate of gang rapes in Sydney that occurred between 1998 and 2002, the perpetrators of these assaults framed their rationale in ethnic terms. The young victims were informed that they were “sluts” and “Aussie pigs” while they were being hunted down and abused.

In Australia's New South Wales Supreme Court in December 2005, a visiting Pakistani rapist testified that his victims had no right to say no, because they were not wearing a headscarf.

And earlier this year Australians were outraged when Lebanese Sheik Faiz Mohammed gave a lecture in Sydney where he informed his audience that rape victims had no one to blame but themselves. Women, he said, who wore skimpy clothing, invited men to rape them.

A few months earlier, in Copenhagen, Islamic mufti and scholar, Shahid Mehdi created uproar when – like his peer in Australia – he stated that women who did not wear a headscarf were asking to be raped.

And with haunting synchronicity in 2004, the London Telegraph reported that visiting Egyptian scholar Sheik Yusaf al-Qaradawi claimed female rape victims should be punished if they were dressed immodestly when they were raped. He added, “For her to be absolved from guilt, a raped woman must have shown good conduct.”

In Norway and Sweden, journalist Fjordman warns of a rape epidemic. Police Inspector Gunnar Larsen stated that the steady increase of rape-cases and the link to ethnicity are clear, unmistakable trends. Two out of three persecutions for rape in Oslo are immigrants with a non-Western background and 80 percent of the victims are Norwegian women.

In Sweden, according to translator for Jihad Watch, Ali Dashti, “Gang rapes, usually involving Muslim immigrant males and native Swedish girls, have become commonplace.” A few weeks ago she said, “Five Kurds brutally raped a 13-year-old Swedish girl.”

In France, Samira Bellil broke her silence – after enduring years of repeated gang rapes in one of the Muslim populated public housing projects – and wrote a book, In the hell of the tournantes, that shocked France. Describing how gang rape is rampant in the banlieues, she explained to Time that, “any neighborhood girl who smokes, uses makeup or wears attractive clothes is a whore.”

Unfortunately, Western women are not the only victims in this epidemic. In Indonesia, in 1998, human rights groups documented the testimony of over 100 Chinese women who were gang raped during the riots that preceded the fall of President Suharto. Many of them were told: “You must be raped, because you are Chinese and non-Muslim.”

Christian Solidarity Worldwide reported that in April 2005, a 9-year-old Pakistani girl was raped, beaten with a cricket bat, hanged upside down from the ceiling, had spoonfuls of chillies poured into her mouth, and repeatedly bashed while handcuffed. Her Muslim neighbours told her they were taking revenge for the American bombing of Iraqi children and informed her they were doing it because she was an “infidel and a Christian.”

In Sudan – where Arab Muslims slaughter black Muslim and Christian Sudanese in an ongoing genocide – former Sudanese slave and now a human rights’ activist Simon Deng says he witnessed girls and women being raped and that the Arab regime of Khartoum sends its soldiers to the field to rape and murder. In other reports, women who are captured by government forces are asked; “Are you Christian or Muslim?” and those who answer Christian, are gang raped before having their breasts cut off.

This phenomenon of Islamic sexual violence against women should be treated as the urgent, violent, repressive epidemic it is. Instead, journalists, academics, and politicians ignore it, rationalize it, or ostracize those who dare discuss it.

In Australia, when journalist Paul Sheehan reported honestly on the Sydney gang rapes, he was called a racist and accused of stirring up anti-Muslim hatred. And when he reported in his Sydney Morning Herald column that there was a high incidence of crime amongst Sydney’s Lebanese community, fellow journalist, David Marr sent him an e-mail stating, “That is a disgraceful column that reflects poorly on us all at the Herald.”

Keysar Trad, vice-president of the Australian Lebanese Muslim Association said the gang rapes were a “heinous” crime but complained it was “rather unfair” that the ethnicity of the rapists had been reported.

Journalist Miranda Devine reported during the same rape trials that all reference to ethnicity had been deleted from the victim impact statement because the prosecutors wanted to negotiate a plea bargain.

So when Judge Megan Latham declared, “There is no evidence before me of any racial element in the commission of these offences,” everyone believed her. And the court, the politicians and most of the press may as well have raped the girls again.

Retired Australian detective Tim Priest warned in 2004 that the Lebanese gangs, which emerged in Sydney in the 1990s – when the police were asleep – had morphed out of control. “The Lebanese groups,” he said, “ were ruthless, extremely violent, and they intimidated not only innocent witnesses, but even the police that attempted to arrest them.”

Priest describes how in 2001, in a Muslim dominated area of Sydney two policemen stopped a car containing three well-known Middle Eastern men to search for stolen property. As the police carried out their search they were physically threatened and the three men claimed they were going to track them down, kill them and then rape their girlfriends.

According to Priest, it didn’t end there. As the Sydney police called for backup the three men used their mobile phones to call their associates, and within minutes, 20 Middle Eastern men arrived on the scene. They punched and pushed the police and damaged state vehicles. The police retreated and the gang followed them to the police station where they intimidated staff, damaged property and held the police station hostage.

Eventually the gang left, the police licked their wounds, and not one of them took action against the Middle Eastern men. Priest claims, “In the minds of the local population, the police are cowards and the message was, 'Lebanese [Muslim gangs] rule the streets.'”

In France, in the banlieues, where gang rape is now known simply as tournantes or ‘pass-around,’ victims know the police will not protect them. If they complain, Samir Bellil said, they know that they and their families will be threatened.

However, Muslim women in the French ghettos are finally fighting back against gang rape and police non-action. They have begun a movement called, “We’re neither whores nor doormats.” They are struggling against the intrinsic violence that plagues their neighbourhoods and the culture that condones it.

In most French prosecutions, the Muslim rapists state that they do not believe they have committed a crime. And in a frightening parallel with the gang rapists in Australia, they claim the victim herself is to blame and accuse her of being a “slut” or a “whore.”

According to The Guardian, during the recent French riots, a Saudi Prince with shares in News Corporation boasted to a conference in Dubai that he had phoned Rupert Murdoch and complained about Fox News describing the disturbances as “Muslim riots.” Within half an hour he said, it was changed to “civil riots.”

Swedish translator, Ali Dashti, stated that in Sweden when three men raped a 22-year-old woman recently, they said one word to her. “Whore.” Such stories, according to Dashti, are in the Swedish newspapers every week. And, the politically correct “take great care not to mention the ethnic background of the perpetrators.”

Sweden’s English newspaper The Local reported in July that Malmo police commander Bengt Lindström had been charged with inciting racial hatred. He sent e-mails from his home computer to two city officials. To the head of healthcare, he wrote: “You...treat old Swedes who have worked hard building up the fatherland like parasites and would rather give my taxes to criminals called Mohammed from Rosengärd.”

In Malmo, the third largest city in Sweden, the police have admitted, Dashti says, that they no longer control the city. “It is effectively ruled by violent gangs of Muslim immigrants.” Ambulance personnel are regularly attacked and spat upon and are now refusing to help until a police escort arrives. The police are too afraid to enter parts of the city without backup.

In early 2005, Norwegian newspapers reported that Oslo had recorded the highest ever number of rape cases in the previous twelve months. However, Fjordman explained, the official statistics contained no data regarding “how immigrants were grossly over represented in rape cases”, and the media remain so strangely silent.

Oslo Professor of Anthropology, Unni Wikan, said Norwegian women must take responsibility for the fact that Muslim men find their manner of dress provocative. And since these men believe women are responsible for rape, she stated, the women must adapt to the multicultural society around them.

The BBC pulled a documentary scheduled for screening in 2004, after police in Britain warned it could increase racial tension. “In these exceptional circumstances... Channel 4 as a responsible broadcaster has agreed to the police’s request...” The documentary was to show how Pakistani and other Muslim men sexually abused young, white English girls as young as 11.

The number of rapes committed by Muslim men against women in the last decade is so incredibly high that it cannot be viewed as anything other than culturally implicit behaviour. It is overtly reinforced and sanctioned by Islamic religious leaders who blame the victims and excuse the rapists.

In three decades of immigration into Western countries, Islam has caused social upheaval and havoc in every one of its host countries. No other immigration program has encountered the problems of non-assimilation and religious ambiguity.

Everywhere in the world, Muslims are in conflict with their neighbours. And as Mark Steyn recently said, every conflict appears to have originated by someone with the name of Mohammed.

In July 2005, Melbourne Sheik Mohammad Omran told Sixty Minutes that “...we believe we have more rights than you because we choose Australia to be our home and you didn’t. “

In the same interview visiting Sheik Khalid Yasin warned “There’s no such thing as a Muslim having a non-Muslim friend, so a non-Muslim could be your associate but they can't be a friend. They're not your friend because they don't understand your religious principles and they cannot because they don't understand your faith.”

Despite being told over and over by Islamic scholars, and witnessing massive influxes of Islamic crime, Western countries continue to believe in the reality of assimilation and moral relativism.

In Australia, Lebanese Christians have assimilated and become a respected part of our community. The Premier of Victoria is a Lebanese Christian as is the Governor Of New South Wales. However, Lebanese Muslims have encountered serious problems because of their refusal to accept our right to live our way of life. Nothing so clearly demonstrates that it is not an issue of race — but of culture.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=20646

[NYer]

Meet the Mayor of Brussels. (http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/671)

[Petronas]

Islamic group urges Catholic school to move to Muslim faith
Mon 16 Jan 2006

AN ISLAMIC campaign group has called for a Catholic primary school to be based on the Muslim faith. The Campaign for Muslim Schools said 90 per cent of pupils at St Albert's Primary, in the Pollokshields area of Glasgow, are Muslim, yet children are having to take part in Catholic rituals like saying the Lord's Prayer and attending mass.

Osama Saeed, co-ordinator of the alliance of Glasgow's main mosques and Muslim organisations, said he could see no reason why the main faith of the school should not change. He said: "Clearly the parents of that area find a faith school, even if it is of another denomination, preferable to a secular one. But surely it should be possible for them to have one that is relevant to their own faith. "To move towards this would be a fantastic example of good faith - in more ways than one - on the part of the Church."

The call came just days after Scotland's most senior Catholic, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, sparked controversy by stating that Scotland's core faith was Christianity and that other faiths should recognise they were "living in Scotland as a Christian country". A spokesman for the Catholic Church in Scotland was not available for comment tonight.

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=71792006

[Petronas]

Airline bans Bibles to avoid offending Muslims
January 9, 2006 11:20 p.m. Eastern

A British airline banned its staff from taking Bibles and wearing crucifixes or St. Christopher medals on flights to Saudi Arabia to avoid offending the country's Muslims. British Midland International also has told female flight attendants they must walk two paces behind male colleagues and cover themselves from head to foot in a headscarf and robe known as an abaya, the Mirror newspaper of London reported. Teddy bears or other cuddly toys also are not allowed.

Airline officials, who have sparked outrage, the paper says, explain the Islamic kingdom's strict laws – enforced by religious police – prohibit public practice of Christianity and figures of animals. BMI spokesman Phil Shepherd said: "In providing air services people want, demand and use, we have an obligation to respect the customs of the destination country."

An airline employee who asked not to be named told the Mirror: "It's outrageous that we must respect their beliefs but they're not prepared to respect ours." The employee said his grandmother gave him a crucifix shortly before she died that he wears at all times. It's got massive sentimental value and I don't see why I have to remove it," he said.
The airline's staff handbook says: "Prior to disembarking the aircraft all female crew will be required to put on their company issued abaya. It will be issued with the headscarf which must be worn."

The employees' union wants staff members to be able to opt out of the flights, but the airline says the only option is to transfer from overseas staff to domestic flights, which could mean a loss of about $30,000 a year in wages. About 40 staff members have filed complaints since the route began in September.

Some of the male members who are homosexual have called in sick, because they are afraid of traveling to Saudi Arabia, where homosexual activity is punishable by flogging, jail or death.

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=48269

[Petronas]

French crackdown on 'racist soup'
Wednesday, 25 January 2006, 04:11 GMT

Charity groups with far-right links serving pork soup to homeless people face a crackdown by French officials. Protesters have accused the groups of deliberate discrimination against Jews and Muslims, who do not eat the meat. Strasbourg officials have banned the hand-outs and police in Paris have closed soup kitchens in an effort to avert racial tension.

The charities have defended offering what they call traditional cuisine to French and European homeless people. The groups, operating in cities across France and neighbouring Belgium, are not formally linked but are associated with a small far-right organisation called Bloc Identitaire.

Identity Soup, as it has been dubbed by its chefs, was banned in Strasbourg this month after officials ruled it could lead to public disorder. "Schemes with racial subtexts must be denounced," Strasbourg's mayor Fabienne Keller said.

Although no ban exists in Paris, police have closed soup kitchens in the capital's Montparnasse and Gare de l'Est train stations on administrative grounds. Volunteers were ordered to re-seal soup containers on the basis they did not have the necessary permits to distribute food. A leading French anti-racism movement has urged Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy to ban pork soup give-aways throughout the country. ...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4644766.stm

[Petronas]

Norway Apologizes over Muhammad Cartoons
Fri, 2006-01-27 10:49

The left-wing government in Norway apologizes to Muslims worldwide for the publication of twelve Muhammad cartoons [see them here] in the Norwegian newspaper Magazinet. Oslo sent out instructions to all the Norwegian embassies on how to respond to queries about the cartoons. Unlike the Danish government, the Norwegian government is not concerned about safeguarding the right to freedom of expression. Foreign Minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, a leading member of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg’s Workers’ Party, wrote the following e-mail to the Norwegian embassies:

I am sorry that the publication of a few cartoons in the Norwegian paper Magazinet has caused unrest among Muslims. I fully understand that these drawings are seen to give offence by Muslims worldwide. Islam is a spiritual reference point for a large part of the world. Your faith has the right to be respected by us.

The cartoons in the Christian paper Magazinet are not constructive in building the
bridges which are necessary between people with different religious and ethnic backgrounds. Instead they contribute to suspicion and unnecessary conflict.

Let it be clear that the Norwegian government condemns every expression or act which expresses contempt for people on the basis of their religion or ethnic origin. Norway has always supported the fight of the UN against religious intolerance and racism, and believes that this fight is important in order to avoid suspicion and conflict. Tolerance, mutual respect and dialogue are the basis values of Norwegian society and of our foreign policy.

Freedom of expression is one of the pillars of Norwegian society. This includes tolerance for opinions that not everyone shares. At the same time our laws and our international obligations enforce restrictions for incitement to hatred or hateful expressions.

Opposition politicians reacted to this message with indignation. Jon Lilletun, the spokesman on foreign policy for the Christian-democrat Kristelig Folkeparti, points out that it is not the ministry’s task to express an opinion on the content of the cartoons. Carl I. Hagen, the leader of the Progress Party, fears that freedom of expression is being swept under the carpet.

Magazinet published the cartoons in support of the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, which after publishing the drawings last September has been threatened with revenge by Muslim extremists. According to Islam it is blasphemy to depict Muhammad. The Danish government has consistently refused to give in to demands from Islamic countries that it apologize for the publication of the cartoons and introduce censorship.

As we noted before it is striking to see how Norwegian politics differs from Danish politics. The Norwegian Foreign Minister’s e-mail was meant to be confidential and not to be disclosed to the Norwegian public, “because,” as the Foreign Ministry wrote, “that would look rather stupid in the Norwegian press.” Apparently Muslims abroad are more deserving of respect than one’s own citizens.

Meanwhile the cartoon controversy drags on in Denmark. Saudi Arabia has called its ambassador to Copenhagen home for consultation. In Saudi Arabia there are calls to boycott Danish products and some Danish companies are already losing customers. As a consequence the Danish government felt obliged to actively contact Saudi religious leaders, while the Danish ambassador to Riyadh participated in a debate on Saudi national television. Still it came as a complete surprise to Foreign Minister Per Stig Møller when Saudi Arabia called its ambassador home for consultation.

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/722

[NYer]

Denmark OTH (http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2006-01-29T224859Z_01_L29575168_RTRUKOC_0_UK-RELIGION-LIBYA-DENMARK.xml&archived=False) refuses to apologize.

http://mediatheek.thinkquest.nl/~ll068/def-jpg's/zw-fotos/viking3.gif

[NYer]

http://www.di2.nu/files/Muhammed_Kurt_Westergaard_Jyllands-Posten_Cartoons.jpg

http://www.di2.nu/files/Muhammed_Jens_Julius_Hansen_Jyllands-Posten_Cartoons.jpg

These are two of the offensive cartoons...

For more, go here. (http://www.di2.nu/files/Muhammed_Cartoons_Jyllands_Posten.html)

[Kamikaze]

Muhammad asked his followers to instill terror in the hearts of the unbelievers, to wage war against them, to smite their heads from above their necks, to deceive them, to kill them wherever they find them, even to rape their wives.



First: Mohammad did not create his own rules. This is the way Allah wanted it to be in order to punish those who are ungrateful to him.

Second: Muslims were never asked to rape wives of their enemies. That is a lie. In fact, that is what enemies of the Muslims used to do to them including the crusaders.

Third: Muslims do not engage in violence for no reason. Either for defending themselves or if no other choice remains. Fighting is their last resort.

[Petronas]

I don't recall, Kamikaze, the source of what you are quoting or who made that statement. Regarding rape of non-Muslim women, however, see:

Western Muslims' Racist Rape Spree
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=20646

Islamic authorities (at least in the eyes of their followers) Sheik Faiz Mohammed, Shahid Mehdi, and Sheik Yusaf al-Qaradawi certainly have been successful in making their followers believe that Islam condones the rape of non-Muslim women who dress according to their own culture rather than following the rules mandated by Islam.

See also the practices in Iran, currently the only Islamic state fully under Sharia law:

"According to a "religious" decree, virgin women prisoners must as a rule be raped before their execution, "lest they go to Paradise." Therefore, the night before execution, a Guard rapes the condemned woman. After her execution, the religious judge at the prison writes out a marriage certificate and sends it to the victim's family, along with a box of sweets. In a written confession in January 1990, Sarmast Akhlaq Tabandeh, a senior Guards Corps interrogator, recounted one such case in Shiraz prison: "Flora Owrangi, an acquaintance of one of my friends was one such victim. The night before her execution, the resident mullah in the prison conducted a lottery among the members of the firing squads and prison officials to determine who would rape her. She was then forcibly injected with anesthesia ampoules, after which she was raped. The next day, after she was executed, the mullah in charge wrote a marriage certificate and the Guard who raped her took that along with a box of sweets to her parents."
http://www.iran-e-azad.org/english/book_on_women/chapter2.html

Given these words and actions by Islamic authorities today, non-Mulims may be forgiven if they incorrectly assume that rape sometimes is condoned by Islam.

The remaining statements in the quote you will recognize as an English translation of various passages of the Koran. It is technically correct that under Islam Muhammad did not make the rules contained in the Koran but just wrote down the revelations received from Allah. However, since the Hadiths, based on the Prophet's life, actions and sayings, for all practical purposes have the same binding authority as far as the behavior mandated for Muslims is concerned, that is a distinction without a difference.

[NYer]

Glenn Reynolds points to some interesting interviews, Here (http://compasspointsblog.com/?p=663) and Here. (http://compasspointsblog.com/?p=669)

Excerpt from the first -

The French riots, however, were just one passing manifestation of an ongoing cultural conflict that’s taking place across Western Europe. Nearly every country is undergoing its own version of this conflict. The authorities have tended to deny this, and when the conflict has flared up in unpleasant ways in a certain country, authorities in other countries have fallen all over themselves insisting that such a thing could never occur within their own borders. After 9/11, European politicians, academics, and journalists insisted that 9/11 couldn’t happen in Europe because it was a reaction to bad things America had done around the world. In the same way, the Paris riots have been dismissed as a result of peculiarly French circumstances, and the 7/7 bombings in London as the result of peculiarly British circumstances. Of course, there are differences from country to country — but this fact should not blind us to the big picture. 9/11 in the US, 3/11 in Spain, 7/7 in Britain, the murders of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh in the Netherlands, the riots in France – to pretend that these events are not connected is to be in major denial. Alas, many of Europe’s leading politicians, academics, and journalists are indeed in major denial – they refuse to see the forest for the trees.

[Kamikaze]

Petronas that is absolutely insane!
I don't know whether this happens every time in Iran but it is certainly not like this in Islam!
As for these muftis who condone rape and women abuse, they should be punished severely.
You know, this is the stuff that makes Islam look bad, but it isn't Islam that is bad, it is the people who hide behind the name of Islam to justify unthinkable actions.

[NYer]

Petronas that is absolutely insane!
I don't know whether this happens every time in Iran but it is certainly not like this in Islam!
As for these muftis who condone rape and women abuse, they should be punished severely.
You know, this is the stuff that makes Islam look bad, but it isn't Islam that is bad, it is the people who hide behind the name of Islam to justify unthinkable actions.

Perhaps Islam should be more aggressive in punishing these "unthinkable actions" instead of looking the other way. Actions do speak louder than words.

[Camp]

Perhaps Islam should be more aggressive in punishing these "unthinkable actions" instead of looking the other way. Actions do speak louder than words.


"Unthinkable?" Hardly. A means to a conversion and a mild rebuke if caught. The razor hot rhetoric from Kamikazi is about as tough as it gets for infidel defilers.

[NYer]

Pardon me for Cross-Posting but we may be witnessing The Law of Unintended Consequences. (http://wincoast.com/forum/showthread.php?p=530058#post530058)

http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/06.01.31.ImageProblem-X.gif

[Camp]

Where is The Far Sides Gary Larson when you need him.

[NYer]

Well, the French caved (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4670370.stm), as France Soir sacked its managing editor.

http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f218/sono001/surprise.jpg

[Vancouver]

From that BBC article: "Seven publications in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy and Spain all carried some of the drawings."
They have various motives, no doubt, but this reaction to censorship is the natural one and should be expected. Recall the bloodthirsty idiot Khomeini. He made Salman Rushdie a superstar.
Wandering a little from the topic, it looks to me very much as if a lot of Europeans are thoroughly fed up with those Muslims who expect European countries to behave exactly like the squalid, backward, fear-ridden Muslim dictatorships which so many of them have deserted, and which most of the rest would very much like to desert.

[Kamikaze]

Perhaps Islam should be more aggressive in punishing these "unthinkable actions" instead of looking the other way. Actions do speak louder than words.



Rape is considered as “hiraba” (highway robbery or terrorism or promoting terror) and hence rapists are to be punished according to the “hirabah” laws, as highlighted in the Qur’an.
Hiraba is described as: a single person or group of people causing public disruption, killing, forcibly taking property or money, attacking or raping women ("hatk al arad"), killing cattle, or disrupting agriculture (Sabiq 1993, 450).
The crime of hiraba is based on the following Quranic verse: The punishment for those who wage war [yuharibuna] against God and His Prophet, and perpetrate disorders in the land is: kill or crucify them, or have a hand on one side and a foot on the other cut off or banish them from the land (Quran 5:33).
As you can see, it is a just punishment for those animals who can not hold their lust in their pants. I think that you will agree that if similar punishments were made in the USA then the number of victims of rape (which is a lot, check http://sa.rochester.edu/masa/stats.php) will decrease significantly.
Therefore, it is not Islam that is wrong, but it is those who hide behind the name of Islam to justify their actions, even though they are shaming the name and image of Islam worldwide.

[Vancouver]

Kamikaze, there is no Muslim country in which women are justly treated. None.
The Muslim rapists who are so well known in places like Malmo and Clichy-sous-Bois have been taught by Islam that any woman who is not escorted by a male is a prostitute and may therefore be raped with impunity.

[Camp]

Kamikaze, there is no Muslim country in which women are justly treated. None.
The Muslim rapists who are so well known in places like Malmo and Clichy-sous-Bois have been taught by Islam that any woman who is not escorted by a male is a prostitute and may therefore be raped with impunity.


There is also, at best, an inconsistant standard as to muslum and non-muslum victims.

[Kamikaze]

That is wrong teaching not by Islam, but by people. Corruption occurs mainly in poor societies in which a large segment of the population is uneducated. Most of the muslim countries are poor countries, and do not follow Islam or they ignore certain rules in it. The problem is not that Islam allows rape and other crimes, but that those people and islamic countries do not follow the islamic law. If these laws were enforced by the countries then crime would decrease. Again, it is not a problem with Islam, but with the people.

[Camp]

Islam does not look to be very learnable to these poor countries. They spend the month of ramadan reciting from and memorizing the koran only to have more and more human corruption.

Maybe an emphasis on literacy beyond the koran would help.

[NYer]

For the EU, Al Qaeda is Not a Terrorist Organization. (http://counterterror.typepad.com/the_counterterrorism_blog/2006/02/for_the_europea.html)

[NYer]

Inquiry demanded over nuclear export. (http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=27331&name=Inquiry+demanded+over+nuclear+export+.)

BRUSSELS — Opposition party Christian Democrat CD&V is demanding a parliamentary commission investigate the controversial export of a machine to Iran that can be used in the production of nuclear weapons.

A report from the intelligence service's supervisory authority, Committee I, indicated on Wednesday that the federal security service VS-SE had made crucial errors handling the incident.

[NYer]

Europe: The New Pipeline To Jihad. (http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1139611813117&call_pageid=968332188854&col=968350060724)

In the coded language of Lokman Amin Mohammed's smuggling network, fighters and suicide bombers sent to Iraq were called "workers" for "the firm."

When one band of fighters he smuggled from Germany launched its first attack, Mohammed exclaimed in a phone conversation: "They have celebrated their first feast."

Last month, the 33-year-old was sentenced in Munich to seven years in prison for smuggling fighters to and from Iraq, and for membership in "the firm," better known as Ansar al-Islam, an Al Qaeda-linked group responsible for suicide attacks against civilians and U.S. soldiers.

During sentencing, Justice Bernd von Heintschel-Heinegg said Mohammed's goal was to chase out U.S. forces and turn Iraq into "Talibanistan" — a reference to the repressive religious regime of the deposed Afghan rulers. The trial highlighted a growing trend: European Muslims heading to Iraq to fight what they consider a jihad, or holy war.

Security officials estimate dozens of recruitment networks are operating across Europe, their numbers increasing as the conflict drags on.

Since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, hundreds of volunteers have reportedly gone off to fight in Iraq.

An Italian investigator who helped dismantle a Milan-based network told the Toronto Star that it alone had shipped 100 fighters and suicide bombers within months of the invasion.

Recent arrests are another indicator of the scale.

In Spain, 46 people suspected of running recruitment networks have been arrested in the last three months, including one believed to have sent a suicide bomber who killed 19 Italians in Nasiriya in November 2003.

During the same three-month period, 32 people in Belgium have either been arrested or put on trial on similar charges, including the group accused of sending a Belgian woman who blew herself up in an attack against U.S. troops near Baghdad last November.

Recruitment networks have also been identified in Britain, France and the Netherlands.

[NYer]

Italy: Recruiting For Iraq Not a crime. (http://counterterror.typepad.com/the_counterterrorism_blog/2006/02/recruiting_for_.html)

The recruitment of volunteers to fight in Iraq against American soldiers cannot be considered under any point of view a terrorist activity.” These words, which would have been more fitting in the speech of a radical anti-war militant, were the core of the ruling with which a Milan Court of Appeals acquitted three men linked to Ansar al Islam (the motivation of the November 2005 ruling were made public only recently and excerpts from it can be found here).

As shocking as it might sound, this is nothing new in Italy. The Court of Appeals, in fact, only upheld the first degree ruling of another Milan-based judge, Clementina Forleo. In January 2005, Mrs. Forleo decided that the men were indeed part of a network that was recruiting fighters for the Iraqi conflict, but that the operations taking place in Iraq constituted “guerrilla warfare” and not terrorism. In her view, “Ansar al Islam was structured as an Islamic combatant organization, with a militia trained for guerrilla activities and financed by groups in Europe and orbiting in the sphere of Islamic fundamentalism, without having goals of a terrorist nature, goals probably shared by only some of its members.” Because one of the men on trial, Mohammed Tahir Hammid, conveniently declared that he did not agree with Ansar al Islam’s tactic of using suicide bombers, Forleo considered Ansar al Islam to be a “heterogeneous” organization whose members had conflicting opinions on the valid means to use in fighting enemy forces.

Even the UN acknowledges Ansar Al Islam as a Terrorist Group...

[Petronas]

Mosque sculpture pulled from German art show
13 February 2006

BERLIN - A sculpture depicting a mosque with missiles as minarets was pulled from a German art show Monday after threats were made, the director of Duesseldorf's art academy confirmed. Titled "Aggression", the work by a Swiss art student was removed from the show at the request of the artist, said academy director Peter Lynen. Lynen said there had been no pressure from the academy itself to pull the work and that every artist had to be given the freedom to address what he termed "contemporary themes". The design of the mosque with rockets as its minarets was very "low-key", said Lynen. He did not say what kinds of threats had led to removal of the sculpture. ...

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=26&story_id=27607&name=Mosque+sculpture+pulled+from+German+art+show

[Petronas]

Its a long article, but well worth reading if you want to understand what is going on in Europe. Dr. Sookhdeo knows whereof he speaks.

'The day is coming when British Muslims form a state within a state'
19/02/2006

For the past two weeks, Patrick Sookhdeo has been canvassing the opinions of Muslim clerics in Britain on the row over the cartoons featuring images of Mohammed that were first published in Denmark and then reprinted in several other European countries. "They think they have won the debate," he says with a sigh. "They believe that the British Government has capitulated to them, because it feared the consequences if it did not.

"The cartoons, you see, have not been published in this country, and the Government has been very critical of those countries in which they were published. To many of the Islamic clerics, that's a clear victory. It's confirmation of what they believe to be a familiar pattern: if spokesmen for British Muslims threaten what they call 'adverse consequences' - violence to the rest of us - then the British Government will cave in. I think it is a very dangerous precedent."

Dr Sookhdeo adds that he believes that "in a decade, you will see parts of English cities which are controlled by Muslim clerics and which follow, not the common law, but aspects of Muslim sharia law. It is already starting to happen - and unless the Government changes the way it treats the so-called leaders of the Islamic community, it will continue."

For someone with such strong and uncompromising views, Dr Sookhdeo is a surprisingly gentle and easy-going man. He speaks with authority on Islam, as it was his first faith: he was brought up as a Muslim in Guyana, the only English colony in South America, and attended a madrassa there. "But Islamic instruction was very different in the 1950s, when I was at school," he says. "There was no talk of suicide bombing or indeed of violence of any kind. Islam was very peaceful."

Dr Sookhdeo's family emigrated to England when he was 10. In his early twenties, when he was at university, he converted to Christianity. "I had simply seen it as the white man's religion, the religion of the colonialists and the oppressors - in a very similar way, in fact, to the way that many Muslims see Christianity today. "Leaving Islam was not easy. According to the literal interpretation of the Koran, the punishment for apostasy is death - and it actually is punished by death in some Middle Eastern states. "It wasn't quite like that here," he says, "although it was traumatic in some ways." Dr Sookhdeo continued to study Islam, doing a PhD at London University on the religion. He is currently director of the Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity. He also advises the Army on security issues related to Islam.

Several years ago, Dr Sookhdeo insisted that the next wave of radical Islam in Britain would involve suicide bombings in this country. His prediction was depressingly confirmed on 7/7 last year. So his claim that, in the next decade, the Muslim community in Britain will not be integrated into mainstream British society, but will isolate itself to a much greater extent, carries weight behind it. Dr Sookhdeo has proved his prescience.

"The Government, and Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, are fundamentally deluded about the nature of Islam," he insists. "Tony Blair unintentionally revealed his ignorance when he said, in an effort to conciliate Muslims, that he had 'read through the Koran twice' and that he kept it by his bedside. He thought he was saying something which showed how seriously he took Islam. But most Muslims thought it was a joke, if not an insult. Because, of course, every Muslim knows that you cannot read the Koran through from cover to cover and understand it. The chapters are not written to be read in that way. Indeed, after the first chapter, the chapters of the Koran are ordered according to their length, not according to their content or chronology: the longest chapters are first, the shorter ones are at the end. You need to know which passage was revealed at what period and in what time in order to be able to understand it - you cannot simply read it from beginning to end and expect to learn anything at all. That is one reason why it takes so long to be able to read and understand the Koran: the meaning of any part of it depends on a knowledge of its context - a context that is not in the Koran itself."

The Prime Minister's ignorance of Islam, Dr Sookhdeo contends, is of a piece with his unsuccessful attempts to conciliate it. And it does indeed seem as if the Government's policy towards radical Islam is based on the hope that if it makes concessions to its leaders, they will reciprocate and relations between fundamentalist Muslims and Tony Blair's Government will then turn into something resembling an ecumenical prayer meeting.

Dr Sookhdeo nods in vigorous agreement with that. "Yes - and it is a very big mistake. Look at what happened in the 1990s. The security services knew about Abu Hamza and the preachers like him. They knew that London was becoming the centre for Islamic terrorists. The police knew. The Government knew. Yet nothing was done. The whole approach towards Muslim militants was based on appeasement. 7/7 proved that that approach does not work - yet it is still being followed. For example, there is a book, The Noble Koran: a New Rendering of its Meaning in English, which is openly available in Muslim bookshops. It calls for the killing of Jews and Christians, and it sets out a strategy for killing the infidels and for warfare against them. The Government has done nothing whatever to interfere with the sale of that book. Why not? Government ministers have promised to punish religious hatred, to criminalise the glorification of terrorism, yet they do nothing about this book, which blatantly does both."

Perhaps the explanation is just that they do not take it seriously. "I fear that is exactly the problem," says Dr Sookhdeo. "The trouble is that Tony Blair and other ministers see Islam through the prism of their own secular outlook. They simply do not realise how seriously Muslims take their religion. Islamic clerics regard themselves as locked in mortal combat with secularism. For example, one of the fundamental notions of a secular society is the moral importance of freedom, of individual choice. But in Islam, choice is not allowable: there cannot be free choice about whether to choose or reject any of the fundamental aspects of the religion, because they are all divinely ordained. God has laid down the law, and man must obey.

'Islamic clerics do not believe in a society in which Islam is one religion among others in a society ruled by basically non-religious laws. They believe it must be the dominant religion - and it is their aim to achieve this. That is why they do not believe in integration. In 1980, the Islamic Council of Europe laid out their strategy for the future - and the fundamental rule was never dilute your presence. That is to say, do not integrate. Rather, concentrate Muslim presence in a particular area until you are a majority in that area, so that the institutions of the local community come to reflect Islamic structures. The education system will be Islamic, the shops will serve only halal food, there will be no advertisements showing naked or semi-naked women, and so on."

That plan, says Dr Sookhdeo, is being followed in Britain. "That is why you are seeing areas which are now almost totally Muslim. The next step will be pushing the Government to recognise sharia law for Muslim communities - which will be backed up by the claim that it is "racist" or "Islamophobic" or "violating the rights of Muslims" to deny them sharia law.

"There's already a Sharia Law Council for the UK. The Government has already started making concessions: it has changed the law so that there are sharia-compliant mortgages and sharia pensions. Some Muslims are now pressing to be allowed four wives: they say it is part of their religion. They claim that not being allowed four wives is a denial of their religious liberty. There are Muslim men in Britain who marry and divorce three women, then marry a fourth time - and stay married, in sharia law, to all four. The more fundamentalist clerics think that it is only a matter of time before they will persuade the Government to concede on the issue of sharia law. Given the Government's record of capitulating, you can see why they believe that."

Dr Sookhdeo's vision of a relentless battle between secular and Islamic Britain seems hard to reconcile with the co-operation that seems to mark the vast majority of the interactions between the two communities. "Well, it isn't me who says Islam is at war with secularisation," he says. "That's how Islamic clerics describe the situation."

But isn't it true that most Muslims who live in theocratic states want to get out of them as quickly as possible and live in a secular country such as Britain or America? And that most Muslims who come to Britain adopt the values of a liberal, democratic, tolerant society, rather than insisting on the inflexible rules of their religion?

"You have to distinguish between ordinary Muslims and their self-appointed leaders," explains Dr Sookhdeo. "I agree that the best hope for our collective future is that the majority of Muslims who have grown up here have accepted the secular nature of the British state and society, the division between religion and politics, and the importance of allowing people to choose freely how they will live. But that is not how most of the clerics talk. And, more significantly, it is not how the 'community leaders' whom the Government has decided represent the Muslim community think either.

"Take, for example, Tariq Ramadan, whom the Government has appointed as an adviser because ministers think he is a 'community leader'. Ramadan sounds, in public, very moderate. But in reality, he has some very extreme views. He attacks liberal Muslims as 'Muslims without Islam'. He is affiliated to the violent and uncompromising Muslim Brotherhood. He calls the education in the state schools of the West 'aggression against the Islamic personality of the child'. He has said that 'the Muslim respects the laws of the country only if they do not contradict any Islamic principle'. He has added that 'compromising on principles is a sign of fear and weakness'."

So what's the answer? What should the Government be doing? "First, it should try to engage with the real Muslim majority, not with the self-appointed 'community leaders' who don't actually represent anyone: they have not been elected, and the vast majority of ordinary Muslims have nothing to do with them.

"Second, the Government should say no to faith-based schools, because they are a block to integration. There should be no compromise over education, or over English as the language of education. The policy of political multiculturalism should be reversed. The hope was that it would to ensure separate communities would soften at the edges and integrate. But the opposite has in fact happened: Islamic communities have hardened. There is much less integration than there was for the generation that arrived when I did. There will be much less in the future if the present trend continues.

"Finally, the Government should make it absolutely clear: we welcome diversity, we welcome different religions - but all of them have to accept the secular basis of British law and society. That is a non-negotiable condition of being here. If the Government does not do all of those things then I fear for the future, because Islamic communities within Britain will form a state within a state. Religion will occupy an ever-larger place in our collective political life. And, speaking as a religious man myself, I fear that outcome.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/02/19/nsharia219.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/02/19/ixnewstop.html

[Petronas]

ITALIAN MINISTER INVESTIGATED FOR INSULTING RELIGIOUS BELIEFS
Rome, 20 Feb. (AKI)

A state prosecutor in Rome has placed under investigation the cabinet minister who angered Muslims by wearing a T-shirt decorated with a cartoon satirising the Prophet Mohammed. The probe is examining whether charges of insulting religious beliefs should be filed. Reforms minister Roberto Calderoli, a leading member of the anti-immigration Northern League party, had to step down over the weekend after rioting outside the Italian consulate in the Libyan city of Benghazi led to 11 deaths. Prosecutor Roberto Cucchiari on Monday placed Calderoli under investigation on charges of insulting religious beliefs and of crimes against cults allowed by the state after the violent protests registered in Libya. The minister risks a fine of up to 5 thousand euros.

Attorney Tommaso Mancini, a consumers' group and Adel Smith, the leader of Italy's Muslims Union, have also filed separate lawsuits after Calderoli showed the T-shirt in an interview to Italian state television RAI broadcast on Wednesday.

The attorney in Rome said he had decided to take action because "Calderoli's conduct has caused threats and violence against Italy and its citizens in Benghazi as well as protests of the Muslim world against Italy and Italians." Calderoli said he had decided to resign on Saturday ...

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Religion&loid=8.0.267100058&par=0

[Petronas]

Funny that I've never heard of anyone being prosecuted under this law for insulting Christianity.

German court convicts man for insulting Islam
Thu Feb 23, 9:47 AM ET

DUESSELDORF, Germany (Reuters) - A German court on Thursday convicted a businessman of insulting Islam by printing the word "Koran" on toilet paper and offering it to mosques. The 61-year-old man, identified only as Manfred van H., was given a one-year jail sentence, suspended for five years, and ordered to complete 300 hours of community service, a district court in the western German town of Luedinghausen ruled. The conviction comes after a Danish newspaper printed cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad -- sparking violent protests around the world from Muslims who saw the images as sacrilegious and an attack on their beliefs.

Manfred van H. printed out sheets of toilet paper bearing the word "Koran" shortly after a group of Muslims carried out a series of bomb attacks in London in July 2005. He sent the paper to German television stations, magazines and some 15 mosques. Prosecutors said that in an accompanying letter Manfred van H. called Islam's holy book a "cookbook for terrorists." He also offered his toilet paper for sale on the Internet at a price of 4 euros ($4.76) per roll, saying the proceeds would go toward a "memorial to all the victims of Islamic terrorism."

The maximum sentence for insulting religious beliefs under the German criminal code is three years in prison.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060223/wl_nm/crime_religion_germany_dc_2

[Petronas]

Interesting, in light of the recent conviction for insulting Islam. Is there a double standard?

Anti-Semitic film cheered with cries of 'Allah is great'
February 26, 2006

The raucous reception by some members of Germany's 2.5 million-strong Turkish community to "Valley of the Wolves," a movie depicting crazed U.S. troops in Iraq massacring a wedding party and a Jewish doctor removing organs from prisoners, has German politicians worried – so worried, Bavaria's interior minister sent intelligence service agents to theaters showing the film to "gauge" audience reaction and identify potential radicals.

The $10 million dollar film, by Turkish director Serdan Akar, has already been wildly successful in Turkey, where its debut was attended by the wife of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "It is an extraordinary film that will go down in history," Turkish Parliament speaker Bulent Arinc, president of the Turkish National Assembly told the Anatolia press agency.

But that's not the way German officials see it. Edmund Stoiber, Bavaria's conservative prime minister, asked theater owners to not show "this racist and anti-Western hate film." Bernd Neumann, Germany's expressed concern that the film "raises serious questions about the values of our society and our ability to instill them". This week, Cinemaxx, Germany's largest theater chain, announced the movie would be pulled from its offerings. "These kinds of hate messages aren't what we need in a society filled with immigrants and mixed ethnic and religious groups," said Michael Kohlstruck, a political scientist at Berlin's Technical University. "All it takes is a few people mobilized by the film to become a danger by carrying out attacks."

The movie, which began showings in Germany three weeks ago, has played to sold out audiences since. Over 130,000 people, mostly young Muslims, saw the film in its first five days. The London Telegraph reports Berlin audiences, made up mostly of Turkish young men, clapping furiously when the building housing the U.S. military commander in northern Iraq is blown up and a standing ovation – accompanied by shouts of "Allah is great!" – when the movie's American antagonist, played by Billy Zane, is stabbed in the chest.

"The Americans always behave like this," one 18-year-old viewer said. "They slaughtered the Red Indians and killed thousands in Vietnam. I was not shocked by the film, I see this on the news every day."

While the film could be dismissed as an action film in which Muslims turn the tables on Rambo, the anti-Semitic element has drawn some of the most serious criticism. The villain of the movie is an American Jewish doctor, played by Gary Busey, who selects Iraqi prisoners, in a manner reminiscent of Nazi concentration camp doctor Joseph Mengele, and removes their organs to sell to rich buyers in the U.S. and Israel.

"Wolves" director Akar employed Soner Yalcin, a journalist who has popularized the Islamist notion that many of Turkey's leaders are descended from Jews, as an adviser on the film.

While some German politicians and Jewish leaders have called for a ban on the film, that seems unlikely since it is no more violent than other action films. Ahlin Sahdin, the film's distributor in Germany, sees the conflict in broader terms: "When a cartoonist insults two billion Muslims it is considered freedom of opinion, but when an action film takes on the Americans it is considered demagoguery. Something is wrong."

The film begins by recounting an actual event that occurred in northern Iraq in July 2003, according to the Forward, when U.S. troops arrested and held 11 Turkish soldiers who were later released. The fictional Turkish hero seeks revenge for the humiliation of his fellow Turks and sets the scene for American troops to massacre innocent guests at a wedding party, firebomb a mosque during evening prayers and conduct summary executions.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=49005

[Petronas]

We should fear Holland’s silence
February 26, 2006

‘Would you write the name you’d like to use here, and your real name there?” asked the girl at reception. I had just been driven to a hotel in the Hague. An hour earlier I’d been greeted at Amsterdam airport by a man holding a sign with a pre-agreed cipher. I hadn’t known where I would be staying, or where I would be speaking. The secrecy was necessary: I had come to Holland to talk about Islam.

Last weekend, four years after his murder, Pim Fortuyn’s political party, Lijst Pim Fortuyn, held a conference in his memory on Islam and Europe. The organisers had assembled nearly all the writers most critical of Islam’s current manifestation in the West. The American scholars Daniel Pipes and Robert Spencer were present, as were the Egyptian-Jewish exile and scholar of dhimmitude, Bat Ye’or, and the great Muslim apostate Ibn Warraq.

Both Ye’or and Warraq write and speak under pseudonyms. Standing at the hotel desk I confessed to the girl that I didn’t have any other name, couldn’t think of a good one fast. I was given my key and made aware that the other person in the lobby, a tall figure in a dark suit, was my security detail. I was taken up to my room where I changed, unpacked and headed back out — the security guard now positioned outside my bedroom door.

I had been invited to deliver the closing speech to the memorial conference on what would have been Fortuyn’s 58th birthday. I said I would talk on the effects of Europe’s increasingly Islamicised population and advocate a tougher European counterterror strategy. There was no overriding political agenda to the occasion, simply a desire for frank discussion.

The event was scholarly, incisive and wide-ranging. There were no ranters or rabble-rousers, just an invited audience of academics, writers, politicians and sombre party members. As yet another example of Islam’s violent confrontation with the West (this time caused by cartoons) swept across the globe, we tried to discuss Islam as openly as we could. The Dutch security service in the Hague was among those who considered the threat to us for doing this as particularly high. The security status of the event was put at just one level below “national emergency”.

This may seem fantastic to people in Britain. But the story of Holland — which I have been charting for some years — should be noted by her allies. Where Holland has gone, Britain and the rest of Europe are following. The silencing happens bit by bit. A student paper in Britain that ran the Danish cartoons got pulped. A London magazine withdrew the cartoons from its website after the British police informed the editor they could not protect him, his staff, or his offices from attack. This happened only days before the police provided 500 officers to protect a “peaceful” Muslim protest in Trafalgar Square.

It seems the British police — who regularly provide protection for mosques (as they did after the 7/7 bombs) — were unable to send even one policeman to protect an organ of free speech. At the notorious London protests, Islamists were allowed to incite murder and bloodshed on the streets, but a passer-by objecting to these displays was threatened with detention for making trouble.

Holland — with its disproportionately high Muslim population — is the canary in the mine. Its once open society is closing, and Europe is closing slowly behind it. It looks, from Holland, like the twilight of liberalism — not the “liberalism” that is actually libertarianism, but the liberalism that is freedom. Not least freedom of expression.

All across Europe, debate on Islam is being stopped. Italy’s greatest living writer, Oriana Fallaci, soon comes up for trial in her home country, and in Britain the government seems intent on pushing through laws that would make truths about Islam and the conduct of its followers impossible to voice.

Those of us who write and talk on Islam thus get caught between those on our own side who are increasingly keen to prosecute and increasing numbers of militants threatening murder. In this situation, not only is free speech being shut down, but our nation’s security is being compromised.

Since the assassinations of Fortuyn and, in 2004, the film maker Theo van Gogh, numerous public figures in Holland have received death threats and routine intimidation. The heroic Somali-born Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali and her equally outspoken colleague Geert Wilders live under constant police protection, often forced to sleep on army bases. Even university professors are under protection.

Europe is shuffling into darkness. It is proving incapable of standing up to its enemies, and in an effort to accommodate the peripheral rights of a minority is failing to protect the most basic rights of its own people.

The governments of Europe have been tricked into believing that criticism of a belief is the same thing as criticism of a race. And so it is becoming increasingly difficult and dangerous to criticise a growing and powerful ideology within our midst. It may soon, in addition, be made illegal.

I had planned — the morning after my speech — to see Geert Wilders, but instead spent the time catching up with his staff. Their leader had been called in by the police to discuss more than 40 new death threats he had received over the previous days.

As I left the Netherlands I once again felt terrible sorrow for a country that is slowly being lost. A society which should be carefree and inspiring has become dark and worried. The jihad in Europe is winning. And Holland, and our continent, takes one step further into a dark and menacing future.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,176-2058502,00.html

[Petronas]

EU regrets 'offensive' cartoons
Monday, 27 February 2006

EU foreign ministers have expressed regret that cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad published in European papers were found offensive by Muslims. At a meeting in Brussels they also agreed on a common line of action to rebuild ties with Muslim nations. Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik said the EU would seek dialogue and mutual understanding. However, the ministers also defended freedom of speech and condemned the violent response to the cartoons.

"The Council [of EU member states] expresses its deep concern at the events that followed the publication of cartoons in a number of European and other media," the ministers' statement says. It adds: "The Council acknowledges and regrets that these cartoons were considered offensive and distressing by Muslims across the world."

Diplomats said that at least one country, the Netherlands, had at first opposed the decision to express "regret". The Czech government was also reported to be concerned that apologising would undermine the freedom fo the media.

While they upheld freedom of expression as a fundamental right, the ministers said freedoms "come with responsibilities". "Freedom of expression should be exercised in a spirit of respect for religious and other beliefs and convictions. Mutual tolerance and respect are universal values we should all uphold," they said.

Per Stig Moeller, Foreign Minister of Denmark, where the cartoons were first published, told reporters that it was time to move on. "It is important that we draw a line, that we move forward," he said.

Denmark has sought to calm Muslim anger by promising to hold a religious conference, donate money to a UN agency fighting prejudice and stage a Muslim cultural exhibition. In a reference to boycotts of Danish products by some Muslims, the ministers' said "boycotts against individual member states are unacceptable".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4753782.stm

[Petronas]

Europe objects to El Al's anti-missile shield

El Al passenger planes will be barred from landing in some European countries because they have been equipped with defense systems against shoulder-held missiles, German newspaper Der Spiegel reported. The Swiss aviation authority has already barred El Al aircrafts equipped with the new system from landing in the country, and the German paper said more countries are expected to soon follow.

"If we catch Israeli planes fitted with this system in our airports, they will be grounded," a spokesman for the Swiss aviation authority told Der Spiegel.

The "Flight Guard" defense system is a military system that has been modified to fit civilian aircraft. This battle-proven system is capable of detecting an approaching missile, warning the crew and automatically activating countermeasures in the form of flares that will divert the missile from its course. The system has already been installed on a Boeing 767, and will soon be fitted on other planes as well.

According to defense sources in Israel, the European ban is "odd and based mostly on a misunderstanding." The officials say European countries are primarily concerned about false alarms that will result from the launching of decoy flares over central airports. "Because these are unique flares, such a malfunction will cause no panic or collateral damages. Instead of thanking Israel, some countries prefer to stick their head in the sand," an Israeli source said. However, a source at the Ministry of Transportation said the objection in Europe is not surprising, adding that "countries who oppose the landing of system-equipped planes are not on the list of countries where the threat of a missile attack is high. Therefore, this is not such a big problem."

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3221013,00.html

[NYer]

Muslim Vote Tips the Balance in The Netherlands (http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/890)

Today the center-left newspaper De Volkskrant writes that the immigrant vote has tipped the balance in favour of the Left. This should not come as a surprise. All across Europe, immigrants tend to vote for the Left. The Left is perceived to be the welfare state’s Santa Claus. Most of the immigrants who came to Europe during the past decades were attracted by the generous welfare benefits which Western Europe lavishly bestows on the “underprivileged.” Today, owing to their demographic growth, the immigrant vote is increasing as more and more young immigrants reach voting age. In many countries the Left has begun to cater for the immigrants, aware that the immigrants guarantee their power.

According to the Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies of the University of Amsterdam 80% of the non-indigenous electorate voted for Labour. This explains why cities such as Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Breda and Arnhem succumbed to the Left. 84% of the Turks voted for the PvdA; 81% of the Antillians/Surinamese did likewise. Of the Moroccans 78% voted Labour and 12% voted Green Left.

The center-right VVD, the party of famous Dutch policians such as Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Frits Bolkestein, received only 1% of the immigrant vote. The CDA got 3%, the SP 5% and Green Left 7%.

According to De Telegraaf, the largest paper in the country, immigrant voters have become a power block.

[Petronas]

Clarke criticises Danish 'mistake' over cartoons
Wednesday March 8, 2006

The British government has accused its Danish counterparts of making "a serious mistake" in the way it handled relations with Muslim countries after the publication of cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad. The home secretary, Charles Clarke, criticised the decision by the Danish prime minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, to snub a request from 11 Muslim countries for a meeting after the cartoons were published in the Jyllands Posten newspaper in September. Mr Clarke told a public meeting in Willesden Green - primarily held to discuss law and order issues - that Mr Rasmussen had not even responded to the request.

Admitting it was a "political point", Mr Clarke said: "I think that was a serious mistake which you could not imagine happening in other countries ... certainly not in this country. It is a question of respecting others, and that means do not provoke or challenge the deeply-held views of others."
His comments appeared to contradict Downing Street's supportive line towards the Danish government.

The prime minister, Tony Blair, last month said it was important to be seen be standing alongside Denmark following worldwide protests and riots over the cartoons last month. The foreign secretary, Jack Straw, said he had never, and nor would he, criticise the Danish government. However, it appears government officials hold private misgivings about the Danish failure to restore relations with the Muslim world last autumn. Mr Straw's office this morning said Mr Clarke's comments chimed with his own views.

Mr Rasmussen's office disputed the claim that the prime minister had failed to respond to the ambassadors' joint letter, which was officially received by the government in mid-October. "The prime minister did respond with a kind letter dated October 21", a statement said. However, it confirmed that Mr Rasmussen had chosen not to agree to the requested meeting. A routine meeting between the Danish foreign minister and eight of the signatory ambassadors was held in Bahrain the following month. The ambassadors "did not raise the issue of the cartoons at the meeting", the prime minister's office said.

Mr Rasmussen issued a statement last month which sought to heal the rift with the Muslim world by condemning "any expression, action or indication that attempts to demonise groups of people on the basis of their religion or ethnic background". "We must do our utmost to get back to the dialogue and on the friendship that has always characterised the relations between Denmark and the Muslim world", the statement said. ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/cartoonprotests/story/0,,1726325,00.html

[NYer]

Germany to Outlaw The Koran? (http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/010551.php)

A broad alliance of grass-roots movements have gone to the prosecutors of several states to hinder the dissemination of the Quran. According to the indictment, the Quran is not just a religious and historic book, but also a political book, which is incompatible with the constiution.

At the prosecutor’s office at Gorch-Forck-Wall 15 in Hamburg, an unusual letter was received Monday morning, containing an indictment filed this weekend. The indictment targeted the Quran, charging that the holy book of the Moslems, according to the accuser, is incompatible with the German constitution.

[Petronas]

Very interesting post, NYer. Check out the article, everyone, and those who understand German also BDB's website (http://www.buergerbewegungen.de/). The indictment lists the verses in the Koran calling for the murder of infidels, taking property from them, physical abuse of women, etc. and declares them to be contrary to various provisions of the German Constitution and Criminal Code. The article also quotes a German Muslim saying that Muslims by 2020 will have taken over the German Chancellorship and Supreme Court. THe BDB's website contains a projection based on current demographic trends (excluding any increased immigration into Germany following a possible accession of Turkey to the EU) showing the tipping point when Muslims will outnumber ethnic Germans being reached in 2045.

[Petronas]

But he admitted that the real motive is the need to keep parade spectators safe.Read: Catholics are not violent, but Muslims are.

Germany’s Carnival — OK to Bash Catholic Church but Islam off Limits
3/3/06

Mardi Gras, Shrove Tuesday, Fat Tuesday and Pancake Tuesday are among the many names for the custom of keeping a festival on the last day before the beginning of the Christian penitential season of Lent. In most countries that have European roots, Mardi Gras has always included elements mocking Catholic ceremonies and customs.

But the tone has changed since the growth of what Christians are recognizing as a new militant secularism that specifically fosters hatred of Christianity. One skit planned for Cologne features the Pope and the Cardinal Archbishop of Cologne as homosexual pop stars who end up in bed together. Last year, a float in the Dusseldorf parade showed Cardinal Meisner striking a match to a pregnant woman tied to the stake, the words "I had an abortion" written on her. The float’s caption read, “Fostering Tradition.”

The custom for making fun of Cathlic symbols goes back to the Middle Ages said Matthias von der Bank, a historian from Cologne's Carnival Museum said, “In the Middle Ages, carnival was a festival of reverse worlds and a playful expression of this," von der Bank said. "So Christian symbols, for example, were turned upside down.”

Von der Bank said, however, that the tone today has changed from playful satire to one of vicious attack. Slandering the Church was not part of carnival's festivities he told a German newspaper. “Our philosophy is that Carnival should be fun and friendly,” Sigrid Krebs, spokesman for the Cologne carnival committee said. "But they have never been aimed at harming or offending people nor will they in the future," Krebs said.

Although the rule of the Düsseldorf carnival committee was that there would be no floats dealing with religion this year, parade organizers seem to feel that Catholicism does not qualify. A float in the Dusseldorf parade featured a statue of Pope Benedict wearing the jersey of the often-defeated soccer team Fortune. The message was clear: the Catholic Church is the losing team and attacking it is acceptable.

Bernd Jost, spokesman for the Dusseldorf carnival committee said that the religion the committee wants to exempt is Islam. “In view of the current debate, we will be keeping very clear of things related to Muslims,” Jost said. “We don't want to fuel hatred,” Jost said. But he admitted that the real motive is the need to keep parade spectators safe.

Last year’s parade floats reflected a more egalitarian secularism and included one in which a Muslim Imam was crawling out of a hamburger. Jacques Tilly, an organizer of Dusseldorf’s parade said he thought the restriction was a compromise. Reflecting a more even-handed antipathy for religion, Tilly said, “Religion is in my eyes a delusion and hence should be mocked. The humour depicted on the floats simply needs to have some bite otherwise there is little point.”

http://www.catholicexchange.com/vm/index.asp?vm_id=43&art_id=32126

[Petronas]

Dhimmitude on the march...

'Weed out textbooks offensive to Muslims'
By David Rennie in Brussels
(Filed: 16/02/2006)

School textbooks should be reviewed for intolerant depictions of Islam and other faiths by experts overseen by the European Union and Islamic leaders, the European Parliament was told yesterday. The call for a special committee to examine religious education in schools came from Hans-Gert Pöttering, the German Christian Democrat, who heads the largest group of MEPs. But the proposal was immediately condemned as "appeasement" by Charles Tannock, a British Conservative MEP.

Mr Pöttering, the head of the centre-Right, but largely federalist European People's Party, said the work of building bridges between Islam and the West had to "begin with young people". During a debate intended to show Europe's unity in the face of the row over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, he said textbooks should be checked to ensure they promoted European values without propagating religious stereotypes or prejudice. He also called for similar tolerance in the Islamic world, holding up examples of anti-Semitic cartoons taken from the Middle East and suggesting a parallel review should be made of Islamic school books.

He also suggested that the EU could co-operate with the 56-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference, which has its headquarters in Saudi Arabia, to create a textbook review committee. "They could help to choose the experts to sit on this committee," he said.

But Dr Tannock, the Conservatives' foreign affairs spokesman at the European Parliament, said: "This sounds like an exercise in political correctness and appeasement. I don't see why we should be bringing children into this debate."

http://telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/02/16/wtort116.xml

[NYer]

It's The Demographics (http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/mar/06031711.html), Stupid.

German Birthrate Hits Bottom: Lowest in Europe

By Gudrun Schultz

BERLIN, Germany, March 17, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Germany’s birth rate is now the lowest in Europe. Only 8.5 babies were born in Germany last year for every 1,000 residents.

In 1964, 1.36 million babies were born in Germany. In 2005, half as many children were born, at just 680,000—the birth rate hasn’t been this low since the end of the Second World War, according to the Federal Statistical Office.

The German city of Chemnitz, in former East Germany, has the lowest birth rate in the world, with 6.9 babies born per 1,000 residents.

“The tradition in the 1950s, 60s and even the 80s in Germany was that a mother was only a mother and looked after the children,” Michael H&#252;ther, who heads up Cologne’s economics institute, told the Guardian.

“We are reaching a critical point,” he said to Die Welt newspaper. “The number of births now determines what happens in the next decade-and-a-half to two decades. You can’t revise it afterwards. The availability of human capital will get worse, and act as a brake on growth.”

There is, however, one segment (http://www.brookings.edu/views/op-ed/fellows/taspinar20030301.htm) of the population with a rising birthrate.

[Petronas]

I just went to check the BDB website (see posts about the German indictments against Islam byt the BDB a few days ago), which had some very good information about Muslim and non-Muslim birth and fertility rates in Germany, and found that it is down or no longer exists. It gave year by year projections based on current birth and immigration rates, which show Muslims increasing from about 4 million today to about 51 million 40 years from now, ethnic Germans dropping from close to 80 million today to also 51 million during the same time.

[Petronas]

BDB website is up again. Here is the link to the page with the German population forecasts: http://www.buergerbewegungen.de/beventw.html

[Petronas]

AUSTRIA: ARMY TO CATER FOR MUSLIMS' SPIRITUAL NEEDS
Mar-20-2006 06:46 pm

About 1,000 Austrian Muslims serving in the country's army are to get their own imams, Austria's defence minister, Guenther Platter has announced. Muslim soldiers should have access to an imam in the same way that army chaplains minister to Austrian Catholic and Protestant soldiers, putting Islam on an equal footing with other officially recognised religions in Austria, Platter said, quoted by Die Presse newspaper. Muslims form about 3.5 percent of Austrian soldiers, according to Platter.

Die Presse said Platter's initiative came after problems involving strictly religious Muslims of Austrian nationality conscripted into the army. The most recent incident was when some of them refused to salute the Austrian flag, the paper reported. The paper also quoted an Austrian Army trainer as testifying that a monthly military parade, when the Austrian flag was raised, some of the Muslims conscripts turned away and visibly turned their backs on the flag.

To the surprise of commanding officers, the Muslim soldiers said the flag was incompatible with their religion and would not salute it in future, Die Presse reported. However, no disciplinary measures were taken against the soldiers, who were simply allowed to be absent from the flag parade. “That caused annoyance among the troops,” the paper quoted one officer as saying. Islamic Community in Austria president Anas Schakfeh, was called in as a mediator. He stated clearly that "saluting the Austrian flag did not violate Islamic religious principles,” the Austrian News Agency reported.

Austrian trainers at the Maria Theresa Barracks in Vienna have complained that Muslim soldiers were often absent from duty, and could only be used for simple tasks in basic training, according to one non-commissioned officer. “Many of us had the impression that people classified as strictly religious Muslims took advantage of their position. For instance, they had to be relieved of duty to be allowed to pray," he said.

Muslims are required to pray five times a day and each session lasts 5-10 minutes, but any solider absent from duty for this purpose is required to make up the time, the Austrian military command pointed out. For instance, Islamic soldiers going to prayers on Friday at midday and missing the rest of the day, had to report for duty on Saturday instead. “They are often called in for Saturday or Sunday duty,” said a spokesman.

But non-commissioned officers, who did not want to be named, claimed it was too easy to get a certificate from the Islamic Community that they are a practising Muslim. “Some of the strictly-religious drink alcohol and eat pork, and we have also tested Muslims positive for drugs,” said one. Schakfeh conceded there were possibly individual “black sheep,” but said that most kept to the rules and the certificates of strict religious observances were immediately withdrawn from those who transgressed.

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Religion&loid=8.0.277832524&par=0#

[Petronas]

Brown to boost Islamic banking
March 12, 2006

GORDON BROWN is drawing up plans to turn Britain into the most Islam-friendly economy in the western world. The chancellor has given Muslim leaders private assurances that he wants to create a “level playing field” in the economy, so that more and more “sharia compliant” financial products can be offered to British Muslims. To comply with sharia law, financial products must not charge or earn interest, which is regarded as usury.

Brown hopes his proposed changes would remove barriers to many British and foreign Muslims participating fully in the financial system. They would help make London the natural home for Islamic funds from around the world, and increase the inflow of investment from oil-rich Middle Eastern countries. “Making the UK and London a centre for Islamic finance means putting in place the tax and legislative framework that is supportive of Islamic products,” said a senior Treasury official. “On top of this, we’re also looking at promoting the City abroad as a centre for Islamic finance.” Officials insist the changes will not compromise the government’s determination to root out and cut off sources of terrorist finance. ...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2081527,00.html

[Petronas]

Blair - The Qur’an "is practical and way ahead of its time"
24 - 30 MAR 2006

The Prime Minister during his speech "Not a clash between civilisations, but a clash about civilisation" spoke forcefully about the problems of terrorism. The talk given to the Foreign Policy Centre and Reuters also included his praise of the Holy Qur’an.

"The most remarkable thing about reading the Koran – in so far as it can be truly translated from the original Arabic - is to understand how progressive it is. I speak with great diffidence and humility as a member of another faith. I am not qualified to make any judgements. But as an outsider, the Koran strikes me as a reforming book, trying to return Judaism and Christianity to their origins, rather as reformers attempted with the Christian Church centuries later. It is inclusive. It extols science and knowledge and abhors superstition. It is practical and way ahead of its time in attitudes to marriage, women and governance," he said.

He added that under the guidance of the Qur’an, the spread of Islam and its dominance over previously Christian or pagan lands was "breathtaking". "Over centuries it founded an Empire, leading the world in discovery, art and culture. We look back to the early Middle Ages, the standard bearers of tolerance at that time were far more likely to be found in Muslim lands than in Christian," he declared.

http://www.themuslimweekly.com/fullstoryview.aspx?NewsID=2E55BC69EA7A593A9AEB68F6&MENUID=&DESCRIPTION=Search%20result

[Petronas]

Muslim woman who refuses to shake men's hands wins case against Dutch school
March 27, 2006 10:44 PM

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) - A Muslim woman who refuses to shake men's hands for religious reasons cannot be barred from a Dutch teacher-training program. The Dutch Equal Treatment Commission found Monday that the Regional Education Center in the city of Utrecht illegally ''discriminated, indirectly, on the basis of religion,'' when it rejected Fatima Amghar for its program.

Amghar, 20, said her religious beliefs forbid her from having physical contact with men over the age of 12. The school rejected her application, arguing that shaking hands was routine for a teaching assistant in Dutch society.

But ''there are other conceivable manners of greeting that can be considered proper and respectful,'' the commission ruled. It warned that Dutch schools risk excluding Muslim women from society unless they find a way to accommodate their beliefs.

Amghar's case is the latest in a series of decisions on the behavior ofo Muslims in the Netherlands. The same commission ruled last year against an Islamic school that refused to accept a Muslim woman for a teaching position because she refused to wear a headscarf. In 2004, another Muslim woman won her case when she complained that she was barred from entering a restaurant in The Hague for wearing a headscarf.

After France banned the wearing of headscarves in public schools, the Dutch government decided to leave that question up to individual schools. Most allow headscarves. However, four months ago parliament approved a ban on wearing the all-covering burqa in public.

The City of Utrecht cut some welfare benefits to unemployed women who insist on wearing burqas to job interviews. The city claimed the women were using the burqa to avoid working, since they knew they wouldn't be hired.

Muslims comprise six percent of Dutch society. Most are first or second generation immigrants from Turkey and Morocco, where the burqa is not common.

http://www.newspress.com/Top/Article/article.jsp?Section=WORLD&ID=564707080645509644

[Petronas]

Brussels Prosecutes Aramaic Priest and Fugitive for Islamophobia
Mon, 2006-03-27 13:35

One of the rare Belgian churches that is packed every weekend is the church of Saint Anthony of Padova in Montignies-sur-Sambre, one of the poorest suburbs of Charleroi, a derelict rust belt area to the south of Brussels. Holy Mass in Montignies is conducted in Latin and lasts up to four hours. Yesterday over 2,000 people attended the service by Father Samuel (Père Samuel). The priest’s sermon dealt with his persecution. The Belgian authorities are bringing the popular priest to court on charges of racism.

Father Samuel has been prosecuted for “incitement to racist hatred” by the Belgian government’s inquisition agency, the so-called Centre for Equal Opportunities and Opposition to Racism (CEOOR), because of a remark he made in a 2002 television interview when he said:

“Every thoroughly islamized Muslim child that is born in Europe is a time bomb for Western children in the future. The latter will be persecuted when they have become a minority.”

Last Thursday the Belgian judiciary decided that the priest will have to stand trial before the penal court in Charleroi. He reacted by repeating his time bomb statement and added that he would be honoured if he had to go to jail for speaking his mind. He added that Jesus, too, had been convicted. During yesterday’s sermon he called upon the faithful to accompany him to court. “We will turn this into an excursion, driving there in full buses.”

Father Samuel’s passport gives his name as Charles-Clément Boniface. That is not entirely correct. He was born in 1942 in Midyat, Turkey, as Samuel Ozdemir. The latter is a surname the priest dislikes because, he explains, it was imposed on his family by the Turks. Samuel was a Christian: “At home we spoke Aramaic, the language of Jesus.” The Aramaics are a Catholic minority in Syria and Turkey. They speak an old Semitic language, which Jesus and the apostles used and which Mel Gibson had his actors use in his movie The Passion of the Christ.

Young Samuel became a Catholic priest. In the mid-1970s he fled to Belgium, claiming that the Aramaic Christians were being persecuted in Turkey. He became a Belgian and adopted the surname of Boniface – “he who does good things.” He was appointed to the diocese of Tournai, but soon became caught up in the culture war between Christians and secularists. Tournai is a thoroughly secularised, modernist diocese. Father Samuel clashed with the bishop, who suspended him in 2001. He then bought the St-Antoine-de-Padoue church in Montignies-sur-Sambre. There he conducts the Mass according to the traditional rites of the Catholic Church.

Hundreds of faithful from all over the country and even from the north of France attend Sunday Mass in Montignies-sur-Sambre. The congregation includes African immigrants, a large number of young people and many young families with small children. In his sermons and on his website Father Samuel speaks out against secularism, but also fights on another front of the three-way culture war, warning against “the islamic invasion” of the West. He says he has witnessed in Turkey what the future has in store for Europe. He claims Muslims are invading Europe and warns for an impending civil war. According to Father Samuel “so-called moderate Muslims do not exist.”

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/936

[Petronas]

Now, we would not want to "demonise" people who blow up commuters in subways... Perhaps his course on "Islam as a first-hand, lived experience" should be combined with a few chemistry courses.

London bombers not terrorists - professor
Apr 4 2006

LONDON'S suicide bombings were not the acts of terrorists but just an extreme Muslim demonstration, a Chester professor has claimed. The attacks that killed 52 people and threw the country into shock last July were part of a long history of demonstrations sparked by British Muslims, according to Professor Ron Geaves. His controversial comments were made at a lecture given at the University of Chester that attracted dignitaries and members of the Muslim community from around the North West. ...

Prof Geaves said: "I have included, rather controversially, the events in London as primarily an extreme form of demonstration and assess what these events actually mean in terms of their significance in the Muslim community. "The word terrorism is a political word which always seems to be used to demonise people." Islam as a first-hand, lived experience

The academic ... said: "... over the last two decades ... I have moved from a position of academic neutrality to one of active engagement with the Muslim community in Britain."

Dr Ruth Ackroyd, department head, said: "I am delighted to have Professor Geaves as a colleague in the department. His wide knowledge of different Muslim communities, not only in the UK, but also in the Indian sub-continent, has brought to his students a rich sense of Islam as a first-hand, lived experience rather than simply text-book learning. ..."

http://iccheshireonline.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100regionalnews/tm_objectid=16901781&method=full&siteid=50020&headline=london-bombers-not-terrorists---professor--name_page.html

[Petronas]

Eurabia meets "1984"

EU lexicon to shun term "Islamic terrorism"
Tue Apr 11, 2006

BERLIN (Reuters) - The European Union, tiptoeing through a minefield of religious and cultural sensitivities, is discreetly reviewing the language it uses to describe terrorists who claim to act in the name of Islam. EU officials are working on what they call a "lexicon" for public communication on terrorism and Islam, designed to make clear that there is nothing in the religion to justify outrages like the September 11 attacks or the bombings of Madrid and London. The lexicon would set down guidelines for EU officials and politicians.

"Certainly 'Islamic terrorism' is something we will not use ... we talk about 'terrorists who abusively invoke Islam'," an EU official told Reuters. Other terms being considered by the review include "Islamist", "fundamentalist" and "jihad". ...

http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyid=2006-04-11T091529Z_01_L22771047_RTRUKOC_0_UK-SECURITY-EU-LANGUAGE.xml

[Petronas]

Muslim students 'being taught to despise unbelievers as filth'
April 20, 2006

MUSLIM students training to be imams at a British college with strong Iranian links have complained that they are being taught fundamentalist doctrines which describe nonMuslims as “filth”. The Times has obtained extracts from medieval texts taught to the students in which unbelievers are likened to pigs and dogs. The texts are taught at the Hawza Ilmiyya of London, a religious school, which has a sister institution, the Islamic College for Advanced Studies (ICAS), which offers a degree validated by Middlesex University.

The students, who have asked to remain anonymous, study their religious courses alongside the university-backed BA in Islamic studies. They spend two days a week as religious students and three days on their university course.

The Hawza Ilmiyya and the ICAS are in the same building at Willesden High Road, northwest London — a former Church of England primary school — and share many of the same teaching staff. They have a single fundraising arm, the Irshad Trust, one of the managing trustees of which is Abdolhossein Moezi, an Iranian cleric and a personal representative of Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, the Iranian supreme religious leader.

Mr Moezi is also the director of the Islamic Centre of England in Maida Vale, a large mosque and community centre that is a registered charity. Its memorandum of association, lodged with the Charity Commission, says that: “At all times at least one of the trustees shall be a representative of the Supreme Spiritual Leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

Both the Irshad Trust and the Islamic Centre of England Ltd (ICEL) were established in 1996. Mr Moezi’s predecessor as Ayatollah Khamenei’s representative, another cleric called Mohsen Araki, was a founding trustee of both charities.

In their first annual accounts, lodged with the Charity Commission in 1997, the charities revealed substantial donations. The Irshad Trust received gifts of £1,367,439 and the ICEL accepted an “exceptional item” of £1.2 million. Around the same time, the ICEL bought a former cinema in Maida Vale without a mortgage. Since then it has received between £1 million and £1.7 million in donations each year which, it says, come from British and overseas donors. The centre declined to say if any of its money came from Iran. Since 2000, its accountants have recorded in their auditors’ report on the charity’s accounts that they have limited evidence about the source of donations.

The links between the two charities and Iran are strong. The final three years of the eight-year Hawza Ilmiyya course are spent studying in colleges in the holy city of Qom, the power base of Iran’s religious leaders.

The text that has upset some students is the core work in their Introduction to Islamic Law class and was written by Muhaqqiq al-Hilli, a 13thcentury scholar. The Hawza Ilmiyya website states that “the module aims to familiarise the student with the basic rules of Islamic law as structured by al-Hilli”.

Besides likening unbelievers to filth, the al-Hilli text includes a chapter on jihad, setting down the conditions under which Muslims are supposed to fight Jews and Christians. The text is one of a number of books that some students say they find “disturbing” and “very worrying”. Their spokesman told The Times: “They are being exposed to very literalist interpretations of the Koran. ...

THE DOCTRINE

‘The water left over in the container after any type of animal has drunk from it is considered clean and pure apart from the left over of a dog, a pig, and a disbeliever’

‘There are ten types of filth and impurities: urine, faeces, semen, carrion, blood of carrion, dogs, pigs, disbelievers’

‘When a dog, a pig, or a disbeliever touches or comes in contact with the clothes or body [of a Muslim] while he [the disbeliever] is wet, it becomes obligatory- compulsory upon him [the Muslim] to wash and clean that part which came in contact with the disbeliever’

From the al-Hilli text

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2142403,00.html

[Petronas]

Dutch Scientific Council Praises Islam
Wednesday, April 19, 2006

The Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR) in the Netherlands, advising the government with the reports it prepares, acknowledges that Islam is "in perfect dynamism" with democracy and human rights. The council, covering relations between Islam and democracy in its latest report titled "Dynamism in Islamic activism," stresses the frequently used statement that in principle Islam conflicts with democracy along with the cliché "clash of civilizations" leads to blocked dialogue among cultures.

A new opening is needed, the Council diagnosed, giving the following advice to EU countries: "Instead of exporting democracy to Muslim countries, democratic attempts harmonious with their own traditions and cultures must be supported." The council’s report mainly focuses on Islamic thought, political movements and laws.

Islamic movements in Europe were also analyzed, "Contrary to the common belief, Islam has no problem accepting democracy and human rights." ... describing Islam together with the words "clash of civilizations" and terrorism are the biggest obstacles facing dialogue ... The WRR report ... advises the idea of exporting democracy must be given up ...

http://www.zaman.com/?bl=international&alt=&trh=20060420&hn=32226

[Petronas]

Ban on Easter poster criticised
Apr 21

Religious leaders, including an aide to the Archbishop of York, have slammed a council’s ban on the advertising of an Easter passion play — because of fears that it would offend other religious groups. Christian ministers labelled as “over sensitive” and “discrimination against Christians” Rotherham Council’s ban of a poster advertising the event from its main town library.

Iranian members of a local Methodist church wanted to advertise their open-air play staged in Rotherham town centre on Good Friday, Easter Eve and Easter Day. But council officials vetoed the idea on the grounds that it could be “prejudicial”. The 100-strong group at Doncaster’s Hexthorpe Methodist Church has separate Bible studies in Iranian but all members attend English language church services on Sundays. English-born Elizabeth Collins, 44, a Bible teacher with the group, who was formerly married to an Iranian, said: “One of our members wanted to put up a poster in the library but officials said it might cause offence to other people. We can only imagine they mean other religions.

“The poster just has a cross on it, with the dates, times and place of the performance and says: ‘Iranian Christian Drama’. What offence can that cause to anyone? This is supposed to be a Christian country. We go to other countries to promote democracy, yet on our own doorstep we can’t even put up a poster about an Easter passion play.” ...

http://www.churchnewspaper.com/news.php?read=on&number_key=5816&title=Ban%20on%20Easter%20poster%20criticised

[Petronas]

Jail toilets face away from Mecca
Thursday, 20 April 2006

Facilities in a prison are being built so Muslim inmates do not have to face Mecca while sitting on the toilet. The Home Office said two new toilet blocks are being installed as part of a refurbishment at Brixton jail in south London. Faith leaders had told prison bosses it was unacceptable for Muslim inmates to face Mecca while using the toilet. "The refurbishment has been carried out with due consideration for all faiths", a Home Office spokeswoman said. ...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4926114.stm

[NYer]

Eurabia meets "1984"

EU lexicon to shun term "Islamic terrorism"


There was no mention of the term: Dhimmitude ...

[NYer]

The Caged Virgin (http://www.slate.com/id/2141276/)

Christopher Hitchens on Ayaan Hirsi Ali's eviction -

But here is the grave and sad news. After being forced into hiding by fascist killers, Ayaan Hirsi Ali found that the Dutch government and people were slightly embarrassed to have such a prominent "Third World" spokeswoman in their midst. She was first kept as a virtual prisoner, which made it almost impossible for her to do her job as an elected representative. When she complained in the press, she was eventually found an apartment in a protected building. Then the other residents of the block filed suit and complained that her presence exposed them to risk. In spite of testimony from the Dutch police, who assured the court that the building was now one of the safest in all Holland, a court has upheld the demand from her neighbors and fellow citizens that she be evicted from her home. In these circumstances, she is considering resigning from parliament and perhaps leaving her adopted country altogether. This is not the only example that I know of a supposedly liberal society collaborating in its own destruction, but I hope at least that it will shame us all into making The Caged Virgin a best seller.

Also, Michelle Malkin reports on Hirsi Ali's appearance at Harvard. (http://michellemalkin.com/archives/005167.htm)

[NYer]

More from Ayaan Hirsi Ali. (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5382547)

[NYer]

Paris Burns ... again. (http://no-pasaran.blogspot.com/2006/05/french-close-their-eyes-and-chant.html)

[NYer]

Youssef Nada ( of Al Taqwa Fame) On The Offensive Again: Seeking Damages From Swiss. (http://counterterrorismblog.org/mt/pings.cgi/2768)

Attorneys for Muslim Brotherhood Banker Youssef Nada, founder and president of the Al Taqwa Bank, have announced their intention to file a new claim against the Swiss government, on Nada’s behalf, for economic losses, defamation and mental distress allegedly caused by the Swiss Government’s three year investigation of Nada’s alleged involvement in financing terrorism. The charges were dropped last May (2005) when the Swiss Prosecutor’s office concluded it had insufficient usable evidence to bring the matter to trial. At the time concerns were expressed over the lack of cooperation and information sharing between relevant intelligence and investigative agencies in the United States and Switzerland, and the difficulty the Swiss Prosecutor's office had in obtaining and turning intelligence into usable evidence.

Nada, and Al Taqwa were designated by the UN Al Qaeda and Taliban Sanctions Committee and by the US Treasury in November 2001 for providing financial support to Al Taqwa. Press reports have speculated that Nada is seeking up to 200 million Swiss Francs as damages, but his attorneys have suggested that these stories are "speculative" and that no claim amount has yet been established. Despite UN and US designation, Nada continues to direct a substantial worldwide business network and has reportedly re-established himself as liquidator of at least some of his holdings maintained through Shell companies in Liechtenstein.

[NYer]

From Atlas Shrugs ...

The evil that dare not speak its name. "Youths," "immigrants," translation Muslim. (http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2006/06/muslims_in_belg.html)

[Petronas]

We musn't rile the terror-mongers
Friday, July 7, 2006

Just in time for the one-year anniversary of 7/7, a poll conducted for The Times of London indicates that 13 percent of British Muslims believe that the four Islamic suicide bombers who murdered 52 people in London last July should be regarded as "martyrs." With a Muslim population in Britain estimated at 1.6 million, this means that some 208,000 British Muslims regard these killers with what can only be described as a worshipful attitude. Which is despicable. But Mother England, it seems, is home to an awful lot of despicable people.

One of them, surely, is Anjem Choudary, who made related news this week. Choudary is a former leader of Al Mujahiroun -- a defunct, jihad-inciting group, whose venomous pronouncements on Islamic supremacy have earned him a strange prominence in the British media. He refuses to condemn the 7/7 attacks, says Muslims shouldn't help police combat jihad terror, and advocates sharia (Islamic law) for Britain. During a BBC "Newsnight" appearance this year, the host asked Choudary why he didn't simply move to a sharia state like Iran.

"Who says you own Britain, anyway?" Choudary replied. "Britain belongs to Allah. The whole world belongs to Allah. ... If I go to the jungle, I'm not going to live like the animals, I'm going to propagate a superior way of life. Islam is a superior way of life."

In a way, the 39-year-old Essex man was just found guilty of a charge connected to propagating that "superior way of life." It all started last February when Choudary organized a march on the Danish Embassy in London to protest Muhammad cartoons first published in a Danish newspaper. This wasn't one of those anti-Danish protests in which people were killed -- hundreds died around the Islamic world in this year's Days of Cartoon Rage -- but it was definitely murder-minded. "Behead Those Who Insult Islam," said one placard. "Slay Those Who Insult Islam," said another. "Kill Those Who Insult Islam," and (for variety) "Butcher Those Who Mock Islam," said others. Hundreds of demonstrators marched through London, praising the 7/7 killers, or calling for the murder of journalists who publish Mohammed cartoons.

And the police stood by.

More accurately, they made sure the protest went off smoothly, as the Times Online reported. "People who tried to snatch away (the placards) were held back by police," the newspaper said. "Several members of the public tackled senior police officers guarding the protesters, demanding to know why they allowed banners that praised the 'Magnificent 19' -- the terrorists who hijacked the aircrafts used on Sept. 11, 2001 -- and others threatening further attacks on London."

Why, indeed. The "Newsnight" show on which Choudary subsequently appeared included news footage of an English bobby vigorously silencing such a citizen, described as a van driver, who, according to the televised report, had angrily criticized the Muslim protesters. It is tragically enlightening.

"Listen to me, listen to me," said the policeman, shaking his finger at the van driver. "They have a right to protest. You let them do it. You say things like that you'll get them riled and I end up in (trouble). You say one more thing like that, mate, and you'll get yourself nicked (arrested) and I am not kidding you, d'you understand me?"

Van driver: "They can do whatever they want and I can't?"

Policeman: "They've got their way of doing it. The way you did it was wrong. You've got one second to get back in your van and get out of here."

Van driver: (bitter) "Freedom of speech."

This vignette wasn't law and order in action. It was desperate, craven appeasement. As the bobby put it, "You say things like that, you'll get them riled." And we mustn't get them riled. Let Choudary and his band of thugs praise mass killings, threaten more attacks and advocate murder by beheading on London streets in broad daylight -- but don't get them riled.

Still, Choudary did end up in a British court of law, and this week a British judge handed down a verdict. Choudary has been found guilty of ... staging a demonstration without giving the required six days' written notice.

Tsk, tsk. That'll be $1,400 in fines, please -- easy enough to pay since Choudary, the Online Sun reports, receives more than twice that per month in government handouts. All of which makes Pax Britannica seem quite cheap at the price.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/column.aspx?UrlTitle=we_musnt_rile_the_terror-mongers&ns=DianaWest&dt=07/07/2006&page=2

[Petronas]

July 12, 2006
A new essay by the superb European writer Fjordman:

We have seen videos on TV of Muslim Jihadis beheading infidel hostages. Less attention has been paid to the fact that Muslims are beheading entire nation states. Although this is happening in slow motion, it is no less dramatic. Historically, the major cities have constituted a country's "head," the seat of most of its political institutions and the largest concentration of its cultural brainpower. What happens when this "head" is cut off from the rest of the body? In many countries across Western Europe, Muslim immigrants tend to settle in major cities, with the native population retreating to minor cities or into the countryside. Previously, Europeans or non-Europeans could travel between countries and visit new cities, each with its own, distinctive character and peculiarities. Soon, you will travel from London to Paris, Amsterdam or Stockholm and find that you have left one city dominated by burkas and sharia to find……yet another city dominated by burkas and sharia. For some reason, this eradication of unique, urban cultures is to be celebrated as "cultural diversity." Britain's population is projected to rise by more than seven million in the next 25 years. The predictions were even greater than those made by the Migrationwatch UK think-tank, whose forecasts had been dismissed in the past as alarmist. Sir Andrew Green, the chairman of Migrationwatch, said the figures were '"staggering." "They totally demolish the Government's claim that it has a 'managed migration' policy. In fact they show that immigration into the UK is out of control." British citizenship has been granted to nearly one million foreign nationals since Labour and Tony Blair came to power in 1997. "Grants of citizenship have quadrupled under the present Government. This is a direct result of their 'no limits' immigration policy." "Immigration on this scale is changing the nature of our society without public consent. It is no longer acceptable."
More white families are moving from London to the regions while many immigrants arrive in the capital from overseas. Migrationwatch said that the change in 10 years had been "extraordinarily rapid'" and "unprecedented." Whites will soon become a minority in Birmingham and other major British cities, posing a "critical" challenge to social stability, Britain's race relations watchdog warned. Statistics showed that white and ethnic minority communities were becoming increasingly segregated.
"Asian youths," a British euphemism for Pakistanis and Muslims from South Asia, in parts of Oldham are trying to create no-go areas for white people. One of them told: "There are signs all around saying whites enter at your risk. It's a matter of revenge." However, it's not just the white natives that are targets of Muslim violence, but other non-Muslims, too. A report on Hindus being driven out of the English city of Bradford by young Muslims was described by some Hindus as "ethnic cleansing." Some of them want to leave the city to escape the "Talibanization of
Bradford."
In an online story in newspaper The Daily Telegraph that was removed "for legal reasons," former Muslim Dr. Patrick Sookhdeo warned that British Muslims could soon form a state within the state. Dr Sookhdeo believed that "in a decade, you will see parts of English cities which are controlled by Muslim clerics and which follow, not the common law, but aspects of Muslim sharia law." "In 1980, the Islamic Council of Europe laid out their strategy for the future - and the fundamental rule was never dilute your presence. That is to say, do not integrate." "Rather, concentrate Muslim presence in a particular area until you are a majority in that area, so that the institutions of the local community come to reflect Islamic structures. The education system will be Islamic, the shops will serve only halal food, there will be no advertisements showing naked or semi-naked women, and so on."
The next step will be pushing the Government to recognize sharia law for Muslim communities - which will be backed up by the claim that it is "racist" or "Islamophobic" to deny them this. Sookhdeo noted that there is already a Sharia Law Council for the UK. "There are Muslim men in Britain who marry and divorce three women, then marry a fourth time - and stay married, in sharia law, to all four." "The more fundamentalist clerics think that it is only a matter of time before they will persuade the Government to concede on the issue of sharia law. Given the Government's record of capitulating, you can see why they believe that."
In France, Muslims already have many smaller states within the state. Criminologist Lucienne Bui Trong wrote that: "From 106 hot points in 1991, we went to 818 sensitive areas in 1999." The term she used, "sensitive areas," was used to describe Muslim no-go zones where anything representing a Western institution (post office truck, firemen, even mail order delivery firms) was routinely ambushed with Molotov cocktails. The number was 818 in 2002, when the French government decided to stop collecting the statistics.
In some of these areas, the phenomenon " target=_blankof gang rape "has become banal." Violence against and pressure on women is part of daily life in the suburbs, where boys can dictate how girls should dress. Pressure is mounting for Muslim women to wear veils. In 2002, a 17-year-old girl was set alight by an 18-year-old boy as his friends stood by. The support group "Ni Putes, Ni Soumises" ("Neither Whores nor Submissives") says the number of forced marriages has risen in recent years, with roughly 70,000 girls pressured into unwanted relationships each year in France. A leaked study conducted between October 2003 and May 2004 under the auspices of France's inspector-general of education, Jean Pierre Obin, described an educational system where Muslim students regularly boycotted classes that concerned Voltaire, Rousseau and Moliere, whom the students accused of being anti-Islamic. Orbin's report cited Muslim students' refusal to use the "plus" sign in mathematics because it looks like a crucifix; Muslims boycotting class trips to churches, cathedrals and monasteries; and forcing wholesale changes in school lunch fare to accommodate their religious practices.
The influence of radical Islamist groups is a growing threat to French business, too, a leading intelligence expert warned, citing the discovery of secret prayer-rooms at the Disneyland theme-park outside Paris. A report commissioned by several retail and courier companies stated that the Islamists' strategy is to "take control of Muslims within the workforce" and then "challenge the rules in order to impose Islamic values." French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said that the riots in 2005 were rather "well organized." Caroline Glick of the Jerusalem Post noted that some Muslim leaders explained that what they wanted was autonomy in their ghettos: "They seek to receive extraterritorial status from the French government, meaning that they will set their own rules based, one can assume, on Sharia law. If the French government accepts the notion of communal autonomy, France will cease to be a functioning state." Following three weeks of unrest, the police said 98 vehicles torched in one day marked a "return to a normal situation everywhere in France." Some of the rioters left boasting messages on various Internet forums. "We aren't going to let up. The French won't do anything and soon, we will be in the majority here" One observer stated: "In France, the majority of young Muslims believe that French society is dying, committing suicide. More like 10 percent to 20 percent of them believe that they are in the process of replacing European civilization with an Islamic one." In the southern city of Marseille, Muslims make up at least a quarter of the population, and rising fast.
In the Netherlands, Muslims will soon make up the majority in all major cities. "Today, we have 1 million Muslims out of 16 million Dutch," according to Frits Bolkestein, Dutch politician. "Within 10 years, they will have an absolute majority in both Amsterdam and Rotterdam. We are staring into the face of a shortly to be divided community. Muslims have the right to their own schools, so there is no teaching of evolution, gay teachers are not tolerated but anti-Semitism is." A researcher for the Netherlands Ministry for Immigration and Integration found that 40% of young Moroccan Muslims in the Netherlands rejected Western values and democracy. Six to seven percent were prepared to use force to "defend" Islam, and the majority were opposed to freedom of speech for offensive statements, particularly criticism of Islam.
We are witnessing a dramatic change in Europe, which men like Bolkestein see as underlined by a drop in national confidence in European countries over the entirety of the last century. The immigration problem, he said, "has to do with the loss of confidence in one's own civilization. It started with World War II, which was really a mass European suicide. Then, the rise of fascism, the Holocaust and the 1968 student cultural revolutions across Europe. There is no clear European identity today. This has a real impact on foreign policy."
Douglas Murray attended a conference in memory of the murdered Islam critic Pim Fortuyn in 2006, and noted with concern the strict security
measures and what he saw as a nation under siege. "All across Europe, debate on Islam is being stopped. Italy's greatest living writer, Oriana Fallaci, soon comes up for trial in her home country, and in Britain the government seems intent on pushing through laws that would make truths about Islam and the conduct of its followers impossible to voice. Europe is shuffling into darkness. It is proving incapable of standing up to its enemies, and in an effort to accommodate the peripheral rights of a minority is failing to protect the most basic rights of its own people." A survey in April 2005, after the murder of another critic of Islam, Theo van Gogh, indicated that 32 percent of Dutch people wanted to emigrate abroad.

They leave what was once their country in favor of people such as Dyab Abou Jahjah, founder of the Arab European League (AEL). The AEL, founded in Belgium in 2000, now has branches in the Netherlands and France, and intends to spread across the EU. Jahjah, who has called the 9/11 attacks "sweet revenge," recruits Muslim youth to spread his ideology, which calls for the introduction of sharia in Europe. "We have three basic demands," he says. "Bilingual education for Arab-speaking kids, hiring quotas that protect Muslims, and the right to keep our cultural customs." "Assimilation is cultural rape. It means renouncing your identity, becoming like the others." Jahjah has also demanded that Arabic should be made an official language in Belgium.
Belgium's Jews, in particular Antwerp's Jewish diamond merchants, have earlier felt threatened by the Arab European League (AEL), which issued a statement: "The AEL calls on the Jewish community in Antwerp to cease its support of, and distance itself from, the state of Israel. If not, attacks in Antwerp are almost unpreventable." Security sources in Germany warned that the country was home to between 3,000 and 5,000 potential Islamic suicide attackers. A Berlin court in 2005 ruled that a well-known Turkish religious leader should be extradited to Turkey. In his Berlin mosque he repeatedly said that "all Germans were stinking people and doomed to go to hell because they were useless creatures and infidels." Shortly before, the press spokesman of this mosque had told about the Turks' strong interest in fostering good relations with native Germans. TV correspondent Reinhard Laska feared that the opinions voiced by the Imam were only the tip of the iceberg: "There was nobody in the mosque who stood up and demanded that the Imam stop his nasty talk about Germans," he said. "Nobody seemed to mind at all." In 2006, "Valley of the Wolves," a virulently anti-Semitic film about the Iraq war, sold out to cheering audiences from Germany's 2.5 million-strong Turkish community. According to Der Spiegel, Germany's and Europe's biggest weekly magazine, an estimated number of 50 women in Germany have been murdered in so-called honor killings in the past decade. Their crime? Trying to break free and live Western lifestyles. Within their communities, the killers are revered as heroes for preserving their family dignity. Much of this insular and ultra-religious world is out of public view, "often hidden in inner-city apartments where the most influential links to the outside world are satellite dishes that receive Turkish and Arabic television and the local mosque." "In these families, loyalty and honor are elevated virtues and women are treated little better than slaves, unseen by society and often unnoticed or ignored by their German neighbors." It caused an outcry when a group of 14-year-old Turkish boys mocked one victim during a class discussion. "She deserved what she got. The whore lived like a German."
In Denmark, the nation-wide organization of Women's Crisis Centres claims that a number of taxi drivers with immigrant background are spying on female immigrants who are in hiding, sending information about their whereabouts to their families. It was a group of taxi drivers who informed a Pakistani man where he could find his sister. He murdered her in broad daylight outside a train station because she had married a man from Afghanistan against her family's orders. 80% of the women seeking help at crisis centres in the city of Oslo, Norway, are from immigrant background.
Non-western immigrants account for nearly 86 percent of the Norwegian capital's total population growth over the past ten years. Muslims make up such a high percentage of cab drivers that it can be hard to obtain a taxi during Islamic holidays. Blind people with their guide dogs are finding it increasingly difficult to get a taxi ride, as demonstrated by a lady in the city of Drammen outside Oslo. Grethe Olsen, accompanied by her guide dog Isak, experienced being rejected by no less than 21 taxis before finally getting a ride. Olsen thought the taxi drivers said no for religious reasons. The Norwegian Blind Association confirmed that this is a well known problem all over the country, especially in cities with many immigrants. Dogs are considered extremely dirty animals in Islam and only permitted for certain limited uses, such as guarding your property. Two hadith, traditions relating to the words and deeds of Muhammad, state that: "The Prophet said, "Angels do not enter a house in which there is a dog or there are pictures" and "Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) ordered the killing of dogs and we would send (men) in Medina and its corners and we did not spare any dog that we did not kill."
Mullah Krekar, former leader of Kurdish guerilla group Ansar-al-Islam, lives in Oslo. He has praised Iraqi al-Qaida leader Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi, has stated that "Osama bin Laden is a good person" and that he was willing to sacrifice himself for bin Laden. Krekar told an Oslo newspaper that there's a war going on between the West and Islam, and that he was sure that Islam would win. Rumor has it that Krekar is such a respected man among many fellow Muslims that he gets taxi rides for free. Which means that it is easier to get a taxi ride in Norway's capital if you praise Osama bin Laden than if you are blind.
It has been reported that shopkeepers in certain areas of Oslo now need to pay protection money. The criminals are more trigger-happy than ever, and since many of them abide by the rules of blood vengeance, violence is rapidly increasing. In Sweden, reports about criminal gangs and mafias, a phenomenon that is growing day by day, are coming in from urban areas all over the country, and a feeling of powerlessness is spreading among ordinary citizens. "We have no other possibility than to flee from this area. Families cannot fight against these problems alone. We are talking about survival, you can get stabbed here. We can only survive by attempting to avoid getting targeted."
Feriz and Pajtim, members of youth gang Gangsta Albanian Thug Unit in the Swedish city of Malmö, explain how they mug and beat people downtown. "Many of us participated in gangs that fought against the Serbs during the war in Kosovo. Violence is in our blood," Feriz said. They target a lone victim and make him a scapegoat. "We make it look like he bumped into one of us. Then we have an opportunity to attack him. We surround him and beat and kick him until he no longer fights back," he said. "You are always many more people than your victims. Cowardly?" "I have heard that from many, but I disagree. The whole point is that they're not supposed to have a chance." Neither Feriz nor Pajtim expressed any sympathy for their victims. "If they get injured, they just have themselves to blame for being weak," said Pajtim and shrugged.
They bring with them a rather brutal culture to Sweden. A BBC article described how the centuries-old custom of blood feuds has made a comeback in Albania in recent years. "The law and order vacuum created by the collapse of communism sent many Albanians back to the ancient customary laws of their tribal roots." "The Kanuns sanction blood feuds and regulate them from all points of view," said professor of law Ismet Elezi. "And first they established the rule: whoever kills will be killed. Blood is avenged with blood." In an effort to end to this perpetual cycle of revenge, the Albanian education ministry has set up programmes for children affected by blood feuds. Each local authority tries to identify the children who do not attend school because they are in hiding or confined to their homes. "It's between the families. If we go and ask for the police to help this thing will get even worse."
What the BBC conveniently "forgot" to mention in this article was that these blood feuds are rooted in Islamic teachings. Two men were killed in a row involving a group of second generation immigrants in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 2005. According to imam Abu Laban, who was later responsible for whipping up hatred against his country of residence because of the now famous cartoons of Muhammad in Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, the thirst for revenge could be cooled if 200,000 kroner were paid by the family of the man who fired the shots.
200,000 Danish kroner is approximately the value of 100 camels, a number based on the example of Muhammad himself. The idea of blood money originates from the Koran, 2.178. Indemnity is secured through the payment of blood money to the next-of-kin or the injured party, as opposed to retaliation, in which the killer is put to death or has a like injury inflicted on him/her. It depends upon what the family of the deceased or the injured party wants.
Politiken, a left-leaning newspaper championing Multiculturalism in Denmark, argued that the principle of blood money might be worth considering. Luckily, they were met by an outcry from angry citizens. Apart from the apparent 7th century time warp Muslims seemed stuck in, many commentators missed out on the worst part of the blood money concept: The compensation to be paid is not the same for all people. The only full members of the Islamic community are Muslim men. All others have fewer rights, due to their religion, sex or slave status. The rates for blood money mirror this religious apartheid system, which is deeply ingrained in Islamic law. A Saudi Arabian court ruled that the value of one woman's life was equal to that of one man's leg.
A secret high-level UK police report concluded that Muslim officers were more likely to become corrupt than white officers, with complaints of misconduct and corruption against Muslim officers running 10 times higher than against their colleagues. "Asian officers and in particular Pakistani Muslim officers are under greater pressure from the family, the extended family ... and their community against that of their white colleagues to engage in activity that might lead to misconduct or criminality." The report argued that British Pakistanis live in a cash culture in which "assisting your extended family is considered a duty" and in an environment in which large amounts of money are loaned between relatives and friends. It recommended that Asian officers needed special anti-corruption training. Only an extremely small percentage of the inhabitants of Pakistan, and many other Muslim countries, actually pay taxes. If Pakistanis don't even pay taxes in Islamic Pakistan, why should they pay taxes to, or feel any loyalty towards, infidel, Western states? The clan is everything, the state is an enemy, a mentality people from these countries bring with them to the West, along with the corruption and the tribal violence associated with it.
The massive concentration of Muslims in major European cities will have dramatic consequences, some of which are already visible. If it is allowed to continue, it will destroy the coherence of society that is necessary for our democracies and our legal systems to work. Increased urban insecurity means that the state is not able to guarantee the security of its citizens. If ordinary citizens feel that the state is no longer able to guarantee the safety of their loved ones, then perhaps native Europeans will create groups and "clans" of their own, to counter the Muslim clans. The result will be a re-tribalization of our countries. The downfall of the nation state, if it happens, will be chaotic, painful and bloody. Can it still be avoided? Only time will tell.

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/012204.php

[Petronas]

BBC bans the word "dhimmi"
Wednesday, July 05, 2006

http://islamophobic.blogspot.com/2006/07/bbc-bans-word-dhimmi.html

[NYer]

BBC bans the word "dhimmi"

http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/Americanmuslim-X.gif

[Petronas]

Darkness descending on Europe... There is a very apt expression of Jews being like the canary in a coal mine: if it no longer is safe to be Jewish in a country, the rest of the people had better watch out, because they will not be far behind in being targeted for oppression or persecution.

Jews warned against harassment
First published: 20 Jul 2006, 12:02

The Mosaic Religious Community has advised its Jewish members against speaking Hebrew loudly on the streets of Oslo or wearing Jewish emblems. The suggestion has infuriated some in the membership. It comes after a Jewish man wearing a kippah, or yarmulke, was assaulted on an Oslo street Saturday. The Mosaic Religious Community wants its members to be careful.

"We have encouraged our members to avoid speaking Hebrew loudly on the street," Anne Sender of the Jewish organization told newspaper Vårt Land. She also told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) that men may want to reconsider wearing the yarmulke.

That's provoked journalist Mona Levin, daughter of the late pianist Robert Levin. "We can't conceal that we're Jews," Levin said, adding that she intended to start wearing her Star of David. "That's letting ourselves down." ...

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article1393945.ece

[Petronas]

Italian Beaches Under Islamic Law
August 7, 2006

Europe’s transformation into Eurabia is still dismissed as absurd by many Europeans who choose to ignore the effects of unassimilated Muslim populations in their cities. But it’s the absurd—as seen in some recent accommodations to Muslims—that might finally force them to avert their eyes no more.

The wandering eyes of men will no longer be a concern for certain women in a popular Italian resort on the Adriatic Sea. The city council of Riccione has come up with a way to enable Muslim women to enjoy the sand and sea without being fully clothed: opening sections of the beach exclusively for their use. Muslim women will now be able to cast off their headscarves and robes because men will be banned from certain portions of the beach. These stretches of sand will also be fitted with tents and have only female lifeguards and waitresses in order to ensure that the Islamic law requiring women to be covered in the presence of men is not broken. Hotel owner Attillio Cenni wants to take things a step further and have female lifeguards—ala Pamela Anderson—keep a lookout for men while patrolling the sea in water scooters.

Everything didn’t go off without a hitch, however. Because the law states that the beach needs to be able to accommodate public passage—and not just Muslims—the partitions couldn’t extend all the way to the sea. But Muslim women need not worry. The city council of Riccione is already considering whether to authorize the construction of reserved seaside swimming pools.

Riccione councilwoman for urban planning, Loretta Villa, defended the city measure as a sound business decision: “We live on tourism and we can’t survive if we don’t satisfy the requests of our customers, especially the ones who have started coming here only recently.” Those requests would more accurately be described as demands from a group that is used to having them met. The truth is that Riccione “has become popular with Arabs, especially Saudis, who are increasingly demanding customized services, such as private jet charters.”

Villa found nothing newsworthy about the creation of sections of the beach for Muslim women only. Comparing the decision to other accommodations made for tourists she said, “When the Germans started coming here didn't we learn the language and start providing German newspapers?" The fact that Germans would never demand the exclusive right to enjoy the beach is apparently lost on the councilwoman.

Muslim inmates in London prisons have recently benefited from an even more bizarre surrender to the tenets of multiculturalism. After Muslims complained that they had to face Mecca while sitting on the toilet, they weren’t told to think about the effects breaking the law would have on their ability to fulfill certain aspects of Islamic law. Personal responsibility was instead taken by the British government, with the Home Office agreeing to rebuild the toilets by turning them 90 degrees. Muslims reacted not with gratitude but by expressing a sense of entitlement. One former prisoner said, “The least the Prison Service can do is make sure people can practice their religion correctly in prison.”

As a way to lessen the public’s shock over the plan, the Home Office refused to reveal what the cost of the “on-going refurbishment” would be to taxpayers. But a British jailer spoke for many when he said, “If they didn’t get locked up for committing crime they would not have this problem. Yet we have to sort out their loos. If we weren’t paying for it as taxpayers I’d laugh my socks off.” Muslim criminals are the ones who are laughing now, content with the knowledge that even after breaking the law they can gain concessions because of their religion. The dangers of such a precedent were not lost on Tory MP Ann Widdecombe, who warned: “Some common sense needs to be applied.”

Indeed, the construction of Islamically-correct toilets is now spreading throughout England. The Manchester Methodist Housing Association has developed a housing estate in North England with “bathrooms that face away from Mecca.” One resident explained why the houses were being built exclusively for Muslims: “We’re all Muslims here so yes, it is important [to live exclusively among Muslims]. For myself I’m not really too bothered but to a lot of the Muslim people, yes it is important to them and yes it is a very good idea.” Paul Belien of The Brussels Journal correctly noted that “anyone in contemporary Britain who would dare to state (even in a private conversation) that “to a lot of non-Muslims people, yes it is important not to live among Muslims and yes it is a very good idea” might find themselves convicted in court for racism.” But in today’s multicultural Europe, Muslims are the only group of people who are allowed to be prejudiced.

European Muslims have clearly learned that Westerners are so scared of violence in the name of Islam that even the most outrageous requests will be granted. Last year Burger King pulled its ice cream cones from its British restaurants after Rashad Akhtar claimed that he read the word “Allah” in the creamy swirl on the lid. The Muslim man didn’t only urge a boycott of Burger King, he stated that “this is my jihad.” Another British Muslim’s complaints caused Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council to ban all pictures of pigs and “pig-related items” because pigs are considered “unclean” in Islam.

The reason why Muslims have such an easy time getting their way in Europe was best expressed by Professor Unni Wikan of the University of Oslo in her defense of a series of rapes committed by Muslim men against Norwegian women. According to the professor, Norwegian women “must take their share of responsibility for these rapes” because rape is viewed as the woman’s fault in Muslim countries. In other words, European Muslims don’t have to stop raping women, but European women have to stop dressing provocatively.

Indeed, the real absurdity in Europe today is the defense of the indefensible.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=23712

[NYer]

Belgian Regime harassing the Brussels Journal. (http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1251)

[Petronas]

Europe nixes landing rights for El Al planes with IDF cargo
04/09/2006

A number of European states are refusing to allow El Al cargo planes carrying Israel Defense Forces equipment from stopover landings in their airports. The refusal came from states considered friendly with Israel, including Britain, Germany and Italy, according to Captain Etai Regev, the chairman of El Al's pilots' union.

Regev sent a letter of complaint on the matter to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and to the Defense Ministry, the Finance Ministry, and the Tourism Ministry. According to Regev, El Al flights bearing heavy loads that arrive from U.S. bases "are not given approval by European states to make stopover landings for refueling, for political reasons.

"As a result, cargo planes are taking off from the U.S. with much lighter weight, and are reaching Israel with significantly fewer munitions than needed." Regev called this "a substantial blow to state defense." ...

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/758607.html

[Petronas]

Media is warned over its coverage of Islam
Friday, 8th September, 2006

THE BRITISH media needs to be more balanced in its coverage of Islam, according to members of Christian-Muslim dialogue groups. On the fifth anniversary of the atrocities of 9/11 in New York, suspicion of Islam in the UK is higher than ever, as shown in a recent YouGov poll in which 53 per cent of respondents felt they thought Islam was a threat to Western liberal democracy.

Meanwhile 65 per cent of those surveyed said security services should focus anti-terrorism intelligence on Muslims. Ibrahim Mogra, chair of the interfaith relations committee of the Muslim Council of Britain, said the media in the UK too often presented a distorted view of the religion. He said: “Not all of the media is bad but some sections present Islam in a very negative way which is not practised by the majority of Muslims in this country. “The media should be going out and talking to mainstream and ordinary Muslims and presenting that to the nation, rather than a perverted view." ...

... Mr Bond called for Christians to get to know Muslims so they could better understand them, by spending time together, sharing meals and even reading scripture together, despite their doctrinal differences. He said it could be helpful for Christians to read the Koran to raise their awareness of Islam, and added: “It’s not rocket science. If we show an interest in Islamic people it’s more likely they will show an interest in Christianity and we can build bridges.”

http://www.churchnewspaper.com/news.php?read=on&number_key=5836&title=Media%20is%20warned%20over%20its%20coverage% 20of%20Islam

[Petronas]

The Islamization of European Anti-Semitism
By Andrew G. Bostom
FrontPageMagazine.com | September 8, 2006

On Thursday, September 7, 2006, as first reported by the Times of London this past Saturday (9/2/06), an All-Party Parliamentary Enquiry into Antisemitism is expected to issue its finding that anti-Jewish violence has become endemic in Britain, both on the streets and university campuses. A major surge of attacks has accompanied—and followed—the recent conflict between Hezbollah and Israel. According to the Times, “The report will call for urgent action from the Government, the police and educational establishments”.

However, in referring to the preponderance of the actual attackers, the Times provided only this vague allusion, “Muslims are over-represented.”, seemingly oblivious to its own earlier poll whose results were published on February 7, 2006. These data revealed the twisted justification for such violent bigotry: 37 per cent of British Muslims believe the Jewish community in Britain is a legitimate target “as part of the ongoing struggle for ‘justice’ in the Middle East.”

A subsequent (9/5/06) report on the Parliamentary Enquiry in the Jerusalem Post was more forthcoming, and stated explicitly that “Islamic extremists” were responsible for “inciting hatred towards Jews”. As the Jerusalem Post also noted, the Parliamentary Enquiry’s results are consistent with data recently published in The Journal of Conflict Resolution by Yale University biostatistician Dr. Edward H. Kaplan, and Dr. Charles A. Small of the Yale Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism.

Drs. Kaplan and Small examined the views of 5004 Europeans, roughly 500 individuals sampled from each of 10 European Union countries (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom). The authors main publicized results confirmed their (rather commonsensical) a priori hypothesis: anti-Israel sentiments strongly and independently predicted the likelihood that an individual was Antisemitic in a graded manner, i.e., the more anti-Israel (on a scale of zero to 4), the more a person was likely to be Antisemitic. But perhaps an even more striking finding in light of the burgeoning Jew hatred now evident in Europe’s Muslim communities, has until now received much less attention: in a controlled comparison to European Christians (as the “referent” group), European Muslims were nearly eightfold (i.e., 800%) more likely to be overtly Antisemitic. Furthermore, in light of the Pew Global Attitudes Project data on Muslim attitudes toward Jews in Islamic countries, the Yale study likely underestimated the extent of Antisemitism amongst Europe’s Muslim communities, had more poorly educated, less acclimated European Muslims been sampled. Pew’s survey previously indicated,

In the Muslim world, attitudes toward Jews remain starkly negative, including virtually unanimous unfavorable ratings of 98% in Jordan and 97% in Egypt. Muslims living in Western countries have a more moderate view of Jews - still more negative than positive, but not nearly by the lopsided margins that prevail in Muslim countries.

What is to account for the clear “Islamization” of European Antisemitism? Might this phenomenon be related to the much maligned descriptive term “Eurabia”? Indeed, the use of the term “Eurabia,” as noted by Bat Ye’or in her seminal 2005 study, “Eurabia-The Euro-Arab Axis” was first introduced, triumphally, in the mid-1970s, as the title of a journal produced by the Association for Franco-Arab Solidarity, and published in Geneva, Paris, and London. The articles and editorials in this publication called for common Euro-Arab positions, at every level – social, economic, and commercial – and were contingent upon the fundamental political condition of European support for the Arab (and non-Arab) Muslim umma’s jihad against Israel. These concrete proposals were not the musings of isolated theorists – they in fact represented policy decisions conceived in conjunction with, and actualized by, European state leaders, their ministers of foreign affairs, and European Parliamentarians.

Nearly 2 ½ years ago, Bat Ye’or summarized the bitter harvest Western Europe was reaping from the sociopolitical and cultural changes it had sown by implementing this Eurabian vision:

Arab and Islamic anti-Israeli propaganda, barely disguised in academic and cultural packaging… imposed in universities, the press, and cultural centers. …Israel[‘s] usurped history and identity are projected onto the Palestinians..part of a global movement that is transforming Europe into a new continent of dhimmitude within a worldwide strategy of jihad and da’wa, the latter being the pacific method of Islamization…this policy has promoted European dhimmitude and rabid Judeophobia.

And rabid Judeophobia is an apt characterization which applies not only to the current “Hezbollah/Israel conflict-related” upsurge in attacks by European Muslims on Jews. Ten months ago, during a November 14, 2005 presentation at The Center for Immigration Studies, in Washington, D.C., Stephen Steinlight, former director of education at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, and subsequently director of national affairs at the American Jewish Committee, cited data demonstrating that Muslim youths, or more appropriately, youthful Muslim thugs, engaged in an average of 12 attacks per day on Parisian Jews, “putting the figures…close to [those] during the days of the Weimar Republic.”

The clear excess virulence of the Antisemitism in Europe’s Muslim versus Christian populations, combined with the evidence that globally, Muslims in Islamic countries exhibit even more fanatical Jew hatred than their European co-religionists, defies the “conventional wisdom” regarding the ultimate origins of Muslim Jew hatred in Western Europe, and beyond. This very flawed construct—that Muslim Jew hatred is merely a loose amalgam of re-cycled medieval Christian Judeophobic motifs, calumnies from the Czarist Russia “Protocols of the Elders of Zion”, and standard Nazi propaganda—ignores both empirical contemporary observations, and primary, uniquely Islamic components of Jew hatred, both past and present. When the late 23 year-old Parisian Jew Ilan Halimi was being tortured to death, his Muslim torturers, as Nidra Poller wrote in the Wall Street Journal “…phoned the family on several occasions and made them listen to the recitation of verses from the Koran, while Ilan's tortured screams could be heard in the background.” Ilan Halimi’s torturers/murderers did not invoke any non-Islamic sources of anti-Jewish hate, only the Koran.

For the Muslim masses, basic Islamic education in the Koran, hadith (the putative words and deeds of the Muslim prophet Muhammad, as recorded by pious transmitters), and sira (earliest Muslim biographies of Muhammad) may create an immutable superstructure of Jew hatred on to which non-Muslim sources of Jew hatred are easily grafted. Examples of this archetypal Jew hatred from the sacred Islamic texts, sira, and main early Sunni historiographical accounts, include: Koranic verses labeling Jews as malevolent enemies of Islam (5:82), and disobedient slayers of their own prophets who suffered justifiable abasement (2:61), including, for some, transformation into apes and swine (5:60); or the more profoundly hateful narratives (in the hadith, sira, and early histories, for example by Tabari) which maintain that the perfidious Jews fomented sectarian strife in early Islam by promoting heresies—including Shi’ism itself—that threatened the unity of the Muslim community (umma), and the canonical hadith (Sahih Muslim Book 026, Number 5431) that the Jews caused Muhammad’s protracted, excruciating death from poisoning. As the scholar Georges Vajda observed, these archetypes, in turn justify Muslim animus towards the Jews, and the admonition to at best, “subject [the Jews] to Muslim domination”, as dhimmis, treated “with contempt”, under “humiliating arrangements”.

These hateful motifs remain vibrant and normative in the Muslim community. Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi, since 1996, Grand Imam of Al-Azhar University (the most prestigious center of Muslim learning in Sunni Islam) wrote these words in his 700 page dissertation rationalizing Muslim Jew hatred, Banu Isra’il fi al-Qur’an wa al-Sunna [Jews in the Koran and the Traditions], originally published in the 1970s, and then re-issued in 1986:

[The] Koran describes the Jews with their own particular degenerate characteristics, i.e. killing the prophets of Allah, corrupting His words by putting them in the wrong places, consuming the people’s wealth frivolously, refusal to distance themselves from the evil they do, and other ugly characteristics caused by their deep-rooted lasciviousness…only a minority of the Jews keep their word….[A]ll Jews are not the same. The good ones become Muslims, the bad ones do not.

These are the expressed, “carefully researched” views on Jews held by the nearest Muslim equivalent to a Pope, who represents 90% of the world’s Muslims. And Sheikh Tantawi has not mollified such hatemongering beliefs since becoming the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar as his statements on the Jews as “enemies of Allah, descendants of apes and pigs”, the legitimacy of homicide bombing of Jews, or “dialogue” with Jews (just below), make clear.

…anyone who avoids meeting with the enemies in order to counter their dubious claims and stick fingers into their eyes, is a coward. My stance stems from Allah’s book [the Koran], more than one-third of which deals with the Jews…[I] wrote a dissertation dealing with them [the Jews], all their false claims and their punishment by Allah. I still believe in everything written in that dissertation.

The release of the All-Party Parliamentary Enquiry into Antisemitism serves as a clarion call to confront this ugly, burgeoning problem which threatens the very fabric of British, and Western European society. Given the primacy of Muslim Jew hatred within this overall phenomenon—motivated by uniquely Islamic religious archetypes of Jews—Muslims must begin the formal process of examining and reforming the anti-Jewish dogmas contained in their own foundational texts.

Professor Phillip Cunningham (in, “Education for Shalom: Religion Textbooks and the Enhancement of the Catholic-Jewish Relationship,” 1995, p. 39) summarized the principal features of the Second Vatican Council's “Declaration of the Relationship of The Church to Non-Christian Religions” (Nostre Aetate):

Nostre Aetate rejected key elements of the ancient anti-Jewish tradition. ‘The Jews’ were not guilty of the crucifixion, had not been renounced by God, were not under a wandering curse, and their covenantal bond with God endured.

These pronouncements and teachings of the Roman Catholic Church’s Second Vatican Council issued in 1965, provide a modern paradigm which the Muslim clerical hierarchy—Sunni, from Mecca and Cairo, Shi’ite, from Qom and Najaf—must embrace, if the scourge of Islamic Jew hatred is to be eradicated, within Europe, and across the globe.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=24272

[Petronas]

A QUESTION OF FAITH... OR TIDINESS?
21 September 2006

A multi-faith cemetery will have all its graves aligned with Mecca, despite Christian burials traditionally facing east. ...

In today's secular society you could be forgiven for not knowing which direction Christian graves face. Ancient tradition shows they should look east in anticipation of the second coming of Jesus Christ.

But all headstones at the new £2.5m High Wood Cemetery in Bulwell will be plotted to face north-east, in line with Islamic faith. Muslims believe the dead look over their shoulder towards Mecca, towards the south-east.

Despite there being separate sections at the cemetery in Low Wood Road for different faiths, the council wanted to give a tidy, linear appearance. Only on special request can families have graves with headstones facing in a different direction. ...

Rachel Farmer, a spokeswoman for the Diocese of Southwell and Nottingham, said: "Positioning all the graves in the direction of Mecca conflicts with the long-standing Christian burial tradition of graves facing towards the east. We believe the people of Nottingham should have the opportunity to follow the Christian burial traditions if they choose to and the Christian faith should not be discriminated against in this way. The 2001 census showed that more than 70% of the population consider themselves Christian. This new policy will limit the choice of the majority in relation to burials at this new cemetery. ..."

http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=133942&command=displayContent&sourceNode=201398&home=yes&more_nodeId1=133951&contentPK=15483807

[Petronas]

These "Moors and Christians" festivals are reenactments to celebrate the Christian victory in the 681 year long reconquest of Spain, after the Muslim army led by Tariq in 711 landed at Gibraltar (Jebel al Tariq) and overran the Iberian Peninsula in four years.

Spaniards tone down exploding Mohammed at fiestas
Mon Oct 2, 6:26 AM ET

Spanish villages are toning down traditional fiestas in which revelers blow up dummies representing the Prophet Mohammed for fear of offending Muslims, the newspaper El Pais reported on Monday.

One eastern Spanish village, Bocairent, decided to abandon the custom of packing the head of a dummy representing Mohammed with fireworks after seeing the angry response by Muslims to a Danish newspaper's publication last year of cartoons of him.

El Pais found that several other villages in the Valencia region had also modified similar fiestas this year. It carried out the investigation after a Berlin opera house decided last week to cancel performances of Mozart's "Idomeneo" because the production included a scene depicting Mohammed's severed head.

Bocairent's mayor, Antonio Valdes, said blowing up the Mohammed dummy was offensive. "It just wasn't necessary, and, as it could hurt some people's feelings, we decided not to do it," he said. The village may not have blown up the wood-and-cardboard Mohammed dummy this year -- but it still threw it off a castle wall at the fiesta's climax in February.

Villages all over Spain hold annual festivals to commemorate the "Reconquista," the reconquest of Spain by Christians from the Moors, which was completed in 1492 after more than 700 years of Muslim rule in much of the country. Spain is now once again home to a growing number of Muslims, mainly Moroccan immigrants, who villagers feel might be offended by some of their traditional celebrations.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061002/wl_nm/religion_spain_mohammed_dc

[Petronas]

Une collégienne a été lapidée mercredi dans une cour de récréation
Pour non-respect du Ramadan
samedi 7 octobre 2006

Selon une information communiquée par Michèle Vianès, de l'association Regards de Femmes :

L'information que j'ai donnée jeudi lors de notre café Regards de Femmes est dans Le Progrès d'aujourd'hui. Une collégienne du collège Jean Mermoz dans le huitième arrondissement de Lyon a été agressée à coup de pierres mercredi matin en cour de récréation alors qu'elle mangeait son goûter . La thèse d'un acte lié au non-respect du ramadan est confirmée par le parquet de Lyon sur la foi des premiers éléments de l'enquête.

Azzedine Gaci, le président du CRCM déclare que si "les faits sont avérés, ils sont inacceptables". Il déplore l'ignorance des élèves à qui il faudrait enseigner le Coran à l'école et qui ignorent que sont exemptées de suivre le ramadan les "femmes indisposées".

http://www.france-echos.com/actualite.php?cle=10411


This is a translation of the France-Echos report:

A schoolgirl was stoned on Wednesday in playground
For non-observance of Ramadan

According to information given by Michèle Vianès, from the Regards de Femmes organization:

The information that I gave Thursday from our cafe Regards de Femmes is in Le Progres today.

A schoolgirl of Jean Mermoz college in Lyon's eighth arrondissement (postal district) was pelted with stones on Wednesday morning in the playground because she ate a snack. The argument that the incident stemmed from the non-observance of Ramadan is confirmed by the Lyon prosecutor's office, based on initial results from its investigation.

Azzedine Gaci, president of the CRCM (Regional Council for the Muslim Religion) , states that "if the facts are proven, they are unacceptable". He deplores the ignorance of the pupils, who should be taught the Koran at school, and who are unaware that "women who are not feeling well" * are exempted from observing Ramadan.

Without other commentaries for today, I will keep you updated

Michèle Vianès

The front cover of Le Progres ... states:

Ramadan fast: A college girl attacked

The attack happened in a recreation moment in the playground of Jean-Mermoz (Lyon 8th). Pupils of the third grade threw stones at an adolescent. The principal of the college said it was a simple incident, not premeditated. But for its side, the Prosecutor's Office of Lyon confirmed in the first stages of an inquiry that this this act could have been linked to the victim not observing the ramadan fast. The incident has provoked strong emotion in the education community.

http://www.westernresistance.com/blog/archives/003151.html

[Petronas]

October 09, 2006
Fjordman: The Eurabia Code, Part 3

Here is the third installment of the essential Eurabia Code series from Fjordman. The Eurabia Code Part 1 is here [http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/013355.php] and Part 2 here [http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/013411.php].

In March 2006, the two-day plenary session of the Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly, held in Brussels approved a resolution which "condemned the offence" caused by the Danish cartoons of the prophet Muhammad as well "as the violence which their publication provoked." These MEPs and national MPs from the EU and Arab countries also urged governments to "ensure respect for religious beliefs and to encourage the values of tolerance, freedom and multiculturalism."
During the parliamentary assembly, Egyptian parliament speaker Ahmed Sorour insisted that the cartoons published in Denmark and other recent events showed the existence of a "cultural deficit." Jordanian MP Hashem al-Qaisi also condemned the cartoons, claiming that it is not sufficient to deplore the cartoons as these things might occur again in another country.

And European Parliament president Josep Borrell referred to the Mediterranean as "a concentrate of all the problems facing humanity." He said that after one year presiding over the assembly he "still did not fully understand the complexities of the Mediterranean." Following the cartoons affair, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana had travelled to the Middle East and made joint statements with Islamic leaders that "freedom of the press entails responsibility and discretion and should respect the beliefs and tenets of all religions." Solana said that he had discussed means to ensure that "religious symbols can be protected." He held talks with Sheikh Mohammed Sayed Tantawi of Al Azhar University, the highest seat of learning in Sunni Islam, and Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa.

Solana also met with the leader of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu. Following their discussion, Solana "expressed our sincere regret that religious feelings have been hurt", and vowed "to reach out… to make sure that people's hearts and minds are not hurt again."

Only a few years earlier, Mr. Solana, then Secretary General of NATO, in a speech stated that "the root cause of conflicts in Europe and beyond can be traced directly to the absence of democracy and openness. The absence of the pressure valve of democratic discourse can lead these societies to explode into violence." The irony that he himself is now trying to curtail the democratic discourse in Europe through the promotion of Islamic censorship apparently did not occur to him.

Meanwhile, the tentacles of the vast, inflated EU bureaucracy insinuate themselves into regulations on every conceivable subject. Some of the examples of the bureaucracy are ridiculous; some are funny. But it is the sinister side to the European bureaucracy:

- The promotion of an official, "EU federal ideology" advocating Multiculturalism;

- The denunciation as "xenophobes" of all those who want to preserve their democracy at the nation state level; and

- Calling those who would limit Third World immigration "racists."

A report from the EU's racism watchdog said that more must be done to combat racism and "Islamophobia." One method of accomplishing this is the promotion of a lexicon which shuns purportedly offensive and culturally insensitive terms. This lexicon would set down guidelines for EU officials and politicians prohibiting what they may say. "Certainly 'Islamic terrorism' is something we will not use ... we talk about 'terrorists who abusively invoke Islam'," an EU official said.

Early in 2006, the EU's human rights commissioner Alvaro Gil-Robles's criticized a plan to revamp Christianity as a school subject in elementary schools in Denmark. Gil-Robles said doing so went against European values. "Religion as a school subject should be a general course that attempts to give students insight into the three monotheistic religions [my emphasis]," he said. The "three monotheistic religions" means Christianity, Judaism and Islam.

As I see it, there are several possible ways of dealing with the issue of education about religion.

1. Teach the traditional religions within a particular country, which in Europe means Christianity and Judaism.

2. Teach all the major world religions.

3. Leave religion out of the curriculum.

What the European Union does, however, is to treat Islam as a traditional, European religion on par with Christianity and Judaism. This is a crucial component of Eurabian thinking and practice. Notice how EU authorities in this case directly interfered to force a once-independent nation state to include more teachings of Islam in its school curriculum in order to instill their children with a proper dose of Eurabian indoctrination. Notice also that they didn't ask for more teaching of Buddhism or Hinduism. Only Islam is being pushed.

In another case, the European Commission rebuffed a call by the Polish president for an EU-wide debate on reinstating the death penalty. "The death penalty is not compatible with European values," a Commission spokesman said. Again, the issue here is not your opinion regarding the death penalty. The real issue is that the metasticizing EU has already defined for you what constitutes "European values." Thus, major issues are simply beyond public debate. This innocent-sounding phrase "European values" cloaks a federal, Eurabian ideology enforced across the entire European Union without regard to the popular will.

Perhaps the most shameful and embarrassing aspect of the history of Eurabia is how the supposedly critical and independent European media
has allowed itself to be corrupted or deceived by the Eurabians. Most of the documents about the Euro-Arab Dialogue place particular emphasis on working with the media, and the Eurabians have played the European media like a Stradivarius. Aided by a pre-existing anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism, European media have been willing to demonize the United States and Israel while remaining largely silent on the topic Eurabia.

In May 2006, a big conference was held in Vienna involving media figures (journalists) from all over Europe, who met with partners from the Arab world as a part of the Euro-Arab Dialogue.

European officials responded publicly with "regret" to Israel's ambassador to Austria Dan Ashbel's decision to boycott the conference on racism in the media because of concern in Jerusalem that anti-Semitism was getting short shrift at the meeting. Speaking for the conference — entitled "Racism, Xenophobia and the Media: Towards Respect and Understanding of all Religions and Cultures" — an official claimed that anti-Semitism was not taken off the agenda. This official countered that the meeting was "primarily a dialogue between the media representatives of all the Euro-Med partners on the problems that beset their profession. These include xenophobia, racism, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia [my emphasis]."

Writer Bruce Bawer thinks that many Europeans recognize that Multiculturalism is leading their societies to disaster. But they've heard all their lives from officially approved authorities that any concern about Multiculturalism and its consequences is tantamount to racism:


"There's a widespread resignation to the fact that multiculturalists control the media, academy, state agencies, and so on. They know very well that if you want to get ahead in European society, you don't take on multicultural orthodoxy. The political establishment seems solidly planted, unmovable, unchangeable. There may be a widespread rage, in short, but it's largely an impotent rage. Europeans today have been bred to be passive, to leave things to their leaders, whose wisdom they've been taught all their lives to take for granted. To shake off a lifetime of this kind of indoctrination is not easy."

According to Bat Ye'or, fear of awakening opposition to EU policy toward the Arab Mediterranean countries led to the repression of all discussion of the economic problems and difficulties of integration caused by massive immigration. Any criticism of Muslim immigration is basically brushed off as being "just like the Jews were talked about in Nazi Germany," a ridiculous but effective statement.

Bat Ye'or agrees with Bawer's analysis "concerning the totalitarian web cohesion of 'teachers, professors, the media, politicians, government agency workers, talking heads on TV, the representatives of state-funded "independent" organizations like SOS Racism' to indoctrinate the politically correct. This perfectly expresses the political directives given by the European Commission to coordinate and control in all EU member-states the political, intellectual, religious, media, teaching and publishing apparatus since the 1970s so as to harmonize with its Mediterranean strategy based on multiculturalism."

Professional harassment, boycott and defamation punish those who dare to openly challenge the Politically Correct discourse. According to Bat Ye'or, this has led to the development of a type of "resistance press" as if Europe were under the "occupation" of its own elected governments. This free press on the Internet and in blogs has brought some changes, including the rejection of the European Constitution in 2005. Despite overwhelming support for the Constitution by the governments in France and the Netherlands and a massive media campaign by political leaders in both countries, voters rejected it. Blogs played a significant part in achieving this.

Only a few months later, EU authorities lined up together with authoritarian regimes such as Iran, Saudi Arabia, Cuba and the Chinese Communist Party in favor of "more international control with" (read: censorship of) the Internet.

According to Richard North of the EU Referendum blog, "The most dangerous form of propaganda is that which does not appear to be propaganda. And it is that form at which the BBC [the British Broadcasting Corporation] excels. Perhaps the biggest sin of all is that of omission. By simply not informing us of key issues, they go by default, unchallenged until it is too late to do anything about them."

Vladimir Bukovsky is a former Soviet dissident, author and human rights activist who spent a total of twelve years in Soviet prisons. Now living in England, he warns against some of the same anti-democratic impulses in the West, especially in the EU, which he views as an heir to the Soviet Union. In 2002, he joined in on protests against the BBC's compulsory TV licence. "The British people are being forced to pay money to a corporation which suppresses free speech — publicising views they don't necessarily agree with." He has blasted the BBC for their "bias and propaganda," especially in stories related to the EU or the Middle East.

Conservative MP, Michael Gove and political commentator Mark Dooley also complain about lopsided coverage: "Take, for example, the BBC's coverage of the late Yasser Arafat. In one profile broadcast in 2002, he was lauded as an "icon" and a "hero," but no mention was made of his terror squads, corruption, or his brutal suppression of dissident Palestinians. Similarly, when Israel assassinated the spiritual leader of Hamas, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, in 2004, one BBC reporter described him as "polite, charming and witty, a deeply religious man." This despite the fact that under Yassin's guidance, Hamas murdered hundreds."

Polish writer Nina Witoszek, now living in Norway, warns that people who have lived under Communist regimes are struck by a strange feeling of dejá vu in Western Europe:

"Before formulating a sentence, you put on a censorship autopilot which asks: Who am I insulting now? Am I too pro-Israeli, or maybe anti-Feminist, or - God forbid – anti-Islamic? Am I "progressive" enough? Soon we shall all write in a decaffeinated language: We shall obediently repeat all the benign mantras such as "dialogue," "pluralism," "reconciliation" and "equality." Norway has never been a totalitarian country, but many people now feel the taste of oppression and of being muzzled. I know many wise Norwegians – and even more wise foreigners – who no longer have the energy to waste time on contributing to a castrated, paranoid democracy. We prefer safety above freedom. This is the first step towards a voluntary bondage."

She quotes follow writer from Poland Czesław Miłosz, who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1980 for books such as The Captive Mind, where he explained the seductiveness of totalitarian ideology.

One essay by Miłosz is titled "Ketman." "Ketman" or "kitman" is an Islamic term brought to Milosz's attention by Arthur Gobineau's book Religions and Philosophies of Central Asia. He had noticed that the dissidents in Persia, long accustomed to tyranny, had evolved a style of their own. The need for survival often involved more than just keeping your mouth shut, but of actively lying in every way necessary. This strategy of dissimulation and deceit, which is especially pronounced by Shia Muslims but also used by Sunnis, is primarily used to deceive non-Muslims, but can also be used against other Muslims under duress.

According to Miłosz, a very similar strategy was used in Communist countries. Similar to Islam, those practicing dissimulation felt a
sense of superiority towards those who were stupid enough to state their real opinions openly. In Communist societies, dissimulation was just as much a technique of adaptation to an authoritarian regime as a conscious, theatrical form of art that became increasingly refined.

It is frightening to hear people who have grown up in former Communist countries say that they see this same totalitarian impulse at work in Western Europe now. According to them, we in the West are at least as brainwashed by Multiculturalism and Political Correctness as they ever were with Communism. It is frightening because I believe they are right. Have we witnessed the fall of the Iron Curtain in Eastern Europe only to see an Iron Veil descend on Western Europe? An Iron Veil of EU bureaucracy and Eurabian treachery, of Political Correctness, Multicultural media censorship and the ever-present threat of Muslim violence and terrorism that is gradually extinguishing free speech. The momentum of bureaucratic treachery is accelerating.

Native Europeans and indeed some non-Muslim immigrants are quietly leaving in growing numbers, gradually turning the continent into a net exporter of refugees rather than an importer of them. When large parts of Europe are being overrun by barbarians — actively aided and abetted by our own trusted leaders — and when people are banned from opposing this onslaught, is Western Europe still a meaningful part of the Free World? Have the countries of Eastern Europe gone from one "Evil Empire" to another? Are they — and we — back in the EUSSR?

Vaclav Klaus, the conservative President of the Czech Republic, has complained that: "Every time I try to remove some piece of Soviet-era regulation, I am told that whatever it is I am trying to scrap is a requirement of the European Commission."

In an interview with Paul Belien of the Brussels Journal in February 2006, Vladimir Bukovksy warned that the European Union is on its way to becoming another Soviet Union. Mr Bukovsky called the EU a "monster" that must be destroyed, the sooner the better, before it develops into a fully-fledged totalitarian state.

"The ultimate purpose of the Soviet Union was to create a new historic entity, the Soviet people, all around the globe. The same is true in the EU today. They are trying to create a new people. They call this people "Europeans", whatever that means. According to Communist doctrine as well as to many forms of Socialist thinking, the state, the national state, is supposed to wither away. In Russia, however, the opposite happened. Instead of withering away the Soviet state became a very powerful state, but the nationalities were obliterated. But when the time of the Soviet collapse came these suppressed feelings of national identity came bouncing back and they nearly destroyed the country. It was so frightening."

Timothy Garton Ash is considered a leading expert on Europe's future. Bruce Bawer views Garton Ash as typical of Europe's political élite. Ash mistrusts national patriotism but adores the EU. He writes about the need for a factitious European patriotism ("flags, symbols, a European anthem we can sing") to encourage "emotional identification with European institutions." And just why does Europe need the EU? Garton Ash's answer: "To prevent our falling back into the bad old ways of war and European barbarism." Among his suggestions is that Europe encourage "the formation of an Arab Union." He makes no mention of Arab democracy. Imagining "Europe in 2025 at its possible best," he pictures it as a "partnership" with Arab countries and Russia that would extend "from Marrakesh, via Cairo, Jerusalem, Baghdad, and Tbilisi, all the way to Vladivostok."

The European Commission proposed the controversial idea of a singing event in all member states to celebrate the European Union's 50th "birthday," the 50th anniversary of the 1957 Treaty of Rome. Commissioner Margot Wallstrom was lobbying for big-style birthday celebrations to "highlight the benefits that European integration has brought to its citizens." Diplomats said the idea had sparked feelings of disgust among new, formerly Communist member states such as Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, which were reminded of "Stalinist times" when people were forced by the state to sing. Brussels also intended to spend around €300,000 on the appointment of 50 citizen "ambassadors," dubbed the "Faces of Europe," who are supposed to "tell their story" throughout the year on what the EU means to them in their daily life. Germany will go ahead with its own idea to let thousands of its bakeries bake 50 sorts of cakes with recipes from all 25 member states.

Commissioner Wallstrom in 2005 argued that politicians who resisted pooling national sovereignty risked a return to Nazi horrors of the 1930s and 1940s. Her fellow commissioners also issued a joint declaration, stating that EU citizens should pay tribute to the dead of the Second World War by voting Yes to the EU Constitution. The commissioners gave the EU sole credit for ending the Cold War, making no mention of the role of NATO or the United States.

Is the EU an instrument to end wars? In October 2006, Michel Thoomis, the secretary general of the French Action Police trade union, warned of a civil war in France created by Muslim immigrants: "We are in a state of civil war, orchestrated by radical Islamists. This is not a question of urban violence any more, it is an intifada, with stones and Molotov cocktails. You no longer see two or three youths confronting police, you see whole tower blocks emptying into the streets to set their 'comrades' free when they are arrested."

These Muslim immigrants were allowed in by the very same European elites who now want European citizens to celebrate their work through cakes and songs. While civil society is disintegrating in Western Europe due to Islamic pressures, EU authorities are working to increase Muslim immigration, while congratulating themselves for bringing peace to the continent. What peace? Where?

The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 ended the Thirty Years' War, the last major religious war in Europe, and helped lay the foundations for modern nation states. Before nation states, we thus had a pattern of borderless religious wars and civil wars. This is what we have returned to, full circle, only this time a borderless Jihad is triggering civil wars in Europe. While the EU may help prevent wars between nation states with old grudges, such as Germany and France, it may also actively cause other kinds of wars. It accomplishes this by increasing Multicultural tensions and a dangerous sense of estrangement between citizens and those who are supposed to be their leaders.

Wars have existed for thousands of years before the advent of the modern nation state. It is far more likely that weakening nation states will end our democratic system, a system which is closely tied to the existence of sovereign nation states, than that it will end wars.

When asked whether the member countries of the EU joined the union voluntarily, and whether the resulting integration reflects the democratic will of Europeans, Vladimir Bukovksy replied, "No, they did not. Look at Denmark which voted against the Maastricht treaty twice. Look at Ireland [which voted against the Nice treaty]. Look at many other countries, they are under enormous pressure. It is almost blackmail. It is a trick for idiots. The people have to vote in referendums until the people vote the way that is wanted. Then they have to stop voting. Why stop? Let us continue voting. The European Union is what Americans would call a shotgun marriage."

In 1992, Bukovksy had unprecedented access to Politburo and other Soviet secret documents, as described in his book, Judgement in Moscow. In January 1989, during a meeting between Soviet leader Gorbachev, former Japanese Prime Minister Nakasone, former French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, American banker Rockefeller and former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Giscard d'Estaing supposedly stated: "Europe is going to be a federal state and you have to prepare yourself for that. You have to work out with us, and the European leaders, how you would react to that."

This was in the 1980s, when most of the media still dismissed as scaremongering any talk of a political union that would subdue the nation states. Fifteen years later, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing became the chief drafter of the truly awful EU Constitution, an impenetrable brick of a book, hundreds of pages long, and lacking any of the checks and balances so crucial to the American Constitution. Giscard has argued that the rejection of the Constitution in the French and Dutch referenda in 2005 "was a mistake which will have to be corrected" and insisted that "In the end, the text will be adopted."

Giscard has also said that "it was a mistake to use the referendum process" because "it is not possible for anyone to understand the full text." Does it instill confidence among the citizens of Europe that we are supposed to be under the authority of a "Constitution" that is too complex for most non-bureaucrats to understand? According to Spain's justice minister Juan Fernando Lopez Aguilar "you don't need to read the European constitution to know that it is good."

Jean-Luc Dehaene, former Belgian Prime Minister, said that "We know that nine out of ten people will not have read the Constitution and will vote on the basis of what politicians and journalists say. More than that, if the answer is No, the vote will probably have to be done again, because it absolutely has to be Yes."

Journalist Nidra Poller, however, is more skeptical. Commenting on the debate prior to the EU Constitution referendum in France, she noted a submissive attitude among EU leaders towards Muslim demands: "The Euro-Mediterranean 'Dialogue' is a masterpiece of abject surrender." The European Union functions as an intermediate stage of an ominous project that calls for a meltdown of traditional European culture, to be replaced by a new, Eurabian cocktail. And she asks: "When subversive appeasement hides behind the veil of 'Dialogue,' what unspeakable ambitions might be dissembled by the noble word 'Constitution'?"

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/013517.php

[NYer]

It's a Civil War ... No, not in Iraq, in France. (http://washingtontimes.com/upi/20061013-083614-1432r.htm)

http://rantburg.com/images/Carboomruss.jpg
Hat tip to Rantburg

France's Interior Ministry said 2,500 police officers had been "wounded" this year. The head of the hard-line trade union "Action Police" Michel Thooris wrote to Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy to describe conditions in housing developments turned slums as "intifada." Police cruisers are pelted daily with stones and "Molotov cocktails" (gasoline-filled bottles with burning wicks that explode on impact) and Thooris said cops assigned to what was rapidly degenerating into "free fire zones" should be protected in armored vehicles. Entire tall buildings empty into the streets to chase policemen and free an arrested comrade.

"We are in a state of civil war, orchestrated by radical Islamists," Thooris told journalists.

[Petronas]

Christian BA employee to take legal action over suspension for wearing cross
Last updated at 12:12pm on 14th October 2006

A committed Christian said today she planned to take legal action against her employers British Airways after the airline ruled that displaying her crucifix breached uniform rules. Heathrow check-in worker Nadia Eweida was sent home after refusing to remove the crucifix which breached BA's dress code. Her treatment by BA - which styles itself as the "world's favourite airline" - brought condemnation both from Christian groups and members of other faiths last night.

BA's chief executive Willie Walsh has upheld the action against Miss Eweida for failing to comply with "uniform regulations" despite himself coming under fire recently for failing to wear a tie.

Miss Eweida, who has an unblemished record during seven years at BA, is suing her employer for religious discrimination after being suspended from work without pay for two weeks. She said her treatment was all the more extraordinary as she and fellow employees had just undergone "diversity training" - including receiving advice from pressure group Stonewall on how to treat gays and lesbians in the workplace.

The airline's uniform code states that staff must not wear visible jewellery or other 'adornments' while on duty without permission from management. It makes exceptions for Muslim and Sikh minorities by allowing them to wear hijabs and turbans. Under rules drawn up by BA's 'diversity team' and 'uniform committee', Sikh employees can even wear the traditional iron bangle - even though this would usually be classed as jewellery - while Muslim workers are also allowed prayer breaks during work time.

But Miss Eweida, 55, from Twickenham, insisted her cross, which is smaller than a ten pence piece, was not jewellery but an expression of her deep Christian faith. She questioned why she was being forced to hide her religion when BA's Muslim and Sikh workers could express theirs.

Miss Eweida said last night: "I will not hide my belief in the Lord Jesus. British Airways permits Muslims to wear a headscarf, Sikhs to wear a turban and other faiths religious apparel. "Only Christians are forbidden to express their faith. I am a loyal and conscientious employee of British Airways, but I stand up for the rights of all citizens." ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=410299&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

Non-Muslim students at Islamic school forced to wear headscarves
Last updated at 22:00pm on 13th October 2006

Female students at a new Islamic school will be made to wear head scarves regardless of their religion, it was revealed yesterday. The Madani High School in Leicester will be required by law to accept 10 per cent of its 600 pupils from a non-Muslim background. But girls who are not Muslim will still have to abide by a rule insisting all female pupils cover their heads as part of the uniform. ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=410312&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

Union Federation Wants National Muslim Holiday
14/10/06

The CNV trade union federation feels that a Muslim feast should be introduced as a bank holiday in the Netherlands. The Christian trade union federation is willing to sacrifice a Christian holiday. CNV vice chairman Rienk van Splunder wishes "to offer Muslims the freedom to practice their faith". The federation is prepared to sacrifice Whit Monday or Easter Monday for a free day during the Sugar Festival. This is the feast day held to celebrate the end of Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting. Van Splunder feels the feast days of other religions are insufficiently honoured in the Netherlands. By introducing official holidays on such feast days, he hopes to create "freedom and respect for one another".

Last year, CNV reported it was not yet prepared to sacrifice Whit Monday for a free day during the Sugar Festival. "But his can no longer be sustained in 2006," as Van Splunder stated Friday. According to Van Splunder, Whit Monday and Easter Monday originate from the Christian tradition but the holidays have long lost their Christian meaning. "For most Dutch people, these two holidays have turned into extra shopping days". The CNV vice chairman denies that he is calling into question the Christian tradition of The Netherlands.

http://www.nisnews.nl/public/141006_2.htm

[Petronas]

FRANCE: EUROPEAN ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY TO OPEN
Oct-17-06 16:57

A European Muslim university will be inaugurated in the northern French city of Lille at the beginning of November. The Avicenne Institute of Human Sciences will be open to all those wishing to study Islamic history, law and literature, its rector Muhammad al-Bashari told Adnkronos International (AKI). The university will follow the French university system and is aimed at training imams and spiritual leaders who will live among Europe's Muslim minorities.

"The institute's courses focus on the rights of Muslim minorities, on the elaboration of fatwas (Islamic religious edicts) outside Muslim countries and on their philosophy," said al-Bashari. ...

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Religion&loid=8.0.350628187&par=0

[NYer]

Meanwhile, the EU is intent on regulating Internet TV! (http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2006/10/is-eu-about-to-regulate.html)

This illustrates just what is wrong with the European Union. It is seeking to regulate where it doesn't need to. It wants to introduce rules where there is no need for any. No doubt what will emerge from this some sort of wishy washy compromise. God, it makes you sick. It's things like this which make me wonder whether, after all, we wouldn't be Better Off Out.

[Petronas]

ITALY: IMMIGRANTS ARE COUNTRY'S FUTURE, REPORT SAYS
Oct-25-06 12:33

The number of immigrants in Italy is on the rise - there are today over 3 million, 5.2 percent of the Italian population - and immigration will soon become the only factor of demographic growth able to counter the country's population decline, a report published on Wednesday says. According to the annual report by Catholic charity Caritas, Italy is becoming a land of immigration like Spain, which has 3.3 million immigrants, France (3.2 million), Great Britain (2.8) and in Europe only lags behind Germany (7.2 million foreigners). ...

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Security&loid=8.0.353115333&par=0

[Petronas]

The British Broadcasting Corporation has admitted to a ... strong inclination to pro-Muslim reporting ... BBC executives admitted the corporation is dominated by homosexuals.


IT'S OK TO KILL GAYS - BRITISH IMAM
http://www.gcn.ie/content/templates/newsupdate.aspx?articleid=1409&zoneid=4

I must be missing something...

BBC Internal Memo Admits Anti-Christian Bias
Company executives admitted the corporation is dominated by homosexuals
October 24, 2006

The British Broadcasting Corporation has admitted to a marked bias against Christianity and a strong inclination to pro-Muslim reporting among the network’s executives and key anchors, in a leaked account of an “impartiality summit.”

The Daily Mail reported Sunday on the secret London meeting of key executives, called by BBC chairman Michael Grade and hosted by veteran broadcaster Sue Lawley. The report revealed that many senior executives are deeply frustrated with the corporation’s commitment to “political correctness” and liberal policies at the expense of journalistic integrity and objectivity.

BBC executives admitted the corporation is dominated by homosexuals. They acknowledged that ethnic minorities held a disproportionate number of positions and said the BBC deliberately encourages multiculturalism and is more careful to avoid offending the Muslim community than Christians.

Tossing the Bible into a garbage can on a comedy show would be acceptable, they said, but not the Koran, and if possible they would broadcast an interview with Osama Bin Laden, giving him the opportunity to explain his views.

“The BBC is not impartial or neutral,” said Andrew Marr, senior political commentator with the corporation. “It’s a publicly funded, urban organization with a abnormally large number of young people, ethnic minorities and gay people. It has a liberal bias not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias.”

Senior executives raised a chorus of complaints against the corporation for bias against the United States and strongly anti-national reporting. Justin Webb, Washington correspondent, said anti-American sentiment runs so deep in the corporation that the U.S. is treated with scorn and derision and given “no moral weight.”

“There was widespread acknowledgement that we may have gone too far in the direction of political correctness,” said one senior executive. “Unfortunately, much of it is so deeply embedded in the BBC’s culture that it is very hard to change it.”

Mary Fitzpatrick, who oversees the corporation’s “diversity” policies, said Muslim women readers for BBC News should be permitted to wear veils while on air, if they choose, after a female newsreader caused a stir by wearing a visible cross on air. Ms. Fitzpatrick also defended the BBC against internal accusations of selective reporting on issues critical of the black community.

Andrew Marr, in an interview with the Mail, said, “The BBC must always try to reflect Britain, which is mostly a provincial, middle-of-the-road country. Britain is not a mirror image of the BBC or the people who work for it.”

During the recent international upheaval over Pope Benedict XVI’s comments on Islam, the BBC was accused by media watchers of deliberately inflaming the Muslim community worldwide through biased and inflammatory coverage. Political commentator David Warren, writing for the Ottawa Citizen, said the BBC was “having a little mischief. The kind of mischief that is likely to end with Catholic priests and faithful butchered around the Muslim world.” The international uproar led to retaliatory attacks in Israel against Christian churches and clergy, and the murder of a nun in Somalia.

http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/oct/06102401.html

[Petronas]

The Rape of Europe
Wed, 2006-10-25 20:57

The German author Henryk M. Broder recently told the Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant (12 October) that young Europeans who love freedom, better emigrate. Europe as we know it will no longer exist 20 years from now. Whilst sitting on a terrace in Berlin, Broder pointed to the other customers and the passers-by and said melancholically: “We are watching the world of yesterday.”

Europe is turning Muslim. As Broder is sixty years old he is not going to emigrate himself. “I am too old,” he said. However, he urged young people to get out and “move to Australia or New Zealand. That is the only option they have if they want to avoid the plagues that will turn the old continent uninhabitable.”

Many Germans and Dutch, apparently, did not wait for Broder’s advice. The number of emigrants leaving the Netherlands and Germany has already surpassed the number of immigrants moving in. One does not have to be prophetic to predict, like Henryk Broder, that Europe is becoming Islamic. Just consider the demographics. The number of Muslims in contemporary Europe is estimated to be 50 million. It is expected to double in twenty years. By 2025, one third of all European children will be born to Muslim families. Today Mohammed is already the most popular name for new-born boys in Brussels, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and other major European cities.

Broder is convinced that the Europeans are not willing to oppose islamization. “The dominant ethos,” he told De Volkskrant, “is perfectly voiced by the stupid blonde woman author with whom I recently debated. She said that it is sometimes better to let yourself be raped than to risk serious injuries while resisting. She said it is sometimes better to avoid fighting than run the risk of death.”

In a recent op-ed piece in the Brussels newspaper De Standaard (23 October) the Dutch (gay and self-declared “humanist”) author Oscar Van den Boogaard refers to Broder’s interview. Van den Boogaard says that to him coping with the islamization of Europe is like “a process of mourning.” He is overwhelmed by a “feeling of sadness.” “I am not a warrior,” he says, “but who is? I have never learned to fight for my freedom. I was only good at enjoying it.”

As Tom Bethell wrote in this month’s American Spectator: “Just at the most basic level of demography the secular-humanist option is not working.” But there is more to it than the fact that non-religious people tend not to have as many children as religious people, because many of them prefer to “enjoy” freedom rather than renounce it for the sake of children. Secularists, it seems to me, are also less keen on fighting. Since they do not believe in an afterlife, this life is the only thing they have to lose. Hence they will rather accept submission than fight. Like the German feminist Broder referred to, they prefer to be raped than to resist.

“If faith collapses, civilization goes with it,” says Bethell. That is the real cause of the closing of civilization in Europe. Islamization is simply the consequence. The very word Islam means “submission” and the secularists have submitted already. Many Europeans have already become Muslims, though they do not realize it or do not want to admit it.

Some of the people I meet in the U.S. are particularly worried about the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe. They are correct when they fear that anti-Semitism is also on the rise among non-immigrant Europeans. The latter hate people with a fighting spirit. Contemporary anti-Semitism in Europe (at least when coming from native Europeans) is related to anti-Americanism. People who are not prepared to resist and are eager to submit, hate others who do not want to submit and are prepared to fight. They hate them because they are afraid that the latter will endanger their lives as well. In their view everyone must submit.

This is why they have come to hate Israel and America so much, and the small band of European “islamophobes” who dare to talk about what they see happening around them. West Europeans have to choose between submission (islam) or death. I fear, like Broder, that they have chosen submission – just like in former days when they preferred to be red rather than dead.

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1609

[Petronas]

Islamic teaching could resolve world problems -- Prince Charles
ISLAMABAD, Oct 31 (KUNA)

Prince Charles Tuesday said that the world problems could be resolve by following Islamic teachings, as Islam is a religion of peace and brotherhood. Prince Charles while addressing a ceremony during his visit to Fatima Jinnah Women University (FJWU) stressed on better relations between Islam and other religions.

He said that clash of civilizations could be averted by following the teaching of Islam and Quraan. Duchess of Cornwall, Camilla Parker, British Ambassador and others members of delegation were also present on the occasion. ...

http://www.kuna.net.kw/Home/Story.aspx?Language=en&DSNO=917294

[Petronas]

To do Prince Charles justice, here is the actual full text of his speech. It would appear that the Kuwaiti News Agency has put a little spin on it in summarizing it...

A speech by HRH The Prince of Wales at Fatima Jinnah University, Pakistan
31st October 2006

Vice-Chancellor, Ladies, and even the occasional Gentleman, thank you Vice-Chancellor for your marvellously kind words, and I apologise to you that my wife and I have taken you so much by surprise. For all those students that don’t do so well in your forthcoming exams, you can always blame my unexpected visit. You won’t be the first!

You can have no idea how much my wife and I have looked forward to visiting your country. For various reasons it has taken me very nearly fifty-eight years of my life to reach this remarkable part of the world, about which I have read and heard so many fascinating stories. Believe it or not, I think I was probably conceived in the months following independence for the Sub-Continent and therefore I feel I have somehow grown up, as it were, with both Pakistan and India. Above all, I have always wanted to experience and to understand the depth of the historic ties between our two countries.

Of course, you know better than I, that understanding requires willing partners. It also requires knowledge and a lack of prejudice. It is the importance of understanding and knowledge which has brought my wife and myself here today. This University clearly imparts knowledge to the highest standards. It is a heartening example of understanding between communities and, above all, between faiths. This understanding is not, of course, a new phenomenon. One could draw examples from Islamic Spain or from Ottoman Turkey. But one need not look so far afield to find examples of equal, or, perhaps, greater relevance. In this ancient part of South Asia, back in 1875, Syed Ahmed Khan founded Aligarh College to provide a modern education, principally to Muslims (men and, later, women), in a manner which encouraged them to play a full part in the national mainstream. The first graduate of the College was a non-Muslim.

Later in our visit to Pakistan, I shall have the honour of laying a wreath at the Tomb of Allama Mohammed Iqbal. That great poet – a graduate, incidentally, of my old Cambridge college – was familiar with both the Western and Islamic philosophical traditions and, of course, benefitted from both. He saw so clearly the importance of understanding between faiths, drawing out the central truth that “Religion does not teach us to harbour enmity amongst us.” This is why I find it so hard to believe those who assume some inevitable conflict between faiths and civilisations. The temptation is there. It always has been. But there is no obligation to succumb to it. Indeed, in both our countries we set our face against it; but we must at all costs guard against this assumption turning into a self-fulfilling prophecy. That would be the greatest tragedy for mankind.

Understanding is, of course, the foundation of the relationship between Pakistan and Britain today. We are linked by our history, by our communities, and by our common interests – in this region, and more broadly across the World. Ours is an enduring relationship, founded on mutual trust and respect. It is not just a relationship between leaders, but an unusually strong partnership between our peoples, strengthened by ties of trade, family and faith. It is also reinforced by the outstanding contribution made to the U.K. by those who have come from Pakistan to make their home with us; those who came all the way from Mirpur and Jhelum and Gujrat and who found themselves settling in Bradford, Leicester, Manchester and London. The support of the British public – led by those of Pakistani descent, through the remarkable effectiveness of Islamic Relief and other humanitarian agencies – together with the British Government in response to last year’s earthquake was nothing short of magnificent. My wife and I will be visiting the earthquake zone later this week, to see at first hand something of the reconstruction work and how those shattered communities are rebuilding their lives.

Now, looking about me, I have a feeling that you, all the very high powered, very intellectually gifted ladies, will have an important role to play in Pakistan’s future. The world is in desperate need of people who have moral courage; who are not afraid of standing up for truth and fairness and civilized values – especially at a time in the world’s history when ignorance and prejudice are so prevalent and so dangerous. Religion has once again become a source of conflict and intolerance. But one of the tasks of education must surely be to engender the acquisition of wisdom. And wisdom tells us that all the great religions provide a different path to the ultimate source of Truth – as if we were all stationed at various points around the circumference of a circle and following separate radii that lead to the sacred centre.

Do you remember the famous eleventh century proverb about the blind men feeling the elephant when “each conceived a visionary whole and to the phantom clung with heart and soul?” At the end of the day “Each had but known one part, and no man all, Hence into deadly error each did fall.” Personally, I have the greatest respect for the inner meaning of Islam and for that of the other great religions. I respect the different approaches to the profound mystery of ultimate knowing. So can we not begin to understand that the outward forms of each religion – although very different – are the diverse manifestations of that inner journey to the sacred centre?

In a secular age you hear again and again the accusation that religion is the cause of so much misery and strife in the world. However, religion itself is not the problem – it is surely human misinterpretation of the sacred texts handed down to us that can lead to such appalling misunderstanding and hatred. A too literal reading of the texts, for instance, can so easily obscure the inner, symbolic meaning contained within them. As Jalaluddin Rumi put it so perceptively – “He who hears the inner voice within him has no need to listen to outside words.”

Incidentally, when I was roughly your age we had a Prime Minister in Britain called Harold MacMillan. He was a remarkable man with an immense knowledge of the sweep of history. According to him there was a Professor of Moral Philosophy at Oxford when he was there as a young man who used to greet his new students with the following – “Nothing that you will learn in the course of your studies will be of the slightest possible use to you in later life – save only this – that if you work hard and intelligently you should be able to detect when someone is talking rot, and that, in my view, is the main, if not the sole, purpose of education!”
I believe that wise leadership is crucial; hence the importance of your role in the future. Will you, for instance, have the moral courage to stand up against the kind of mistaken and misguided leadership that can so easily set one community against another?

Will you have the wisdom and the understanding to recognize that it is a re-discovery of the universal message contained in all the great religions that can help to lead us out of the overwhelming environmental crisis that threatens to engulf our world?

This planet’s survival will depend on you understanding that you can achieve unity through diversity; that you can in fact build on living, timeless traditions that are a part of your unique culture and still be “modern”. It will also depend on you realizing that the planetary crisis we face is so profound in its rapidly developing consequences that we simply cannot afford to go on squabbling amongst ourselves while we destroy the world around us at a truly terrifying rate. As it says in the Qu’ran – “Only they pay attention who have hearts; only they believe (or see signs) who have hearts.” Have you seen the signs? Will you trust in what your hearts are telling you?

http://www.princeofwales.gov.uk/speeches/religion_31102006.html

[Petronas]

ITALY: CONSERVATIVE LEADER RECOMMENDS TEACHING ISLAM IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS
Nov-17-06 11:04

Islam should be taught in public schools, a leading conservative politician in Italy says. Gianfranco Fini, head of the right-wing National Alliance Party who served as foreign minister under the previous government of Silvio Berlusconi, told Italy's largest circulation magazine Panorama on Friday that a child wishing to study the Koran in school "has the right to do that as an optional course." "We need immigrants and they represent an opportunity, not a risk. Integration means first of all guaranteeing that immigrants have rights, the right to believe in their God and practice their religion," he added.

"At the same time we must demand that they accept our culture and abide by precise duties concerning the separation of the religious sphere from the public one," Fini also stressed.

Approximately one million Muslims live today in Italy, according to the latest report by Italian charity Caritas. Some 500,000 students in Italian schools are foreign and one third of them is Muslim.

Today, only Catholicism is taught in Italian public schools. Students however can choose not to attend Catholic religion courses, which start in kindergarten and carry on through until high school.

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Religion&loid=8.0.360703143&par

[Ono]

Oh boy...

[Petronas]

German Population Plunge “Irreversible,” Federal Stats Office Admits
Expected that one third of all European children will be born to Muslim families by 2025
November 9, 2006

Germany’s downward spiral in population is no longer reversible, the country’s federal statistics office said Tuesday. The birthrate has dropped so low that immigration numbers cannot compensate.

“The fall in the population can no longer be stopped,” vice-president Walter Rademacher with the Federal Statistics Office said, reported Agence France-Presse.

Germany has the lowest birthrate in Europe, with an average of 1.36 children per woman. Despite government incentives to encourage larger families, the population is dropping rapidly and that trend will continue, with an expected loss of as much as 12 million by 2050. That would mean about a 15 percent drop from the country’s current population of 82.4 million, the German news source Deutsche Welle reported today.

The low birthrate will cause the German population to age dramatically over the next 40 years--last year there were 144,000 more deaths than births, and that number could increase to 600,000 by 2050, the FSO forecast stated. With a 22 percent reduction in the workforce and increasing costs for senior assistance and medical care, the drop in population is expected to have a radical impact on the nation’s economy, along with the welfare budget.

“I wouldn’t like to use the word ‘bankrupt’ because it’s a major challenge for the social insurance systems, that’s for certain,” Radermacher said in an interview with DW-Radio. “But the first thing is to reform the social insurance systems…We can learn from other countries…In every case, you need someone who has to work and give you some earnings.”

“The projections tell us the development of demographic trends will be even more dramatic in the eastern part of Germany,” Radermacher said . “This is because of the fertility rates in the eastern part of Germany, because of internal migration with the borders of Germany and many other demographic factors.”

While immigrants are increasingly relied upon to compensate for low birth rates in European countries, Radermacher said even factoring in a projected annual influx of 100,000-200,000 migrants won’t prevent the population plunge. “Even those people who are immigrants adopt after a couple years the lifestyle and the number of children per family. So the assumption that immigrants will stick to their habits is simply not true.”

Germany has one of the largest populations of Muslim immigrants in Western Europe, with a Muslim community of over 3 million. That trend is expected to continue, leading some demographic trend-watchers to warn that the country is well on the way to becoming a Muslim state by 2050, Deutsche Welle reported.

The Brussels Journal reported last month that one third of all European children will be born to Muslim families by 2025. There are an estimated 50 million Muslims living in Europe today--that number is expected to double over the next twenty years.

The population losses faced by Germany reflect a trend occurring across Europe--The European Union’s statistics agency Eurostat has predicted an overall drop in Europe’s population of 7 million people by 2050. The demographic decline coincides with a dramatic drop in Christian religious belief and a consequent rejection of Christian morality and emphasis on the benefits of family life and children.

http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/nov/06110903.html

[Petronas]

Europe's tolerance finds its limit
Saturday, November 25, 2006

Tolerance may have died in Europe the day Mohammed Bouyeri murdered Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh. On the morning of Nov. 2, 2004, as Mr. van Gogh cycled to work in Amsterdam, the bearded young man in a long Middle-Eastern-style shirt fired at him with a handgun. The mortally wounded filmmaker tried to run for cover. But the killer chased him, shot him once more and slit his throat from ear to ear. Then, he plunged two knives, one with a five-page letter attached, into the body.

The note began: "This is my last word, riddled with bullets, baptized in blood ... " It was filled with jihadist slogans and threats and contained a blood-curdling diatribe against Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali-born Dutch politician who had written the script of Mr. van Gogh's last film, Submission. The 10-minute short about the abuse of Muslim women had upset some Muslims because it showed sacred Koranic texts superimposed on a semi-naked woman.

Bouyeri's missive ended with a threatening chant: "I know for sure that you, O America, are going to meet with disaster. I know for sure that you, O Europe, are going to meet with disaster. I know for sure that you, O Holland, are going to meet with disaster."

The savagery of the killing triggered revulsion across Europe. Today, the continent is attempting to cope with increasingly bitter racial and religious squabbles and is riven with doubts about its future.

Decades of open-door immigration policies have transformed Europe through the arrival of several million immigrants, mostly Muslims, from North Africa, Turkey and Southwest Asia. But as the region became one of the most multicultural regions on Earth, its people have gradually turned against the policies that made it this way. From Amsterdam to Paris and Brussels to Berlin, politicians want to restrict immigration and force recent arrivals to integrate more thoroughly into their new homelands.

The Netherlands, where 6% of the country's 16 million people come from Islamic countries, has found itself at the forefront of a general hardening of European attitudes toward Muslim minorities.

In the two years since Mr. van Gogh's murder, the Dutch government has adopted sweeping reforms aimed at forcing immigrants to integrate more fully into society. Immigrants must now pass a language test within five years of arrival or risk being deported. They must also take special integration classes when they apply for a visa. Rotterdam has published a code of conduct suggesting that immigrants speak Dutch when out in public and the government runs courses to train imams in Western values.

This week, elections in the Netherlands seemed to reinforce the growing distrust between the native and immigrant populations when the Freedom Party, a previously insignificant far-right fringe group, won nine seats in parliament.

Led by Geert Wilders, a strident radical who goes out of his way to insult Muslims and warn that the Netherlands is about to be engulfed by an "Islamic tsunami," the Freedom Party is now the fifth- largest in the Dutch parliament. Mr. Wilders is the political heir of Pim Fortuyn, a populist politician who campaigned on immigration issues and was assassinated in 2002 just before elections.

This time around, Mr. Wilders called for an end to immigration and demanded bans on building religious schools and mosques. "We need more decency in this country, more education and less Islam," he recently told Dutch television. "We have had enough Islam in the Netherlands. I believe Islam is a violent religion and the Koran is a violent book. There is no such thing as moderate Islam."

Similar far-right movements are flourishing, along with large Muslim immigrant populations, in Austria, Belgium, Germany and Italy.

In France, one citizen in five voted for right-wing extremist Jean-Marie Le Pen in the 2002 presidential election. Now, Nicolas Sarkozy, the hardline Interior Minister who hopes to represent the centre-right in next April's presidential contest, has begun to court the anti-immigrant vote, unveiling a proposed immigration act that is a virtual copy of the Dutch regulations. "The French way of integration no longer works," he said recently, referring to last year's riots in immigrant neighbourhoods, the worst civil unrest in the country in decades.

But it's not just the far right that is declaring the death of multiculturalism. Britain's ruling Labour party has abandoned the laissez-faire pluralism of the past and introduced a U.S.-style citizenship ceremony, complete with declarations of loyalty. Naturalizing immigrants must also pass language and citizenship tests. More recently, Jack Straw, a former foreign secretary, created a huge controversy when he declared he wanted Muslim women to abandon the veil.

He insisted he didn't want to be "prescriptive," but felt that covering people's faces makes it more difficult to communicate. "Communities are bound together partly by informal chance relations between strangers -- people being able to acknowledge each other in the street or being able to pass the time of day," he said. "That's made more difficult if people are wearing a veil."

The comments caused many Muslims to insist they are being persecuted simply for being different. "The implication is clear: niqab- or hijab-wearing women, and, through them, European Muslims are being asked to submit not to the law of the land, but to each country's dominant way of life," Naima Bouteldja, a French journalist, wrote in The Guardian newspaper.

"The mounting campaign against multiculturalism by politicians, pundits and the press, in Britain and across Europe, is neither innocent nor innocuous," said Ambalavaner Sivanandan, director of Britain's Institute of Race Relations. "It is a prelude to a policy that deems there is one dominant culture, one unique set of values, one nativist loyalty -- a policy of assimilation."

Still, in the wake of last summer's suicide bombings on London's transit system by home-grown terrorists, there are growing fears multiculturalism protects and preserves every culture -- except the host culture. The native-born terrorist has become a symbol of multiculturalism's failure. Usually, these new extremists do not feel at home in the West but have only the most tenuous ties to their families' original homelands. As a result, they are susceptible to arguments of religious certainty and promises of eternal glory. The cultural isolation encouraged by multiculturalism also lets Islamist activists find refuge and anonymity in Europe's immigrant communities.

"The fruits of 30 years of state-endorsed multiculturalism have only increased inter-racial tension and inter-racial sectarianism," analyst Patrick West wrote in a recent report for the British think-tank Civitas. "The fact that the London suicide bombers of July 7 [2005] were born and bred in Britain -- and encouraged by the state to be different -- illustrates that hard multiculturalism has the capacity to be not only divisive but decidedly lethal.

On the other hand, Trevor Phillips, a black political journalist who heads Britain's Commission for Racial Equality, suggests multiculturalism is outdated because it fails to address cultural differences or reinforce common values. Britain could be "sleepwalking" towards segregation, he warns, saying, "We have allowed tolerance of diversity to harden into the effective isolation of communities."

"The multiculturalism beloved by our political and civic bureaucracies has not only failed to deliver peace, but is the partial cause of alienation and extremism," said Michael Nazir-Ali, the Pakistani-born Anglican Bishop of Rochester. When that isolation and extremism combine with the simmering resentments of Europe's immigrants, neither tolerance nor understanding are likely. In such a globalized clash of cultures, multiculturalism seems doomed to be eclipsed by anger and fear.

NEW EUROPEAN POLICIES STRESS INTEGRATION

DENMARK

Danes used to pride themselves on their multiculturalism. Then last fall the newspaper Jyllands-Posten published a dozen cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed. Muslims around the world were outraged. By the time things settled, Danes were beginning to see their 200,000 Muslim immigrants as a threat to their own national identity.

In recent years the Danish government has adopted several policies that aim to hasten the integration of the 5% of the population who are immigrants -- mainly Muslims -- from countries such as Turkey, Somalia, Pakistan, Lebanon and Iraq. Family members, for instance, must now pass an "attachment test" showing their loyalty to Danish society and values.

FRANCE

France has the largest Islamic presence of any country in Western Europe -- its more than six million Muslims, half of them citizens, make up nearly 10% of the population. Many live in drab suburbs that have become no-go areas for the authorities, plagued with drugs, gang rapes and fear. Periodically they erupt in violent protests such as the two weeks of riots in November, 2005.

France's official policy is of assimilation and integration, but such laws as the 2004 ban on female students wearing Muslim headscarves are fuelling resentment and reinforcing immigrants' sense of exclusion. A new "social integration contract" requires immigrants to take a half-day civics class and, if necessary, up to 500 hours of language instruction. Immigrants would receive a 10-year residence permit and discrimination protections in return for undertaking to learn French and get a job.

GERMANY

Getting German citizenship was once as simple as swearing an oath of allegiance to the country's constitution. Now prospective Muslim immigrants in Baden-Wuerttemberg are questioned on their personal political and cultural views. Candidates are asked their opinions on religious freedom, sexual equality and homosexuality, with questions as blunt as, "Do you think a woman should obey her husband and that he can beat her if she is disobedient?"

In the past Germany did not even acknowledge it had immigrants. They were "guest workers" who would one day go home. Some 3.3 million Muslims now live in Germany and, like the rest of Europe, the country has begun to adjust its laws to try to force greater integration. The government provides new migrants with 600 hours of language training and 30 hours of civics instruction.

SWEDEN

For decades Sweden has had some of Europe's most liberal asylum laws. As a result, it has one of its fastest-growing immigrant populations. Of the nine million Swedish citizens, about 1.08 million are foreign-born and up to 40,000 asylum seekers are waiting to be approved.

Once proud of its multi-ethnic, multicultural reputation, Sweden has recently become aware it is a house divided. Immigrants dominate in some areas -- they form nearly 40% of the population of Malmo, the third-largest city. They feature largely on welfare rolls, have higher jobless rates and push up crime. There are also fears radical Islamic groups are finding terrorism recruits in Sweden. In October, 2005, a 19-year-old Swede, a refugee from Yugoslavia, was arrested in Sarajevo in an apartment that contained suicide-bomb vests and explosives.

To encourage greater integration and to underline efforts to re-emphasize Sweden's Western values, the government wants to ban girls under 15 from wearing veils, introduce mandatory medical examinations to detect ritual genital mutilation, end arranged marriages and cut off state funding for religious schools.

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=b4d47fc8-9764-4bcb-9fa3-4cbd0d7c56e3

[NYer]

Ralph Peters agrees. (http://www.nypost.com/seven/11262006/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_eurabia_myth_opedcolumnists_ralph_peters.htm)

Don't let Europe's current round of playing pacifist dress-up fool you: This is the continent that perfected genocide and ethnic cleansing, the happy-go-lucky slice of humanity that brought us such recent hits as the Holocaust and Srebrenica.

Apparently Paul Beilin of Brussels Journal isn't so sure ... and is preparing a rebuttal.

[NYer]

Paul Beilin's rebuttal. (http://politicscentral.com/2006/11/28/eurabia_is_real_enough_unfortu.php)

[Petronas]

Sharia law is spreading as authority wanes
1:59am GMT 30/11/2006

Islamic sharia law is gaining an increasing foothold in parts of Britain, a report claims. Sharia, derived from several sources including the Koran, is applied to varying degrees in predominantly Muslim countries but it has no binding status in Britain. The Koran is one of the sources that Sharia derives from

However, the BBC Radio 4 programme Law in Action produced evidence yesterday that it was being used by some Muslims as an alternative to English criminal law. Aydarus Yusuf, 29, a youth worker from Somalia, recalled a stabbing case that was decided by an unofficial Somali "court" sitting in Woolwich, south-east London.

Mr Yusuf said a group of Somali youths were arrested on suspicion of stabbing another Somali teenager. The victim's family told the police it would be settled out of court and the suspects were released on bail. A hearing was convened and elders ordered the assailants to compensate their victim. "All their uncles and their fathers were there," said Mr Yusuf. "So they all put something towards that and apologised for the wrongdoing." Although Scotland Yard had no information about that case yesterday, a spokesman said it was common for the police not to proceed with assault cases if the victims decided not to press charges. However, the spokesman said cases of domestic violence, including rape, might go to trial regardless of the victim's wishes.

Mr Yusuf told the programme he felt more bound by the traditional law of his birth than by the laws of his adopted country. "Us Somalis, wherever we are in the world, we have our own law," he said. "It's not sharia, it's not religious — it's just a cultural thing." Sharia's great strength was the effectiveness of its penalties, he said. Those who appeared before religious courts would avoid re-offending so as not to bring shame on their families. Some lawyers welcomed the advance of what has become known as "legal pluralism".

Dr Prakash Shah, a senior lecturer in law at Queen Mary University of London, said such tribunals "could be more effective than the formal legal system".

In his book Islam in Britain, Patrick Sookhdeo, director of the Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity, says there is an "alternative parallel unofficial legal system" that operates in the Muslim community on a voluntary basis. "Sharia courts now operate in most larger cities, with different sectarian and ethnic groups operating their own courts that cater to their specific needs according to their traditions," he says. These are based on sharia councils, set up in Britain to help Muslims solve family and personal problems.

Sharia councils may grant divorces under religious law to a woman whose husband refuses to complete a civil divorce by declaring his marriage over. There is evidence that these councils are evolving into courts of arbitration. Faizul Aqtab Siddiqi, a barrister and principal of Hijaz College Islamic University, near Nuneaton, Warwicks, said this type of court had advantages for Muslims. "It operates on a low budget, it operates on very small timescales and the process and the laws of evidence are far more lenient and it's less awesome an environment than the English courts," he said.

Mr Siddiqi predicted that there would be a formal network of Muslim courts within a decade. "I was speaking to a police officer who said we no longer have the bobby on the beat who will give somebody a slap on the wrist. So I think there is a case to be made under which the elders sit together and reprimand people, trying to get them to change."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=Y3UZA1RZGTHK5QFIQMFSFGGAVCBQ 0IV0?xml=/news/2006/11/29/nsharia29.xml

[Petronas]

Faced with Radical Islam, Europe Is in Danger of Decay
By Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Posted: Thursday, November 30, 2006

Le Figaro (France)
Publication Date: November 18, 2006

Two years ago, movie director Theo van Gogh’s throat was cut on a street in Amsterdam in the name of radical Islam. I had partaken in his last work, Submission, where we represented, in the most accurate way possible, the condition of Muslim women: tyranny, humiliations, violence. In this film, we showed Muslim women who had finally rebelled, talking to God in a tone of defiance. It made Imam Fawaz of the Hague scream with hate during the delivery of a vengeful sermon. My friend Theo, the “criminal bastard”, was subsequently riddled with bullets and stabbed to death with a dagger.

At the beginning of this November, the trial of the members of a violent Islamic network in the Netherlands entered its final phase. And an entire society today asks itself questions about the integration of its immigrants. While I reside in the United States at present--I’m well-protected here--the invectives of the Imam still ring in my ear, calling for the punishment of Theo, and promising me a Divine curse in the form of blindness combined with cancer of the tongue and cancer of the brain.

Time has passed. After a bad quarrel regarding my Dutch naturalization and my resignation from the Dutch Parliament, I was rapidly rehabilitated. Here I am, once again a Dutch citizen, an émigrée in the United States. Whatever one may say of it, the United States remains in many regards the greatest champion of liberty. At the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, I have more time and more means to diffuse my ideas.

People ask me incessantly what it’s like to live with perpetual death threats. This question is most often asked by Westerners, with the naiveté of those who consider life to be naturally peaceful. Born in Somalia, the daughter of an opponent of Siyad Barré’s dictatorship, I grew up in my country, then in Saudi-Arabia and in Kenya in an environment in which death invited itself without end. A virus, a bacterium, a parasite, a drought, a famine, a civil war, soldiers, torturers: death could take all forms and hit anyone, anytime. When I had malaria, I got well again. When I was circumcised, my wound transformed into scar tissue, and I survived. When my Qur’an teacher fractured my skull, doctors saved me. A bandit put the blade of his knife against my throat: I’m still alive, and more of a rebel than ever before.

I remember Saudi-Arabia where, under the cover of purity, our most minor gestures were haunted by sin and fear: hangings, the cutting off of hands, women controlled and stoned to death, such was and such remains the everyday life of that country. The respect for the literal words of the Prophet is incompatible with human rights, in contradiction to philosophy of classical liberalism. Submerged in a medieval mentality, numerous Muslim countries profit from Western technological advances, pretending to ignore that these advances find their very origin in Enlightenment-thinking. It’s this blindness coupled with hypocrisy that renders the transition towards modernity a most arduous one for the faithful. I quit the world of faith, genital mutilation and forced marriage for that of reason and sexual emancipation. I made the journey towards human rights. At present, I know that one of these two worlds is simply better than the other.

Some, in the West, find such a distinction to be politically incorrect, but it’s necessary to realize that it is Islam which is most traumatized by fundamentalism, not the Western world. Europe only feels the shock waves because of immigration and globalization. It’s by making morality relative and by affirming the equality of cultures that a number of Western intellectuals embark on the path, without realizing it themselves, of self-destruction. Three concepts are at the heart of your culture: 1) freedom of the individual as an end in and of itself, 2) rationality, 3) separation of the scientific and the religious.

Created on a humanist base, your institutions are the expression of the life here on earth, while Islamic philosophy, rejecting individual freedom, submits the individual to God. On Islamic soil, rationality and science enter into a conflict with the Qur’an: any innovation becomes unacceptable. The government cannot be founded on the thought of man: life on earth, after all, is only temporary. It’s necessary to invest in the hereafter. Islam is a cult of the hereafter. Such is the veritable schism with the West: the two world views are incompatible. I, personally, have opted for life in the here and now.

When I was a child in Somalia, under the tree where she braided, my grandmother told us stories and asked us questions, in order to know if we had understood the concept: being able to recognize the enemy, in particular. She told me: “It’s a very useful instinct. If you don’t know what you have to fear, you will not survive.” And when she caught me in flagrante delicto of incomprehension, she called me doqon! This word means two things: being foolish and naïve. We said, in Somalia: “Stupid like a date palm tree!” Dates from that tree are treasures, and the one who loses them is an imbecile.

No, Europe is not traumatized by Islam, but she is like a date palm tree which despoils itself, foolish and naïve. Things fall. She remains inert. Worse, she gives freedom to the enemies of freedom. At the heart of your beautiful West, it is the right-thinking people with a socializing tendency who do this the most, in the spirit of pacifism, voluntary blindness and conformism, when confronted with the rise of fundamentalism, when confronted with the aggressiveness of radicals, when confronted with the dangers of communitarianism. Stupid. Like the data palm tree. Please: don’t be doqon.

http://www.aei.org/publications/filter.all,pubID.25217/pub_detail.asp

[Petronas]

The Islamic Empire Strikes Back
December 05, 2006

According to Sher Zieve, “Due to concerns regarding Austria’s growing Muslim population, the country’s officials are said to have banned references to St. Nick—also known as Santa Claus—in its kindergarten schools. The Muslim immigration into Austria is said to be at 400,000 and growing.”

“As Muslims continue to increase their populations in Western countries more western traditions are being removed—said to be attributed to fears of offending Muslim groups. However, Austrian officials said that the reason for the banning of St. Nick is that the bearded figure “evokes fear” in children.” ...

http://mensnewsdaily.com/2006/12/05/the-islamic-empire-strikes-back/

[Petronas]

Less Christianity, more Islam and Hinduism, schools ordered
4th December 2006

A new religious syllabus for schools has caused a fury among church groups and politicians after recommending teachers cut down on education about Christianity while increasing lessons in Islam and Hinduism.

Teachers in Buckinghamshire were directed to spend 40 per cent of religious education on Christianity, while giving Islam and Hinduism equal play at 20 per cent each. Just ten percent was then to be devoted to other religions - including Judaism - with a final ten per cent on "general concepts". It was recommended that younger children receive just 36 hours per year of religious education, with that number upped to 45 in the lead up to the GCSEs.

However when the lack of time devoted to Christianity sparked protests, Buckinghamshire education authorities reportedly removed those numbers from official documents. Councillors accused authorities of a cover-up, saying that while the need to teach children about other world religions is obvious the lack of education on Christianity in a Christian country was going too far.

However the Buckinghamshire County Council reportedly hit back saying the changes would not impact taxpayers as printing errors meant the document had to be redrafted anyway. The council also insisted Christianity remained the focus of the syllabus, and insisted the new policies provided flexibility for the schools and promoted goodwill, seeking to inform rather than influence children.

However critics reportedly insisted the nation's religion was being turned in to a sideshow in the name of political correctness.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=420385&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

Sensurerer Barnetime
6.12 2006

NRK Dagsnytt kan fortelle at Barnetimen har erstattet belastende ord i gamle hørespill og byttet dem ut med tidsriktige. Således heter ikke pappaen til Pippi lenger negerkonge, men sjørøverkonge. Det skal ha skjedd et par ganger, og målet er å gjøre skuespillene inkluderende og ikke ekskluderende, sier ansvarlige i NRK. Finn Erik Vinje synes ikke noe om den nye praksisen. Han mener det er å retusjere historien og fjerne det som var gangbart språk på den tiden bøkene ble skrevet.

Det er grunn til å spørre om denne språklige korrekthet brer om seg, og nå går fra voksen til barnas verden. En person som reiser rundt i barnehaver fortalte at hun hadde opplevd at Asbjørnsen og Moes eventyr var skrevet om: istedet var ordet "gris" var det satt inn "rev". Da hun hørte det samme i barnehave nummer to, begynte hun å lure på om dette er noe som er innført.

http://www.document.no/weblogg/archives/010511.html

Norway: "Pig" replaced with "fox" in kindergarten fairy tales
December 07, 2006

From Fjordman:

Document.no, Norway's largest independent weblog, reports that in Norwegian kindergartens, pigs in traditional fairy tales are now quietly being replaced with other animals. A person who visits kindergartens to read fairy tales experienced that in stories by Asbjørnsen and Moe, the Norwegian equivalent of the Brothers Grimm, the word pig had been replaced with fox. When she discovered the same thing happening in another kindergarten, she wondered whether this was a new policy.

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/014319.php

[NYer]

The most popular name for a male newborn in Brussels for 2005 is ... Here. (http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1732)

[Petronas]

The same goes for Rotterdam in Holland and Malmo in Sweden.

[Petronas]

UK schools get guide to Islam
December 10, 2006 Sunday Ziqa'ad 18, 1427

A guide to Islam is being given to primary schools across Britain containing a headscarf, a prayer mat, a prayer cap, sacred Ihram clothing worn during the pilgrimage to Makkah, a poster of the Muslim prophets and a compass to locate the direction of Makkah. According to Daily Express the teaching resource, provided by the Muslim Council of Britain, is intended to provide children aged seven and 11 with information about true Islamic beliefs.

The pack, described on Friday by one head teacher as a "three-foot by three-foot plastic box", also contains CDs, videos, children's books and pamphlets and model kits of a mosque and Islam's holiest site, the Ka'bah.

Sir Iqbal Sacranie, of the MCB, said: "We believe education is the key to creating a vibrant and understanding society. We want to ensure that every schoolchild has access to high quality Islamic resources in their schools." Colin Manning, head teacher of North Reddish Junior School in Stockport, which has only four Muslim pupils, said: "The future is in the hands of young people.

The better they understand each other, the more secure that future will be." Tahir Alam, education spokesman for the MCB, added: "We found that schools were using books that were not accurate about Muslim traditions and beliefs so we put this pack together. We now have over 800 schools using them."

http://www.dawn.com/2006/12/10/int9.htm

[Petronas]

Parents angered as every pupil is given halal school meals
16th December 2006

Halal meat is being served to pupils in state schools without their knowledge, even if they believe the religious slaughter is cruel. Parents have reacted furiously after being sent letters telling them their children's school dinners have been all-halal for 'some time'.

To conform with Jewish and Muslim religious tradition, animals are prepared for halal products by having their throats slit while conscious - a method many people believe is inhumane and which the RSPCA has condemned. The meat was introduced at four schools in the Reading area with a high proportion of Muslim pupils. But parents of non-Muslim pupils - between 20 and 50 per cent of the schools' roll -say they were not consulted.

Coach driver Andrew Weston, 37, who has a son and daughter at St John's primary school, said: "We received a letter saying only halal meat was being served and had been for some time. I was shocked. The way the animals are killed for this meat is barbaric and cruel. Our children should have a choice." Abdul Dean, ethnic minorities officer for the Christian Peoples Alliance, said: "Christian children should be given an equal chance to have non-halal meat. The school should have explained the situation to parents at the outset."

Last month, a head teacher in Rotherham caused an outcry when she said she intended to replace traditional turkey with halal chicken to create an 'integrated Christmas'. Jan Charters, head of Oakwood School, backed down after complaints by MPs. A spokesperson for Reading Borough Council said: "The decision was taken several years ago. Schools thought it was the appropriate choice for their multi-cultural community. We are increasing options at the four schools by offering fish each day." The other schools where only halal meat is served are New Town, Oxford Road and Alfred Sutton primary schools.

Earlier this year, an RSPCA pamphlet stated: "Muslim communities in the UK should review their slaughter practices. Research demonstrates that slaughter of any animal without stunning can cause unnecessary suffering."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=423111&in_page_id=1770

[NYer]

In UK, Mohammed (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/12/21/nnames21.xml) overtakes George as most popular boy's name.

[Petronas]

The Death of Europe
December 21, 2006

It was just thirty or so years ago when much of the academic and journalistic elite worried about overpopulation. It was considered a serious and possibly lethal crisis for humanity. Now, the political phenomenon of our time is the essential depopulation — and essential disintegration — of Europe. No one, circa 1970, ever predicted this turn of events.

The German author Henryk Broder recently told a Dutch newspaper that young Europeans who love freedom must emigrate, because the Europe they knew will no longer exist in 20 years. Demographics trends show Europe is becoming Muslim, which will have profound political and social consequences as the Enlightenment finally dims.

Many Europeans are taking Mr. Broder’s advice. In 2004, for the first time in history, more Germans left their country than immigrants moved in. More than 145,000 Germans exited, most for the United States. In 2003, more than 110,000 people (mostly Dutch natives) left the Netherlands while 90,000 (mostly Muslims) moved in. In the first half of 2004, more than 53,000 moved out. An exodus of more than 100,000 people a year is a lot in a nation of just 16 million. It is, as sociologists like to say, a trend.

Many of the immigrants moving to Europe do not like Europeans. In Scandinavian countries, crime rates are soaring. In Norway, rapes are up a sickening 40 percent since the year 2000. Two-thirds of the sexual assailants are Muslim immigrants. Many immigrants to Europe do not consider themselves as citizens, but enemies to their respective nations.

According to writer Paul Bekien of the Brussels Journal – who catalogued some of these figures – the European decline also explains the anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism in Europe. America and Israel will fight for freedom. Too many Europeans will submit to tyranny.

"This is why (many Europeans) have come to hate Israel and Americans so much, and the small band of European "islamphobes" who dare talk about what they see happening around them. West Europeans have to choose between submission (Islam) and death. I fear, like Broder, they have chosen submission – just like in former days when they preferred to be red rather than dead," he wrote.

Science fiction writer Robert Silverberg once wrote a story in which couples traveled in time to see the end of the world. While they traveled, their current world was crumbling into chaos. The story was an ironic satire on the times.

But his chilling story is now true. Individuals can death-watch the end of the European era. It is probably the most important – and least publicized – event of our time.

http://www.dailynews-record.com/opinion_details.php?AID=7859&CHID=36

[Petronas]

Man attacked over wife's Muslim veil comment
Sunday December 24, 12:04 PM

A man,whose wife made a passing comment about a Muslim woman's full face veil, suffered a broken nose and lost his front teeth after being attacked and headbutted by the woman's partner, police said on Sunday. The victim, a 46-year-old white man, was walking through Regent's Park with his wife, son and daughter when they passed another family, a Muslim man and his wife who was pushing a baby in a pushchair.

"The victim's wife made a comment directed to her husband that she thought it must be difficult for the woman wearing the veil to see out of it as it covered her face," a police spokesman said. "The suspect began shouting and returned approximately 10 minutes later on his own and repeatedly punched and headbutted the victim." The man was taken to hospital, suffering from facial injuries including a broken nose and a black eye, but was discharged later in the day.

The police spokesman said the suspect was about 35-years-old and of Middle Eastern appearance and that they were treating the incident as a racially-motivated assault. The attack occurred in mid-November but police were only alerted to the incident last week. ...

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/24122006/325/man-attacked-wife-s-muslim-veil-comment.html

[NYer]

Cat Stevens awarded EU Peace Prize. (http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1815)

Also known as Yusuf Islam, he received the Mediterranean Prize for Peace January 4, 2007 in Naples, Italy.

No doubt his support of both the Salman Rushdie fatwa and Hamas weighed heavily in his favor.

[Petronas]

British girl banned from wearing cross at school
13 January 2007

A British schoolgirl has been barred from wearing a crucifix necklace in class, the Daily Mail reported Saturday. Samantha Devine, a 13-year-old Roman Catholic, was told by teachers in Gillingham, south-east England, that it breached health and safety rules, the paper added.

Her family reportedly says it will fight the decision and has accused the school of discriminating against Christians because Sikh and Muslim pupils can wear religious symbols.

The case echoes that of British Airways employee Nadia Eweida, who was suspended in October for failing to remove her necklace or hide it under clothing in accordance with company policy. ...

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/theworld/2007/January/theworld_January344.xml&section=theworld&col=

[Alli]

that it breached health and safety rules, the paper added.
What???

[Petronas]

The rationale is ironic, as it is a fact that in many parts of Europe today it is both unsafe and bad for your health to be openly Christian (or Jewish, or non-Muslim), though that is probably not what the teachers meant...

[Petronas]

Threatened French teacher quits teaching
January 24, 2007

Robert Redeker Update. A professor of philosophy who goes by the tag "Das Ding an sich" has kindly translated this item from the superb German-language Politically Incorrect blog:

The French philosophy teacher Robert Redeker who, because of his criticism of Islam was threatened with death, is giving up. Shamefully left in a bind by the authorities and insulted by the depraved Left, Redeker had to hide with his family for months in different locations -- of course on his own dime, while the Muslim who threatened him was permitted to move about freely.
Now Redeker has had enough and explains, that he will no longer practice his profession as a teacher.

"The French critic of Islam, teacher Robert Redeker, no longer wants to teach in school after death threats were directed at him. Redeker said on Saturday to French broadcasting that instead of teaching he will take a post in the state research institute CNRS. He agreed on that with Education Minister Gilles de Robien. In interviews he complained that the Ministry of Education had left him without help. On Saturday Redeker said further that he wasn’t sorry for his article. In the article he had called the Quran a 'book of unbelievable violence' and the Prophet Muhammad a 'merciless warmonger.'"

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/014961.php

[Petronas]

Islam converts change face of Europe
Jan. 23, 2007

As many as 100,000 French and British citizens have converted to Islam over the last decade, according to a new book by an Israeli historian.

The figures cited by Hebrew University Prof. Raphael Israeli in his upcoming book The Third Islamic Invasion of Europe are representative of the fast-changing face of Europe, which the Islamic history professor says is in danger of becoming "Eurabia" within half a century.

He noted that about 30 million Muslims currently live in Europe, out of a total population of 380 million., adding that with a high Muslim birthrate in Europe, the number of Muslims living in the continent is likely to double within 25 years.

Israeli also cited massive immigration and Turkey's future inclusion in the EU as the primary reasons why the face of Europe will be indelibly changed within a generation.

European concerns over a fast-growing Muslim population is at the center of opposition to Turkey's entry into the EU, he said, as the inclusion of Turkey into the EU will catapult the number of Muslims to 100 million out of a total population of 450 million.

"The sheer weight of demography will produce a situation where no Frenchman or Dutchman could be elected to parliament without the support of the Muslim minority," he said Monday in an interview with The Jerusalem Post. "Muslims will have a more and more decisive voice in the makeup of European governments."

"With Turkey as a member of the EU, the process will be accelerated, without [Turkey] it will be slower but it will still happen," he added. Turkey has strong relations with Israel.

The historian, who has authored 19 previous books, said that Muslim political power in Europe would directly impact domestic politics, including Europe's immigration policy, with millions of additional Muslims waiting at the door to gain entry to the EU as part of "family reunification" programs.

"Every European with a right mind has every reason to be frightened," Israeli said.

The 50,000 French and 50,000 British who have converted to Islam over the last decade, including many from mixed marriages, did so for personal convictions, romanticized notions of Islam, as well as for business reasons, while others see Islam as the wave of the future at a time when Christianity is on the wane, Israeli said.

He said that Muslims converting to Christianity existed but their numbers were significantly smaller.

Israeli noted that conversions in mixed marriages worked only in one direction since a Muslim woman who marries a Christian is considered an apostate in her community, and faces physical danger. "It is time one should wake up and realize what is happening in Europe," he concluded.

Israeli's book is due out in London in the coming months.•

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1167467792048&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FPrinter

[Petronas]

New curriculum will 'make every lesson politically correct'
25th January 2007

Children will be taught race relations and multiculturalism with every subject they study -from Spanish to science - under controversial changes to the school curriculum announced by the Government. In music and art, they could have to learn Indian and Chinese songs and instruments, and West African drumming. In maths and science, key Muslim contributions such algebra and the number zero will be emphasised to counter Islamophobia. And in English, pupils will study literature on the experiences of migration - such as Zadie Smith's novel White Teeth, or Brick Lane, by Monica Ali.

One critic accused Education Secretary Alan Johnson of 'politicising' lessons with the new agenda. Tory MP Douglas Carswell, a member of the Commons education select committee, said schools will be vehicles for multicultural propaganda and classrooms turned into 'laboratories for politically-correct thought'. ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=431316&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

Bolton bans Holocaust Day

IN A move widely seen to be bowing to Muslim pressure, Bolton Council has scrapped its Holocaust Memorial Day event. The council is to replace it with a Genocide Memorial Day in June. This is in line with the policy of the Muslim Council of Britain, which continues to boycott HMD and is asking for a Genocide Day, which will also mark "the ongoing genocide and human rights abuses of Palestinians" by Israelis. The council decision was made in consultation with the town's Interfaith Council.

But Rabbi Joseph Lever of United Synagogue who has participated in the Bolton event for around three years was not consulted on the decision. He said: "I mourn the fact that the Holocaust Memorial Day event will not take place in Bolton this year." Louis Rapaport, president of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester, was equally disappointed that the Jewish community was not consulted. ...

http://www.jewishtelegraph.co.uk/man_1.html

[Petronas]

Terror cells throughout Europe similar
30 January 2007

The Hofstad group is not a typically Dutch phenomenon. The group very much resembles other jihadist networks throughout Europe. These are also usually local groups that are not steered from the outside by international connections. Terrorism expert Edwin Bakker concluded this in his study ‘Jihadi terrorists in Europe,’ in which he examined specific characteristics of terrorists and their networks since 11 September.

The young men of the Hofstad group are ‘somewhat younger’ than the members of an average terrorist network, Bakker said. The researcher is affiliated with the Clingendael Institute for international affairs. The average age of the European jihadists that Bakker studied was 27.5 years. “The Hofstad young men can perhaps be seen as the forerunners of a new trend. More very young jihadists have turned up since their arrest.”

Although the jihadists display differences, there are also common characteristics. Most are born or raised in Europe. They are often of either North African or (in Great Britain) Pakistani descent. Bakker has not noticed any connections between the European networks and Al Qaeda. ‘So terrorism is an internal European problem.’

http://www.expatica.com/actual/article.asp?subchannel_id=19&story_id=35949

[Petronas]

'Palestinian Genocide Day' instead of Holocaust Day
01.31.07, 10:56

While the rest of Europe marked the UN-established International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27, a small town in Spain opted instead to commemorate the 'Day of Palestinian Genocide'. Ciempozuelos, a Madrid suburb home to less than 20,000 residents, announced that it would hold ceremonies and public events in honor of the 'genocide of the Palestinian people'.

Following the town's announcement Israel's Ambassador to Spain Victor Harel issued an urgent message to Ciempozeulos mayor Susana León, a member of the ruling Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE), asking him to reconsider his decision. Harel also turned to Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs Miguel Moratinos and the PSOE secretary general. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) publicly slammed the decision as "shameful." In an open letter to León the ADL wrote: "Applying the term 'genocide' to the Arab-Israeli conflict encourages hatred toward the State of Israel and deliberately insults those of us, both Jews and non-Jews, who seek to solemnly commemorate the victims of the Nazi campaign of slaughter."

The affair was covered extensively by the Spanish press. El Mundo, the country's largest daily newspaper, ran an editorial on the Ciempozeulos affair under the title – 'An insult to Israel'. The coverage led to numerous Spanish citizens contacting the Israeli embassy to voice their support for Israel, while at the same time the Ciempozeulos administration was flooded by angry phone calls from outraged citizens.

Following the request of the Spanish Foreign Affairs Ministry the town eventually decided to cancel 'Palestinian Genocide Day' as well as choosing to forgo any of the original Holocaust ceremonies. Any trace of the affair was stricken from the town's official website. "The pain does not only belong to one people," said Mayor León, adding that he was sorry for any distress that may have been caused.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3359209,00.html

[Petronas]

'Wave of hatred' warning as attacks on Jews hits record high
13:36pm on 1st February 2007

A study published today shows the number of reported anti-Semitic incidents has almost tripled in 10 years, with more than half the attacks last year taking place in London. The findings prompted the report's authors to warn of a "wave of hatred" against Jews. The number of incidents increased to 594 last year, up by 31 per cent on the previous year. Violent assaults soared to 112, up by more than a third on 2005. Incidents ranged from the unprovoked stabbing of a Jewish man in north London to the sending of hate mail and the vandalism of Jewish cemeteries and synagogues.

The Anti-Semitic Incidents Report 2006, compiled by the Community Security Trust (CST), responsible for combating anti-Semitism in the UK, blames the huge rise on a number of factors ranging from Israel's invasion of Lebanon last summer to the jailing of the historian David Irving in Austria for denying the Holocaust.

The threatened suspension of Ken Livingstone as Mayor for comments made to a Jewish Evening Standard reporter triggered 11 anti-Semitic incidents, according to the report.

When the figures were first compiled in 1984, there were just 154 reported incidents, about a quarter of the total for last year.

Mark Gardner, CST spokesman said of the level of hate crimes: "This is unacceptable racism, that many Jews had hoped and believed was a thing of the past. Today's anti-Semitism is a wave of hatred, intimidation and abuse against British Jews, who are stupidly blamed and randomly attacked over international tensions for which they bear no responsibility."

Incidents last year include:

• An Orthodox Jew punched in the face and almost pushed off a Tube platform by an Arab man who screamed: "Get back to Stamford Hill, I want to kill you all"
• A Jewish man walking to synagogue with his two young sons suffered a broken leg after being punched and kicked by a white man shouting "f***ing Jew"
• Seventy incidents of desecration and damage to synagogues, cemeteries, Jewish schools and private homes with attacks including swastikas daubed on walls
• Savage assault of a 12-year-old Jewish girl Jasmine Kranat, who was beaten unconscious on a north London bus by two teenage girls who asked her first if she was Jewish.

The physical descriptions of perpetrators in 205 of the incidents show 96 were by white people, 28 by black people, 60 by Asians and 16 by Arabs. The report has been passed to ministers.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=433030&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

When truth no longer is a defense to a libel charge... Or maybe the government has decreed that the "truth" is now different? "1984"...

Teacher sacked over religion row
Friday, 2 February 2007, 19:54 GMT

A supply teacher has been sacked from a secondary school following complaints from Muslim pupils. Andrew McLuskey was sacked from Bayliss Court Secondary School in Slough after a Religious Education lesson discussing the pros and cons of religion.

Pupils at the predominantly Muslim school claimed Mr McLuskey said most suicide bombers were Muslim. But he rejected the allegation and said the school was too quick to sack him without giving him right of reply. He expected to complete an eight week contract at the school - but was sacked after only several days. Deputy head teacher Ray Hinds says the pupils were very upset

"I feel it's very unjust," he said. "I think I should've been given the chance to respond to the allegations and not in effect be ejected from a job without the chance to defend myself."

The school authorities denied they were being heavy-handed and said their first priority was pupils' welfare. "I don't think it's important what I think," said the school's deputy head teacher Ray Hinds. "It's what the pupils think that were in the classroom at the time. And they were very upset."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6326277.stm

[Petronas]

Appeasement takes hold again in Europe
February 5, 2007

Last September Robert Redeker, a French high-school philosophy teacher and author of several scholarly books, published an opinion piece in Le Figaro entitled "What should the free world do in the face of Islamist intimidation?"

His piece concluded that while Judaism and Christianity are religions whose rites reject and delegitimise violence, Islam is a religion that, in its own sacred text, as well as in its everyday rites, exalts violence and hatred.

The article was posted on the internet, translated into Arabic, and widely distributed. Within a day, it was being condemned on Al-Jazeera TV and the offending issue of Le Figaro was banned in Egypt and Tunisia. Redeker received a large number of threatening emails. He was condemned to death on one Muslim site, which posted his address and a photograph of his home.

Redeker and his family went into hiding. Five months later they are still living in secrecy. Christian Delacampagne, writing in the latest issue of Commentary magazine, describes how the French reacted: "The communist mayor of Redeker's town condemned him, the headmaster of his school complained that he had included his affiliation at the end of the article, France's two largest teachers' unions, both socialist, issued statements saying they did not share Redeker's convictions. The leading leftist human-rights organisations denounced his irresponsible declarations and putrid ideas. The French Education Minister, Gilles de Robien, criticised Redeker.

"The editorial board of Le Monde, France's newspaper of record, characterised Redeker's piece as excessive, misleading and insulting. It called his remarks about Muhammad a blasphemy. To judge from this response, large sectors of the French intellectual and political establishment have carved out an exception to the hard-won tradition of open discussion: when it comes to Islam, as opposed to Christianity or Judaism, freedom of speech must respect definite limits.

"How did France reach this point?"

The last time France was faced with a large-scale threat from something similar - fascism - it reacted with denial, defeat and accommodation. Parallels are drawn by an American writer living in Europe, Bruce Bawer, whose book While Europe Slept describes rapidly growing Muslim enclaves across Western Europe in which women are oppressed, homosexuals are persecuted, infidels are threatened, Jews are demonised, "honour" killings are frequent, forced marriages are routine, and freedom of speech and religion are repudiated. European political and media establishments turn a blind eye to this in the name of an illusory multicultural harmony. ...

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/appeasement-takes-hold-again-in-europe/2007/02/04/1170523957031.html

[Ono]

"He was condemned to death on one Muslim site, which posted his address and a photograph of his home."

Proving Redeker's point quite nicely.

France is a disgrace.

[Petronas]

We do use books that call Jews 'apes' admits head of Islamic school
7th February 2007

The principal of an Islamic school has admitted that it uses textbooks which describe Jews as 'apes' and Christians as 'pigs' and has refused to withdraw them. Dr Sumaya Alyusuf confirmed that the offending books exist after former teacher Colin Cook, 57, alleged that children as young as five are taught from racist materials at the King Fahd Academy in Acton.

In an interview on BBC2's Newsnight, Dr Alyusuf was asked by Jeremy Paxman whether she recognised the books. She said: "Yes, I do recognise these books, of course. We have these books in our school. These books have good chapters that can be used by the teachers. It depends on the objectives the teacher wants to achieve." In another exchange, Dr Alyusuf insisted the books should not be scrapped, saying that allegedly racist sections had been 'misinterpreted'.

The school is owned, funded and run by the government of Saudi Arabia. ...

In his employment tribunal claim Mr Cook, who taught English at the school for 19 years, has accused it of poisoning pupils' minds with a curriculum of hate. Arabic translators have found that the books also describe Jews as 'repugnant'. ...

In legal papers submitted to a Watford employment tribunal, he [Mr Cook]alleged that pupils as young as five are taught that religions including Christianity and Judaism are 'worthless'.

He also alleges that when he questioned whether the curriculum complied with British laws, he was told: "This is not England. It is Saudi Arabia".

Pupils have allegedly been heard saying they want to 'kill Americans', praising 9/11 and idolising Osama bin Laden as their 'hero'.

Mr Cook claims he was dismissed last December after blowing the whistle on the school for covering up cheating by children in GCSE exams. He is bringing a tribunal claim for unfair dismissal, race discrimination and victimisation. The school is vigorously defending his claims.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=434506&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

STUDENT IN HIDING OVER ISLAM FURY
11 February 2007

A CAMBRIDGE University student has gone into hiding after publishing an offensive cartoon of the Muslim prophet Mohammed with a "joke" caption saying "violent paedophile". The cartoon in student magazine Clareification is the same one that caused riots around the world when it was published in a Danish newspaper in 2005.

Together with the caption, it is seen as so inflammatory that the 19-year-old undergraduate from Clare College has been taken to a secret location for his own safety.

The university's Islamic society blasted the cartoon as "hugely offensive" and "crude, unabashed prejudice", while student union president Calum Davey expressed "deep regret" over the publication. He said: "This material does not reflect the views of Clare students."

The magazine had been renamed Crucification for a special edition on religious satire, and the front page included headlines stating: "Ayatollah rethinks stance on misunderstood Rushdie."

Officials yesterday warned police about the controversy and launched an urgent probe into how the cartoon was published and what action to take against the student.

http://www.sundaymirror.co.uk/news/tm_headline=student-in-hiding-over-islam-fury---&method=full&objectid=18606146&siteid=62484-name_page.html

[Petronas]

Comics Joking About Islam Live in Fear
16 February 2007

AMSTERDAM — Actor and stand-up comedian Hans Teeuwen has launched a solidarity campaign to support his colleague Ewout Jansen, who has been receiving death threats from Muslim extremists because of his jokes, De Volkskrant writes. Teeuwen says he finds it difficult to unite all fellow-comedians as one force, for many seem to be afraid to speak out for the "freedom of humour". Every comedian's agenda tells you the exact time and place where he is going to perform. One or two phone calls with threats and he cannot perform at ease any more, Teeuwen explains. Teeuwen will act as the spokesperson for the cabaret duo Ewout Jansen en Etiënne Kemerink, to distract the attention now focused on Jansen.

Meanwhile, the threats have been addressed not only to Jansen, but targeted at every form of satire somehow touching upon Islam. This is why Ewout and Etienne are calling upon all Dutch comedians to join in filing collective charges against a member of the Amsterdam As Soenna Mosque named Kabli and the mosque's current leadership.

At the end of January, Kabli told student magazine Folia that it was supposedly every Muslim's task to fight back if jokes were made about Islam. Such jokes are called haram (reprehensible). If a comedian, despite having been warned, continues with his jokes, he must be punished or even killed, Kabli said in the interview.

http://www.expatica.com/actual/article.asp?subchannel_id=1&story_id=36639

[Petronas]

Father killed family for being too western
Thursday, February 22, 2007

A father killed his wife and four daughters in their sleep because he could not bear them adopting a more westernised lifestyle, an inquest in England heard on Tuesday, The Telegraph reported on Wednesday.

Muhammad Riaz, 49, found it abhorrent that his eldest daughter wanted to be a fashion designer, and that she and her sisters were likely to reject the Muslim tradition of arranged marriages. On Halloween last year he sprayed petrol throughout their terraced home in Accrington, Lancashire, and set it alight. Caneze Riaz, 39, woke and tried to protect her three-year-old child, Hannah, who was sleeping with her, but was overcome by fumes. Her other daughters, Sayrah, 16, Sophia, 13, and Alisha, 10, died elsewhere in the house. Riaz, who had spent the evening drinking, set himself on fire and died two days later.

Relatives broke the news to the couple’s son, Adam, 17, as he lay terminally ill with cancer at the Christie Hospital, Manchester. He died six weeks later.

Michael Singleton, the coroner, recorded verdicts that Riaz killed himself and that his victims were unlawfully killed. Riaz, who had spent all but the last 17 years of his life in Pakistan’s NWFP region, met his Anglo-Pakistani wife when her father sent her to the sub-continent to find a husband.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\02\22\story_22-2-2007_pg7_35

[Petronas]

Quran top selling book in Denmark
Tuesday, January 30, 2007

BERLIN: The holy book of Islam, the Quran, has become a top selling book in Denmark one year after the blasphemous caricature crisis shook up the Danish society and the Muslim world, the Munich-based Focus news magazine reported on Monday. The Quran was ranked second during the important Christmas book sales period. Buyers of the Quran include many young Muslims who grew up in Denmark but do not speak Arabic. ...

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\01\30\story_30-1-2007_pg1_5

[Ono]

Curiosity as to what makes them tick (pun intended).

[Petronas]

Police protect girls forced to convert to Islam
Last updated at 17:04pm on 22nd February 2007

Extremist Muslims who force vulnerable teenage girls to convert to Islam are being targeted by police, Met chief Sir Ian Blair has revealed. Police are working with universities to clamp down on "aggressive conversions" during which girls are beaten up and forced to abandon university courses. The Hindu Forum of Britain claims hundreds of mostly Sikh and Hindu girls have been intimidated by Muslim men who take them out on dates before terrorising them until they convert.

Sir Ian spoke about the problem at a conference organised by the forum. A Met spokesman said: "Neighbourhood officers work with university authorities in London and we would encourage anyone targeted in this way to seek help and support and where necessary use third party reporting facilities if they do not want to contact police directly."

Ramesh Kallidai, of the Hindu Forum of Britain, said: "Some girls are petrified because they are constantly being phoned up, having their door knocked. One girl was beaten up on the street and others have been forced to leave university."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=437871&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

Islam Could Become Europe's Dominant Religion, Experts Say

As the Anglican Communion continues to fight over homosexuality and as church attendance plummets, experts say that Islam is well on its way to becoming the most dominant religion in Europe. ...

Meanwhile, research studies show that church attendance in Britain is dropping precipitously, as well as across the whole of Western Europe. According to Christian Research, a British think tank, only 6.3 percent of the British population in 2005 attended Christian services on a weekly basis.

The group also projects that around 4,000 churches will close over the next 15 years, being sold off or rehabilitated for other uses. Reflecting a trend around Europe, British churches in the past decade have been transformed into restaurants, cafes, art galleries, mosques, and in one notable instance, a training school for circus acrobats in Bristol.

But while church attendance on the continent reportedly shows a similar decline, the level of Muslim religious participation and the Muslim population itself has exploded. In recent years, experts say that young European Muslims are returning to the faith which their parents observed only sporadically, becoming much more devout.

Though Muslims only comprise around three percent of the British population, Christian Research says that in 35 years there will be twice as many Muslims in mosques on Friday as there are Christians in churches on Sunday. In a 2004 ICM poll of 500 British Muslims, 51 percent said that they prayed every day.

In November, a study by the Spanish magazine Alba said that more mosques and prayer centers have been built in France than churches over the last century, with over 4,000 mosques currently serving the largest Muslim population in Europe. Europe has seen a wave of Muslim immigration over the last century, in large part from the countries of North Africa, and some experts predict that they will become the dominant population by the end of this century.

In January, the Islam-Archive Central Institute, a government-sponsored think tank, projected that Muslims will be the majority population of Germany by 2046, based on fertility rates.

Brent Nelson, an expert on European Islam at Furman University in South Carolina, told Cybercast News Service Thursday it was hard to guess what a Europe with a large Muslim minority would look like. However, he said that unless Christians and Muslims as a whole learn to compromise and live together, there was a danger of a clash between the two cultures.

From introducing daily prayers into the workplace to building mosques and minarets in cities, there would be endless grounds for conflict in the future, he said. "The danger is that Europe will not come to terms with what it means to absorb a large Muslim population," he said. "And in turn that Muslims won't come to terms with what it means to live in the West, the need to compromise with Western values. If that doesn't occur, you'll have a culture war which will dwarf anything we've seen in the United States."

David Masci, a senior research fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, said Thursday it was difficult for many Muslim immigrants to accept the secular nature of countries like Holland. "Look," he said. "Holland is a society which is very, very liberal in terms of attitudes towards gender and towards sexuality. These people are clearly pushing against that." However, he added that the Pentecostal and Evangelical strains of Christianity were showing a revival in Europe, spurred on by an influx of immigrants from Africa and Asia. Though he didn't believe that Muslims would become the majority in Europe, he said he did see Muslims and Evangelical Christians eventually working together to achieve common goals, in areas such as curbing abortion laws and same-sex "marriage."

Sara Silvestri, an expert on European Islam at Chatham House, a London-based think tank, that many Muslims have a tendency to exaggerate their religious beliefs when asked. Events over the last five years and the media spotlight on Islamic issues pushed previously nominal Muslims to be more active in their faith, she told Cybercast News Service. "I know Muslims who don't wear a veil, who don't grow a beard, but who still identify themselves as a Muslim in the social sphere," she said.

Nicole Bourque, a professor of religious studies at Glasgow University, said that she thought increasing numbers of Christians would convert to Islam in the coming years. She said that she knew of around 200 converts in Glasgow alone, mostly lapsed Christians who had grown up without a strong religious background. While many were women who had married Muslim men, she said many had been attracted to learn more about Islam by its increased profile since 2001.

http://www.crosswalk.com/news/11530801/

[Petronas]

From the 2007 Intelligence Summit:
Some Muslim preachers now refer to Europe as Dar al Dawa (house of preaching) rather than Dar al Harb (house of war, the general designation for all non-Muslim lands). Europe is seen as moving into the Muslim sphere of influence.

[Petronas]

Islam is and will be a European religion
13.03.2007

The birthrate among Muslim immigrants in Europe is three times higher than that of the non-Muslim European population. According to Sweden's consul general in İstanbul, Ingmar Karlsson, if this trend continues, the Muslim population will be doubled by 2015, while Europe's non-Muslim population will decrease by 3.5 percent. Some estimates indicate that in 30 years the number of Muslims in Europe could be as high as 65 million.

The outspoken consul general, who is a doctor of divinity and the author of more than 10 books on the subjects of Europe's relationship with faith, terrorism, Islam and minorities, has said that the trend towards a multi-racial and multi-confessional Europe is unstoppable; therefore, Islam must be recognized and regarded as a "domestic" European religion. ...

http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=105153

[Petronas]

The Tragedy of Islamic Indoctrination In British Schools
March 16, 2007

America is fortunate to have the separation of "church and state" enshrined within the "Establishment Clause" of the First Amendment. No one religion can be promoted, or denigrated, within public schools. Despite this, Islamist indoctrination has crept onto the curriculum of many American schools.

Britain has no written constitution to guide its policies. Worse, Britain has an unelected monarch as its "constitutional" head of state. This monarch is also titular head of the Church of England or "defender of the faith" - a title stemming from the time of Henry VIII. Queen Elizabeth II has never interfered in politics or policy. Since her heir, Prince Charles, declared in 1994 that he was going to support alternative religions as a "defender of faith" - he undermined his role as future monarch and weakened the constitutional authority of the Church of England. His open support for Islam has further undermined his traditional role as "defender of the faith" in waiting.

Since 1992, all state (publicly funded) schools in Britain have had to adhere to the educational strategies laid out in a National Curriculum. This set of standards has been modified over the years. The National Curriculum includes compulsory lessons on religious education. Children in "Key Stages 1 and 2" (up to 11 years of age) are taught in ways that insult teachers' integrity. When a Koran is presented to 10-year old children, the teacher is ordered to wash his or her hands before touching the book, "to show the children the respect with which Muslims treat the holy book. " Note the words - "the holy book", as opposed to "their holy book". The children are urged to wash and dry their hands too, even though they are not expected to touch the book.

The demons of political correctness have so deeply infiltrated the National Curriculum documentation that each time Mohammed's name appears, the Arabic symbol for his name is displayed afterwards. Unit 5B Section 2 is intended to indoctrinate children thus: "Children should learn: why Muslims have instructions for worship, how Muslims show concern for others, how Muslims care for people in the community, that abstinence from food plays a part in religious observance." In Unit 5A, Section 2, teachers are told that their pupils must learn " to understand that the Qur'an is fundamental to Muslims because it is the 'word of God'." Note the characterization: the Koran "is" the word of God, not "it is believed by Muslims to be" the word of God.

Unit 5A, Section 1, instructs teachers to: "Ask the children to copy the Shahadah and write a short explanation of the beliefs it expresses." The Shahadah is the statement of belief that signals conversion to Islam. To make young children write out this declaration is a blasphemy against any other faith the child may belong to, including atheism. ...

http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/global.php?id=807725

[Petronas]

Church school renames Three Little Pigs to avoid offending Muslims
15th March 2007

The story of the Three Little Pigs' battle with the Big Bad Wolf has delighted children since it was written more than 150 years ago. But the tale highlighting the merits of hardwork and practicality has become the latest to fall victim to political correctness. A junior school production of the children's story has been renamed the Three Little Puppies for fear of offending Muslims. ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=442555&in_page_id=1770&ito=newsnow

[Petronas]

Background: The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Arafat's uncle, during WWII advised Hitler and Eichmann on the extermination of the Jews, visiting Auschwitz, and helped raise a Muslim SS division (the 13. SS Mountain Division “Handschar” - the curved scimitar of the Saracens).

Ban on lecturer who links Nazis and Islam
16th March 2007

A university has been accused of censorship after cancelling a lecture on 'Islamic anti-semitism' by a leading German academic. Dr Matthias Kuntzel, a political scientist who has spoken around the world on Islamic fundamentalism, arrived at Leeds University on Wednesday to be told his lecture had been cancelled at short notice on security grounds.

Protest emails had allegedly been sent by Muslims about the event, which was due to discuss links between the Nazis and Islamic extremists. The university has insisted the cancellation was due to health and safety fears rather than concerns about a Muslim backlash.

But the controversial Dr Kuntzel, who was allowed to hold two private seminars at the university, criticised the cancellation of his lecture entitled Hitler's Legacy: Islamic Anti-Semitism in the Middle East. Dr Kuntzel said the decision to cancel was made the day after "stupid" emails were sent to the authorities. "I really have no other explanation as to why they decided to cancel it," he said. "They have reacted in the wrong way and given in to a kind of pressure. I was told it was for security reasons - that they cannot shelter my person." ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=442572&in_page_id=1770

[Petronas]

Europe divided over response to calls of Islam
March 12, 2007

ALL quiet on the western front? Since the London bombings and last year's Danish cartoons crisis, the great Muslim challenge to Europe has been in the news less often. But under the surface, the continental plates are shifting.

In Italy, the coastal town of Riccione reveals plans to create a women-only section of its famous beach.

In the Netherlands, plans are announced to build a Muslim hospital in Rotterdam. Staff will not have to be Muslim but must respect Muslim traditions, and medical personnel will treat only their own sex.

In Britain, Lancashire hospitals have begun a pilot program to allow female Muslim patients to wear a burqa-style head-to-toe hospital gown. The change happened without much fuss, but in France a far more tense argument is under way.

Should gynaecologists provide (sometimes false) certificates of virginity - and even repair broken hymens - for Muslim women about to marry? The French National College of Gynaecologists and Obstetricians opposes these "humiliating" and "macho" practices. But Le Monde reports that faced with the distress of young women - and worried the women could face shame, the refusal of marriage and even violence - many doctors are reluctantly and quietly acceding to such requests.

At the same time, the college reports a growing number of cases of verbal and sometimes physical attacks on its male members who treat female Muslims. "Do our doctors have to be protected by police in order to do their jobs?" the college demanded in a recent statement. ...

One reason this debate is so vexed is that it is hard to know what ordinary Muslims want: integration or separation. Surely millions are simply trying to fit in, often in the face of severe obstacles? Quite possibly, but in Britain there is troubling evidence to the contrary. While French Muslims show in polls a consistent wish to integrate, in two recent polls, up to 40 per cent of British Muslims said they wanted to live under sharia law. Alarmingly, in one poll it was young Muslims who expressed this wish most strongly: 40 per cent of 16- to 24-year-olds, compared with 17 per cent for those aged over 55. ...

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/europe-divided-over-response-to-calls-of-islam/2007/03/11/1173548020176.html?page=fullpage

[Petronas]

It is time for a global convention on Islam
03/29/2007

... Judge Christa Datz-Winter ... denied a request last week by a Muslim woman of Moroccan descent to hasten her divorce because she claimed her husband beat her. In a symbolic gesture of world indifference, which has come to frame the issue of Muslims in a post 9-11 era, the Frankfurt adjudicator refused on the grounds that the Koran allows a man to beat his wife for disobedience. ...

http://www.baynewsbrooklyn.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=18144908&BRD=2384&PAG=461&dept_id=560116&rfi=6

[Petronas]

God forbid we offend anyone when dealing with a terrorist attack.

Don't confuse terrorism with Islam, says EU
Last Updated: 1:51am BST 31/03/2007

The European Union has drawn up guidelines advising government spokesmen to refrain from linking Islam and terrorism in their statements. Brussels officials have confirmed the existence of a classified handbook which offers "non-offensive" phrases to use when announcing anti-terrorist operations or dealing with terrorist attacks.

Banned terms are said to include "jihad", "Islamic" or "fundamentalist". The word "jihad" is to be avoided altogether, according to some sources, because for Muslims the word can mean a personal struggle to live a moral life. One alternative, suggested publicly last year, is for the term "Islamic terrorism" to be replaced by "terrorists who abusively invoke Islam".

An EU official said that the secret guidebook, or, "common lexicon", is aimed at preventing the distortion of the Muslim faith and the alienation of Muslims in Europe. "The common lexicon includes guidance on a number of frequently used terms where lack of care by EU and member states' spokespeople may give rise to misunderstandings," he said. "Careful usage of certain terms is not about empty political correctness but stems from astute awareness of the EU's interests in the fight against terrorism. Terrorists exploit and augment suspicions."

Details on the contents of the lexicon remain secret, but British officials stressed that it is there as a helpful aid "providing context" for civil servants making speeches or giving press conferences. "We are fully signed up to this, but it is not binding," said one.

However, Conservative MEP Syed Kamall hit out at the lexicon. "It is this kind of political correctness and secrecy that creates resentment among both the mainstream in Europe and in Islam," he said. Meanwhile, UK Independence Party MEP Gerard Batten claimed that the EU was in denial over the true roots of terrorism. "This type of newspeak shows that the EU refuses to face reality," he said. "The major world terrorist threat is one posed by ideology and that ideology is inspired by fundamentalist jihadi Islam."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/03/30/wislam30.xml

[Petronas]

‘I’m off to join soldiers of Islam’
Saturday, July 28, 2007

LAHORE: A British schoolboy, who was jailed on Thursday for two years, left his parents a farewell letter telling them that he was going to fight as a soldier of Islam and would meet them again in the “garden of paradise”, said a report published in The Times on Friday.

Mohammed Irfan Raja ran away from his home in Ilford, East London, in February last year hoping to join four Bradford University students determined to train as terrorists in Pakistan to fight British soldiers and die as martyrs, said the newspaper. “Raja, who was then 17, urged his parents in the letter not to blame each other for failing to stop him but his resolve was weakened by a tearful telephone conversation in which his parents begged him to come home. He was arrested on his return after three days away and the rest of the members in the would-be terrorist cell were rounded up.”

Four others – Aitzaz Zafar, 20, Usman Malik, 21, Akbar Butt, 20, and Awaab Iqbal, also 20, who had amassed a small library glorifying Islamic terrorism to persuade others to fight the holy war – were sentenced to serve between twenty-seven months and three years. All had been found guilty this week of possessing articles that could be used for terrorism.

Judge Peter Beaumont, the Recorder of London, said that they should be punished for being prepared to train in Pakistan and then fight in Afghanistan against British soldiers. He told them: “Each of you is British. You were born here, your families live here, you went to school and university here. You hold British passports. You live under the protection of its laws, which give you freedom of speech and religious observance. Yet each of you was prepared to break its laws. Why? Because in my judgment you were intoxicated by the extremist nature of the material that each of you collected, shared and discussed – the songs, the images and language of violent jihad. “So carried away by that material were you that each of you crossed the line. That is exactly what the people that peddle this material want to achieve and exactly what you did.”

Iqbal, Zafar and Malik had been at the centre of a radical Islamic group at Bradford University. Police later found downloaded material said to be intended to encourage terrorism or martyrdom. Raja, now 19, had been introduced to the group by another 17-year-old student. Andrew Edis, QC, for the prosecution, said: “Irfan Raja was not as firm in his purpose as he hoped he would be, and as the people in Bradford hoped he would be. He had hidden his purpose from his family, who were beside themselves with worry and fear when they found out what he had done. They are orthodox Muslims and do not subscribe to this extremist or radical strain of thought.”

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\07\28\story_28-7-2007_pg4_7

[NYer]

Hospital personnel must respect Ramadan. (http://news.scotsman.com/edinburgh.cfm?id=1275192007)

HOSPITAL staff in the Lothians have been told not to eat at their desks to avoid offending Muslim colleagues during Ramadan.

NHS Lothian has advised doctors and other health workers not to have working lunches during the 30-day fast, which begins next month.

The health service's Equality and Diversity Officer sent an e-mail to all senior managers, giving guidance on religious tolerance.

This includes ensuring Muslim staff are given breaks to pray, and time off to celebrate Eid at the end of Ramadan.

It is understood they also advised hospital managers to move food trolleys away from areas where Muslims work.

An NHS spokesman said he could not confirm what was in the e-mail.

"This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper."
TS Eliot, The Hollow Men

[Petronas]

TV airing for Islam's story of Christ
Saturday August 18, 2007

There was no manger, Christ is not the Messiah, and the crucifixion never happened. A forthcoming ITV documentary will portray Jesus as Muslims see him. With the Koran as a main source and drawing on interviews with scholars and historians, the Muslim Jesus explores how Islam honours Christ as a prophet but not as the son of God. According to the Koran the crucifixion was a divine illusion. ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/religion/Story/0,,2151358,00.html

[Petronas]

The mayor of Brussels prohibits a demonstration on 9/11 to protest against the increasing Islamizaton of Europe as "too dangerous" in a city inhabited by as many Muslims as Brussels is, but allows a demonstration two days earlier by an organization that claims the 9/11 attacks were carried out by the Bush administration.

http://buergerbewegungen.de/
http://buergerbewegungen.de/StellungnahmeDemoverbot.pdf
http://www.politicallyincorrect.de/2007/08/thielemans-genehmigt-911-demo-in-bruessel/
http://www.911komplott.de/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=284&Itemid=2#jc_allComments

[NYer]

http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/06.09.10.Refresher-X.gif

[Petronas]

Video from the 9/11/07 demonstration against the Islamization of Europe in Brussels. Reminds me of documentaries I have seen - from 1933 Germany. A darkness seems to be descending on Europe.

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/2463

[Petronas]

Balkans: Wahabis seen as growing regional threat
Novi Pazar, Serbia, 7 July

Although still a small group, Wahabis, followers of a fundamentalist school of Islam, are increasingly seen by officials and observers as a growing threat to the Balkans. Tensions between Wahabis and mainstream Muslims have been simmering for the past 18 months as Wahabis seek to gain influence in Bosnia-Heregovina and also in Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo. In the past months, seven suspected militants were arrested in southern Serbia and a radical Islamist training camp and weapons cache uncovered. Evidence, the Serbian interior ministry says, that Wahabis are trying to recruit potential terrorists and plot attacks.

In April, at the request of the Serbian authorities, police in breakaway Kosovo province issued an arrest warrant for Ismail Pretic, who they claim is a Wahabi militant who may have fled to the United Nations administered province. Road-blocks have been erected in northern Kosovo to help apprehend Pretic, who should be considered "armed and dangerous," according to police.

Serbian security officials say militants at the Wahabi training camp in Serbia's southern Sandjak region - were planning an attack on local Muslims. On 17 March police discovered there an underground arsenal of weapons, including rocket-propelled grenades, 10 kilogrammes of plastic explosives and automatic assault rifles. Police said they arrested four suspected Islamist militants during the raid a further two on 19 March.

Up to 30 Wahabis had been gathering and undergoing training in the camp at Ninaja Mountain, about 30 km north of the town of Novi Pazar police said. The six men arrested all come from Novi Pazar, capital of Sandjak - a Serbian region populated predominately by Muslims.

“Wahabis did not act this openly before. When these men were arrested, it was clear they had received some financial support since they were all poor yet loaded with weapons. Their main target was and still is the Islamic community in Sandzak," Mufti Muamer Zukorlic, leader of Islamic community in Sandzak told Adnkronos International (AKI).

There was a connection between Bosnian and Sandzak Wahabis, Zukorlic points out. “We had individuals from Bosnia-Hezegovina coming to hold lectures and they were considered to be leaders among local Wahabis," Zukorlic said. "But, gradually Bosnian Wahabis stopped their contacts with locals. Here, we have about 150 sect members and they are not all the same," Zukorlic added. Visibly identifiable by their ankle length trousers and beards, Wahabis have campaigned to do away with with what they see as heresy, attempts that have erupted into violence several times.

Asked if the Islamic community can solve the problem of Wahabi radicalism, Zukorlic replied: "They no longer pray in mosques."

The fundamentalist Wahhabi movement which preaches a 'pure Islam' originated in Saudi Arabia in the early 18th century and preaches religious intolerance towards other religious groups, including moderate Muslims. Several clashes have been reported lately in Bosnia and in Sandzak between Wahabis and moderate Muslims, including in a shootout in Novi Pazar last November in which several people were injured.

The Wahabi movement first emerged in the Balkans during the 1992-1995 civil war in Bosnia, when thousands of mujahadeen fighters from Islamic countries came to fight on the side of local Muslims. Many have remained in the country since the war, and according to foreign intelligence sources have been indoctrinating local youths and even operating terrorist training camps.

Because of the Wahabi military support in the 1990s, the Bosnian government has been reluctant to crack down on Wahabi religious and military training efforts, analysts say. The Wahabis, who believe they are carrying out God's will, refuse to crack down on the alleged terrorists in their midst, stoking tensions between the Wahabis and the government.

“The Wahabi sect is a national security question for Bosnia, because Islamic analysts consider them as militant and therefore dangerous, " the chairman of Bosnia's three-man rotating state presidency, Negojsa Radmanovic, told AKI. "If Wahabis prove to be a security risk, the authorities will have to take action to ensure the public's safety and regulate Islam," he said.

Only the funeral of former Bosnian Muslim leader and wartime Bosnian president, Alija Izetbegovic went down with a bigger crowd and more security than that of the unofficial leader of the Wahabi sect in Bosnia, Jusuf Barcic,, in Tuzla following his death in a car crash in April.

Barcic's funeral threatened to become a serious incident as more than 3,000 Wahabis from Bosnia, Slovenia, Austria, Germany and Sandjak gathered at the event, refusing journalists access to the mosque. More than 50 uniformed and undercover police reportedly monitored the funeral. Police were reported to have taken no action when Palestinian Karray Kanel Bin Ali, the alleged 'mastermind' of the Wahabi sect in Bosnia, threatened to smash cameras and ordered a journalists to be removed from the spot.

Although Barcic had not been on good terms with the Muslim community in Bosnia for the past eight years, after his return from Saudi Arabia, the community granted his father permission to bury him with religious honours. Barcic, a self-proclaimed sheikh became known to the Bosnian public two months ago after he and his followers attempted to enter the central Czar mosque in Sarajevo to preach "a return to traditional Islam. He and his followers had earlier occupied several mosques in the Tuzla region, clashing with local Muslims.

In Maoca, near the Bosnian town of Brcko, Wahabis have even their own elementary school. "The ministry neglected these premises. We renovated them using our money and now we are educating our children," said a teacher at the school, Nusret Imamovic. Some 20 pupils there are following Jordan's rather than the Bosnian school programme, Imamovic said.

Security officials and terrorism experts believe that Wahabis in the Balkans are receiving covert financing from Saudi 'charities'. Five of the '9/11' attackers had served as Wahabi sponsored fighters in Bosnia, according to intelligence sources. Dozens of other militants arrested in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Chechnya, who proved to be members of various militant groups had been awarded Bosnian citizenship.

Although the Saudis have reportedly poured money into building mosques and supporting Wahabi missionaries, only about three percent of the Bosnian population adopted this more conservative form of Islam. Commentators such as Zukorlic claim Wahabis remain a small group with no significant influence in the region. Wahabis claim they are merely religious activists.

http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Religion/?id=1.0.1086621768

[NYer]

Hirsi Ali offered safe haven in Denmark. (http://pajamasmedia.com/xpress/flemmingrose/2007/10/15/hirsi_ali_offered_a_safe_haven.php)

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is deeply dissapointed that the Dutch parliament last week declined to finance her security in the US, though she is a Dutch citizen and was forced to leave Holland and move to the US after having received several death threats and lived in hiding for years.

[American_Jihad]

The Twin Myths of Eurabia


Bat Ye’or is the most informed contemporary scholar of the unique Islamic institution of dhimmitude, the repressive and humiliating apartheid system imposed upon those non-Muslims (i.e., dhimmis) subjugated by Jihad. Sir Jadunath Sarkar, the pre-eminent historian of Mughal India, wrote the following in 1920 regarding the impact of centuries of Jihad and dhimmitude on the indigenous Hindus of the Indian subcontinent:

“The conversion of the entire population to Islam and the extinction of every form of dissent is the ideal of the Muslim State. If any infidel is suffered to exist in the community, it is as a necessary evil, and for a transitional period only. Political and social disabilities must be imposed on him, and bribes offered to him from the public funds, to hasten the day of his spiritual enlightenment and the addition of his name to the roll of true believers.” “A non-Muslim therefore cannot be a citizen of the State; he is a member of a depressed class; his status is a modified form of slavery. He lives under a contract (zimma, or ‘dhimma’) with the State: for the life and property grudgingly spared to him by the commander of the faithful he must undergo political and social disabilities, and pay a commutation money. In short, his continued existence in the State after the conquest of his country by the Muslims is conditional upon his person and property made subservient to the cause of Islam.”

According to Bat Ye’or, Eurabia is essentially a political project for a demographic and cultural symbiosis between Europe and the Arab Muslim world, a new extended Mediterranean “continent” made possible by EU authorities through deliberately favoring Muslim immigration, promoting Multiculturalism and the dissemination of Arab and Islamic culture in Europe. In the essay Andalusian Myth, Eurabian Reality, co-authored with Andrew G. Bostom, editor of the comprehensive book The Legacy of Jihad: Islamic Holy War and the Fate of Non-Muslims, Bat Ye’or dispels one of the founding myths of Eurabia: that of the alleged “tolerance” of medieval Spain under Islamic rule.

During the completion of the new Granada Mosque, which was marked by celebratory announcements July 10, 2003 of a “return of Islam to Spain,” disconcerting statements were made by European Muslim leaders. Specifically, the keynote speaker at this conference, Umar Ibrahim Vadillo, a Spanish Muslim leader, encouraged Muslims to cause an economic collapse of Western economies (by ceasing to use Western currencies, and switching to gold dinars), while the German Muslim leader Abu Bakr Rieger told Muslim attendees to avoid adapting their Islamic religious practices to accommodate European (i.e., Western Enlightenment?) values.

Bat Ye’or and Andrew Bostom state that: “We believe that reiterating these ahistorical, roseate claims about Muslim Spain abets the contemporary Islamist agenda, and retards the evolution of a liberal, reformed ‘Euro-Islam’ fully compatible with post-Enlightenment Western values.” “Iberia [Spain] was conquered in 710-716 AD by Arab tribes originating from northern, central and southern Arabia. Massive Berber and Arab immigration, and the colonization of the Iberian peninsula, followed the conquest. Most churches were converted into mosques. Although the conquest had been planned and conducted jointly with a strong faction of royal Iberian Christian dissidents, including a bishop, it proceeded as a classical jihad with massive pillages, enslavement, deportations and killings.”

“In the regions under stable Islamic control, Jews and Christians were tolerated as dhimmis – like elsewhere in other Islamic lands – and could not build new churches or synagogues nor restore the old ones. Segregated in special quarters, they had to wear discriminatory clothing. Subjected to heavy taxes, the Christian peasantry formed a servile class attached to the Arab domains; many abandoned their land and fled to the towns. Harsh reprisals with mutilations and crucifixions would sanction the Mozarab (Christian dhimmis) calls for help from the Christian kings.”

The humiliating status imposed on the dhimmis and the confiscation of their land provoked many revolts, punished by massacres, as in Toledo (761, 784-86, 797), Saragossa from 781 to 881, Cordova (805), Merida (805-813, 828), and yet again in Toledo (811-819). The insurgents were crucified, as prescribed in the Koran 5:33.

According to Bat Ye’or and Bostom, “Feuding was endemic in the Andalusian cities between the different sectors of the population: Arab and Berber colonizers, Iberian Muslim converts (Muwalladun) and Christian dhimmis (Mozarabs). There were rarely periods of peace in the Amirate of Cordova (756-912), nor later.” “Al-Andalus represented the land of jihad par excellence. Every year, sometimes twice a year, raiding expeditions were sent to ravage the Christian Spanish kingdoms to the north, the Basque regions, or France and the Rhone valley, bringing back booty and slaves. Andalusian corsairs attacked and invaded along the Sicilian and Italian coasts, even as far as the Aegean Islands, looting and burning as they went. Thousands of people were deported to slavery in Andalusia, where the caliph kept a militia of tens of thousand of Christian slaves brought from all parts of Christian Europe (the Saqaliba), and a harem filled with captured Christian women. Society was sharply divided along ethnic and religious lines, with the Arab tribes at the top of the hierarchy, followed by the Berbers who were never recognized as equals, despite their Islamization; lower in the scale came the mullawadun converts and, at the very bottom, the dhimmi Christians and Jews.”

Richard Fletcher observed in Moorish Spain that “Moorish Spain was not a tolerant and enlightened society even in its most cultivated epoch.” A prominent Andalusian jurist, Ibn Hazm of Cordoba (d. 1064), wrote that Allah has established the infidels’ ownership of their property merely to provide booty for Muslims. Ibn Abdun forbade the selling of scientific books to dhimmis, under the pretext that they translated them and attributed them to their co-religionists and bishops.

Bat Ye’or and Bostom state that: “The Muslim Berber Almohads in Spain and North Africa (1130-1232) wreaked enormous destruction on both the Jewish and Christian populations. This devastation – massacre, captivity, and forced conversion – was described by the Jewish chronicler Abraham Ibn Daud, and the poet Abraham Ibn Ezra. Suspicious of the sincerity of the Jewish converts to Islam, Muslim ‘inquisitors’ (i.e., antedating their Christian Spanish counterparts by three centuries) removed the children from such families, placing them in the care of Muslim educators.”

“The socio-political history of Andalusia was characterized by a particularly oppressive dhimmitude that is completely incompatible with modern notions of equality between individuals, regardless of religious faith. At the dawn of the 21st century, we must insist that Muslims in the West adopt post-Enlightenment societal standards of equality, not ‘tolerance,’ abandoning forever their hagiography of the brutal, discriminatory standards practiced by the classical Maliki jurists of ‘enlightened’ Andalusia.”

Some modern Spaniards, however, seem to have forgotten the painful lessons inflicted by an Islamic occupation that ended as late as 1492. Every year, in a tradition that goes back to the 16th century, Spanish villages still celebrate the Reconquista, the liberation from the Moors (as the Muslims were locally called) during “Moros y Cristianos” festivals in which effigies of the prophet Muhammad – the so-called “la Mahoma” – are mocked, thrown out of windows, and burned. After the 2004 Madrid train bombings which killed 192 people, the village of Bocairent near Valencia decided to discontinue the century old tradition of mocking and burning effigies of Muhammad. Bocairent did not want to risk becoming the target of suicide bombers.

The Socialist government of PM Zapatero gained power after the bombings. Mr Zapatero’s first act after winning the general election was to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq. He then turned on the Church, which he viewed as part of the “old Spain.” The government drew up plans to finance the teaching of Islam in state-run schools and to give funds to mosques on the grounds that it would create greater understanding of the country's one million Muslims. Spain’s leading archbishop, Cardinal Antonio María Rouco, denounced the Socialist government, saying its policies were taking the country back to medieval times, when Muslim invaders swept across the Straits of Gibraltar. “Some people wish to place us in the year 711,” Cardinal Rouco said. “It seems as if we are meant to wipe ourselves out of history.”

These days, we also hear claims that we in the West owe so much to Muslims because Muslim Spain preserved and passed on Greek knowledge to the West, without which there would have been no Renaissance. The funny thing is, nobody seems to ask the Greeks about how good Muslims have been at preserving their cultural heritage. They might disagree.

The classical and Greek heritage did not die when the Western Roman Empire collapsed, it continued in the Eastern Roman Empire, later known as the Byzantine Empire, as it was more Greek than Roman. It lived on there uninterruptedly until the 15th century when it was finally destroyed by, well, Turkish Muslims. The Byzantine Empire upheld the unbroken succession of Roman emperors for a thousand years after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. The Byzantines played a crucial part in the transmitting the classical and Greco-Roman heritage to Renaissance Italy, especially after the Ottoman Muslim conquest and the many Greek scholars fleeing to the West.

The Greeks bore the brunt of the Jihad for more than a thousand years. Muslims wiped out Greek communities all over the Eastern Mediterranean for centuries, a process that continued in countries such as “Turkey,” the formerly Greek-dominated region of Anatolia, and Egypt even after WW2. If this is how Muslims “preserve Greek heritage,” I hope they will never be in a position to “preserve” mine.

Robert Spencer describes how on Tuesday, May 29, 1453, the armies of the Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II entered Constantinople, breaking through the defenses of a vastly outnumbered and indomitably courageous Byzantine force. Historian Steven Runciman notes what happened next: The Muslim soldiers “slew everyone that they met in the streets, men, women, and children without discrimination. The blood ran in rivers down the steep streets from the heights of Petra toward the Golden Horn. But soon the lust for slaughter was assuaged. The soldiers realized that captives and precious objects would bring them greater profit.” It has come to be known as Black Tuesday, the Last Day of the World.

The jihadists also entered the Hagia Sophia, which for nearly a thousand years had been the grandest church in Christendom. Muslim men then killed the elderly and weak and led the rest off into slavery. Once the Muslims had thoroughly subdued Constantinople, they set out to Islamize it. According to the Muslim chronicler Hoca Sa’deddin, “churches which were within the city were emptied of their vile idols and cleansed from the filthy and idolatrous impurities and by the defacement of their images and the erection of Islamic prayer niches and pulpits many monasteries and chapels became the envy of the gardens of Paradise.”

One of the worst burdens on the dhimmi population in the Ottoman Empire was devshirmeh, the forced collection of young boys from Christian Greeks, Croats, Bulgarians, Serbs and Albanians to build a slave army of Janissaries. Vasiliki Papoulia highlights the continuous desperate, often violent struggle of the Christian populations against this brutally imposed Ottoman levy:

“It is obvious that the population strongly resented […] this measure [and the levy] could be carried out only by force. Those who refused to surrender their sons – the healthiest, the handsomest and the most intelligent – were on the spot put to death by hanging. Nevertheless we have examples of armed resistance. Since there was no possibility of escaping [the levy] the population resorted to several subterfuges. Some left their villages and fled to certain cities which enjoyed exemption from the child levy or migrated to Venetian-held territories. The result was a depopulation of the countryside.”

Andrew Bostom describes how John Quincy Adams, diplomat and 19th century President of the United States, understood Jihad well, and had lots of sympathy with the Greeks, who, along with the Serbs, were the first to revolt against Turkish Muslim rule:

“If ever insurrection was holy in the eyes of God, such was that of the Greeks against their Mahometan oppressors. Yet for six long years, they were suffered to be overwhelmed by the whole mass of the Ottoman power; cheered only by the sympathies of all the civilized world, but without a finger raised to sustain or relieve them by the Christian governments of Europe; while the sword of extermination, instinct with the spirit of the Koran, was passing in merciless horror over the classical regions of Greece, the birth-place of philosophy, of poetry, of eloquence, of all the arts that embellish, and all the sciences that dignify the human character. The monarchs of Austria, of France, and England, inflexibly persisted in seeing in the Greeks, only revolted subjects against a lawful sovereign. The ferocious Turk eagerly seized upon this absurd concession, and while sweeping with his besom of destruction over the Grecian provinces, answered every insinuation of interest in behalf of that suffering people, by assertions of the unqualified rights of sovereignty, and by triumphantly retorting upon the legitimates of Europe, the consequences naturally flowing from their own perverted maxims.”

The gradual loss of supremacy over their non-Muslim subjects and the Islamic anger this sparked culminated in the outright Jihadist genocide of the Christian Armenians in the early 20th century, a crime Turks are greatly reluctant to acknowledge even today. Serious riots broke out in Istanbul on the night of September 6, 1955, which led to looting in Greek neighborhoods and the destruction of many of the city’s churches and synagogues. More than 5,000 shops belonging to the Greek minority were looted by an emotional crowd of several thousand people. The Turkish Pogrom resulted not only from “fervid chauvinism, or even [from] the economic resentment of many impoverished rioters, but [from] the profound religious fanaticism in many segments of Turkish society.”

Ultranationalist Turks in 2005 attacked an exhibit in Istanbul of rare photographs of the violent anti-Greek incidents that occurred 50 years earlier, ripping photos off the walls, shouting “Turkey is Turkish and will stay that way.” “I’m merely defending my country,” one militant said. Turkey is officially 99 percent Muslim. 4,000 Greek Orthodox faithful live primarily in Istanbul. Known as Constantinople under Greece’s last great empire, Istanbul remains the seat of the Eastern Orthodox patriarchate, the highest authority in the Orthodox world.

We often hear that “Islamic culture” was superior to Western culture in the Middle Ages, and that Westerners owe much of our technological progress to Muslims. If we say that the “Middle East” and the Eastern Mediterranean were culturally and economically superior to Europe in the Middle Ages, then this is true. However, this had been the case for thousands of years before Islam entered into history. The oldest civilizations know to mankind originated in a belt stretching from today's Egypt via Syria, Lebanon, Iran and Iraq to Pakistan. It is not a coincidence that the first European civilizations began in countries that were geographically close to the Middle East: The island of Crete, later mainland Greece and the Balkans, then Rome. Even in the Roman Empire, the Eastern part of the empire was stronger and more urbanized than its Northern and Western regions, which is one of the reasons why the Eastern half proved much more durable while the Western half collapsed in the 5th century.

When the Arab Muslims, a collection of backward, nomadic warrior tribes who did not even have a fully developed script, conquered Egypt, Syria and Iran, they took control over some of the world’s largest centres of accumulated knowledge. To say that “Muslims” or “Islamic culture” created the civilizations of the Middle East can be compared to an illiterate person storming into the planet’s largest library, killing all the librarians and then claiming to have written all the books there. The cultural superiority of the Middle East in relations to Europe did not begin with Islam’s entry into the area. In fact, it ended with it. One of the great riddles of history is how this once-dynamic region could become the world’s number one problem spot. It so happens that this decline coincides with the region’s Islamization, although some would claim that it had already started before this. Islam’s much-vaunted “Golden Age” was in reality just the twilight of the conquered pre-Islamic cultures, an echo of times passed.

It is true that no civilization exists in a vacuum. Modern Western civilization owes much to Egyptians, Persians, Sumerians, Byzantines, Assyrians, Jews, Indians and Chinese. We owe little, if anything to Islam.

The esteemed F.A. Hayek, in his classic The Road to Serfdom, can have fresh lessons for us even today. According to him, “The most effective way of making people accept the validity of the values they are to serve is to persuade them that they are really the same as those which they, or at least the best among them, have always held, but which were not properly understood or recognised before.” “The most efficient technique to this end is to use the old words but change their meaning. Few traits of totalitarian regimes are at the same time so confusing to the superficial observer and yet so characteristic of the whole intellectual climate as the complete perversion of language, the change of the meaning of words by which he ideals of the new regimes are expressed.” “Gradually, as this process continues, the whole language becomes despoiled, words become empty shells deprived of any definite meaning, as capable of denoting one thing as its opposite and used solely for the emotional associations which still adhere to them.” “With all the fatalistic belief of every pseudo-historian since Hegel and Marx this development is represented as inevitable: ‘We know the direction in which the world is moving, and we must bow to it or perish.’”

Isn’t this exactly what is happening in the West now, with Multiculturalism and Muslim immigration? A massive rewriting of our history, and a perversion of language?

The European Commission proposed the controversial idea of a Eurovision-style singing event in all member states to celebrate the European Union’s 50th “birthday,” the 50th anniversary of the 1957 Treaty of Rome. Commissioner Margot Wallstrom was lobbying for big-style birthday celebrations to “highlight the benefits that European integration has brought to its citizens.” Diplomats said the idea had sparked feelings of disgust among new member states, which were reminded of “Stalinist times” when people were forced to sing. Brussels also intended to spend around €300,000 on the appointment of 50 citizen “ambassadors,” dubbed the “Faces of Europe,” who were supposed to “tell their story” throughout the year on what the EU means to them in their daily life. Germany will in any case go ahead with its own idea to let thousands of its bakeries bake 50 sorts of cakes with recipes from all 25 member states.

Tariq Ramadan, the grandson of the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, the most important Islamist movement of the 20th century, is a resident of Geneva, Switzerland. He is the author of a dozen books, among them To Be a European Muslim, translated into 14 languages. The EU Parliament consults him as an expert voice of “moderate Islam.”

Mr Ramadan says decadent Europe will give way to an Islamized Europe. The 21st century, he says, will see a second role reversal between Islam and the West: “The West will begin its new decline, and the Arab-Islamic world its renewal” and ascent to seven centuries of world domination after seven centuries of decline. “Only Islam can achieve the synthesis between Christianity and humanism, and fill the spiritual void that afflicts the West.” All good people are implicitly Muslims, he maintains, “because true humanism is founded in Koranic revelations.”

Muslim identity is the only true source of universality, proclaims Tariq Ramadan. “It will fill the spiritual void that afflicts the West.” In a clash with Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somalian-born Dutch MP and critic of Islam, Ramadan said it was wrong to suggest that Muslims were in Europe to proselytize, and wrong to say that Europe had a Judeo-Christian past. “Islam is a European religion. The Muslims came here after the first and second world wars to rebuild Europe, not to colonise.” Again, according to F.A. Hayek, “The Nazi leader who described the National-Socialist revolution as a counter-Renaissance spoke more truly than he probably knew. It was the decisive step in the destruction of that civilisation which modern man had built up from the age of the Renaissance and which was above all an individualist civilisation. Individualism has a bad name today and the term has come to be connected with egotism and selfishness. But the individualism of which we speak in contrast to socialism and all other forms of collectivism has no necessary connection with these.”

“The essential features of that individualism which, from elements provided by Christianity and the philosophy of classical antiquity, was first fully developed during the Renaissance and has since grown and spread into what we know as Western European civilisation – the respect for the individual man qua man, that is the recognition of his own views and tastes.” “From the commercial cities of Northern Italy the new view of life spread with commerce to the west and north, through France and the south-west of Germany to the Low Countries and the British Isles, taking firm root wherever there was no despotic political power to stifle it.”

In sharp contrast to the Islamic world, “During the whole of this modern period of European history the general direction of social development was one of freeing the individual from the ties which had bound him to the customary or prescribed ways in the pursuit of his ordinary activities.” “Perhaps the greatest result of the unchaining of individual energies was the marvellous growth of science which followed the march of individual liberty from Italy to England and beyond.” “Only since industrial freedom opened the path to the free use of new knowledge, only since everything could be tried – if somebody could be found to back it at his own risk – and, it should be added, as often as not from outside the authorities officially entrusted with the cultivation of learning, has science made the great strides which in the last hundred and fifty years have changed the face of the world.”

If this was all caused by the introduction of “Islamic science,” how come none of it took place in Islamic lands? It is patently absurd to claim that Islam, perhaps the most anti-individualistic creed on earth, was somehow responsible for triggering the individual brilliance of Renaissance men such as Leonardo da Vinci, not to mention the grossly un-Islamic, figurative art of Michelangelo. So why is this assertion repeated, again and again?

The roots of Western civilization are primarily Judeo-Christian and Greco-Roman. If you want to create a new entity, Eurabia, encompassing Europe, Turkey and the Arab world, you need first to establish that this cultural entity isn’t “new” at all, but has always existed. The way to do this is to establish that Islam is a natural and integral part of Western civilization. You need to imprint in the minds of the people that yes, Muslims and Christians can indeed live peacefully together, as we did in the glorious days of Andalusia. Not only can we live with Muslims, we actually owe Muslims gratitude for helping us create the scientific achievements of the modern West. Thus we have the twin foundational myths of Eurabia. This is why French President Jacques Chirac can claim that “Islam has contributed just as much to Western civilization as Christianity,” thus echoing Tariq Ramadan. Muslims believe that all people are born as Muslims. Jews and Christians share the same message as Muslims. If they disagree on something, this is because Jews or Christians have “misinterpreted” or “perverted” the true, Islamic message. All good things are essentially Islamic, as Mr Ramadan points out. It is thus an illusion to claim that there is such as thing as a separate, “Judeo-Christian” civilization. All Western achievements are Islamic, as they are the result of a civilization Muslims gave to us. Muslims should thus feel no gratitude for enjoying the benefits of the West, they are merely enjoying the legitimate benefits of their own civilization. In fact, Westerners should feel gratitude towards Muslims.

It is a time-tested Islamic tradition: If you cannot show significant historical achievements of your own, you can always steal somebody else’s.

The EU elites see themselves as Julius Caesar or Octavian, but end up being Brutus, stabbing their own peoples in the back. They want to recreate the Roman Empire on both sides of the Mediterranean, bound together by some vague references to a “shared Greek heritage.” Instead, they are creating a civilizational breakdown across much of Western Europe as the barbarians are overrunning the continent. The EU wants to recreate the Roman Empire and ends up creating the second fall of Rome.

It has been said that those who do not have a history also do not have a future. If so, maybe the reverse is true as well. Westerners have lost sense of much of our own cultural heritage. We have forgotten who we once were. Perhaps if we start reclaiming our past, we will discover that we have also gained a future, as an added bonus.

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1211