Islam in Europe and pre-emptive dhimmitude

[Crafty_Dog]

Parallel Societies

(Page 4 of 7)



The topic of marriage comes up often among Turks in places like Duisburg. It
is not a side issue. Of the roughly 25,000 foreigners who immigrate to
Germany every year to marry, about a thousand go to Duisburg, and the great
majority of those are Turks. The city's Marxloh neighborhood is the
Continental capital of Turkish wedding caterers and bridal shops.

Duisburg, where the Rhine and the Ruhr meet, and where mining and industry
link up to the biggest inland port in Europe, is a kind of European
Pittsburgh. In decades past, tens of thousands of Turks came to work in the
city's three big steel plants, which together employed 64,000 people in the
'70s, and in its archipelago of coal mines. But today there are only 20,000
industrial jobs left in the whole city. Duisburg's population, 608,000 in
the 1970s, has fallen to under half a million. The older German-born natives
(who had jobs) die, their children (who want jobs) move and the absolute
number of Turks living there continues to grow. According to the mayor's
office, there are 41,900 Turks in Duisburg, and another 24,000 of Turkish
background who have acquired German citizenship. Together they account for
more than half of Duisburg's minority population - and for much of the city's
dynamism as well. In Marxloh, where half of the 18,000 residents are
immigrants or children of immigrants, the largest mosque in Germany is
nearing completion. At the same time, the local Catholic bishop has
announced he must reduce the number of parishes in Duisburg from 32 to 4.
The Evangelical Church of Germany, a Protestant umbrella organization,
recently published a controversial document in which it laid out some ground
rules for turning Christian houses of worship into Muslim ones. Duisburg is
changing from a "typical" postwar German city into a heavily - and, in
parts, predominantly - Turkish one, through a kind of distillation.

In the neighborhood of Hochfeld, which has lost one-third of its population
in the past three decades, this distillation is at its extreme. Rauf Ceylan,
a sociologist whose parents settled as guest workers nearby in Wanheim, has
spent years studying the coffeehouses and mosques that are the central
community institutions for men. What Ceylan has found is a parallel society
growing increasingly elaborate and increasingly entrenched. He calls
Hochfeld an "ethnic colony," rather than just a "ghetto" or "community."
That is, Hochfeld is more than a place where a homesick Turk can find a
little corner of Turkey, the way a Japanese immigrant might gravitate to a
sushi restaurant in New Hampshire. It is turning into a fully articulated
Turkish society, where a Turk has the institutions to lead any kind of
Turkish life he chooses. And the life that most Hochfeld residents choose is
becoming steadily more traditional. The first generation of guest workers
were not particularly traditionalist, Ceylan says. They were mostly single
men, with the easy-come, easy-go lifestyle that being single implies. But
once they acquired wives from Turkey and formed families, their role changed
from hired worker to paterfamilias, and their priorities changed, too. They
built institutions that mimicked those of the villages they hailed from.

Many Germans held out hope that younger generations, those born here, would
have different priorities. Exposed to German society through television and
schools, they would lose interest in the ways of coffeehouse and mosque. The
old assumption that living in the middle of Western prosperity creates an
almost automatic loyalty has been shaken in recent years. German residents,
of course, played a leading role in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Said
Bahaji, a German citizen of Moroccan descent who served in the German Army,
provided important logistical support for the Hamburg-based cell led by the
Egyptian Mohamed Atta. The Lebanese-born 9/11 terrorist Ziad Jarrah did part
of the planning in Duisburg, and had a romantic involvement with a seemingly
well-assimilated Turkish-German woman who studied dentistry nearby in
Bochum.

The way immigrants marry is a key factor in the way they assimilate, or don't.
In 2000, the German Youth Institute reported that 53 percent of Turkish
women ages 16 to 29 would not consider marrying a German "under any
circumstances." Indeed, the big gap that separates young Turks from German
youth culture is an important theme of "Head-On," Fatih Akin's
Turkish-German film of 2005. Perhaps Turks' preference for Turkish mates
reflects, in some cases, the desire for a religious life. But a survey taken
in the late 1990s found similar discomfort on the part of Germans, for whom
religious considerations are presumably less of a factor. Fifteen percent of
western Germans and just 7 percent of eastern ones said it would be
"pleasant" (angenehm) to have a Turkish relative. Majorities in both places
agreed it would be "unpleasant."

===============

Page 5 of 7)

Where such attitudes prevail, self-segregation is inevitable, mystifying
those immigrants most inclined to assimilate. "There is a big change that
comes at puberty, a divergence of interests," says Osman Apaydin, who runs a
development program around the corner from the wedding shops in Marxloh.
Sitting in his office in February, he described how his grown daughter,
modern-minded, open to the world, much more comfortable speaking German than
Turkish, who went to majority-German schools, now finds herself unmarried,
with an increasingly Turkish circle of friends. To hear Apaydin describe it,
the difficulty of modern Turkish women in finding husbands resembles the
predicament of highly educated black women in the United States.

Where traditional young women start families and assimilated ones have
trouble finding their social footing, the next generation is brought up -
almost by definition - by those who are least assimilated themselves. You
can blame Turkish attitudes if you want, but they arise from a certain
objective truth: The closer one gets to German culture, the farther one gets
from family. There are a lot of ways to measure this. In North
Rhine-Westphalia, Germany's most populous state and the one where Duisburg
is located, 80 percent of Turks ages 25 to 34 are married; their average
marriage age is 21 for women and 24 for men. Among non-Turks, only 32
percent of 25- to 34-year-olds are married; the average marriage age is 29
for women and 32 for men. Germans have one of the lowest fertility rates in
the history of the world - 1.36 children per woman, according to 2004
figures. While it is hard to find precise figures for Turks in Germany, the
rate is widely agreed to be higher. The rate in Turkey itself is almost
twice as high, at 2.4 children per woman. If a good chance of childlessness
and middle-aged solitude is the price of assimilation, it is for many Turks
an exorbitant one. According to a study done by the Center for Turkey
Studies in Essen, young Turkish women and men brought up in Germany view
their fellow Turkish-Germans of the opposite sex as "distant from their own
culture, or 'degenerate.' "

You seldom meet young Turkish women of marriage age who describe themselves
as either unambiguously traditional or unambiguously modern. Take Yasemin
Yadigaroglu, for instance. A tight, traditional head scarf covers every last
strand of her hair. But there is something bold and dashing about her, as
well as conservative. At 26, she leads a campaign supported by the Duisburg
city government to dissuade Turks from marrying their cousins. A German
citizen born in Duisburg, she studied social science at the University of
Duisburg-Essen.

Unlike Kelek, Yadigaroglu is an observant Muslim. She says that cousin
marriage is "a misrepresentation of Islam." Yet despite her religious bent,
Yadigaroglu's preoccupations and even conclusions about the family overlap
with Kelek's. Yadigaroglu claims that marriage between cousins retards
assimilation, that it contributes to parallel societies like the ones Ceylan
describes in Hochfeld and that it is responsible for birth defects. In an
academic paper, she even hints at a feminist critique of the traditional
Turkish family. "Through marriage to a cousin," she writes, "a new role
orientation gets established within the family. The aunt and uncle become
in-laws. The new daughter-in-law sinks to the lowest level of the family
hierarchy, in marked contrast to her previous role as niece."

One Friday afternoon just before evening prayers, I traveled to
Wanheimerort, a dockside area just south of Hochfeld, to see four young
women between 17 and 20 who meet there every week. All were born in Turkey
but have spent much of their lives in Wanheimerort. At least two are German
citizens. Esra is studying mathematics at a university nearby, Fatma and
Meltem are on their way there and Guler studies dental hygiene. Esra, at
least, spoke terrific English but wouldn't use it, perhaps out of
consideration for the several non-English speakers in the room. The Ditib
mosque they attend is among the more liberal in the area, but all the girls
except Fatma were wearing head scarves. I thought of Yadigaroglu, with her
mix of tradition and eagerness to assimilate and decided to ask whether -
given their career tracks - any of them might consider themselves feminists,
if only in an unconventional way. Their answers were: Nein, nein, nein and
nein. "Women think this word makes them more and more free," one said
scornfully.

==============



Page 6 of 7)



Young men I met were often more sour and defensive in such discussions. It
was as if they wanted to be clear about just who was rejecting whom in this
battle between their egos and the wider society's values. In the Duisburg
neighborhood of Meiderich, I visited a German-literature class at the local
high school and asked a room full of 18-year-olds to talk about marriage.
Three-quarters had a Turkish background. One, Husayn, spoke of how he had
already been betrothed to a cousin at a family celebration in Bielefeld and
was looking forward to standing on his own two feet. Several said that
brothers and sisters had married cousins from Turkey, yet each one of them
presented that as a special case, an exception.

But one student, a sharp-tongued fellow named Yavuz, had noticed the erosion
of the Turkish family model in Germany. It struck him as a catastrophe.
"Father and son are no longer father and son," he complained. "They're
buddies to one another. Your father becomes someone to go out and have a
beer with." And Turks' tendency to marry their cousins did not look so bad,
Yavuz said, with the air of one repeating something heard over a dinner
table, when you consider that "one out of six Germans commits incest."

I had heard similar things elsewhere in Germany. In the Comenius Garden in
Neukolln, a particularly tough part of Berlin, Murat, Ali and Hakan, all in
their late teens, were passing a freezing cold afternoon chatting and making
up rap verses. Ali, whose family comes from the Black Sea port of Rize, is
the son of a local Neukölln imam. He is training to be a plumber but is not
employed yet. He is betrothed to a "friend" in Turkey. The person who
introduced me to Ali said Ali's other friends had spoken of the woman as his
cousin. So I started by asking him why he had looked for his wife in Turkey.
"German girls are Schlampen," he replied. They're sluts.

These may be dangerous attitudes. They may also be just the ordinary
sour-grapes insecurities that are the lot of immigrants' children at all
times and all places. Turks often complain that Germans see only the
repressive side to Turkish traditions and not the protective side.

Even Seyran Ates sometimes sounds uncertain that German ideals are
sufficient to protect women. At the end of last summer, two months after she
was attacked on the Mockernbrucke subway platform, she gave up her law
practice. She now says she would be willing to continue work in a law firm,
provided it was large enough to guarantee her security. People have
organized events for her and proclaimed their solidarity. Her alma mater,
the Free University of Berlin, awarded her a prize for defense of human
rights last March. "Socially, there has been a lot of support," she says.
But the way the incident itself occurred, particularly the way men looked on
while she and her client were assaulted - that clearly still upsets her.

"It brought me to despair," she said over tea. "It showed a lack of civic
courage."

But would it have been any different in Turkey if a man had begun to beat up
a woman like that on a subway platform?

"Oh, yes," she said calmly. "They'd have lynched him."

The Same Pillow

Wolfgang Schauble, Germany's interior minister, is in an awkward position. A
European interior minister is usually referred to as his country's "top
 cop." That was the job description the last time Schauble held the post,
under Helmut Kohl, between 1989 and 1991. But since he returned to the
ministry in the autumn of 2005, as the highest-ranking Christian Democrat
(behind Chancellor Angela Merkel) in a new coalition government, Schauble
has devoted much of his effort to the Islamkonferenz. At times he seems less
a top cop than a top marriage counselor.

Seated near his desk at the top of an office tower north of Berlin's
Tiergarten in February, Schauble admitted that the tendency of Turks to
bring spouses from abroad is a "main reason why integration isn't improving
with the passing generations." He agrees with Kelek and Ates that what he
calls the "freedom-constraining effects of the family" can stand between a
woman from a non-German culture and the rights to which she is entitled as a
German resident. But as a churchgoing Protestant, he is disinclined to
fiddle with marriage itself. "You have to distinguish between arranged
marriages and forced marriages," he told me. "Forced marriages are illegal.
They're assaults on human rights. They don't meet the minimum demands of a
free society. But arranged marriage - that's a complicated area. There have
always been cases where people have chosen not to meet as just man and woman
but with the intercession of some kind of third party."

=================



Page 7 of 7)



So Schauble seems to be trying to influence behaviors that he says are
neither illegal nor, in most cases, even wrong. He has been pragmatic. When
he started the Islamkonferenz last September, he praised Islam for
reinforcing aspects of German tradition that Germans themselves had
neglected: "the importance of family, respect for elders, a consciousness
and pride in one's own history, culture, religion, tradition and the
day-to-day life of one's faith." Yet he has also spoken favorably about a
controversial video that the government of the Netherlands has been showing
to prospective immigrants. It is supposed to acclimate them to the relative
tolerance of Western societies. Images of women at a topless beach and of
two men kissing are meant to squelch any expectation that those who inhabit
traditionalist cultures can bring those cultures with them to Holland. But
isn't this inconsistent? Don't the social benefits that Schäuble praises
come from a traditional moralism - about, for instance, baring ones breasts
in public - that the video repudiates? "Breasts," Schauble replied, "are not
the main theme."

Certain countries in Europe have placed sharp restrictions on those who
marry foreigners. The Netherlands is one of them. In Denmark, citizens under
the age of 24 are not even allowed to reside in the country with their
non-E.U. spouses. Germany is unlikely to try anything so restrictive. But in
March, the German cabinet approved a reform of immigration laws that would
raise the minimum age of foreign-born spouses to 18. (Studies show that the
lower the age of marriage, the greater the tendency to have an arranged
marriage.)

Schauble also intends to require a minimum basic language proficiency for a
spouse before he or she comes to Germany. "Let's say a young woman, from
some remote part of Turkey, is brought together with her husband while he is
on summer vacation," Schauble suggested. "If she doesn't know a single word
of German when she comes - well, she has little chance to escape the total
control of his family. If she knows a little bit of German, her chances are
better." Long a pet enthusiasm of Schauble's, the idea was taken up by the
incoming French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, during the French campaign this
spring. Schäuble insists that when he says "a little bit" of the native
language, he means a bare minimum, the kind of German you can learn from a
few weeks of listening to audiotapes.

Nonetheless, this little bit means a big change. For perhaps the first time
since the war, German institutions and public opinion are taking a stand in
favor of German culture as they understand it, and implicitly against the
culture of a foreign minority. After a decade in which the Social Democratic
government of Gerhard Schroder focused on the qualifications for German
citizenship (since 1999, all children born in Germany, of whatever
parentage, are eligible for it), the Merkel coalition, following Schäuble,
is stressing the content of citizenship. Germany is beginning to insist on
citizens' responsibilities as well as citizens' rights.

"We are facing the same problems, whether we are practicing Muslims or not,"
Oguz Ucuncu told me one night in Cologne, over a Turkish barbecue in the
heavily immigrant neighborhood of Mulheim. Ucuncu, a quick-witted and
decidedly modern spokesman for the conservative Turkish Muslim group Milli
Gorus, serves on one of the committees of the Islamkonferenz. He pointed out
that Internet "flirt exchanges" and "singles exchanges" are increasingly
popular in Germany. What are those, he asked, if not high-tech means of
"arranging" marriages? (Not to mention considerably less binding romantic
encounters.) What of those native Germans who marry abroad, he asked,
especially the thousands who have married women from East Asia? Shouldn't
they, too, stand accused of wishing to "secede" from Western European
feminism, just as those Turks who marry in Turkey stand accused? "The first
point of any government program now," Ucuncu said, "should be to promote
solidity of family. The idea we should promote is: May you sleep on the same
pillow to the end of your life. This is a Muslim value we should not give
away."

[Crafty_Dog]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

UK: Children involved in terrorism

LONDON, England (CNN) -- The head of Britain's intelligence services has warned that children as young as 15 are becoming involved in terrorist-related activity.

Jonathan Evans, the chief of MI5, also said that at least 2,000 people are living in Britain who pose a threat to security because of the country's support for al Qaeda-inspired terrorism.

"As I speak, terrorists are methodically and intentionally targeting young people and children in this country. They are radicalising, indoctrinating and grooming young, vulnerable people to carry out acts of terrorism," he told a gathering of newspaper editors in Manchester.

Evans said the figure of 2,000 -- an increase of 400 since November 2006 -- only included those the intelligence services knew about and that the actual number could be double.

He said there had been 200 terrorist convictions in Britain since the September 11 attacks.

The MI5 head added that over recent years much of the command and inspiration for attack planning in the UK had come from al Qaeda's remaining core leadership in the tribal areas of Pakistan.

However, he said in the last 12 months terrorist plots on British soil were increasingly been inspired by al Qaeda cadres in other countries, including in Iraq and East Africa.

"There is no doubt now that al Qaeda in Iraq aspires to promote terrorist attacks outside Iraq. There is no doubt that there is training activity and terrorist planning in East Africa -- particularly in Somalia -- which is focused on the UK," he told the Society of Editors meeting.

According to Evans, there had been "no decrease" in the number of Russian covert intelligence officers operating in Britain since the end of the Cold War.

He said that resources that could be devoted to counter-terrorism were instead being used to protect Britain against spying by Russia, China and others.

"A number of countries continue to devote considerable time and energy trying to steal our sensitive technology on civilian and military projects, and trying to obtain political and economic intelligence at our expense," he said.

[Crafty_Dog]

Illegal immigrant demands to be flown home
Illegal immigrant demands to be flown home because Britons are 'rude and unfriendly'
Last updated at 11:13am on 16th November 2007



An illegal immigrant has demanded to be flown home after saying he was fed up with British people - because they are "rude and unfriendly".

Speaking today, Mokhtar Tabet, 30 - who has been given a home, food and free travel around London - claims his local council has breached his human rights by moving him to a place he does not like.
He was refused asylum in 2004 and is set to be deported.

He said: "The council evicted me from my home in September and moved me to Streatham, which I don't like.

"The new place is small, and the kitchen closes at 9pm, so I can't have anything to eat late at night. They have taken away my human rights."

Croydon Council says it has bent over backwards to help Tabet, who fled Algeria in 2002.



A spokesman said: "Mr Tabet was accommodated in Norbury Crescent, with Croydon Council paying his rent, council tax and utility bills.

"In July, his landlord gave him two months' notice to quit the premises, and the council offered him a flat in Anerley Road, which he refused citing its poor state of repair.

"The necessary repairs were carried out and he again refused it.

"He was told that refusal would amount to him making himself intentionally homeless and he would be placed in hostel-style accommodation. He agreed to this."

Mr Tabet is entitled to return to Algeria at his own expense and admits that he "does not like it here".

But he refuses to do so and says Britain will have to pay for his travel if it wants him to leave.

He moaned: "I miss Algeria. The English people are not helpful, they are so unfriendly and rude.
"I thought I had made friends in Croydon, but when I ask them for money they don't give me it, so I know they can't be my friends."

Mr Tabet fled Algeria in 2002 after being arrested for refusing to give up his home so the army could monitor terrorist activity in his town.

Released after 30 days' solitary confinement he fled to Britain, illegally entering the country on a flight from Tunisia, and sought asylum.

He now receives £32 a week in vouchers from Croydon Council to buy food with while he awaits deportation.

Unsatisfied at this, he griped: "Croydon Council only gives me food vouchers, they won't give me cash. I want the money.
"I have nothing to buy new clothes with, I have to go to a refugee centre. But if there's not anything nice there, you leave with nothing.

"I want the council to give me a bigger flat and money instead of vouchers."

Mr Tabet suffers from diabetes, a retina disease and kidney failure and believes he should be allowed to stay in the country so he can continue to get free NHS care.

He said: "The Home Office said I could afford the medicine back home, but I can't, I don't have a job."

The council insists he has no grounds for complaint. The spokesman explained: "He is supported by the council by way of vouchers, in accordance with the law."

Mr Tabet admits that since he was refused asylum he has "stayed and no one has said anything about it".

But a spokesman from the Border and Immigration Agency insisted he can expect to be deported. He said: "The period between an individual being refused asylum and their removal will vary from case to case depending on individual circumstances. He is being processed through our returning scheme.
"Individuals are free to apply for a new passport and return voluntarily at any time. It's a case of if he wants to return on his own dollar or ours."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

[Crafty_Dog]

Imam's daughter in hiding after her conversion to Christianity sparked death threats
By LIZ HULL and DANIEL BATES

The daughter of a British imam is living under police protection after receiving death threats from her father for converting to Christianity.

The 31-year-old, whose father is the leader of a mosque in Lancashire, has moved house an astonishing 45 times after relatives pledged to hunt her down and kill her.

The British-born university graduate, who uses the pseudonym Hannah for her own safety, said she renounced the Muslim faith to escape being forced into an arranged marriage when she was 16.

She has been in hiding for more than a decade but called in police only a few months ago after receiving a text message from her brother.

In it, he said he would not be held responsible for his actions if she failed to return to Islam.

Officers have agreed to offer her protection in case of an attempt on her life.

Last night the woman said: "I'm determined to live my life the way I want to because I should have that freedom in this country.

"If you make the choice to come to this country, as my parents did from Pakistan, you have to abide by the laws of this country and that means respecting the freedoms of other people.

Scroll down for more... {R}

"I know the Koran says anyone who goes away from Islam should be killed as an apostate, so in some ways my family are following the Koran. They are following Islam to the word.

"But I do not think every Muslim would act on that.

"My situation is frightening, but I'm not going to let it frighten me to the extent I can't live my life.

"I pretty much feel like I've lost my family and that's very hard.

"Some days I feel very low and what my father might do preys on my mind. But I regularly change my phone number to avoid him catching up with me.'

Hannah was born in Lancashire to Pakistani parents who raised her and her siblings as strict Sunni Muslims.

She prayed and read the Koran, wore traditional Muslim clothes and was sent to a madrassa, a religious Muslim school.

She ran away from home at 16 after overhearing her father organising her arranged marriage.

Hannah was taken in by a religious education teacher and decided to convert to the Christian faith.

Although unhappy, her parents tolerated their daughter's dismissal-of Islam as a "teenage phase".

But when she opted to get baptised, while studying at Manchester University, her family were incensed and the death threats began.

Her father arrived at her home with 40 men and threatened to kill her for betraying Islam.

"I saw my uncle and around 40 men storming up the street clutching axes, hammers, knives and bits of wood," she said.

"My dad was shouting through the letter box, "I'm going to kill you", while the others smashed on the window and beat the door.

"They were shouting, 'We're going to kill you' and 'Traitor'.

"It was terrifying. I was convinced I was going to either die, but suddenly after about ten minutes the noise stopped and the men suddenly went away."

Since then Hannah, who gives talks to churches on Islam, has been on the run from her family, often being forced to flee her home with only a few minutes' notice.

After receiving the latest text threat from her brother, in June, she finally went to the police.

No one has been arrested or charged in connection with the death threats, but officers have put her on an "at risk" register and have given her a panic number to call if she fears for her own safety.

Yesterday Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester, told delegates at the launch of a religious charity that Muslims in Britain who wished to change faiths were living in fear of their lives because of Islamic hostility to conversion.

A study this year found that 36 per cent of British Muslims between 16 and 24 believe those who convert to another religion should be punished by death.

In July an Iranian immigrant to Britain, who converted to Christianity, was saved from deportation after it emerged she would be stoned to death in her own country.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.goal.com/en/Articolo.aspx?ContenutoId=509968

Fenerbahce To Ask Uefa For Three Points From Inter Match


A Turkish lawyer has filed a complaint to Uefa after Inter wore a shirt with an offensive symbol, at least to Islamic culture, in their recent match against Fenerbahce.

A Turkish lawyer who's an expert on European law, Baris Kaska, is asking Uefa to cancel the three points Inter earned in their win against Fenerbahce in the recent Champions League match.

The Nerazzurri had beaten the Turkish champions 3-0 at home to qualify for the next round of the Champions League.

The reason for the appeal is unusual: the celebratory shirt for Inter's centenary worn by the team that night, and on several other occasions this season, offended many people in Turkey.

The shirt's scheme saw a big red cross on a white background, a symbol of the city of Milan, and reminded many of an emblem of the order of the Templars, which is considered offensive in Islamic culture.

Inter consciously did not wear their 'centenary shirt' in their first match against Fenerbahce in Istanbul, but at home, they did not think it was necessary to do the same.

However, the very sensitive Turkish media reacted bitterly and that led to the official appeal filed by Kaska, who announced this decision during an interview to Barcelona daily La Vanguardia.

[Crafty_Dog]

This could fit on any of a number of threads, but because the discs in question were being sold in the UK, I post it here:

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=28314&only&rss

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,524739,00.html

Interior Ministry Warns of Radicalization of Muslims
A new study commissioned by Germany's Interior Ministry warns of a growing threat from the radicalization of Muslims in the country. Six percent of Muslims in Germany support violence in the name of Islam, the authors write.


 AP
Muslims protest in Dusseldorf against the Danish Muhammad cartoons in this Feb. 2006 photo. The Interior Ministry has warned that exclusion of Muslims from mainstream German society is leading to radicalization.
A new study released by Germany's Interior Ministry has added new fuel to the debate about integration of Muslims in Germany, with the report warning about the danger of radicalization of Muslims.

According to the study, which was published Tuesday, around 40 percent of Muslims surveyed had a "fundamentalist orientation," which the authors defined as a strongly religious worldview and moral values.

However, the authors concluded that the vast majority of Muslims in Germany reject religiously motivated terrorism and violence: Some 92 percent of respondents agreed with the statement that terrorist acts in the name of Islam were a serious sin and an insult to Allah.

But the authors saw a potential threat in a small minority with Islamist leanings: Around 6 percent of those surveyed were classified as having "violent tendencies," while 14 percent of respondents had "anti-democratic" tendencies.

Around 12 percent of the Muslims in Germany identified with a religious-moral critique of the West and supported corporal punishment and the death penalty. The report also concluded that religious beliefs are becoming increasingly important for young people.

The study, which was carried out by Katrin Brettfeld and Peter Wetzels from the Institute for Criminology at the University of Hamburg, was commissioned by the Interior Ministry in an attempt to finding out the extent to which the Muslim community in Germany provides a breeding ground for extremist groups and potential terrorists. The authors interviewed 1,750 Muslims living in Germany for the study. Of that number, around 40 percent had German citizenship.

'Fundamental Religious Orientation'

In the introduction to the report, Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble writes that the study leads to the "worrying conclusion that a serious potential for Islamist radicalization has developed in Germany." According to Schäuble, the lack of integration of immigrants into German society is leading to a "fundamental religious orientation."

The survey found that more than half of the respondents felt themselves excluded from German society and felt they were treated as foreigners. Around 20 percent had experienced some form of racism within the last 12 months.

Reacting to the study, Christine Haderthauer, general secretary of the conservative Bavarian party the Christian Social Union, said that her party "has always warned against the dangers of parallel societies. Our fears have been confirmed in a shocking manner." She said that Germany needs "an offensive to promote religious tolerance among young Muslims."


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 However social anthropologist Werner Schiffauer urged caution when interpreting the results. He told the daily newspaper Frankfurter Rundschau that "anti-democratic attitudes were equally common among Muslims and Germans (sic)," adding that it could not be concluded that Islam encourages anti-democratic tendencies. Leaders of groups representing the Turkish community and Muslims in Germany also urged caution in interpreting the results.

In concluding that 6 percent of Muslims in Germany have violent tendencies, the study appears to contradict to some extent the findings of Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, which monitors Islamist activity in the country. According to its 2006 report, there are currently around 32,000 Islamists in Germany who pose a potential security threat. That figure represents slightly more than 1 percent of the around 3 million Muslims who live in the country.

The Interior Ministry under Schäuble has sparked a series of controversies in recent months. Schäuble was the subject of heated criticism in July of this year when he appeared to suggest in a SPIEGEL interview (more...) that the targeted killing of terrorists might have to be considered. Schäuble's opponents have condemned him for attempting to constantly stretch the limits of what is acceptable under Germany's constitution in the fight against terror.

Other controversial positions Schäuble has promoted recently include taking terrorists into preventive custody, deploying the German army in domestic operations and searching suspects' computers online without their knowledge.

dgs/ap/ddp/afp

[Crafty_Dog]

Iran: Europe will become a Muslim continent, says Khamenei's spokesman


Tehran, 21 Dec. (AKI) - Europe will eventually become a Muslim continent, according to a representative of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei.

"In a dozen years, Europe will be an Islamic continent," said Rasul Jalilzadeh on Friday as he was speaking to the basiji, a voluntary organisation in the capital Tehran.


"The Islamisation of the European continent is imminent and this step favours the arrival of the Mahdi," he said, referring to the 12th imam of Shiite Islam.


Shiites believe that the Imam Mahdi, who disppeared as an adolescent, will return to bring an end to chaos and bring universal justice.

Rasul Jalilzadeh believes that "the Islamisation of Europe is one of the consequences of the Islamic revolution in Iran" in that "the messages and values that this revolution has transmitted to the Europeans, to convince them "to abandon their current faiths and convert to Shiite Islam."

http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English...1.0.1696552901

[Crafty_Dog]

Bishop warns of no-go zones for non-Muslims
By Jonathan Wynne-Jones
Last Updated: 12:39am GMT 06/01/2008

Islamic extremists have created "no-go" areas across Britain where it is too dangerous for non-Muslims to enter, one of the Church of England's most senior bishops warns today.

The Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester and the Church's only Asian bishop, says that people of a different race or faith face physical attack if they live or work in communities dominated by a strict Muslim ideology.

Bishop Nazir-Ali warns that attempts are being made to give Britain an increasingly Islamic character

Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, he compares the threat to the use of intimidation by the far-Right, and says that it is becoming increasingly difficult for Christianity to be the nation's public religion in a multifaith, multicultural society.

His comments come as a poll of the General Synod - the Church's parliament - shows that its senior leaders, including bishops, also believe that Britain is being damaged by large-scale immigration.

Bishop Nazir-Ali, who was born in Pakistan, gives warning that attempts are being made to give Britain an increasingly Islamic character by introducing the call to prayer and wider use of sharia law, a legal system based on the Koran.

In an attack on the Government's response to immigration and the influx of "people of other faiths to these shores", he blames its "novel philosophy of multiculturalism" for allowing society to become deeply divided, and accuses ministers of lacking a "moral and spiritual vision".

Echoing Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Commission for Equalities and Human Rights, who has said that the country is "sleepwalking into segregation", the bishop argues that multiculturalism has led to deep divisions.

David Davis, the shadow home secretary, has accused Muslims of promoting a kind of "voluntary apartheid" by shutting themselves in closed societies and demanding immunity from criticism.

In the Synod survey, to be published this week, bishops, senior clergy and influential churchgoers said that an increasingly multi-faith society threatens the country's Christian heritage and blamed the divisions on the Government's failure to integrate immigrants into their communities.

It found that more than one in three believe that a mass influx of people of other faiths is diluting the Christian nature of Britain and only a quarter feel that they have been integrated into society.

The overwhelming majority - 80 per cent - said that the Government has not upheld the place of religion in public life and up to 63 per cent fear that the Church will be disestablished within a generation, breaking a bond that has existed between the Church and State since the Reformation.

Calls for disestablishment have grown following research showing that attendance at Mass has overtaken the number of worshippers at Church of England Sunday services.

Bishop Nazir-Ali, whose father converted from Islam to Catholicism, was criticised by Ibrahim Mogra, of the Muslim Council of Britain. He said: "It's irresponsible for a man of his position to make these comments.
"He should accept that Britain is a multicultural society in which we are free to follow our religion at the same time as being extremely proud to be British. We wouldn't allow 'no-go' areas to happen. I smell extreme intolerance when people criticise multiculturalism without proper evidence of what has gone wrong."

Religious membership in Britain:
click to enlarge

But the Bishop's concerns are shared by other members of the General Synod.
The Rt Rev Nicholas Reade, the Bishop of Blackburn, which has a large Muslim community, said that it was increasingly difficult for Christians to share their faith in areas where there was a high proportion of immigrants of other faiths.

He believes that increasing pressure will be put on the Government to begin the process of disestablishment and end the preferential status given to the Church of England. "The writing is on the wall," he said.
Gordon Brown relinquished Downing Street's involvement in appointing bishops in one of his first facts as Prime Minister - a move viewed by some as a significant step towards disestablishment.

Last night, Mr Davis said: "Bishop Nazir-Ali has drawn attention to a deeply serious problem. The Government's confused and counter-productive approach risks creating a number of closed societies instead of one open, cohesive one. It generates the risk of encouraging radicalisation and creating home-grown terrorism."

From: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main...-mostviewedbox
----------

Can anyone help explain the role of the Church of England and its connection with the British government?

[Crafty_Dog]

Head banker leaves job over Muslim gaffe

Ill-advised quip

By OUT-LAW.COM → More by this author
Published Tuesday 8th January 2008 10:22 GMT
Find out how your peers are dealing with Virtualization
A senior banking industry figure has left his job after making a joke about Muslims which reportedly stunned colleagues and was the subject of complaints. Marc Howells of Barclaycard Europe has left his post.
Howells was discussing quarterly figures with staff when he is reported as saying: "The results were like Muslims – some were good, some were Shi'ite".

The remark was reported to senior management and a complaint was made. It is understood that Howells has left in what has been called 'redundancy under compromise'. He was the head of Barclaycard in Europe.
Barclaycard will not comment directly on Howells and his leaving of the company, but company sources told the Daily Telegraph newspaper: "Once word got round and a complaint was made he was toast. Part of the deal was that the circumstances of his departure must never be disclosed. But there was no chance of that once his Shi'ite joke started doing the rounds."
"We have nothing to add on this particular case," said a Barclaycard statement. "Everybody who works here gets guidance of what is right and what is wrong. We have a robust approach to equality and diversity and do not tolerate discrimination."

[Crafty_Dog]

Bin Laden's son applies to move to U.K. with wife - Daily Mail RIA Novosti
Monday January 14, 2008
Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden's son has applied for a visa to the United Kingdom where he intends to live with his British wife, the Daily Mail reported.
Omar Bin Laden, 26, and his wife Jane Felix-Browne, 52, say they have been interviewed at the British Embassy in Cairo. The embassy has declined to comment on the issue.
The British woman, who changed her name to Zaina Al Sabah Bin Laden after her marriage to Omar, has been married six times and has three sons and five grandchildren, according to the tabloid.
If the couple's application is accepted, they will move to Jane's $1.1 million home in Cheshire, near Manchester.
The Daily mail quoted her as saying: "The embassy staff are all very friendly and they are doing all the checks. It could take a while for the visa to come through but there's no reason in law why Omar and I should not be able to live in the U.K. together."
The son of the world's most wanted terrorist has divorced his first wife, the mother of his two-year-old son, and is currently waiting for confirmation of the divorce to come through from Saudi Arabia, so that he can prove the British woman is his only spouse.
"We have been told there will not be a problem as long as we can provide the original documents from his divorce from his first wife. And that should be done in a week," Mrs Bin Laden said.
A British marriage visa would allow Omar to live in the country for two years, after which he would be able to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain.
The couple say they are "peace activists", and are organizing a horse ride from Cairo to Morocco.
Omar Bin Laden told the Mail on Sunday: "Associates of my father forced the cancellation of the Dakar Rally [across north-west Africa], but they won't stop me from riding. We want people to join us on the trek - Jews, Arabs, Christians, Muslims, it doesn't matter where people are from."

[Crafty_Dog]

English mosques are so extremist they'd be closed down in Baghdad, says IRAQ'S deputy prime minister

Certain English mosques are more radical than those found in Iraq and would be "illegal" in the war-torn country according to the Iraqi deputy prime minister.  The shocking remarks, made by Dr Barham Salih, related to mosques he visited in Blackburn and have angered Muslim leaders.  Dr Salih visited the east Lancashire town in 2005 as a guest of Jack Straw and made his remarks at a dinner party in Baghdad in November.

Shadow culture minister Tobias Ellwood, who attended the dinner, claimed the Iraqi politician said: "I am not surprised that you British are facing so many problems with extremists after what I saw in those mosques in Blackburn.  What I saw would not be allowed here in Iraq - it would be illegal."

The 41-year-old MP made the claims during a Westminster debate on terrorism.

He said: "I know Jack Straw well, but my eyebrows raise when you have a very senior Iraqi leader make comments like that.  I do not believe these comments can be dismissed out of hand. I was absolutely shocked.  He went inside the mosques, and said literature he saw would be illegal. He was quite clear.  The comments are only directed at a very small proportion of mosques in the UK - the vast majority of Muslims wouldn't want to be labelled."

Salim Mulla, chairman of the Lancashire Council of Mosques, reacted furiously to the comments. He said Dr Salih spoke positively about what he had seen in the town when they spoke during his visit.

He said: "We are going out of our way to bring the community together. Nobody is working harder than us at breaking down barriers.  For Dr Salih to make these sort of comments is not very helpful at all.  I don't know where he's coming from. He was very co-operative when he visited, and took lots of photographs. How many incidents have we had in Blackburn? He is talking a load of rubbish."

Dr Salih, a Sunni Muslim, was elected in January 2005 to Iraq's first democratically held elections in 50 years.  During his visit, in the run-up to the 2005 general election, he told voters to support Jack Straw, then Foreign Secretary, and not to turn against him because of the war in Iraq.  Salim Mulla said he could not recall which mosques, Dr Salih visited.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

[Crafty_Dog]

Porter sacked by hospital after he asks for 'multi-faith' prayer room crucifix be made visible

A hospital porter has been sacked after a row over a crucifix being covered up in a prayer room used by Muslims.

Joseph Protano, 54, was suspended four days after the incident last month at a children's hospital - and has since been dismissed.

The row centres on a prayer room available to staff and visitors of all faiths, which contains a statue of the Virgin Mary and a crucifix.

Mr Protano, a Roman Catholic who has worked two years at the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital, Pendlebury, entered the room when three Muslims were using it - two patients and a doctor.

An argument broke out after he asked them to remove a cloth covering the crucifix and statue and to turn a picture of the Virgin Mary face up.

He has now been dismissed for gross misconduct but he intends to appeal.

Police quizzed him for four hours last month, on suspicion of religiously aggravated assault, but he was released without charge.

He denies the allegations and must wait to see if police take any action.

He said he was unable to comment on his sacking as the police probe and his plans to appeal were ongoing.

But a friend said: "He was very shocked at the decision. He thinks he has been treated terribly.

"He loves his job and doesn't do it for the money - until recently, his employers were paying just £5.88 an hour.

"They are saying he should not have gone into the prayer room and it is alleged he used racist language, which he totally refutes.

"His pay has been stopped, even though he intends to appeal, and he has had to sign on for benefits."

The friend said Mr Protano went into the prayer room about six times a day to check that the statue and crucifix were not left covered because he felt could be upsetting for visiting Christian parents to find them covered up.

The case has angered many hospital staff, who think he has been treated unfairly.

Police said a file had been passed to the Crown Prosecution Service for a decision over any further action.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

[G M]

**"America Alone" continues to be proven accurate. It's wonderful how well "multiculti" is working out. Keep in mind that under sharia law, no non-muslim is ever justified in self-defense and any muslim has the right to rob, rape, enslave and murder any non-muslim.**


SPIEGEL ONLINE - February 1, 2008, 10:32 AM
URL: http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,532423,00.html

'WE'RE SITTING ON A POWDER KEG'
Immigrants Protest Death of Moroccan Teenager in Cologne

By Barbara Schmid and Andreas Ulrich
Following the violent death of a Moroccan teenager in Cologne, hundreds of immigrants have taken to the streets in nightly demonstrations to protest what they see as evidence of their second-class status in Germany. Police warn the city could be ready to explode.


Ikhlas Abbis
Members of the immigrant community have been protesting the death of a teenager in Cologne.

The owner of an electronics shop on Cologne's Kalker Hauptstrasse had rolled down the shutters on the windows in case there was unrest. Now they have photos of a 17-year-old Moroccan boy taped to them. The teenager, whose name was Salih, was killed in front of the shop two weeks ago.
The sidewalk is a sea of candles as hundreds of people chant: "Salih! Salih! We want justice!" They feel that Salih was one of them -- a youth from an immigrant family.

For the police, the case is clear cut. According to their version of events, Salih allegedly wanted to mug a 20-year-old German man, who tried to defend himself. But he panicked and pulled out a pocketknife that he plunged into Salih's heart with an unlucky stab. Prosecutors said it was a clear case of self-defense, and there are witnesses. But none of that matters any longer.

Every night last week, up to 300 protestors gathered at the spot where Salih died to demand "justice" instead of letting his killer walk free. They are protesting against "racism in Germany" -- but since it appears clear that this case involves self-defense, it's obviously about more than just the unfortunate Salih. It's more about how immigrants and their children feel they are currently being treated in Germany.

FROM THE MAGAZINE

Find out how you can reprint this DER SPIEGEL article in your publication.
The incident has struck a chord with those who feel disenfranchised from German society -- those without a proper education or vocational training, those without a future. The frustration is palpable. "We're sitting on a powder keg," warns former police commissioner Winrich Granitzka, who is also head of the Christian Democratic group in Cologne's city council. "There's the danger we could see a situation like in the suburbs of Paris."
Cologne certainly isn't Paris and the district of Kalk can't be compared with the high-rise suburban ghettoes surrounding the French capital. But Kalk, which used to be home to a chemical plant, is certainly depressing. The only bright spot is the large and colorful new shopping center, which stands out from its gray surroundings.

Immigrants and people with at least one non-German parent make up 54.7 percent of Kalk's population. The amount of young people between 15 and 18 living there is above average; education levels, on the other hand, are below average. Some 90 percent of people without a job in the area count as long-term unemployed.

"It seems to me as if they only send losers here," says Kemal Düzardic, a 22-year-old friend of the dead teenager. He and the others gather near the photos and candles even in the cold and the rain. One question weighs heavily on their minds. What if a German had died and the killer had been one of them?

A mere eight hours after the incident happened, the police announced it had been a case of self-defense and no charges would be pressed. The statement was "somewhat unfortunately formulated," admits Cologne police officer Catherine Maus in hindsight.

The "unfortunate" wording came at a particularly unfortunate time. "We have too many criminal foreigners," Roland Koch, the conservative governor of the state of Hesse, said in late December. In his re-election campaign, which many observers considered xenophobic, Koch made clear he thought immigrants should assimilate and shouldn't expect Germans to accommodate their cultural practices.

Of course, many of the Kalk youths who were born and raised within sight of Cologne's towering cathedral and speak the local German dialect don't consider themselves "foreigners." But Koch's populist attacks still resonated throughout the immigrant community.

"Stop this Racist," was the headline in the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet, accompanied by a caricature of the Christian Democrat politician with an extra-long nose. The Social Democrats, the left-wing Left party, the Greens and even a few Christian Democrats distanced themselves from Koch. Only the mass circulation newspaper Bild took his side and delighted in featuring new stories about "foreign" repeat offenders with long criminal records on an almost daily basis.

But the people with immigrant backgrounds in Kalk read Bild too. "What's with this crap?" says one irritated young man. "We grew up here, we aren't criminals. So why are we treated differently than other Germans?"

'We Feel like Second-Class Citizens'

For more than 40 years, the German mainstream tried to assert that Germany wasn't a "country of immigration." That attitude has had repercussions. Around 72 percent of Germany's 1.7 million Turks -- the largest group of foreigners living in the country -- don't have proper vocational qualifications. Some 40 percent of young people from immigrant families neither study nor pursue a traineeship after they leave school. They do odd jobs or hang around -- and they make up a disproportionate amount of violent offenders.

"The city of Cologne does a lot for integration," says police director Michael Temme, who has been keeping a careful eye on how his officers have been policing the demonstrations. But he admits there are "hot spots" in the city, including in Kalk. And so every evening he finds himself wondering if this will be the night when a spark finally ignites the powder keg, if this will be the night when shop windows get shattered and cars go up in flames.

"We feel like second-class citizens," says a middle-aged Moroccan man. "It will never stop, maybe it will even get worse," adds a young man. A group of intimidating-looking youths chant: "Salih, Salih!" They want a different kind of justice. It sounds more like a call for revenge.

"Something needs to happen to shake up Germany," says Social Democratic parliamentarian Lale Akgün, quoting a phrase made famous by former President Roman Herzog. "We need, at long last, social policies that are based on acceptance, and we need a fundamental reform of both education and social policy," she says. Germans need foreigners and foreigners need Germans, she says.

FROM THE MAGAZINE

Find out how you can reprint this DER SPIEGEL article in your publication.
It's an opinion shared by demographers and labor market experts. If people aren't given the opportunity to get vocational skills and qualifications, there will be "mass unemployment with a simultaneous dearth of skilled labor," according to the Institute for Employment Research (IAB).
A study commissioned by the Bertelsmann Foundation has calculated that a lack of integration of immigrants in Germany has already cost the country €16 billion. Many immigrants are unemployed, earn less and pay smaller amounts of tax and social security contributions.

The protesters in Cologne's Kalk district know this and that's what makes the situation so explosive. There's a feeling of not getting a fair chance and of being disenfranchised.

Around a fifth of foreign children see themselves as being "strongly discriminated against" or "individually disadvantaged," according to a survey by the Germany Youth Institute (DJI) in Munich. More than half feel they are neither respected nor treated equally. "Those are strong opinions that they have formed based on their own experiences," says DJI researcher Jan Skrobanek.

"We're not welcome here," says 14-year-old Fatima from Kalk. She ostentatiously pulls down her headscarf to cover her face as she stands in front of Salih's photo. "After elementary school we all get shoved into the Hauptschule," she says, referring to the lowest level of Germany's three-tier high school system. "None of us go to Realschule (apprenticeship-track high school), only Germans go there," she says. Her three older siblings couldn't find a traineeship after finishing high school. Fatima doesn't believe her luck will be any better.

Experts agree that youth crime in Germany isn't an ethnic problem, but rather a social one. Immigrant children from middle-class families and those that do well in school generally aren't troublemakers. Those that manage to find an apprenticeship or a job have a "significantly smaller feeling of being disadvantaged," according to youth researcher Skrobanek.

"We have to do everything we can to lower the high proportion of 40 percent of young immigrants without vocational qualifications," Maria Böhmer, the German government's commissioner for integration affairs, announced recently.

The federal government wants to spend €350 million over the next three years to work toward that goal. An employer will receive a subsidy of at least €4,000 if they give an apprenticeship to an applicant that has already unsuccessfully applied for one. It's a beginning.

"But immigrants have to do their part as well," insists Social Democrat Lale Akgün. "They have to give up their attitude of rejection and join society."

In a survey carried out by the Center for Turkish Studies in Essen, one-third of immigrant parents admitted that they would have problems with a German son-in-law. Hence, not much can be expected from the older generation -- which makes the future prospects of the children that much worse.

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"Many children experience an inconsistency in the way that they are raised which they find very challenging," says Haci-Halil Uslucan from the University of Magdeburg. At home they might be raised in a patriarchal fashion that puts an emphasis on obedience, while at school they are taught self-responsibility, individual choice and equality. "This disconnect is extremely difficult to deal with," says Uslucan.
Anyone interested in establishing equal opportunities and preventing young immigrants from drifting into criminality has to start promoting language development and education as early as kindergarten, says economist and criminologist Horst Entorf.

Salih, the dead teen from Kalk, had never had any run-ins with the police. "He wanted to get his high school diploma," says his 23-year-old brother Abdallah, who is studying electronics. Abdallah was part of the street protests last week. But the more radical protesters made him uneasy.

A few days ago, the Moroccan consul general visited Abdallah and his parents. He explained to them that the police investigation had been carried out conscientiously. But Abdallah still wonders whether a foreigner would have been released so quickly.

[G M]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=511963&in_page_id=1770&in_page_id=1770&expand=true#StartComments

Asian PCs 'blocking crackdown on honour killings'
By MILES GOSLETT and DANIEL BOFFEY - More by this author »
Last updated at 13:56pm on 3rd February 2008
 Comments (15)

Some Asians in the police and in Government jobs have been accused of blocking the crackdown against so-called honour killings.
It is alleged they are not only failing to help desperate women trying to flee abuse and arranged marriages but are actively encouraging punishment for those they believe are breaking traditional taboos.

Terrified victims who seek official help are even being tracked down by a network of Asian men working in Government departments and social services, according to a study written by the think-tank Social Cohesion.

One woman was found by her family after she signed on at a Jobcentre where a member of the Asian community was working.

Scroll down for more


The study follows the horrific case of 20-year-old Banaz Mahmod whose body was found in a suitcase after she was raped and strangled with a bootlace by hitmen hired by her family

The report also claims some Asian police officers actually return women to their abusive families or refuse to act against men enforcing 'traditional' roles.

Meanwhile, non-Asian officials and police officers are scared of acting against families who abuse their relatives for fear of being branded as racist, the report says.

The study follows the horrific case of 20-year-old Banaz Mahmod, from Mitcham, South London, whose body was found in a suitcase after she was raped and strangled with a bootlace by hitmen hired by her family.

She was killed for falling in love with a man the family disapproved of – despite unsuccessfully asking police for help five times.

In one plea she recorded a video message that helped convict her father and uncle of her murder.

Controversially, the report accuses one of the Government's closest advisers on Muslim matters, the Muslim Council of Britain, of hampering attempts to criminalise forced marriage.

It said: "The MCB has sought to block legislation aimed at ending honour-based violence. Almost all women's groups interviewed for this report say that the MCB has done little or nothing to end honour-based violence...

"In many northern towns...South Asian women are often afraid to seek help because they know that Asians working in local government believe that women who break traditional taboos deserve to be punished."

Report contributor Nazir Afzal, of the Crown Prosecution Service, added: "Domestic violence is not an issue the Muslim Council of Britain wants to know about."

David Davies, the Tory MP for Monmouth who is on the Home Affairs Select committee investigating forced marriages and domestic violence, said: "Thousands of girls are being taken to Pakistan every year for marriage, although it is best described as abduction and rape."

James Brandon, one of the report's authors, said: "It is estimated that ten women a year in Britain die through honour killings and honour violence. The Government must change the way it approaches this problem."

The MCB said: "Our position has always been clear: so-called honour killings are murder. They are severe criminal offences which we condemn."

[Crafty_Dog]

Does anyone have any other info on the subject of this piece?  I'd like to have more than one source/one point of view on this:
=================

Can of Worms: Mufti Wants Moratorium on French Law Separating Church and State

From the desk of Tiberge on Fri, 2008-02-01 13:06
The mufti of the Paris mosque, Dalil Boubakeur, has dropped what amounts to a political and religious bomb. He proposes a moratorium on the French law of 1905 separating Church and State, because not enough mosques are being built in France.
Besides his position as mufti, he is the president of the CFCM (French Council of the Muslim Faith), an association officially established in 2003 thanks to the efforts of Minister of the Interior Nicolas Sarkozy.

Questioned by Le Monde, Mr. Boubakeur set forth the idea of a “moratorium of 10 to 20 years” on the 1905 law, which forbids all public funding of places of worship, so that Islam can “catch up” on its needs. “The associations that administer houses of worship need to be given air to breathe,” he says.
This has to be one of the most daring statements made yet by a Muslim leader in France. There are at least 1500 mosques and prayer rooms in France, 75 in Paris alone.
Dalil Boubakeur’s proposal to suspend the 1905 law has incensed France’s radical secularists, the advocates of “laïcité,” who see in his words a predictable maneuver, welcomed by the State and Churches alike, for the purpose of restoring the power of religion to all spheres of French life.

Militants of “laïcité” are convinced that Nicolas Sarkozy intends, through modifications to the existing law, to impose his view of the equality of all religions onto the French people, instead of maintaining the strict separation that has been enforced until recently when Islam came into the picture.

The blog Riposte Laïque writes:
Sarkozy, through his speeches in Rome and then in Ryadh rolled out the red carpet to the Churches, and someone had to go into the breach. This role fell to the freedom-destroying mufti of the Paris mosque, since Islam is the spear-head of this offensive.

Their fear, despite what they say about Islam, is of the return of Christianity, especially Catholicism, to the decision-making process of the government, as the following statements attest:
Furthermore, in Europe, 20 countries out of 25 are signatories of concordats with the Catholic Church. Now they want all of France to be aligned with those countries.

Riposte Laïque calls for a massive protest, first at the local level, then a march towards Paris. Among the organizations cited as participants in this protest are the Grand Orient of France (Freemasons) and the Ligue de l'Enseignement (League of Teachers).

Sarkozy has (knowingly?) opened a can of worms with his initiatives on religion. But the essential problem remains Islam. The advocates of “laïcité” seem to forget that there can be no separation of Church and State in Islam and that if Islam is going to be given privileges, it automatically means the end of the law of 1905. Sarkozy is banking on the fallacious notion of “equality” of religions and is throwing all religions together in the same arena to find a way of co-existing.

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/2927

[Crafty_Dog]

Second post on this.  The quality and accuracy of this source is unknown to me, but the subject matter seems important.
================

http://galliawatch.blogspot.com/2008/01/great-fear.html

Dalil Boubakeur's proposal to suspend the 1905 law separating Church and State has incensed the advocates of "laïcité" who see in his words a predictable maneuver, welcomed by the State and Churches alike, for the purpose of restoring the power of religion to all spheres of French life.

The following excerpts are taken from a long text posted at Riposte Laïque, a website of militants of "laïcité". Essentially, a coalition of left-leaning groups and individuals, they have the virtue of wanting to preserve intact the 1905 law separating Church and State. It isn't clear if they understand the true nature of Islam and its refusal of such a separation. What is clear is their intense hostility towards religion, and their firm belief that Nicolas Sarkozy intends, through modifications to the existing law, to impose his view of the equality of all religions onto the French people, instead of maintaining the strict separation that has been enforced until recently when Islam came into the picture.

(...) Why should Boubakeur have any qualms (about suspending the law)? Sarkozy, through his speeches in Rome and then in Ryadh rolled out the red carpet to the Churches, and someone had to go into the breach. This role fell to the freedom-destroying mufti of the Paris mosque, since Islam is the spear-head of this offensive.

(...) The ministers visit him (Boubakeur) during Ramadan, an obscurantist practice if ever there was one, to break the fast. They invite him to the television studios where, all the while claiming to favor "laïcité", he whimpers about discrimination towards Muslims. Sarkozy takes him along in his baggage when he goes to Algiers. There, Boubakeur listens enthralled to the French president who, in an incredible speech, denounces Islamophobia and anti-Semitism in the same breath.

As thanks for these good and loyal favors, Boubakeur plays the game expected of him by the powers-that-be and the Churches: he demands the end of the law of 1905.

Note: They come close to saying that it is a conspiracy by the government and the religions - i.e. a pre-planned plot to pave the way for the abolition of the law.

Their fear, despite what they say about Islam, is of the return of Christianity, especially Catholicism, to the decision-making process of the government, as the following statements attest:

In Europe through Article 15-1 of the new Treaty of Lisbon, which replaces the former Article 1-52, they want to render unavoidable the consultation of the Catholic Church before any political policy is adopted.

Furthermore, in Europe, 20 countries out of 25 are signatories of concordats with the Catholic Church. Now they want all of France to be aligned with those countries.

Note: I cannot comment on the above. I have not read the Treaty, nor am I familiar with the concordats.

But Catholicism is not their only fear:

(...) The Turkish Islamists who still intend to enter Europe feel that the moment has come. They are trying to end the ban on the Islamic veil, instituted by Mustapha Kemal, at the University.

The Protestants, among whom the Evangelicals are today in the majority, are patiently waiting for the French State to "tinker" with the law of 1905 that forbids the construction of houses of worship, in order to benefit from these derogations.

Movements such as the Church of Scientology, Jehovah's Witnesses, Raelians, and others are eager for these revisions so that they may be recognized fully as religions, and take advantage of the subsidies, fiscal exemptions and other privileges which are today forbidden by Article 2 of this accursed law.

In short, the stage is set, the scenario is soon to be played out.

Note: I know nothing about Raelians. I doubt that they pose a threat comparable to Islam.

The article goes on to call for a massive protest, first at the local level, then a march towards Paris. Among the organizations cited as participants in this protest are the Grand Orient of France (Freemasons) and the Ligue de l'Enseignement (League of Teachers):

Today is not the time to be timorous with those who prepared the way for Sarkozy and the concept of "open laïcité." Nor must we be divided in our ranks, whatever divergences may exist,

(...) We are convinced that the potential for mobilization by the French people around the concept of "laïcité" is intact. The citizens of this country are much more attached to the separation of the religious from the political than the elite is willing to believe.

Note: Sarkozy has (knowingly?) opened a can of worms with his initiatives on religion. But the essential problem remains Islam. The advocates of "laïcité" seem to forget that there can be no separation of Church and State in Islam and that if Islam is going to be given privileges, it automatically means the end of the law of 1905. Sarkozy, the Great Egalitarian, is banking on the fallacious notion of "equality" of religions and is throwing all religions together in the same arena to find a way of co-existing. His specific plans to modify the 1905 law will be the topic of future posts.

The image is of Liberty Leading the People, a famous painting from 1830 by Eugène Delacroix.




Labels: Christianity, Dalil Boubakeur, Islam, Laïcité, Religion

[Crafty_Dog]

The Coming Dhimmitude:

================

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Sharia law in UK is 'unavoidable'
BBC ^

Posted on 02/07/2008 6:03:54 AM PST by Sub-Driver

Sharia law in UK is 'unavoidable' The Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams says the adoption of Islamic Sharia law in the UK is "unavoidable".
Dr Williams told BBC Radio 4's World at One that the UK has to "face up to the fact" that some of its citizens do not relate to the British legal system.
Dr Williams argues that adopting some aspects of Sharia law would help maintain social cohesion.
For example, Muslims could choose to have marital disputes or financial matters dealt with in a Sharia court.
He says Muslims should not have to choose between "the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty".
In an exclusive interview with BBC correspondent Christopher Landau, ahead of a lecture to lawyers in London later on Monday, Dr Williams argues this relies on Sharia law being better understood. At the moment, he says "sensational reporting of opinion polls" clouds the issue.
He stresses that "nobody in their right mind would want to see in this country the kind of inhumanity that's sometimes been associated with the practice of the law in some Islamic states; states; the extreme punishments, the attitudes to women as well".
But Dr Williams says the argument that "there's one law for everybody... I think that's a bit of a danger".
"There's a place for finding what would be a constructive accommodation with some aspects of Muslim law, as we already do with some other aspects of religious law." Dr Williams adds: "What we don't want either, is I think, a stand-off, where the law squares up to people's religious consciences."

[Crafty_Dog]

Last updated at 16:32pm on 8th February 2008  Comments (16)
Sharia law "courts" are already dealing with crime on the streets of London, it emerged today.



The revelation came after the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, called for an "accommodation" with parts of the Islamic legal code in a speech which attracted widespread condemnation.


The Archbishop said parts of civil law could be dealt with under the sharia system but already some communities have gone much further - and it was revealed today that a teenage stabbing case among the Somali community in Woolwich had been dealt with by a sharia "trial".
 
Youth worker Aydarus Yusuf, 29, who was involved in setting up the hearing, said a group of Somali youths were arrested by police on suspicion of stabbing another Somali teenager.

The victim's family told officers the matter would be settled out of court and the suspects were released on bail.
A hearing was convened and elders ordered the assailants to compensate the victim.

"All their uncles and their fathers were there," said Mr Yusuf. "So they all put something towards that and apologised for the wrongdoing."

An Islamic Council in Leyton also revealed that it had dealt with more than 7,000 divorces while sharia courts in the capital have settled hundreds of financial disputes.

Today's revelations came as controversy raged over Dr Williams's call for parts of sharia law to be adopted in Britain.

His comments were condemned by Downing Street, the Tories and the chairman of the Government's Equalities and Human Rights Commission.
They were described as a "recipe for chaos" by Culture Secretary Andy Burnham.

Along with the Islamic Council in Leyton, there are reports of at least two other sharia courts sitting in London.
There are also courts in a number of other areas of the country with high Muslim populations, including Dewsbury in West Yorkshire, Birmingham and Rotherham, South Yorkshire.

Most are understood to concentrate on divorce cases - although such judgments are not recognised in British law - as well as financial disputes. Suhaib Hasan, a spokesman for the Islamic Sharia Council in Leyton, which was set up in 1982, said that he and his colleagues dealt with more than 200 cases a year, ranging from inheritance to marriage and divorce.

"From the beginning, people have wanted our services. More and more come back to us. Each month we deal with 20 cases," he said.

On its website, the Islamic Sharia Council warns those who use its services that the divorces it grants cannot invalidate a union under British civil law and advises that a separate civil divorce should be obtained. As well as giving advice on legal matters, such as inheritance, the website also gives general guidance on Muslim practices including the need for beards and the need for women to cover themselves in public.

It also covers issues such as whether women should train as doctors. It supports this as a "lesser evil", but suggests that training should take place at an all-female college and that future treatment should be given to "women only".

[Crafty_Dog]

Sharia law row: Archbishop is in shock as he faces demands to quit

The Archbishop of Canterbury was facing demands to quit last night as the row over sharia law intensified. Leading bishops publicly contradicted Dr Rowan Williams's call for Islamic law to be brought into the British legal system.  With the Church of England plunged into crisis, senior figures were said to be discussing the archbishop's future.

One member of the church's "Cabinet", the Archbishop's Council, was reported as saying: "There have been a lot of calls for him to resign. I don't suppose he will take any notice, but, yes, he should resign."

Officials at Lambeth Palace told the BBC Dr Williams was in a "state of shock" and "completely overwhelmed" by the scale of the row.  It was said that he could not believe the fury of the reaction. The most damaging attack came from the Pakistan-born Bishop of Rochester, the Right Reverend Michael Nazir-Ali.  He said it would be "simply impossible" to bring sharia law into British law "without fundamentally affecting its integrity".  Sharia "would be in tension with the English legal tradition on questions like monogamy, provisions for divorce, the rights of women, custody of children, laws of inheritance and of evidence. This is not to mention the relation of freedom of belief and of expression to provisions for blasphemy and apostasy."

The church's second most senior leader, Archbishop of York Dr John Sentamu, refused to discuss the matter. But he has said sharia law "would never happen" in Britain.  Politicians joined the chorus of condemnation, with Downing Street saying British law should be based on British values. Tory and LibDem leaders also voiced strong criticism.

Even prominent Muslims were rounding on Dr Williams. Shahid Malik, Labour MP for Dewsbury, said: "I haven't experienced any clamour or fervent desire for sharia law in this country. "If there are people who prefer sharia law there are always countries where they could go and live." Khalid Mahmood, Labour MP for Birmingham Perry Bar, rejected the idea that British law forces Muslims to choose between their religion and their society. He said: "This will alienate people from other communities because they will think it is what Muslims want - and it is not."

The Muslim Council of Britain came to Dr Williams's aid, however, describing his comments in a lecture to lawyers and a BBC interview as "thoughtful".

But Oxford University Islamic scholar Professor Tariq Ramadan admitted: "These kinds of statements just feed the fears of fellow citizens. I really think we, as Muslims, need to come up with something that we abide by the common law and within these latitudes there are possibilities for us to be faithful to Islamic principles."

The archbishop is likely to come under heavy fire next week at a meeting of the Church's General Synod.  Liberal and feminist critics have been appalled by the thought of sharia law while evangelical opponents believe Dr Williams has failed to defend Christianity.

The archbishop was already battling intractable difficulties within the church over gay rights, a row which began nearly five years ago and has brought him criticism from all sides. Later this year he has to face a conference of hundreds of bishops from around the world which threatens further bitter division.  Dr Williams's opponents on the conservative evangelical wing - who resent his liberal beliefs on issues such as gay rights - were suggesting last night that the archbishop is finished.

The Reverend Paul Dawson of the Reform group of around 500 clergy said: "We are very sad that he does not seem to be able to articulate a clear Christian vision for Britain. It is true to say that there is a lot of dissatisfaction."

Dr Williams defended himself in a Lambeth Palace statement saying he had been trying to "tease out" the issue.  The archbishop had said it could help build a better and more cohesive society if Muslims were able to choose to have marital disputes or financial matters, for example, dealt with in a sharia court. The adoption of some elements of sharia law "seems unavoidable".

But the statement insisted: "The archbishop made no proposals for sharia, and certainly did not call for its introduction as some kind of parallel jurisdiction to the civil law." 

Even fellow bishops, however, think this is precisely what Dr Williams did say.

Bishop of Southwark Tom Butler, a liberal who would normally be expected to defend Dr Williams, said the archbishop had been entering a minefield and added: "It will take a great deal of thought and work before I think it is a good idea."

He was more blunt in a circular to clergy in his diocese, saying he had yet to be convinced of the feasibility of incorporating any non-Christian religious law into the English legal system.

[Crafty_Dog]

TURKEY: ASSIMILATION IS A CRIME, ERDOGAN TO GERMAN TURKS
(ANSAmed) - BERLIN, FEBRUARY 11 - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan added yesterday fuel to the fire of the polemics recently sparked off in Germany on the integration of the Turkish immigrants in the country, warning the German Turkish community against an excessive adaptation to the national culture. "Assimilation is a crime against humanity", Erdogan said in Cologne, during his visit in Germany, in front of an audience of 16,000 people, the majority of whom Turkish immigrants. Erdogan's proposal to open schools of Turkish language in Germany also to favour the integration of the Turkish immigrants in the country was strongly criticised recently by the German political world. Leader of conservative party CSU, Erwin Huber, said that if the proposal were launched, it would be a poison for integration and would lead to the creation of ghettos, as well as to the establishment of a mini-Turkey in Germany. Yesterday Erdogan said that it is important to learn German, however he underlined that the Turkish language could not be neglected, in order to protect the Turkish students from the challenge to maintain their identity and their culture. (ANSAmed).

[Crafty_Dog]

'Osama bin London' groomed 21/7 bombers

By Duncan Gardham, Security Correspondent
Last Updated: 4:40pm GMT 26/02/2008

The missed opportunities in relation to the July 21 bombers can be disclosed today following the conviction of one of the most senior terrorist recruiters in Britain - a man who called himself "Osama bin London".

Street preacher Mohammed Hamid - who once told young Muslims the 52 deaths in the July 7 attacks on London were "not even breakfast to me" - groomed the would-be suicide bombers under the noses of watching police, security services and even the BBC.

Hamid, 50, who is believed to have met senior al-Qa'eda figures in Afghanistan, organised a series of training camps in the New Forest, the Lake District, and Scotland and paintballing sessions in Berkshire and Kent to train his followers.

He also held regular Friday prayer meetings at his home in Clapton, East London, where he would urge Muslims to attack non-believers.

All four of the failed suicide bombers of July 21 attended his meetings and Hamid ran an Islamic bookstall on Oxford Street with Muktar Ibrahim, the leader of the July 21 gang.

He was spoken to by police on three other occasions before July 2005 at his Oxford Street stall and on eight separate occasions afterwards - but was not arrested until September 2006, more than a year after the July attacks, after an undercover policeman infiltrated his group.

The 50-year-old was found guilty of organising terrorist training camps and encouraging Muslims to murder non-believers at the end of a four-month trial at Woolwich Crown Court.

Police first observed the July 21 bombers being put through their paces in the Lake District at one of Hamid's camps on May 2, 2004 - more than a year before they launched their failed attacks on London's transport system.

Following a tip off, a Cumbrian officer out fell running came across a group of 20 Asian men training in Great Langdale as Hamid barked orders.

Special Branch was called in to photograph the group and close-up surveillance pictures showed all four of the men who went on to attack London on July 21 the following year.

Hamid's home in Hackney, East London was subsequently put under surveillance and four weeks later, on May 29, he was seen collecting another group together to return to Great Langdale.

Once again the fell-running officer located them in the Lake District and this time the surveillance was left to Cumbrian police who saw the group "holding branches or sticks as though they were carrying rifles".

The case was handed over to MI5 but their agents brought the wrong camera equipment when they turned up in August 2004 because they were not expecting the group to be there again. They shot just 11 minutes of footage across three days, however the film once again included Muktar Ibrahim.

One former Royal Marine Commando watched the group as they performed press-ups, sit-ups, an anti-ambush drill and "leopard crawling," moving low and flat along the ground.

But the three-man surveillance team seemed to take a relaxed approach to the operation, at one point signing off on the camera: "And what a lovely view it is."

Also there were Hamid's co-accused Kibley da Costa, 24, Mohammed Al-Figari, 42, and Kader Ahmed, 20. They have been found guilty of attending terror camps in the New Forest and at a Berkshire paintballing centre.

Hamid was also joined in his teachings by Atilla Ahmet, 43, the self-styled emir of the gang, who admitted three charges of soliciting murder at the start of the trial.

Ahmet was Abu Hamza's right-hand man at Finsbury Park Mosque and took control of his notorious Supporters of Shariah group after his arrest in 2004.

During Hamid's trial, the court heard how he and Muktar Ibrahim set up a stall selling Islamic literature outside Debenhams department store in Oxford Street and how, in October 2004, both men were arrested following a disturbance at the stall.

Police called to reports of three men blocking the pavement with a trestle table stacked with religious books found they refused to move and started to abuse the black and Asian officers when they were threatened with arrest.

The officers had to call for assistance and as Hamid was handcuffed and dragged to the police van he told the officers: "I've got a bomb and I'm going to blow you all up."

At the police station Hamid gave his name as Osama bin London and was only identified after a fingerprint check which showed up his extensive criminal record for theft and burglary. Ibrahim ran from police and was only stopped when a member of the public tripped him up. However, he failed to turn up at Horseferry Road Magistrates Court because he had travelled to Pakistan where it is thought he learned how to make the bombs for July 21.

Perhaps the ultimate irony came courtesy of a BBC documentary called "Don't Panic I'm Islamic" broadcast in June 2005. Hamid was recruited from his stall on Oxford Street to represent the acceptable face of modern Islam.

He was filmed, along with co-accused Mohammed al-Figari and 14 other men at a paintball centre in Tonbridge, Kent where they were seen ducking behind oil barrels and shooting at cut out figures before lining up to pray at the end of the day.

The documentary was shot in February 2005 at the Delta Force centre because it was convenient for the TV crew but Hamid's group returned four days before the July 7 attacks, this time bringing with them Ramzi Mohammed and Hussain Osman, who went on to launch failed attacks on July 21.

The producer returned to talk to Hamid as the July 21 gang were on the run and said he admitted knowing them and was "agitated, concerned, and worried", but the producer claimed her bosses took the decision not to notify the police.

Hamid exchanged 155 calls and text messages with the four July 21 bombers, including one message sent to Hussain Osman on the evening of July 7, in which he used the alias Al-Quran and wrote: "Assalam bro, we fear no-one except ALLAH, we will not change our ways, we are proud to be a Muslim an we will not hide. 8pm Friday at my place, be there food and talk, AL-QURAN."

He also sent Mohammed and Osman a text on the night of July 21 and attempted to ring both of them the following day.

Co-accused Kader Ahmed and Kibley da Costa also made attempts to contact the men in the two days after the attacks.

Hamid, assisted by Ahmet, was said to be a "recruiter, groomer and corrupter of young Muslims."

Both men talked of shedding blood to implement sharia [Islamic law] and suggested Parliament as a target, with Ahmet saying: "The House of Parliament, the big people, the MPs, the police, the army, the city slickers are all halal [permitted]."

MI5 put a recording device in Hamid's home in September 2005 and in April 2006 an undercover officer managed to join the group after approaching Hamid at his stall in Oxford Street.

The officer, codenamed Dawood, joined Hamid at his home for his Friday meetings and went with the group on camping weekends in the New Forest and an Islamic school in Sussex.

At a meeting at his house on June 16 2006, he told his followers they were "Soldiers of Allah" who were "fighting for sharia".

"The whole aspect is for you to get shahada [martyred] for you to be shaheed [martyr]," he added.

Hamid and Kibley da Costa, 24, of West Norwood, south east London, were also found guilty of providing training for terrorism. Mohammed al-Figari, 42, of Tottenham, north London, and Kader Ahmed, 20, of Plaistow, east London, were found guilty of receiving terrorist training.

Two further members of the gang, Mohammed Kyriacou, 19, and Yassin Mutegombwa, 23, admitted attending terrorist training camps, it can be reported today after restrictions were lifted.

Property manager Mousa Brown, 41, was cleared of providing and receiving weapons training and has been freed from custody.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main...526.xml&page=1

[G M]

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23450679-details/MI5%20targets%20four%20Met%20police%20officers%20'working%20as%20Al%20Qaeda%20Spies'/article.do

MI5 TARGETS FOUR MET POLICE OFFICERS 'WORKING AS AL QAEDA SPIES'
Last updated at 22:37pm on 09.03.08
 Add your view
 

Warning: Terror moles reportedly work in the Met

Four police officers in Britain's top force are reportedly under close secret service surveillance after being identified as Al Qaeda spies, it emerged today.
MI5 are said to have homed in on the the "sleeper" agents passing secrets from Scotland Yard to the terror group only in recent weeks.
The suspected spies are believed to have used methods similar to those employed by the IRA in the 1970s as they infiltrated the police and the Army in Northern Ireland.

Bombed: Police began searching for spies after July 7 attacks

All four are understood to be Asians living in London and are feared to have links both with Islamic extremists in Britain and worldwide terror groups - including al-Qaeda training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
MI5 chiefs reportedly believe the suspected moles have been planted as sleepers - agents under deep cover - to keep al-Qaeda informed of anti-terror raids planned by London's Metropolitan Police.
They are said to fear the four could have already accessed sensitive information about secret operations to root out terror cells planning further attacks in the UK.
Scotland Yard refused to discuss allegations that a sleeper cell of al Qaida spies is being kept under secret service surveillance after infiltrating the Metropolitan Police.
According to the News of the World, in the past few weeks MI5 agents have identified four officers suspected of passing secrets from the force.
All four are allegedly Asians living in London and are feared to have links with Islamic extremists in Britain and worldwide terrorist organisations.
MI5 bosses reportedly fear the moles may have been planted to keep al Qaida informed of anti-terror raids, and may have already accessed sensitive information about ongoing operations.
Secret service agents are said to be monitoring the suspects, who work at different London police stations. A Yard spokesman said: "All police officers and police staff, upon joining the Metropolitan Police Service and during their careers undergo a range of security checks.
"These are robust and vary accordingly to the type and sensitivity of the individual postings.
"We take matters of security very seriously and if any issues arise about individuals, they may be subject to further assessment.
"This could lead to restrictions being put in place relating to where an individual may work within the organisation or could lead to their dismissal."
"If there are people within the police force feeding information to terror groups this needs to be stopped.
"Since the names came to light there has been a non-stop effort to find out everything about their backgrounds."
The officers' names apparently emerged during a low-profile investigation into police force infiltration which has been going on since the July 2005 London bombings.
Last year MI5 believed there were up to eight police staff—uniform and civilians with links to extremist groups.
Now agents, helped by anti-terror police, are understood to be watching the four suspects - who work at different police stations around London - around the clock while searching for the vital evidence needed to make arrests.
The officers' every move at work is being monitored along with their phone calls, it was claimed.
Homeland security agents are reportedly sifting through their bank account transactions.
MI5 experts are also understood to be building a family tree for each one and trying to put together a picture of their links to their home countries.
Their names are being cross-referred with lists of men who have been to terror training camps in Pakistan or Afghanistan.
What is clear is that the infiltration methods used by the officers under suspicion bear hallmarks of the IRA in the past.
The police source said: "The IRA tried to infiltrate and they succeeded to a certain extent.
"By just slipping under the radar it takes suspicion away from you.
"If you are a young Pakistani of English origin and you feel you want to do something for the cause of Islam, what better way than to join the enemy and attack from within?"
MI5 believes other sleeper cells are trying to infiltrate public services across Britain in order to gain vital intelligence.
Even exiled cleric Omar Bakri has revealed how Islamic extremists were working at the heart of the NHS and other vital services.
Failed asylum seeker Omar Altimimi was jailed for nine years last July for keeping manuals on detonating car bombs.
Before his conviction he had applied to work as a cleaner for Greater Manchester police.
Numbers of officers from ethnic minorities have risen since the Met was accused of being institutionally racist in the Stephen Lawrence public inquiry report.
MP Patrick Mercer, Tory terrorism advisor, said: "This discovery by MI5 comes as no surprise to me.
"Recruiting ethnic people into key public sector organisations - in place to protect us - is a risk.
"Our vetting procedures have to be toughened before it's too late."

[Crafty_Dog]

Its the NY Times, so the tone of the piece is what you would expect.  Still some worthy point to be gleaned.
===================

LLEIDA, Spain — As prayer time approached on a chilly Friday afternoon and men drifted toward the mosque on North Street, Hocine Kouitene hauled open its huge steel doors.

As places of worship go, the crudely converted garage leaves much to be desired, said Mr. Kouitene, vice president of the Islamic Association for Union and Cooperation in Lleida, a prosperous medieval town in northeastern Spain surrounded by fruit farms that are a magnet for immigrant workers. Freezing in winter and stifling in summer, the prayer hall is so cramped that the congregation, swollen to 1,000 from 50 over the past five years, sometimes spills onto the street.

“It’s just not the same to pray in a garage as it is to pray in a proper mosque,” said Mr. Kouitene, an imposing Algerian in a long, black coat and white head scarf. “We want a place where we can pray comfortably, without bothering anybody.”

Although Spain is peppered with the remnants of ancient mosques, most Muslims gather in dingy apartments, warehouses and garages like the one on North Street, pressed into service as prayer halls to accommodate a ballooning population.

The mosque shortage stems partly from the lack of resources common to any relatively poor, rapidly growing immigrant group. But in several places, Muslims trying to build mosques have also met resistance from communities wary of an alien culture or fearful they will foster violent radicals.

Distrust sharpened after a group of Islamists bombed commuter trains in Madrid in March 2004, killing 191 people, and in several cities, local governments, cowed by angry opposition from non-Muslims, have blocked Muslim groups from acquiring land for mosques.

The result, Muslim leaders say, is that some Muslims feel anchorless and marginalized.

“A proper mosque would act as a focus, a reference point for Islam here,” said Mohammed Halhoul, spokesman for the Catalan Islamic Council. A quarter of Spain’s Muslims live in Catalonia, the northeastern region that is home to Lleida, but the area has no real mosques.

“I feel like a Catalan,” Mr. Halhoul said, “except when it comes to the question of the mosque.”

Muslims ruled much of Spain for centuries, but after they were ultimately vanquished in the 1400s, their mosques were either left to ruin or converted into churches. Since then, fewer than a dozen new mosques have been built to serve Spain’s Muslim population, which has grown in the past 10 years to about one million from about 50,000 as immigrants have poured into the country.

That rise has coincided with a decline in church attendance in overwhelmingly Catholic Spain, giving new echo to an old rivalry between the two religions. It was the Catholic king and queen, Ferdinand and Isabella, who defeated the last Moorish ruler in Spain in 1492 and oversaw the expulsion of Jews and Muslims. Now, as churches struggle to draw a dwindling flock, Muslim prayer halls are overflowing.

“The reality of this country has changed much faster than that of other countries,” Ángel Ros, Lleida’s mayor, said in an interview. “A process that took 30 years in Italy or France has taken 10 years in Spain.”

Lleida is a case in point: a city whose 13th-century cathedral looms from a fortified hilltop over plains that produce half of Spain’s pears and apples, it has drawn a flood of immigrants. They now make up nearly a fifth of the city’s 125,000 residents, compared with 4 percent in 2000. A quarter of them are from Muslim countries. Friday, the Muslim day of prayer, has replaced Saturday as a day off in addition to Sunday on many local farms.

The North Street prayer hall faced opposition from the outset. Marta Roigé, head of the local neighborhood association, said residents tried to block it five years ago by renting the garage themselves, but backed down after the landlord started a bidding war. They have since sued the local council to close it down on the basis that it is a health and safety hazard.



-----------------

“The tension has grown as the numbers have grown,” Ms. Roigé said. “They’ve set up shops, butchers, long-distance call centers and restaurants.” These businesses, catering to Muslim immigrants, line the surrounding streets.

Skip to next paragraph
 
The New York Times
The immigrant population has soared recently in Lleida.
She added: “They are radicals, fundamentalists. They don’t want to integrate.”

Muslim leaders, however, say the lack of proper mosques is one barrier to integration. And Spanish authorities and Muslim leaders say the potential for extremism would be easier to monitor at fewer, larger mosques than at the 600 or so prayer halls scattered throughout the country.

Some Muslim leaders believe the tide is starting to turn in their bid to return minarets to Spanish skylines. Following a pact between the Islamic Association and Lleida’s town hall in December, the city may become the first in Catalonia to build a mosque.

The association secured a 50-year lease on a plot of government land on the edge of town, and Mr. Kouitene says the group hopes to break ground next year if it can raise the money.

Several other Muslim communities are on the verge of similar breakthroughs. In the southern city of Seville, Muslims are close to obtaining a plot of land for a mosque after years of bitter local resistance; in 2005 protesters dumped a pig’s head on a plot originally chosen.

Meanwhile, the ruling coalition in Catalonia submitted a bill in the regional parliament in December that would oblige local governments to set aside land for mosques and other places of worship. Representatives of Muslim organizations hope it will inspire a similar national law.

“People are realizing the world has changed and they can’t look the other way,” said Mohammed Chaib, a member of the Catalan parliament and the only Muslim lawmaker in Spain.

Some Catholic clerics see things differently. Cardinal Luis Martínez Sistach, archbishop of Barcelona, opposes the bill, which would entitle all religious groups to land on an equal basis. He argues that Catholicism requires different rules.

“A church, a synagogue or a mosque are not the same thing,” he said, according to the conservative Spanish newspaper ABC. The bill, he said, “impinges on our ability to exercise a fundamental right, that of religious liberty.”

While no law on religious land use exists, the wealthy Catholic Church faces no difficulty acquiring land, experts in law and religion say.

Álex Seglers, an expert on church-state relations, is skeptical that the bill will be effective. The bill is vague and gives local governments too much discretion over what land it provides to which group, he says.

For the worshipers at North Street, the next big hurdle is money. Spain’s secular state cannot finance religious buildings, though it has a special arrangement to subsidize the Catholic Church.

“We have a saying in our religion,” Mr. Kouitene said. “Anywhere there are even a few Muslims, you must build a mosque for joint prayer. Otherwise, the devil rules in that place.”

Mayor Ros, for one, welcomes the building.

“We used to have a dominant religion, and now we have many religions and we have to find a way of respecting that fact,” he said. “Churches were the great public works of the Middle Ages and of the Renaissance. Now I see a day when every large city in Spain will have a mosque.”

[Crafty_Dog]

March 16, 2008

Asian youths in 'faith hate' attack on priest


Kevin Dowling

An Anglican priest is in hospital after he was beaten up and insulted in what appears to be a “faith hate” assault by Asian youths.

Canon Michael Ainsworth, 57, was kicked and punched in the head and left with deep cuts, bruising and two black eyes in the grounds of his historic church in east London after he asked three Asian youths there to be quiet.

The attack at the 18th-century St George in the East Church in Stepney follows a number of apparently anti-Christian attacks in recent months in the same area.

Alan Green, area dean for Tower Hamlets, said: “It was a nasty cowardly attack. There were several groups in the churchyard and two from one group attacked him and the other group came and helped him back to the house.

“He was kicked and punched in the head as he lay on the ground, I believe that what was shouted was ‘you ********** priest’ before they attacked him.”

A Metropolitan police spokesman said: “The suspects are Asian . . . and the incident is being investigated as an alleged faith hate crime.”

The church had previously been targeted when a brick smashed a window during a service. Allan Ramanoop, a member of the parochial church council, said: “On one occasion, youths shouted: ‘This should not be a church, this should be a mosque, you should not be here’.

“The youths are anti-Christian. It’s terrible what they have done to Canon Ainsworth. We’ve never had violence like that before.”
A parishioner raised the alarm after the attack on March 5, but the youths had fled by the time police arrived.

The church was consecrated in 1729 and designed by Nicholas Hawksmoor, a pupil of Sir Christopher Wren. It was severely damaged during the blitz but rebuilt in the 1960s.

Ainsworth was discharged from hospital but has now gone back in. Yesterday, he was visited in St Bartholomew’s hospital by his wife Jan, who is also a priest as well as being the Church of England’s chief education officer.

She said her husband was concerned publicity about the attack could fuel inter-faith tensions. “He does not want the level of fuss and attention. I think he feels it’s quite difficult in the local area.”
The Met recorded an upsurge in attacks against Muslims after the July 2005 bombings in London. There are also numerous attacks against Jews but, according to police statistics, relatively few Christians are attacked because of their faith.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/com...cle3559768.ece

[Crafty_Dog]

 When you read the Sun story below make sure you click on the link to view the pictures.
A MUSLIM bus driver told stunned passengers to get off so he could PRAY.
Published: 29 Mar 2008
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article976258.ece
Video: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article976258.ece
By ALEX PEAKE and ANDY CRICK
The white Islamic convert rolled out his prayer mat in the aisle and knelt on the floor facing Mecca. Passengers watched in amazement as he held out his palms towards the sky, bowed his head and began to chant.
One, who filmed the man on his mobile phone, said: “He was clearly praying and chanting in Arabic.
“We thought it was a wind-up at first, like Jeremy Beadle.”
The 21-year-old plumber added: “He looked English and had a London accent. He looked like a Muslim convert, with a big, bushy beard.
“Eventually everyone started complaining. One woman said, ‘What the hell are you doing? I’m going to be late for work’.”
After a few minutes the driver calmly got up, opened the doors and asked everyone back on board.
But they saw a rucksack lying on the floor of the red single-decker and feared he might be a fanatic. So they all refused.
The passenger added: “One chap said, ‘I’m not getting on there now’.
“An elderly couple also looked really confused and worried.
“After seeing that no-one wanted to get on he drove off and we all waited until the next bus came about 20 minutes later. I was left totally stunned. It made me not want to get on a bus again.”
The bizarre event unfolded on the number 81 in Langley, Berkshire, at around 1.30pm on Thursday.
The passenger said he rang the bus firm to complain but claimed it did not believe him.
He said: “They asked me, ‘Are you sure?’. Then they said they would get back to me, but they weren’t taking me seriously at all.”
Yesterday the driver, who said his name was Hrun, told The Sun: “I asked everyone to get off because I needed to pray. I was running late and had not had time.
“I pray five times a day as a Muslim — but I don’t normally ask people to get off the bus to do it.”
Muslims pray at pre-dawn, noon, afternoon, sunset and evening.
A spokesperson for bus company London United said: “We are aware of a reported incident involving our route 81.
“We are currently undertaking a full investigation into the matter.”

[Crafty_Dog]

The Heathrow Plot Trial: Retrospection and Implications
April 9, 2008
Graphic for Terrorism Intelligence Report

By Fred Burton and Scott Stewart

The trial of eight men accused of participating in a 2006 plot to bomb a series of airline flights began April 3 in London. The men are charged with conspiracy to commit murder and preparing acts of terrorism in connection with the plot, which allegedly called for using liquid explosives to bring down at least seven planes flying from London’s Heathrow Airport to cities in the United States and Canada.

The trial is expected to last several months, but several interesting facts already have emerged regarding the plot and the people accused of participating in it. Although a considerable amount of media attention has been focused on the revelation that two Air Canada flights (one to Montreal and one to Toronto) were among the first seven flights targeted — the others were United Airlines flights to Washington, Chicago and San Francisco, and American Airlines flights to Chicago and New York — perhaps the most interesting revelation has been the alleged role of Mohammed Gulzar.

Gulzar reportedly flew into the United Kingdom in July 2006 using a fraudulent identity. His means of travel and his role in the conspiracy suggest he was an operational commander who had been sent from abroad to assist the grassroots plotters with their attack plans. The involvement of an operational commander sent by the al Qaeda core leadership and charged with working with grassroots operatives to orchestrate an attack is what we consider the al Qaeda 1.0 operational model.

When combined with other indicators, Gulzar’s role and travel pattern seem to confirm the involvement of the al Qaeda core leadership in the plot. The participation of the core organization sheds new light on the behavior of the core al Qaeda leaders in 2006, and gives us some insight into plots they might still be planning.
Recurrent Themes

As we noted after the Heathrow plot came to light, the scheme shared several themes with other thwarted or successful al Qaeda plots, including the choice of aircraft as targets, the notion of multiple, simultaneous strikes and the use of modular improvised explosive devices, which would have been smuggled aboard the aircraft in carry-on luggage. Moreover, whoever was involved in planning the operation shared al Qaeda’s penchant for “thinking big.”

As originally conceived, al Qaeda’s 2001 “planes operation” was to involve the simultaneous hijackings of 10 aircraft departing from both the East and West Coasts of the United States. Nine of the aircraft were to be either blown up in-flight or slammed into targeted buildings. The 10th plane was to be landed at a U.S. airport and, after all the adult male passengers were killed, a speech was to be delivered outlining al Qaeda’s grievances with the United States. Al Qaeda’s apex leaders — Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and Mohammed Atef — eventually agreed to a scaled-down version of the planes operation involving four aircraft, which was carried out Sept. 11, 2001.

The West Coast portion of the plan was spun off as a separate operation that was to have occurred in October 2001, but which reportedly was postponed several times for various reasons. This operation, also known as the Library Tower Plot, was compromised and disrupted in 2002.

These themes also were evidenced in the plot to bomb American Airlines Flight 63 in December 2001. In that plan, Richard Reid successfully smuggled his “shoe bomb” aboard the aircraft. The attempt failed only because Reid tried to light the bomb’s fuse in the passenger cabin (rather than a more secluded area, such as a restroom) and was stopped by a flight attendant and passengers.

The 2006 Heathrow plot, however, bears the strongest resemblance to Operation Bojinka, which Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, along with his nephew Abdel Basit, helped to plan and finance while living in Manila, the Philippines, in the mid-1990s. The tactical similarities include the targeting of multiple U.S.-flagged aircraft traveling to the United States, the use of modular explosive devices — which were to be assembled in-flight after operatives accessed their carry-on baggage — and the use of liquid explosives.

The scope of the Heathrow plot also highlights another theme common in al Qaeda plots: a tendency to think big. This theme, which was reflected in the original planes operation and in Bojinka, was also the undoing of al Qaeda attacks such as the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the Millennium Bomb Plot and an attempted strike against the USS The Sullivans off the coast of Yemen in January 2000. Indeed, the scope of the Heathrow plot and the need to include many people in its execution is likely what opened the door for a British government informant to penetrate the group and learn of the plans.
Mohammed Gulzar

A close look at the details emerging from the trial of Gulzar and the seven other suspects also reveals other recurring themes, including the use of document fraud. Gulzar entered the United Kingdom on July 18, 2006, using a fraudulent South African passport in the name of Altaf Ravat. He reportedly was traveling with his new wife and, in order to secure a visa, alleged that he was on his honeymoon. The pair even spent a couple of days in Mauritius after leaving South Africa in order to make the honeymoon cover appear more convincing. As a British citizen, Gulzar had the right to a British passport and thus could have traveled to the United Kingdom using his own identity. The only reason to commit document fraud was to conceal his identity.

As seen in past cases involving operational commanders such as Basit and Ahmed Ressam, it is fairly common for operational commanders to commit passport fraud. In fact, recovered al Qaeda operation manuals encourage using fraudulent documents to hide one’s identity, enter a country illegally or continue to stay in a country after a legitimate visa has expired. Basit had more than a dozen aliases that we know of, including the well-known fraudulent Iraqi passport in the name of Ramzi Yousef — the name by which many people still mistakenly refer to him. Gulzar’s use of South Africa as a source of fraudulent documents and a transit point to Europe also exemplifies a trend we have been watching for some time now.
=========
When British police arrested Gulzar on Aug. 9, 2006, he told them his name was Altaf Ravat and produced his South African documents. It was only after running fingerprint checks that they determined — two days after his arrest — that he really was a British citizen named Mohammed Gulzar. When questioned by police, Gulzar admitted he was not on his honeymoon, though he then said he was a missionary with the Tablighi Jamaat and was in the United Kingdom on a proselytizing mission.

As seen in past attacks — the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the attack on the USS Cole, the East Africa embassy bombings and others that followed the al Qaeda 1.0 operational model — the operational planner does not intend to be killed or captured. He flees and lives to fight another day. In operations in which an operative plans to be killed, such as 9/11 and the July 7, 2005 London attacks, there is no need for him to hide his true identity. Gulzar’s use of a fraudulent identity suggests he intended to flee after the attack. This theory is supported by the fact that British authorities recovered a number of videotapes containing the wills and suicide declarations of various members of the alleged cell, but they did not recover such a video featuring Gulzar.
Fitting the Pieces Together

Hindsight is a wonderful thing and when we use it to plug the 2006 Heathrow plot into the big picture of al Qaeda behavior during that time, we can begin to make some assumptions as to the extent of the core leadership’s involvement.

According to court testimony, the British government began to monitor many of the men allegedly involved in the plot shortly after the July 7, 2005 London attacks. It also has been reported that, like Mohammed Siddique Khan, several of the men involved in the 2006 plot had traveled to Pakistan and received training at jihadist camps. It also appears that Gulzar was sent by the core al Qaeda leadership to London in July 2006 to supervise the execution of this plot. Judging from past cases, Gulzar’s preparation for the travel to London likely began several months prior to his actual arrival in the United Kingdom. Also judging from past cases, a plan of this magnitude, involving so many aircraft, almost certainly would have to have been approved by the al Qaeda apex leadership. The leadership probably also provided the funding for the operation, including the more than $271,000 in cash the group reportedly paid for the flat they purchased in London, where the improvised explosive mixtures were to be manufactured.

If those assumptions are indeed true, then this plot may very well be one of the operations Osama bin Laden was referencing in his Jan. 19, 2006, message when he said, “The delay in similar operations happening in America has not been because of failure to break through your security measures. The operations are under preparation and you will see them in your homes the minute they are through (with preparations), with God’s permission.”

The preparations for this attack also had picked up momentum by mid-2006 when the al Qaeda core leadership was undertaking what we referred to at the time as a media blitz. Indeed, just as the traffic from this blitz was beginning to slow down, As-Sahab released a video titled, “Will of the Knights of the London Raid (Part 2),” which contained the last will of London bomber Shehzad Tanweer. This video was released one day before the anniversary of the July 7 attacks and 12 days before Gulzar arrived in the United Kingdom.

Nine days after Gulzar’s arrival, and two weeks before the arrests were made, As-Sahab released a video featuring al-Zawahiri. The backdrop featured three large photographs: one of Mohammed Atef (al Qaeda’s senior military chief who was killed in Afghanistan in late 2001), one of 9/11 operational commander Mohammed Atta and one of the burning World Trade Center towers.

In the video, al-Zawahiri discussed a lecture Atef gave in 2000 to al Qaeda trainees about Palestine. According to his recounting, Atta — who was among the trainees — asked, “What is the way to defeat the attack on Palestine?” Al-Zawahiri supplied his own answer in the video, saying the nation that produced the 19 “who shook America” is “capable of producing double that number.”

It could be a coincidence that a large plot involving aircraft — nearly twice as many as were hijacked on 9/11 — was thwarted only two weeks after this video surfaced. But we are not big believers in coincidence — nor do we believe there are obvious (or even hidden) messages in every al Qaeda message. However, to our minds the July 27 tape was a clear message meant to be viewed in retrospect — that al Qaeda was behind the Heathrow airline plot.
The Continuing Fixation

More than anything, the current trial is a reminder of three things. First, had the first wave of attacks successfully taken down the planes, it would have been very difficult to determine how the explosive devices had been smuggled aboard the aircraft. This means it is entirely possible the same tactic would have been used in subsequent waves of attacks.

Second, for some reason in 2006 the al Qaeda leadership’s eagerness for a spectacular attack appears to have trumped their perceived need for moderation. It was the moderation of people like Mohammed Atef that reined in the enthusiasm of the group’s idealists (men such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed) and caused them to scale down the 2001 planes operation to less than half its original size — a measure that improved operational security and assisted in the 9/11 plot’s eventual success.

Finally, al Qaeda remains fixated on aircraft as targets and, in spite of changes in security procedures since 9/11, aircraft remain vulnerable to attack.

[Crafty_Dog]

Second post of the day:

Children Told they are Dogs during Mosque Visit

THE HAGUE, 09/04/08 - A primary school in Amsterdam wished to provide its pupils with an understanding for other cultures. But during a visit to a mosque, the children were told they were dogs.

With a view to developing understanding and respect for other cultures among children, primary school De Horizon regularly organises outings to various religious organisations. The chairman of the El Mouchidine mosque told the children from group 7 (aged 10) and their chaperones however that non-Muslims are dogs.

In a letter to the children's parents, the school expresses its regret at the incident: "We are shocked that during the guided tour, the mosque's chairman told the children and chaperoning parents that non believers were dogs. We consider this statement as unacceptable since we allow our children to partake in this project to develop respect for freedom of religious choice".

In the meantime, the school's management has addressed the mosque on the undesirable behaviour of the chairman. Both parties will say nothing further on the matter. "We will resolve the matter amongst ourselves and I have no inclination whatsoever to discuss the matter with the media", as newspaper De Telegraaf quoted the school's spokesperson Mariet ten Berge. "We have been to the mosque before and it always went well".

Angry parents had sent the letter on to De Telegraaf but were reportedly rapped on the knuckles by the school's management. "The school wishes to play this down. That is precisely the problem", as one mother commented.

http://www.nisnews.nl/public/090408_2.htm

[Crafty_Dog]

http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/20...de-out-of.html


Quote:
In 2006 Church of England officials contemplated giving Saint George the boot from his perch as Patron Saint of England because he was too offensive for modern day Muslims.

Now, British officials have cancelled an annual St. George's Day Parade in Bradford in fear that Muslims will riot. Many of the youngsters had already made flags of St George to carry in the parade on April 23, which was designed to boost community cohesion. 

[Crafty_Dog]

German Court Rules Muslim Girl Can't Skip Swimming Lessons

Thursday , May 08, 2008

A German court on Wednesday ruled that a Muslim student cannot skip co-ed swimming lessons because her religion prohibits form-fitting clothes that do not cover her body, The Local reported.

The 12-year-old girl’s parents sued a school in the northern city of Remscheid after it refused to let the girl skip the lessons. The court sided with the school, saying that the state’s responsibility to educate the girl outweighed an infringement on her religious freedom.

Last year the girl’s parents rejected an offer from the school saying she could swim in leggings and a T-shirt. They argued that her body still would be visible through wet clothes, The Local reported.

The court concluded that because the swim lessons take place in water, there would be very little time that her body would be seen.
The parents’ attorney said the family will appeal the decision.

Click here to read more on this story from The Local.
====================================

German Court Rules Christian Girl Can't Skip Sharia Law Thursdays

Thursday , May 08, 2012
A German court on Wednesday ruled that a Christian student cannot skip Sharia Law Thursdays where all of the female students must dress in Burkas and pray towards Mecco 5 times a day in an effort to teach all non-muslim children religious diversity and tolerance, despite the fact her religion prohitbs worshipping false gods, The Local reported.

The 12-year-old girl’s parents sued a school in the northern city of Remscheid after it refused to let the girl skip the lessons. The court sided with the school, saying that the state’s responsibility to educate the girl outweighed an infringement on her religious freedom.

Muslim students, of course, still do not have to learn about Christianity or Judaism, because those religions are offensive to muslims, and they could burn in Allah's Fires if they should emulate Infidels.

(Requesting URL on this one)

[G M]

http://hotair.com/archives/2008/06/01/british-cop-warns-christians-leafletting-in-muslim-areas-is-a-hate-crime/

British cop warns Christians: Leafletting in Muslim areas is a “hate crime”
POSTED AT 9:16 PM ON JUNE 1, 2008 BY ALLAHPUNDIT   


Well, no. Not yet, anyway.

The preachers, both ministers in Birmingham, were handing out leaflets on Alum Rock Road in February when they started talking to four Asian youths.

A police community support officer (PCSO) interrupted the conversation and began questioning the ministers about their beliefs.

They said when the officer realised they were American, although both have lived in Britain for many years, he launched a tirade against President Bush and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan…

“He said we were in a Muslim area and were not allowed to spread our Christian message. He said we were committing a hate crime by telling the youths to leave Islam and said that he was going to take us to the police station.”…

West Midlands Police, who refused to apologise, said the incident had been “fully investigated” and the officer would be given training in understanding hate crime and communication.

Funny how British cops keep “misunderstanding” hate crimes laws. I have some legal training myself and after reading this story from April, I’d say the cop here has a pretty firm handle on where the law is headed. Spend some time with that last link and see how far down the road they already are. In America, as far as I know, hate crimes constitutionally can only be charged in connection with another criminal offense. You can’t be charged with hate; you can be charged with assault and have your sentence enhanced if they prove the assault was motivated by hate. Thoughtcrime + actual crime = hate crime, in other words. In the U.K., it sounds like they’re flirting with knocking out that pesky “actual crime” element and just going the whole nine Orwellian yards.

Exit quotation, per the cop: “You have been warned. If you come back here and get beaten up, well you have been warned.” They’re being silenced for their own safety, you see, and if that “logic” sounds distressingly familiar, well, it should. (Bonus nuance: As longtime HA readers know, the cop’s worries about this sort of thing being especially unwelcome in Birmingham are not necessarily unfounded.)

[Crafty_Dog]

Islamic extremists to get therapy not jail in Government's new 'anti-radicalisation' plan

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Last updated at 3:53 PM on 03rd June 2008

Islamic extremists could receive counselling instead of criminal charges under new Government plans to 'deradicalise' religious fanatics issued today.

The move is part of a £12.5m Home Office plan which give councils guidance about how to prevent extremism spreading.

People who fall under the influence of violent organisations will not automatically face prosecution under the new plan.

Instead it will concentrate on a national 'deradicalisation' programme that will try to persuade extremists to change their views through therapy and counselling from community groups.

The scheme will seek to reverse the process of indoctrination carried out by al Qaida-related extremists, using unnamed 'specialised techniques'.

Community groups and councils in England and Wales will get cash from a £12.5m fund to implement the new measures.
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said: 'The national security challenges we face demand fresh approaches.

'A key element of our strategy aims to stop people getting involved in extremist violence.

'We are investing at local level to build resilient communities, which are equipped to confront violent extremism and support the most vulnerable individuals.'

However the plan came in for criticism for being pointless.

Shadow home secretary David Davis said of today's publication: 'This is pointless when the Government is fuelling the problem it is seeking to solve with its draconian approach to 42 days.'

Ms Smith is facing a battle with MPs to extend the time police can hold terror suspects without charge from 28 days to 42 days.

The 72-page plan also said councils should make sure they have systems to remove funding or other support from inappropriate groups.

Councils should ask police to vet anyone involved in projects that receive government anti-radicalisation funding, it urged.

However local groups that challenge the messages of violent extremists should be supported, it went on.

If a group is found to be promoting violent extremism, local agencies and the police should consider disrupting or removing funding, and deny access to public facilities, the document added.

The measures on 'de-radicalisation' are based on examples overseas and on a scheme in Leicester which 'aims to encourage young people to feel more valued and to eradicate myths and assumptions which lead to young people becoming alienated and disempowered'.

Communities Secretary Hazel Blears said: 'Preventing violent extremism is about supporting local people to build resilient communities where extremists and their messages of hate cannot take root.

'Nationally and locally there is a growing alliance against violent extremism. A majority of individuals and organisations are working together to prevent radicalisation and extremism in a small minority of communities.

'We are putting funding where it is needed and today's new guidance sets out our clear expectations around what local authorities and their partners should achieve.

'Local leadership is vital and it is those people that know their communities best - community leaders, local authorities, police and schools - who, with support from government, provide the key to tackling this issue.

'Whilst no-one pretends it is easy we are already seeing some fantastic work including projects working with some of the most vulnerable young people, work to strengthen governance in mosques and the capacity of imams and Muslim women beginning to take a stronger role.'

A Home Office spokesman said the maps referred to in today's strategy document were already being drawn up.

They would not focus only on Muslim extremism but 'anywhere prone to extremist talk and violent behaviour,' he said.

'This is not an anti-Muslim document,' he said. 'It will cover denominations of all faiths.'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...tion-plan.html

[Crafty_Dog]

 Brit Secretary, says sidelining of Christianity is 'common sense'

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hazel Blears, Communities Secretary, says sidelining of Christianity is 'common sense'

By George Pitcher and Jonathan Wynne-Jones
Last updated: 1:17 PM BST 09/06/2008

It is "common sense" for Christianity to be sidelined at the expense of Islam, a Government minister claimed on Sunday.

Hazel Blears, the Communities Secretary, defended Labour’s policy on religion after a report backed by the Church of England claimed that Muslims receive a disproportionate amount of attention.

She said it was right that more money and effort was spent on Islam than Christianity because of the threat from extremism and home-grown terrorism.

Ms Blears told BBC Radio 4’s Sunday programme: “That’s just common sense. If we’ve got an issue where we have to build resilience of young Muslim men and women to withstand an extremist message.”

She added: “We live in a secular democracy. That’s a precious thing. We don’t live in a theocracy, but we’ve always accepted that hundreds of thousands of people are motivated by faith. We live in a secular democracy but we want to recognise the role of faith.”

The Church of England bishop responsible for the report, the Rt Rev Stephen Lowe, Bishop for Urban Life and Faith, said afterwards: “She said we live in a secular democracy. That comes as news to me – we have an established Church, but the Government can’t deal with Christianity.”

As The Daily Telegraph reported on Saturday, the landmark report commissioned by the Church and written by academics at the Von Hugel Institute accuses ministers of paying only “lip service” to Christianity and marginalising the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches, while focusing “intently” on Islam.

However Malaysia’s Prime Minister warned yesterday that Muslim extremism in Britain will grow unless the Government and society learn to understand Islam.

Abdullah Badawi claimed that the legacy of Britain’s imperial past has hampered its ability to appreciate its Islamic population.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, the prime minister urged Gordon Brown to allow the country’s Muslims to live under Islamic law, but also said that they must prove their worth to society.

Mr Abdullah argues that the Government must do more to ensure Muslims do not feel discriminated against if it is to tackle the rise of radicalism.

“The failure to understand Muslims is driving a divide between the communities,” he said.

“Gordon Brown must encourage a better understanding because Britain must appreciate its Muslims.”

Mr Abdullah argued that Britain needs to come to terms with being home to immigrants from countries that it used to rule over.

“The British Empire expanded in Asia, everywhere, throughout the Muslim land, through the land of Hindus and the land of Buddhists.

“When they were ruling it was different because they wanted it to be peaceful and to keep it peaceful they had to use diplomacy.”

He said that Muslims in Britain were more likely to be radicalised because they feel ignored rather than due to religious reasons.

“Is it because of poverty, social unrest, deprivation, feeling discriminated against, thinking people don’t care much because of the colour of their skin?”

Mr Abdullah, who was talking on the eve of a landmark summit of world leaders, echoed the calls of the Archbishop of Canterbury earlier this year for Muslims to be able to live under sharia.

The Malaysian Prime Minister also acknowledged that Muslims must also play their part in proving their value as immigrants.

“If they want to be respected then they must do something for the community,” he said.

“They must not be a liability. They have to be an asset.”

Story from Telegraph News:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/news...-sense%27.html

[Crafty_Dog]

For Muslim women in Europe, a medical road back to virginity

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For Muslim women in Europe, a medical road back to virginity
By Elaine Sciolino and Souad Mekhennet Published: June 10, 2008

PARIS: The surgery in the private clinic off the Champs-Élysées involved one semicircular cut, 10 self-dissolving stitches and a discounted fee of $2,900.
But for the patient, a 23-year-old French student of Moroccan descent from Montpellier, the 30-minute procedure represented the key to a new life: the illusion of virginity.
Like an increasing number of other Muslim women in Europe, she had a "hymenoplasty," a restoration of her hymen, the thin vaginal membrane that normally breaks during the first act of intercourse.
"In my culture, not to be a virgin is to be dirt," said the student, perched on a hospital bed as she awaited surgery Thursday. "Right now, virginity is more important to me than life."
As Europe's Muslim population grows, many young Muslim women find themselves caught between the freedoms that European society affords and the deep-rooted traditions of their parents' and grandparents' generations.
Gynecologists report that in the past few years, more Muslim women are asking for certificates of virginity before marriage.

That trend in turn has created a demand among cosmetic surgeons for hymen replacements, which, if done properly, they say, will not be detected and will produce tell-tale vaginal bleeding on the wedding night. The service is widely advertised on the Internet; there are medical tourism packages to countries like Tunisia where the procedure is less expensive.
"If you're a Muslim woman growing up in more open societies in Europe, you can easily end up having sex before marriage," said Hicham Mouallem, a doctor in London who performs the surgery. "So if you're looking to marry a Muslim and don't want to have problems, you'll try to recapture your virginity."

There are no reliable statistics on how many women undergo the procedure because it is mostly done in private clinics and in most cases is not covered by tax-financed insurance plans.
But the subject of hymen repair is becoming so talked about that it has become the subject of a film comedy that opens in Italy this week. "Women's Hearts," as its title is translated in English, tells the story of a Moroccan-born woman living in Italy who takes a road trip to Casablanca for the operation.
"We realized that what we thought was a sporadic practice was actually pretty common," said Davide Sordella, the director. "These women can live in Italy, adopt our mentality and wear jeans. But in the moments that matter, they don't always have the strength to go against their culture."

The issue has been particularly charged in France, where there has been a renewed and fierce debate about a prejudice that was supposed to have been buried with the country's sexual revolution 40 years ago: the importance of a woman's virginity.
The furor followed the revelation two weeks ago that a court in the northern city of Lille had annulled the 2006 marriage of two French Muslims after the groom discovered his bride was not the virgin she had claimed to be.
The domestic saga has gripped the nation. The bridegroom, an unidentified engineer in his 30s, left the nuptial bed and announced to the still-partying wedding guests that his bride had lied about her past. She was delivered that night to her parents' doorstep.
The next day, he asked a lawyer to annul the marriage. The bride, then a nursing student in her 20s, confessed the truth to the court and agreed to an annulment.
In its ruling, there was no mention of religion. Rather, it cited breach of contract, concluding that he had married her after "she was presented to him as single and chaste."
In secular, republican France, the case touches on several sensitive subjects: the intrusion of religion into daily life, the grounds for dissolution of a marriage and the equality of the sexes.
There were calls in Parliament this week for the resignation of Rachida Dati, the minister of justice, after she upheld the ruling. Dati, who is a Muslim, backed down and ordered an appeal.
Some feminists, lawyers and doctors warned that the court's acceptance of the centrality of virginity in marriage would encourage more French women from Arab and African Muslim backgrounds to have their hymens rebuilt. But there is much debate over whether the procedure is an act of liberation or repression.
"The judgment was a betrayal of France's Muslim women," said Elizabeth Badinter, a feminist writer. "It sends these women a message of despair by saying that virginity is important in the eyes of the law. More women are going to say to themselves: 'My God, I'm not going to take that risk. I'll recreate my virginity."'
The plight of the rejected bride persuaded the Montpellier student to go ahead with the surgery.
She insisted that she had never had intercourse and said that she had discovered her hymen was torn only when she tried to obtain a certificate of virginity to present to her boyfriend and his family.
She said she had bled after an accident on a horse when she was 10.
The trauma of realizing that she could not prove her virginity was so intense, she said, that she quietly took out a loan to pay for the procedure.
"All of a sudden, virginity is important in France," she said. "I realized that I could be seen like that woman everyone is talking about on television."

Surgeons who perform the procedure said they were empowering their patients by giving them a viable future and preventing them from being abused - or even killed - by their fathers or brothers.

"Who am I to judge?" asked Marc Abecassis, the plastic surgeon who restored the Montpellier student's hymen. "I have colleagues in the United States whose patients do this as a Valentine's present to their husbands. What I do is different. This is not for amusement. My patients don't have a choice if they want to find serenity - and husbands."
A specialist in what he calls "intimate" surgery, including penile enhancement, Abecassis says he performs two to four hymen restorations a week.
The French College of Gynecologists and Obstetricians opposes the hymen procedure on moral, cultural and health grounds.
"We had a revolution in France to win equality; we had a sexual revolution in 1968 when women fought for contraception and abortion," said Jacques Lansac, the association's president. "Attaching so much importance to the hymen is regression, submission to the intolerance of the past."
But the stories of the women who have had the surgery capture the complexity and raw emotion behind their decision.
One 32-year-old Macedonian-born Muslim said that she had chosen the surgery to avoid being punished by her father after her relationship with her boyfriend of eight years ended.
"I was afraid that my father would take me to a doctor and see whether I was still a virgin," said the woman, who owns a small business and lives on her own in Frankfurt. "He told me, 'I will forgive everything, but not if you have thrown dirt on my honor.' I wasn't afraid he would kill me, but I was sure he would have beaten me."

In other cases, the woman and her partner together decide on the surgery. A 26-year-old French woman of Moroccan descent said she lost her virginity four years ago when she fell in love with the man she was now planning to marry. She and her fiancé decided to share the cost of her $3,400 hymen replacement surgery in Paris.
His extended family in Morocco is very conservative, she said, and required that a gynecologist - and family friend - in Morocco examine her for proof of virginity before their wedding.
"It doesn't matter for my fiancé that I am not a virgin, but it would pose a huge problem for his family," she said. "They know that you can pour blood on the sheets on the wedding night, so I have to have better proof."
Meanwhile, the lives of the young French couple whose marriage was annulled are on hold. The Justice Ministry has asked the Lille prosecutor for an appeal, arguing that the court decision "provoked a heated social debate" that "touched all citizens of our country and especially women." At the Islamic Center of Roubaix, the suburb of Lille where the marriage took place, there is sympathy for the woman.
"The man is the biggest of all the donkeys," said Abdelkibir Errami, the center's vice president. "Even if the woman was no longer a virgin, he had no right to expose her honor. This is not what Islam teaches. It teaches forgiveness."

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/06/...ope/virgin.php

[G M]

At the Islamic Center of Roubaix, the suburb of Lille where the marriage took place, there is sympathy for the woman.
"The man is the biggest of all the donkeys," said Abdelkibir Errami, the center's vice president. "Even if the woman was no longer a virgin, he had no right to expose her honor. This is not what Islam teaches. It teaches forgiveness."

**This is why you see muslims oppose honor killings with such fervor around the world, right?**

/a cricket chirps in the distance/

[G M]

**Two questions: How do you say "right of return" en espanol? When do we stop posting this in "Islam in europe" and post articles like this in "Islam in Islamic countries"?**

- Pajamas Media - http://pajamasmedia.com -

Spain, the Once and Future Muslim Province
June 9, 2008 - by Aaron Hanscom

It’s a miracle Matthew Yglesias made it out of Spain alive in 2006. The young blogger described the dangers he confronted on his Spanish vacation in a [1] piece he wrote for the American Prospect shortly after his return to America:

The modern city [of Toledo] features a large traffic circle just outside the medieval town walls known as the glorieta de la reconquista in honor of this distinction. But today in a new ironic twist, it is from that very plaza where the Mullahs issue their fatwas that the craven Spanish government, having chosen the path of appeasement, invariably follows. Toledo’s women, who only in the recent past enjoyed basic legal equality with men albeit in the context of a culture that was highly traditionalistic by American standards, now fear to walk the streets unveiled. Spain’s historic wine industry groans under the crushing yoke of the Islamists’ informal power, the riojas of the past but a fading memory.

Yglesias was obviously writing with tongue firmly planted in cheek. The joke, of course, was on conservative pundits in America, who had predicted devastating consequences in the wake of the March 11 Madrid bombings and the subsequent electoral victory of Socialist José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. “Appeasement,” it turned out, hadn’t enabled Muslims to reconquer Granada and avenge the Moors’ loss of Al-Andalus in 1492 following more than 700 years of Islamic rule. Spain, Yglesias argued, had instead become a paragon of liberalism, with positions on gay marriage and women’s rights that America “should be so lucky as to have.” Two years after Zapatero fulfilled a campaign promise and pulled Spanish troops from Iraq, Spaniards were living in a socialist utopia — not under sharia law.

Although Muslim extremists surely appreciate some of Zapatero’s policies — he granted the largest [2] blanket amnesty in Spanish history to nearly one million undocumented immigrants and thought it wise to [3] negotiate with the Basque terrorist group ETA — their idea of paradise is quite different from those of Spain’s “[4] accidental prime minister.” Critics such as Matthew Yglesias seem unaware that jihadists will not rest until the caliphate is reestablished on the Iberian Peninsula because they feel compelled to reconquer any country or territory that has at one time been under the domain of Islam. Spain is the most important of these lands because it was the largest Christian territory conquered in Europe and it represented the summit of Islamic civilization. The loss of Al-Andalus was therefore the most important loss ever suffered by the Ummah (the community of Muslims). Thus, freeing Spain from an illegal and illegitimate occupation by infidels would prove that all other Islamist goals can be achieved.

Nostalgia for an idealized Al-Andalus is being passed on to the next generation. Gustavo de Aristegui, the foreign affairs spokesman for the conservative Popular Party, explains in his book [5] The Jihad in Spain: The obsession to reconquer Al-Ándalus that, in schools throughout the Muslim world, maps are used with Spain and Portugal colored green because they are still considered part of dar al-Islam, or the House of Islam. The HAMAS children’s magazine Al-Fateh published a [6] piece in 2006 from the point of view of Asbilia or — as the infidels call it — Seville: “I yearn that you, my beloved, will call me to return, together with the rest of the lost cities of the lost orchard [Andalus] to the hands of the Muslims so that joy and happiness will fill my land, and you will visit me because I am the bride of the country of Andalus.”

Unfortunately, it’s not only terrorists in the making who are being told to reclaim Spain. Osama bin Laden has made many references to “the tragedy of Al-Andalus,” and Ayman Al Zawahiri, Al-Qaeda’s number two man, never misses an opportunity to mention the “lost paradise.” He’s not pining for a Mediterranean vacation and the sandy beaches of Marbella, though. Last year he [7] exhorted Islamists in North Africa “to once again feel the soil of Al Ándalus beneath your feet.” In case that wasn’t clear enough, he later released a videotape in which he says that “the reconquest of Al-Andalus is a responsibility” of all Muslims.

Many are doing their best to live up to that responsibility. More than 300 Islamist suspects have been arrested in counterterrorism operations in Spain since the Madrid bombings. Most recently, twelve Pakistanis were [8] arrested in January for allegedly planning suicide bombings in Barcelona’s subways. Meanwhile, rhetoric about the reconquest of Ceuta and Melilla (Spanish enclaves on the North African coast) is common among jihadists. For example, Zawahiri responded to the arrests of 11 individuals for planning to stage terrorist attacks in Ceuta by referring to Ceuta and Melilla as “occupied cities.” No wonder former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer once warned that if by any chance Israel were to fall and be defeated, the next in line would definitely be Spain.

Some Spanish politicians often seem eager to move Spain up to the front of that line. Zapatero, who has [9] said that “sexual equality is a lot more effective against terrorism than military strength,” appointed a pregnant woman as defense minister in April. According to PJM’s [10] Jose Guardia, this move was meant to symbolize Spain’s new role as a soft power. At least the primer minister isn’t prepared to start giving away land. Representatives of the Cordoba and Seville City Councils signed a document in 2004 that states that Ceuta and Melilla are occupied territories that need to be returned to their legitimate owners. In 2007 the small left-wing party, Izquierda Unida, backed a call for [11] preferential citizenship for descendants of Spanish Muslims expelled from Spain in the seventeenth century. Such a policy would be less disturbing if there wasn’t already an active “foot in the threshold” strategy being employed by irredentist Muslims. Aristegui explains that the “purchase of land, houses and commercial properties in some of the most emblematic cities of the former Al-Andalus…[is]the first step towards dominating the city, the region and eventually, all Al-Andalus.”

It’s worth remembering that the terrorist cell responsible for the Madrid bombings called itself “[12] the brigade situated in Al-Andalus.” Since March 11, 2004, Spanish security forces have successfully broken up plots to blow up such locations as Real Madrid’s soccer stadium and Madrid’s Audiencia Nacional — the highest criminal court where Islamic cases are investigated. But, as former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar has [13] noted: “Islamic terror is not just a criminal activity. It’s something more. To win over terror we will need much more than just intelligence or police actions. We will need more than defensive measures.” Of course, Spaniards made clear that they prefer appeasement to this uncomfortable truth when they voted Aznar’s party out of power in 2004.

So could Spain could once again fall under Islamic rule? I asked this question to Aristegui in a 2006 [14] interview. “I don’t think so, but the fight will become more difficult and extensive because Spanish society today is not willing or ready to accept the threat we face,” he told me. In other words, Spain might not always remain an ideal vacation destination — even for Matthew Yglesias.

Article printed from Pajamas Media: http://pajamasmedia.com

URL to article: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/spain-the-once-and-future-muslim-province/

URLs in this post:
[1] piece: http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?articleId=11371
[2] blanket amnesty: http://spainreview.org/?p=146
[3] negotiate: http://www.city-journal.org/2008/18_2_basque_terrorists.html
[4] accidental prime minister: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article691019.ece
[5] The Jihad in Spain: The obsession to reconquer Al-Ándalus: http://www.casadellibro.com/fichas/fichabiblio/0,1094,2900001086733,00.html?codigo=2900001086733
[6] piece: http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=BA2D868F-BDCB-429A-8432-E83343375FF9
[7] exhorted: http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=031907C
[8] arrested: http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL19433678
[9] said: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,901040927-699350,00.html
[10] Jose Guardia: http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/20/europe/madrid.php
[11] preferential citizenship: http://africa.reuters.com/wire/news/usnL21935313.html
[12] the brigade situated in Al-Andalus.: http://www.lawrencewright.com/art-madrid.html
[13] noted: http://www.jcpa.org/brief/brief005-23.htm
[14] interview: http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=715C1193-821F-47F0-8332-1FA10C86CEB6

[Crafty_Dog]

Muslims outraged at police advert featuring cute puppy sitting in policeman's hat

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 12:15 PM on 01st July 2008

A postcard featuring a cute puppy sitting in a policeman's hat advertising a Scottish police force's new telephone number has sparked outrage from Muslims.

Tayside Police's new non-emergency phone number has prompted complaints from members of the Islamic community.

The choice of image on the Tayside Police cards - a black dog sitting in a police officer's hat - has now been raised with Chief Constable John Vine.

The advert has upset Muslims because dogs are considered ritually unclean and has sparked such anger that some shopkeepers in Dundee have refused to display the advert.

Dundee councillor Mohammed Asif said: 'My concern was that it's not welcomed by all communities, with the dog on the cards.

'It was probably a waste of resources going to these communities.

'They (the police) should have understood. Since then, the police have explained that it was an oversight on their part, and that if they'd seen it was going to cause upset they wouldn't have done it.'

Councillor Asif, who is a member of the Tayside Joint Police Board, said that the force had a diversity adviser and was generally very aware of such issues.

He raised the matter with Mr Vine at a meeting of the board.

The chief constable said he was unaware of the concerns and that the force had not sought to cause any upset but added he would look into the matter.

Councillor Asif said: 'People who have shops just won't put up the postcard. But the police have said to me that it was simply an oversight and they did not seek to offend or upset.'

Cards featuring police dog-in-training Rebel have been distributed to communities throughout the area to advertise the single number point of contact for non-emergency calls to the police.

Rebel has proved a popular recruit for Tayside Police after coming through the very first Lothian and Borders Police dog-breeding programme in February.

One of seven German Shepherd pups born in early December, he has now completed his course of inoculations, and is free to venture out onto the streets of Tayside.

A spokesman for Tayside Police said: 'Trainee police dog Rebel has proved extremely popular with children and adults since being introduced to the public, aged six weeks old, as Tayside Police's newest canine recruit.

'His incredible world-wide popularity - he has attracted record visitor numbers to our website - led us to believe Rebel could play a starring role in the promotion of our non-emergency number.

'We did not seek advice from the force's diversity adviser prior to publishing and distributing the postcards. That was an oversight and we apologise for any offence caused.'

Find this story at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...emans-hat.html

[G M]

The correct response was "If ye dinna like tha wee doggie, gah fock yuirself".

[Crafty_Dog]

Sharia law SHOULD be used in Britain, says UK's top judge

By Steve Doughty
Last updated at 8:07 PM on 03rd July 2008

The most senior judge in England tonight gave his blessing to the use of sharia law to resolve disputes among Muslims.

Lord Chief Justice Lord Phillips said that Islamic legal principles could be employed to deal with family and marital arguments and to regulate finance.

He declared: 'It is possible in this country for those who are entering into a contractual agreement to agree that the agreement shall be governed by a law other than English law.'

In his speech in an East London mosque Lord Phillips signalled approval of sharia principles as a means of settling disputes so long as no punishments that conflict with the established law are involved, and as long as divorces are made to comply with the civil law.

But his remarks - which give the green light from the highest judicial office to the informal sharia courts already operated by numerous mosques - provoked a storm of criticism.

Lawyers warned that family and marital disputes settled by sharia could leave women or vulnerable people at a serious disadvantage.

Tories said that equality under the law must be respected and warned that outcomes incompatible with English law should never be enforceable.

Lord Phillips spoke five months after Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams surrounded himself in controversy with a lecture in which he suggested Islamic law could have official status and that it could govern marital law, financial transactions and arbitration in disputes.

The Lord Chief Justice said today of the Archbishop's views: 'It was not very radical to advocate embracing sharia law in the context of family disputes.'

He added that there was 'widespread misunderstanding as to the nature of sharia law'.

Lord Phillips said: 'Those who in this country are in dispute as to their respective rights are free to subject that dispute to the mediation of a chosen person, or to agree that the dispute shall be resolved by a chosen arbitrator.

'There is no reason why principles of sharia law or any other religious code should not be the basis for mediation or other forms of alternative dispute resolution.'

Lord Phillips said that any sanctions must be 'drawn from the laws of England and Wales'. Severe physical punishment - he mentioned stoning, flogging or the cutting off of hands - was 'out of the question' in Britain, he said.

'So far as aspects of matrimonial law are concerned, there is a limited precedent for English law to recognise aspects of religious laws, although when it comes to divorce this can only be effected in accordance with the civil law of this country,' he said

The signal of approval for voluntary sharia tribunals brought protests from lawyers who fear that in some Islamic communities women do not have a full and equal say and that they could be disadvantaged in supposedly voluntary sharia arrangements.

Barrister and human rights specialist John Cooper said: 'There should be one law by which everyone is held to account.

'I have considerable concerns that well-crafted and carefully designed laws in this country, drawn up to protect both parties including the weak and vulnerable party in matrimonial break-ups could be compromised.

'I have concerns over a system of law that may cause one party to be disadvantaged.'

Resolution, the organisation of family law solicitors, said people should govern their lives in accordance with religious principles 'provided that those beliefs and traditions do not contradict the fundamental principle of equality on which this country’s laws are based.'

Spokesman Teresa Richardson said religious law 'must be used to find solutions which are consistent with the basic principles of family law in this country and people must always have redress to the civil courts where they so choose.'

Robert Whelan of the Civitas think tank said: 'Everybody is governed by English law and it is not possible to sign away your legal rights.

That is why guarantees on consumer products always have to tell customers their statutory rights are not affected.

'There is not much doubt that in traditional Islamic communities women do not enjoy the freedoms that women in this country have had for 100 years or more.

'It is very easy to put pressure on young women in a male-dominated household.

'The English law stands to protect people from intimidation in such circumstances.'

Tories warned that principles of equality under the law must be respected.

Shadow Home Secretary Dominic Grieve said: 'The Lord Chief Justice correctly points out that there is a tradition in this country of allowing mediation to take place subject to other legal principles as long as it is voluntary and not subject to coercion, and with outcomes which are not fundamentally incompatible with our own legal principles.

'Any that are incompatible cannot and should never be enforceable.

'One of the key aspects of our free society in Britain is equality under our own laws. It is important that this should be understood and respected by all in our country.'

A spokesman for Jack Straw's Ministry of Justice said: 'English law, which is based on our shared values of equality and a respect for the rule of law, takes precedence over any other legal system.

'The Government has no intention of changing this position. Alongside this it is possible for other dispute resolution systems on matters of civil law to be accommodated, so long as they are not in conflict with the laws of England and Wales and are abided by on a voluntary basis.'

BRIEFING: SHARIA LAW

* Sharia law is based on the Koran, on associated teaching about the life of the Prophet Mohammed, and on the judgements of Islamic clerics and lawyers down the centuries.
* It is in essence a set of religious principles by which Muslims are required to live. Sharia is interpreted and enforced differently in different countries across the Islamic world.
* Islamic law is often regarded as having four parts: how Muslims should worship; commerce; crime and punishment; and marriage and divorce.
* Sharia says forbidden behaviour, like drinking alcohol and taking drugs, or adultery, should be punished. Islamic scholars say the Koran sets down punishments such as lashes or stoning for adultery.
* Sharia law also permits behaviour not allowed by English law, for examply polygamy, which in some jurisdictions says men may have up to four wives.
* In Britain, sharia courts are often operated by mosques. Muslim families come to sharia courts for justice and agree to be bound by their rulings.
* They have no formal legal status.
* There are around 1.6 million British Muslims, most of whom are of Pakistani origin. The strongest Muslim communities are in London, especially in the East London borough of Tower Hamlets where Lord Phillips spoke yesterday, Birmingham, Yorkshire and Lancashire.
* Orthodox Jews operate Beth Din courts which are subordinate to the civil law and which decide issues among 180,000 people according to ancient Jewish law. They are regulated by the Chief Rabbi. A divorcing Jewish couple first divorce in the civil courts, then come to the Beth Din tribunals for religious judgement.
* The only religious courts in England with full and official legal status are the consistory courts and tribunals which decide disputes and disciplinary matters in the Church of England.

[G M]

Anyone still want to argue this is "nothing to worry about"?

[Crafty_Dog]

2nd Terror Suspect Released in Britain
NY" Times
By JOHN F. BURNS
Published: July 4, 2008
LONDON — A 45-year-old Algerian described by American prosecutors as the mastermind of an abortive plot to bomb Los Angeles International Airport during millennium celebrations in 1999 has been released on tight bail conditions after seven years in British jails, court officials said Thursday.

The release of the unnamed Algerian is the second time in a little more than two weeks that a suspect named by prosecutors as having close ties to Osama bin Laden, but not charged, has been let out on bail in Britain pending a final court ruling on government deportation proceedings.

In June, a 47-year-old Palestinian with Jordanian citizenship, described as having had a major ideological influence within Al Qaeda’s European ranks, was released after seven years in jail. That suspect, known by the alias Abu Qatada, was placed under house arrest for 22 hours a day.

British officials said the bail conditions for the Algerian would be similar. In addition to being allowed to leave his home for only two hours a day, mainly for mosque visits, Abu Qatada is required to wear electronic monitoring devices, and barred from having guests, access to the Internet or a mobile phone. He is also forbidden to receive guests or to meet with people outside his home.

In some instances, terrorist suspects held in Britain without being charged have the right not to be named publicly. In the Algerian’s case, this has meant that he has been identified by court officials only by a code name, “U.”

But American prosecutors previously identified him in court papers by an alias, Abu Doha. British newspapers have said he was born in Algeria in 1963 and captured in 2001 at Heathrow Airport in London while trying to board a flight to Saudi Arabia with a false passport.

The release of the two men has highlighted the problems the British authorities face as they try to curb what they have acknowledged as a large and growing Islamist terrorist underground in Britain. Despite volumes of intelligence information implicating the Algerian and Abu Qatada amassed by British and American investigators, and by the authorities in their own countries, British officials say that attempts to build indictments against them have been frustrated by a lack of detailed evidence that would stand up in court.

The other option, seeking to deport the two men to their homelands, has been blocked by British judges on the grounds that the men may be subjected to torture at home, or to prosecution based on evidence obtained by torture, in violation of Europe’s human rights charter.

In both cases, appeal court judges also ruled that their rights were being violated by indefinite detention, and ordered their release.

In a ruling last year, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission in Britain described the Algerian suspect as having had “direct links” with Mr. bin Laden and of having held a “senior position” at a Qaeda camp for Islamic extremists in Afghanistan in the late 1990s. In their bid to deport the Algerian, the British authorities described him as the leader of an abortive plot to attack a Christmas market in the French city of Strasbourg in 2000, in addition to the role he is alleged to have played in the planned Los Angeles attack.

The protections afforded the Algerian and Abu Qatada, including the decision to release them while lawyers battle the government over their deportation, have caused growing dismay on both sides of the Atlantic. Bush administration officials have pressed Britain to adopt tighter antiterrorism laws that reduce the courts’ discretion in terrorism cases, and opinion polls have shown increasing concern among British voters about the scope of the terrorism threat.

The frustration was mirrored in a commentary published after Abu Qatada’s release in The Sun, the hell-raising tabloid that is Britain’s most widely sold newspaper.

“Poor old Osama bin Laden, scuttling around the war-torn Afghan mountains to avoid death or capture,” the newspaper said. “But hope is on the horizon for the world’s most wanted terrorist. There’s one place on Earth where he would be perfectly safe. Britain. Here, we throw nobody out. Bin Laden has every chance of ending his days among peace and plenty.”

British newspapers have chronicled the steep costs of years of court proceedings against those suspected of being terrorist leaders, and what British commentators have described as overly generous welfare payments to them and their families. After Abu Qatada was released, the newspapers said, he was granted a $300-a-week disability payment because a bad back made it impossible for him to work, even though the release order prevented him from seeking employment.

Officials have estimated the cost of maintaining surveillance on Abu Qatada in the four-bedroom Edwardian house in west London where he is confined with his wife and five children at $2 million a year. Welfare payments to his family amount to an additional $90,000 a year, according to news accounts. Similar figures have been calculated for the family of a man with the alias of Abu Hamza al-Masri, a 51-year-old Egyptian-born cleric with steel prosthetics for hands who once ran the main Qaeda Web site in Britain, now serving a seven-year prison term for incitement to murder.

The Hamza case is cited by British officials as one in which the legal system here has effectively stifled an Islamic extremist leader. The British government has agreed to his extradition to the United States, where he faces a possible life sentence on charges that involve being part of a global conspiracy to wage holy war against the United States, and trying to set up a Qaeda training camp in Oregon.

Last month, the Court of Appeal in London upheld the extradition order, and officials have said he could be flown to the United States within a month unless the country’s highest court, the Law Lords, agrees to review the appeal court ruling.

[Crafty_Dog]

Second post of the day:
--------------------------------------

Schoolboys punished with detention for refusing to kneel in class and pray to Allah

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 11:30 AM on 04th July 2008

Two schoolboys were given detention after refusing to kneel down and 'pray to Allah' during a religious education lesson.

Parents were outraged that the two boys from year seven (11 to 12-year-olds) were punished for not wanting to take part in the practical demonstration of how Allah is worshipped. They said forcing their children to take part in the exercise at Alsager High School, near Stoke-on-Trent - which included wearing Muslim headgear - was a breach of their human rights.

One parent, Sharon Luinen, said: "This isn't right, it's taking things too far.  I understand that they have to learn about other religions. I can live with that but it is taking it a step too far to be punished because they wouldn't join in Muslim prayer.  Making them pray to Allah, who isn't who they worship, is wrong and what got me is that they were told they were being disrespectful.  I don't want this to look as if I have a problem with the school because I am generally very happy with it."

Another parent Karen Williams said: "I am absolutely furious my daughter was made to take part in it and I don't find it acceptable. I haven't got a problem with them teaching my child other religions and a small amount of information doesn't do any harm.  But not only did they have to pray, the teacher had gone into the class and made them watch a short film and then said 'we are now going out to pray to Allah'.

"Then two boys got detention and all the other children missed their refreshment break because of the teacher. Not only was it forced upon them, my daughter was told off for not doing it right. They'd never done it before and they were supposed to do it in another language."

"My child has been forced to pray to Allah in a school lesson." The grandfather of one of the pupils in the class said: "It's absolutely disgusting, there's no other way of putting it. My daughter and a lot of other mothers are furious about their children being made to kneel on the floor and pray to Islam. If they didn't do it they were given detention. I am not racist, I've been friendly with an Indian for 30 years. I've also been to a Muslim wedding where it was explained to me that alcohol would not be served and I respected that.  But if Muslims were asked to go to church on Sunday and take Holy Communion there would be war."

Parents said that their children were made to bend down on their knees on prayer mats which the RE teacher had got out of her cupboard and they were also told to wear Islamic headgear during the lesson on Tuesday afternoon.

Deputy headmaster Keith Plant said: "It's difficult to know at the moment whether this was part of the curriculum or not. I am not an RE teacher, I am an English teacher. At the moment it is our enterprise week and many of our members of staff are away. The particular member of staff you need to speak to isn't around. I think that it is a shame that so many parents have got in touch with the Press before coming to me.  I have spoken to the teacher and she has articulately given me her version of events, but that is all I can give you at the moment."

A statement from Cheshire County Council on behalf of the school read: "The headteacher David Black contacted this authority immediately complaints were received. Enquiries are being made into the circumstances as a matter of urgency and all parents will be informed accordingly.  Educating children in the beliefs of different faith is part of the diversity curriculum on the basis that knowledge is essential to understanding. We accept that such teaching is to be conducted with some sense of sensitivity."

Find this story at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ray-Allah.html

[Crafty_Dog]

Young Brit Muslims to get citizenship lessons in bid to combat extremism

Lee Glendinning
guardian.co.uk, Friday July 18, 2008


Young Muslims will be given British citizenship lessons when they attend mosque schools, as part of a range of new measures outlined by the government to combat extremism.

The plans, contained in a report published today, Preventing Violent Extremism: Next Steps for Communities, were put together after discussions with representatives of Muslim communities in an attempt to prevent the marginalisation of young people.

A central focus will be to show that adhering to the Islamic faith can co-exist with being British.

Trials of the new citizenship lessons will begin in several cities at the start of the new term in September, where they will be taught alongside traditional lessons about the Qu'ran.

Cambridge University has been commissioned to create an independent board of about 20 academic and theological experts to examine issues relating to Islam in a modern context.

They will be expected to compile a report on Islamic beliefs in relation to life in modern Britain over the coming academic year.

The communities secretary, Hazel Blears, announced the plans as part of a new package to prevent radicalisation which includes a renewed focus on community leadership.

"We have made significant progress working with communities to build an alliance against violent extremists,'' she said.

"We have a responsibility to ensure our young people are equipped with the skills they need to stand up to violent extremists and help them understand how their faith is compatible with wider shared values,'' she said.

Officials said mosque teachers in London, Leicester, Birmingham, Oldham, Rochdale, and Bradford would be trained in using the new materials over the summer.

The secretary of state for children, schools and families, Ed Balls said: "Extremists of every persuasion tend to paint the world as black and white, accentuating division and difference, and exploiting fears based on ignorance or prejudice.

"Education can be a powerful tool in tackling this. Giving young people the opportunity to learn about different cultures and faiths, and - crucially - to gain an understanding of the values we share, will also help to build mutual respect and tolerance from an early age and create an environment where extremism cannot flourish."

Sheikh Ibrahim Mogra, an imam who is a member of the Muslim Council of Britain, said the creation of the group had been driven by Muslims rather than the government.

"We felt we needed something of this nature to help create a better structured approach to how we are educating our children,'' he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "We feel our children need to be taught that they can be proud Muslims and proud young British people.

"Anything that helps to make our communities stronger should be welcomed - provided that it's not used to isolate, control or change what a community is."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2...tion.terrorism

[Crafty_Dog]

Some folks in Denmark are getting upset

http://siad.wordpress.com/

[G M]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/2461830/Killing-for-religion-is-justified,-say-third-of-Muslim-students.html

Killing for religion is justified, say third of Muslim students
A third of Muslim students in Britain believe killing someone in the name of religion is justified, a new poll claims.
 
By Patrick Sawer
Last Updated: 1:00AM BST 27 Jul 2008

The survey found that extreme Islamist ideology has a profound influence on a significant minority of Muslims on campuses across the country.
The findings will concern police chiefs, the security services and ministers, who are struggling with radicalisation among Muslim communities.
The YouGov poll was conducted for the Right-wing think tank, the Centre for Social Cohesion, at 12 universities, including Imperial College and Kings College London. It also found:
40 per cent support the introduction of sharia into British law for Muslims
a third back the notion of a worldwide Islamic caliphate (state) based on sharia law
40 per feel it is unacceptable for Muslim men and women to mix freely
24 per cent do not think men and women are equal in the eyes of Allah
a quarter have little or no respect for homosexuals.
Although 53 per cent said that killing in the name of religion was never justified, compared with 94 per cent of non-Muslims, 32 per cent said that it was. Of these, 4 per cent said killing could be justified to "promote or preserve" religion, while 28 per cent said it was acceptable if that religion were under attack.
There was also sympathy for the view that Muslim soldiers in the Armed Forces should be allowed to opt out of operations in Muslim countries, with 57 per cent agreeing.
The report's authors found that Islamic societies on campus, operating under the umbrella of the Federation of Student Islamic Societies, exert a strong influence on many of Britain's 90,000 Muslim students. A quarter of them belong to Islamic societies and their views are often more extreme.
While three-fifths of society members said that killing in the name of religion was acceptable, an equal number of non-member Muslims said it was never justified. The security services have identified Islamist activism at universities acts as a possible "gateway" to violent extremism. Several terrorists and sympathisers began their extremist careers on campuses.
The authors of the report, "Islam on Campus", lay much of the blame for extremism among Muslim students on the group Hizb ut-Tahrir, which seeks to build a worldwide Islamic state.
YouGov polled 600 Muslim students and 800 non-Muslim students at universities with a high number of Muslims.

[HUSS]

Italy Declares State of Emergency over Illegal Immigration Invasion
 


We can all see that the Western world is being overrun by illegals from the 3rd world. But most of our countries leaders just do not have the guts to do anything about it. Except for one, our friends in Italy. Our countries are being financially drained by illegals, entire neighbourhoods being taken over and many of them are trying to impose an ideology on us that is completely opposite from life as we know it. Now the government of Italy which has bulldozed a Mosque site, closed a major Mosque, and deported dozens of Egyptians, has declared a state of emergency because of illegal immigration. Our countries are like a life raft to some coming from the 3rd world, but even life rafts sink if overcrowded.


Italy Declares State of Emergency over Illegal Immigration Invasion ⋅ July 26, 2008



Britain is not the only country which is being subjected to a Third World immigration invasion - almost every other Western European country is struggling under the same burden. Italy is however, unusual in one respect - it now actually has a government with enough guts to tackle the issue head-on.

Yesterday, the Italian government declared a “national state of emergency” over illegal immigration. A Cabinet statement said that the Government had to confront a “persistent and exceptional influx” of non-EU citizens and it had approved a proposal from Roberto Maroni, the Interior Minister, to declare a state of emergency “throughout the national territory”.

The state of emergency was earlier in effect only for the southern provinces of Sicily, Puglia and Calabria. Italy’s long shoreline and proximity to Africa make it a popular entry point into Europe for thousands of Africans who make hazardous journeys in flimsy boats each year.

Mario Morcone, a senior official at the Interior Ministry, said that the decision had been prompted by the continuing arrival of illegal immigrants in ramshackle boats run by people-smugglers at the tiny Italian island of Lampedusa, just off the North African coast. Many such boats capsize and their passengers drown.

Mr Morcone said that 9,342 immigrants had arrived between the start of the year and the end of June - double the figure for the previous year - and there were at present more than 1,000 at the overcrowded refugee camp in Lampedusa. Some are repatriated but many are sent to immigrant camps on the Italian mainland.

Silvio Berlusconi, the Prime Minister, won final parliamentary approval this week for a security package under which illegal immigrants convicted of crimes will face jail sentences a third longer than those for Italians.

Italy has also started a controversial census of Roma which involved the fingerprinting and photographing of all adults and children over 14 years old. Roma - sometimes referred to as gypsies - are often blamed in Italy for the rising crime rate across the country.

Minister Maroni said that fingerprinting Roma gypsy children would ensure that those parents who sent their children out to beg instead of school could be traced and punished.

http://islaminaction08.blogspot.com/2008/07/italy-declares-state-of-emergency-over.html

[HUSS]

July 26, 2008
NORWAY - UP IN FLAMES AND MUSLIMS FIGHTING MUSLIMS
Here are two posts that aptly describe the "enhancement" to Western European countries, in particular Norway, and their indigenous populations that the so called "diversity", multiculturalism and rampant immigration has brought. Aided and abeted by moronic politicians and law enforcement who fear political correctness over actual violence. One has to wonder if the backlash has begun -- but interesting enough - the fighting that appears to have started is between immigrant groups - particularly muslims.

23 PEOPLE INJURED IN NORWAY REFUGEE CENTER ATTACK:

OSLO, July 25 (Reuters) - Twenty-three people were wounded when a gang of 40-50 men armed with steel bars and machetes attacked residents at a refugee centre in Norway late on Thursday, officials said on Friday.

No one was seriously wounded, but 10 were sent to hospital and 13 treated at a local clinic, hospital officials said.

An official at the centre in Oestfold south of Oslo said the attackers were Chechens and the victims Kurds. Police declined to confirm or deny that and said they had made no arrests so far.

"There was an attack from outside the asylum centre by people who don't live here, Chechens, 40 to 50 men armed with steel bars and other weapons," Ole Morten Lyng, an official at the centre, told NRK public radio news.

"There also seem to have been knives involved," Lyng said. "They went into the rooms and pulled out Kurds and beat them up."

A police officer said some of the attackers had machetes.

Lyng told Norwegian news agency NTB that the conflict stemmed from a minor dispute between Kurds and Chechens at the centre that got blown out of proportion. (Reporting by John Acher; editing by Elizabeth Piper)




Meanwhile, Norway is Sinking into a Sea of Flames
by Dymphna

Fjordman sends along some of the dystopian stories emanating from Northern Europe...

First, a link to Bruce Bawer’s site. He’s talking about Dagbladet’s report on the alarming number of tourist buses being set afire in Oslo (from July 18):


Dagbladet reports that in the last two weeks, eighteen tourist buses in Oslo have been set upon by thieves and vandals.

[…]

Official reactions to this latest development only serve to underscore where the roots of the problem lie. You can almost see the spokesman for the Agency for Road and Transport shrugging and yawning as he tells Dagbladet that, well, this sort of this happens every summer, and hey, don’t worry, there’s more and more tourist buses coming to Norway. And the cops? They say that they “can’t see any connection among the events of recent weeks.” A police spokesman told Dagbladet that they hadn’t put the case materials together yet - they’ll get around to that on, oh, Monday.

No, Oslo isn’t Rome or Paris. But not long ago, it was at least a safe, clean city. It’s now rapidly declining into a maelstrom of chaos, crime, and filth under politicians who’ve essentially handed it over to armies of Nigerian prostitutes, gypsy beggars, and Muslim gangsters; who ordered street work that should have been wrapped up months ago but that continues to keep much of the downtown area looking like Berlin in 1946; and who blithely hike subsidies to groups like the Islamic Council while letting the police and military go chronically underfunded.


Well, of course. Who wants to pay a decent wage to those nasty men who protect others when the Islamic Council, peace be unto them, needs funding so desperately?

And the cops? They simply suffer from the same virulent indifference as their superiors. It’s a top-down disease.

Mr. Bawer suggests that tourists re-route to Copenhagen instead.

Aftenposten has more details (in English) on this pastime of tourist bus burning. Here’s one Spanish tour driver’s experience:


“My company sends buses all over Europe, but we’ve never experienced anything like this,” bus driver Jorge Muniz Paredes to newspaper Aften. “If I talked about this on Spanish television, people would think I was in Africa.”

Paredes recently found his bus burning near the new Opera House on Oslo’s waterfront. The bus, used to carry Spanish tourists on sightseeing trips in Oslo, was in top condition, he said.

He’s convinced vandals are behind the fire on his bus. Two days earlier, the bus’ windshield had been smashed.

[…]

Three Spanish tour bus companies have filed a complaint with Norwegian tourism promoters in Madrid, who in turn have contacted both the Norwegian embassy in Spain and the Spanish embassy in Norway.

Some tour operators are considering dropping Oslo from their tour itineraries. “Oslo’s not a particularly pretty city, like Rome or Paris,” said Paredes. “The only reason we come is because it’s the capital of Norway. The vandalism makes the destination insecure and if this continues, we’ll stop coming.”


Oh, well. Plenty more tourists to take their place, right?

But here is the most interesting story from Fjordman’s selection. It lays bare the core of the problem. Olso burns while government strangles its citizens on procedural policies. The pervasive cynicism is heart-breaking.
- - - - - - - - -
Read carefully with attention to what the authorities themselves consider important:


An awkward power struggle has broken out among foreign and local beggars in Oslo, ironically over their street sales of a magazine whose very title calls for more equality in the capital.

Norwegian beggars are getting competition from foreign beggars, and conflicts are breaking out.

The conflict is over who should be allowed to peddle the magazine, which sells for NOK 50. Its sellers can keep half of the proceeds.

The magazine, called “=Oslo” (equal Oslo), was started up to help provide an income source to those who otherwise would beg for spare change on the streets of the capital. Many of its original sellers were Norwegian drug addicts.

Now, however, new groups of foreign beggars want to sell the magazine as well, reported newspaper Dagsavisen earlier this week. The magazine won’t let them, saying the sellers should be Norwegian and must be able to speak Norwegian.

That’s led to protests, and state authorities are investigating whether “=Oslo” is violating anti-discrimination laws. “If we find that ‘=Oslo’ has broken the law, they’ll have to find a new solution for the foreigners,” said Ingeborg Grimsmo, Norway’s acting discrimination ombud.


Why would a magazine originate with the intention of having “beggars” sell their product? It’s insane. Remember when Rudy Giuliani began cleaning up New York City by removing the beggars who were washing car windshields in city traffic?

The problem with “beggars” is that keeping civic order is an on-going problem. Mayor Giuliani solved it in his time, but the squeegee men are making a comeback in The Big Apple and their appearance scares people because of what it represents - erosion of public space. These depredations don’t stay “cured”; they demand vigilance and creative thinking. Neither is in great supply in Norway.

Here’s another problem where the authorities cynically leave in a bind those who would help the hungry:


Thorny issues also have broken out within an Oslo organization that serves the poor and offers them free food (Fattighuset). It has refused to give food to the foreign beggars, claiming that the foreigners try to sell the food on the street.

“We can’t have that,” said Johanna Engen, a board member at Fattighuset, arguing that it defies the purpose of the aid and can threaten donations.

The anti-discrimination authority is investigating whether Fattighuset can legally only give food to poor Norwegians and not poor foreigners. “There are important principles at stake,” Grimsmo said, arguing that the foreigners are becoming “more and more” stigmatized in Norway.


People get “stigmatized” when they consistently operate outside the mores of local culture. Perhaps these “foreigners” of unnamed ethnicity come from a place where ripping off charitable organizations is all in a day’s work.

Fattighuset is absolutely right: letting this go on would threaten donations. But the “anti-discrimination authority” is not concerned with outcomes; it lives for procedures. And by its lights, procedures take precedence over virtue.

When a government - be it local, state, or federal - has that much power over charitable endeavors and it uses that dominance with Kafkaesque indifference, then the government is acting with evil. Indifferent evil, but evil nonetheless.

Fjordman called it a maelstrom of chaos. His powers of perception are acute.

http://theopinionator.typepad.com/my_weblog/2008/07/men-with-bars-b.html

[G M]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/2485750/British-Muslims-fighting-with-Taliban-in-Afghanistan.html

British Muslims 'fighting with Taliban in Afghanistan'
British Muslims are helping the Taliban in their war against UK soldiers in southern Afghanistan, according to the former commander of Britain's forces in Afghanistan.
 
By Con Coughlin, Duncan Gardham and Thomas Harding
Last Updated: 12:25PM BST 02 Aug 2008

Brig. Ed Butler: 'There are British passport holders who live in the U.K. who are being found in places like Kandahar' Photo: HEATHCLIFF O'MALLEY
Brig. Ed Butler, who spent six months commanding British forces in Afghanistan, also revealed fears that militant Islamic groups in south-east Asia are supporting terrorist plots in the UK.
The brigadier, a former head of the SAS, spoke exclusively to the Daily Telegraph in the week when the British death toll in Afghanistan reached 114, with 17 fatalities in the last two months.
UK forces have uncovered evidence that British Muslims are actively supporting the Taliban and al-Qa'eda in attacks on coalition forces in southern Afghanistan, Brig Butler said.
He said: "There are British passport holders who live in the U.K. who are being found in places like Kandahar."
Earlier this year, it was revealed that RAF Nimrod spyplanes monitoring Taliban radio signals in Afghanistan had heard militants speaking with Yorkshire and Midlands accents.
Privately, British officers in Afghanistan estimate that several thousand Taliban fighters have been killed since 2006, among them people from outside the country.
One officer said: "While my troops have not actually found British passports on enemy dead there has been a suspicion that with the high number of Taliban casualties they have needed to recruit a lot of foreign fighters and some of these are likely to be of British-Muslim descent."
Disturbingly, Brig Butler suggested the traffic between Britain and Afghanistan may flow in both directions, with some British Muslims returning from the region and posing a domestic security threat.
Brig Butler, 46, said he had seen evidence that terror groups based in southern Afghanistan were plotting with Muslim extremists in Britain to carry out terror attacks in the UK.
"There is a link between Kandahar and urban conurbations in the UK," said Brig. Butler. "This is something the military understands but the British public does not."
Western intelligence agencies are increasingly concerned that Afghanistan and its lawless border with Pakistan are now home to many training camps used by Jihadi groups to prepare radicals for attacks in the West.
A Whitehall source confirmed that the security services are aware of some radicalized British Muslims returning to the UK from Afghanstan.
The source said: "There are very small numbers of British citizens traveling out there, being trained up and then returning to the UK."
With al-Qaeda widely seen to be losing ground in Iraq, counter-terrorism officials say that Afghanistan is emerging as the focus for radicalised Western Muslims wanting to fight Western forces.
Earlier this year, Nigel Inkster, a former deputy head of MI6, warned that Taliban groups over the border in Pakistan have "dispatched terrorists to a number of locations including Spain and the United Kingdom."
Brig Butler, widely regarded as one of the best British officers of his generation, announced his decision to retire from the Army earlier this year.
He had been a candidate for the job of Director, Special Forces, overseeing the SAS, the SBS and the Special Reconnaissance Regiment.
Despite claims that his premature retirement was in protest at the government's underfunding of the Armed Forces, Brig Butler insisted his decision to step down had been prompted by the desire to spend more time with his family.
"I reached the conclusion that I did not want to leave my family any more for an extended period. Life is too short. There is no point having a family if you are not going to see them," he said.
Brig Butler commanded British forces when they began their current mission in southern Afghanistan two years ago and is credited with being the architect of the British Army's strategy for defeating the Taliban.
But he said that from the outset British commanders knew the Taliban "would be up for a fight, but we were surprised at how ferocious that fight turned out to be."
When British forces deployed to Helmand province in 2006, Brig Butler warned the government that there was a strong possibility that British soldiers would end up killing Muslims who held British passports and were fighting with the Taliban and al-Qa'eda.
He is currently Commander of Joint Force Operations based at Northwood, near London, and will formally leave the Army next year.
British commanders and diplomats have warned that the West faces a "long haul" in Afghanistan and may have to retain a military presence there for decades to come.
Brig Butler believes the continued presence of radical British Muslims in southern Afghanistan is one of the reasons British forces must remain in the region, despite the heavy number of battlefield fatalities.
"This is a highly significant mission," he said. "If we do not win against the protagonists of the September 11 attacks then those who are against us will take great succour from it."
It is vital for British forces to remain in Afghanistan "for as long as it takes" to prevent a repeat of the July 7 bombings in London in 2005, which killed 52 people, he said.
Several British Muslims were detained in Afghanistan during the 2001 U.S.-led military operation to overthrow the Taliban, and were held at Guantanamo Bay as enemy combatants.
All were later released and say they had no involvement in anti-coalition activity.

[G M]

Germany’s Intifada   
By Stephen Brown
FrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, August 01, 2008
First it was France, and now Germany.
 
German authorities are reporting that, within their cities, areas now exist where police fear to tread. In many German urban areas drug dealing, theft, brawls, and assaults on police officers are the order of the day. The problem is becoming so severe police scarcely dare enter some quarters except in strength, while in others they concentrate on their own safety first.     
 
But this is old news to French law enforcement officials. The 2005 riots woke France up to the fact that an anti-civilization had arisen in the “banlieues” (housing projects), which surround major French cities. Populated mainly by immigrants from North and West Africa, many with a Muslim background, they are known as places of anger and aggression towards anyone who represents “official” France.
 
French police are sometimes attacked with Molotov cocktails when they enter such areas. Firemen and ambulance attendants are not treated much better. Police even had difficulty protecting a French president, Jacques Chirac, and his interior minister when they went campaigning in a banlieue. The two high-ranking politicians were also met with Molotovs and had to retreat.
 
In all, the French housing projects have the look of scarred battlefields with burnt out cars littering the landscape. The extent of France’s lawlessness problem manifested itself last month when 592 cars were torched in France in the two nights surrounding Bastille Day, July 14 and 15, 150 in the Paris region alone. To make matters worse, Islamic fundamentalists have attracted many of the banlieus’ unemployed, uneducated and frustrated young men to their cause. These fundamentalists, it is suspected, were the ones directing the 2005 disturbances and their recurrence in 2007.
 
In Germany, the problem neighbourhoods are often located within the city and not on the outskirts. Like in France, though, urban anti-societies have arisen, but in Germany they consist mainly of Turkish and Arab immigrants, many from Lebanon. In their districts, German laws and values now have little, if any, validity, while their culture of lawlessness does.
 
Police complain that when they conduct routine checks in these neighbourhoods, they are met with angry crowds and often risk assault. Even when a policeman is carrying out a simple duty, like inspecting someone’s identification, out of nowhere suddenly appear 20 to 30 men, yelling wildly, who push and shove him. They assemble quickly after having been contacted by cell phone.
 
While confrontations occur over nothing, violence can occur when the stakes are higher. When Berlin police arrested three drug-dealing Arabs in Kreuzberg, for example, a district where Turks and Arabs form the majority, they were immediately swarmed by two dozen men who tried to free the suspected criminals by force. Only the quick arrival of reinforcements saved the day. It is also in Kreuzberg that the first car burnings in Germany took place.
 
For the last ten years Berlin has been the leading German city for such “resistance-to-police” incidents. Overall, Germany’s police union records an average of 26,000 such occurrences a year, an increase of 60 per cent from the 1980s. Berlin accounts for about 3,000 of this total. In Germany’s capital, a union official said, there exists “an alarm level red” concerning violence against police.
 
“We have been registering for years a loss of police authority and a rapid sinking of a lack of restraint,” said Eberhard Schonberg, the police union’s head.
 
But what is even more disturbing to law enforcement officials is the increase in violent crime among minors, especially those with a foreign background. Germany was shocked this year when two youths, one Turkish and the other Greek, nearly beat a 76-year-old retired school principal to death in Munich last December. The pensioner had admonished them for smoking on a commuter train. The two criminals kicked and yelled “s**t German” at the man’s prostrate form after having knocked him down.
 
There is also an overrepresentation of immigrant youth in crime statistics. A survey of schools in western German cities showed that ten per cent of the Turkish students were repeat offenders, who had committed more than five violent offences. The same survey showed 8.3 per cent of students from the former Yugoslavia were in the same category along with 5.9 per cent from the former Soviet Union. Native-born Germans, who also included those from migrant backgrounds with German citizenship, made up only 2.9 per cent of such delinquents.   
 
And while German teenagers are more often the victims of youth crime, immigrant youth brutality very often occurs between different ethnic groups. Violence between Turks and Arabs at one high school in Berlin, for example, became so bad the principal asked the city to close her school. This incident then led other principals across Germany to request the same for their schools.
 
But even immigrant children as young as eight are committing illegal acts. Police report of an Arab neighborhood in Duisburg, a city in the Rhineland, where such youthful miscreants “kick old ladies, demand sexual intercourse from women, throw water-filled balloons against business windows and deliberately cross streets at red lights to create traffic jams.” Their aim, police say, is to generate fear among outsiders.
 
The overall purpose of such disturbing behavior and anti-police incidents is to turn these immigrant neighbourhoods into lawless mini-states, where their tribal and religious customs and rules predominate, and criminals can act freely. In scuffles and confrontations German police are often told, in threat and obscenity-filled language, to go away and that these streets belong to the ethnic group that lives there.
 
As everyone knows, a competent and effective police force is necessary to protect the law-abiding citizen, guarantee his rights and carry out one of the main functions of the state: law and order. But increasingly in some European urban areas, a police uniform has come to mean nothing. And countries like Germany do not act now to reverse this, their cities will become as burnt out and eviscerated as the carcasses of cars France knows only too well.

Stephen Brown is a contributing editor at Frontpagemag.com. He has a graduate degree in Russian and Eastern European history. Email him at alsolzh@hotmail.com.

[Crafty_Dog]

Moved here from a post elsewhere by GM:


http://www.amazon.com/While-Europe-Slept-Radical-Destroying/dp/0767920058/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1217916421&sr=8-1

A must read! I'm sorry I put off reading it for so long.