The Guardian interviews “Anne”, a French Muslim woman who converted to Islam at 18 and has worn the niqab for five years.
Monthly Archives: April 2011
Hitler admirer who describes Muslims as ‘ragheads’ is BNP candidate
A BNP Assembly candidate is exposed as a racist who calls Muslims “Ragheads” and refers to Catholics as “Taigs”. And Steven Moore, who will contest both the East Antrim Assembly and council elections, also has a fascination with Hitler
The party’s Ulster Organiser is one of the first BNP candidates to finally put themselves at the mercy of the electorate. On Wednesday the far-right party announced they would be contesting three Assembly seats and would also be targeting four council seats.
Last week before the Northern Ireland soccer match at Windsor Park, BNP activists connected to football hooligans from Leeds handed out sick anti-Muslim leaflets to fans. The shocking leaflet carried the headline, “Our Children are not Halal Meat” and warned how Muslim paedophile gangs are “preying on vulnerable white girls”.
Despite attempts from the far-right party, led by convicted racist Nick Griffin, to re-brand themselves as a friendly non-racist party they continue to be run by people like Moore.
When Moore isn’t posting videos by white power bands such as Skrewdriver on Facebook, he reveals his fancy for all things “Third Reich” by sharing videos of Adolf Hitler with his online friends. One apparent favourite is entitled: “Why the world cannot forget Adolf Hitler”. He also has a penchant for songs and videos of the German Wehrmacht.
Elsewhere, Moore has thrown his energies into trying to stop a mosque allegedly being built in Ballymena and more recently launched a campaign to terrify the people of Larne that a proposed detention centre for failed asylum seekers will turn their town into some sort of Asian ghetto.
France: first Muslim woman fined for wearing veil
Police have fined a woman in a shopping centre car park outside Paris for wearing a niqab, or full-face Islamic veil, in the first enforcement of France’s burqa ban.
The 28-year-old woman was stopped by police in the car park in Les Mureaux, north-west of Paris, at 5.30pm on Monday, the day the niqab ban came into force. Police said she was stopped “without incident” for a few minutes and given a €150 (£132) fine. She has one month to pay.
Under the law backed by Nicolas Sarkozy, it is illegal for women in full-face veils to go anywhere in public, including walk down the street, enter shops, use public transport, attend doctors’ surgeries or town halls. They face a fine or a citizenship class.
On Tuesday morning another woman in a full-face veil was stopped by police after she tried to enter a town hall in Saint-Denis, north of Paris. Followed by a French TV crew, she had brought some paperwork to the town hall for a bureaucratic issue just before 11am. She was refused by officials on the grounds that she was wearing a niqab. On the way out police asked her to remove her face-veil to check her identity.
When she refused she was taken to a local police station, where she lifted her veil but insisted on putting it back on again. She was not fined but Le Parisien reported that she had been given a written reminder and a leaflet explaining that full-face veils were no longer allowed in public and she risked a fine.
After police warned that the law banning niqabs was “infinitely difficult” to enforce and would not be a priority, the interior minister Claude Guéant insisted the law would be fully applied in the name of “secularism” and gender equality.
Islamophobia and the media – a timely book
Roy Greenslade reviews a new book Pointing the Finger: Islam and Muslims in the British Media, edited by Julian Petley and Robin Richardson. He writes:
“It is a timely and important book, as another author who has written widely on the same subject, Elizabeth Poole, points out. There are terrific contributions from several media academics and a key chapter ‘Keeping your integrity – and your job: voices from the newsroom’ – was written by The Guardian columnist Hugh Muir and fellow journalist Laura Smith.
“Few topics are as controversial as the media treatment of Muslims, and too few journalists take it seriously. They should, because they are responsible for the stories people retell. It is press-generated myths about Islam that fuel misunderstandings and feed prejudice, and thus bedevil rational discussion.”
‘Call for UK burka ban grows’ claims Express
Police made the first arrests yesterday of women flouting France’s new burka ban amid fresh calls to outlaw them in Britain too. Anyone who appears veiled in public in France can now be fined £130 under a law that came into effect yesterday. The move sparked calls for a similar approach in this country, with surveys showing there was widespread public support for a law that would make it illegal for anyone to cover their face in public.
Tory MP Philip Hollobone has tabled a private member’s bill that would ban veils in public, while UKIP has won public support for its policy on outlawing the burka. Mr Hollobone announced his bill last year, saying: “This is Britain. We are not a Muslim country. Covering your face in public is strange, and to many people both intimidating and offensive. We are never going to get along with having a fully integrated society if a substantial minority insist on concealing their identity from everyone else.”
Last night, UKIP’s Gerard Batten said: “UKIP is opposed to the burka because it is a physical manifestation of extremist Islam which is intolerant and incompatible with Western liberal democracy. UKIP policy is to ban it from all public institutions, buildings and public transport; private organisations and buildings must have a blanket ban on all face-coverings or no policy at all.”
Quite how two notorious Islamophobes reiterating their views on the veil demonstrates that the call for a ban is “growing” is unclear.
BNP mayor for Lancashire town
A town is to become the first in the country to have a mayor from the far-right BNP, in a move branded divisive and worrying by campaigners. John Cave was chosen by an overwhelming vote to take over the chains of office as next year’s mayor of Padiham, near Burnley.
With a population of around 10,000, Padiham’s town council only has limited powers, and elected members do not stand on party political grounds. However, the next mayor is a long-term BNP activist in nearby Burnley and his wife, Sharon Wilkinson – expected to be his mayoress – became the party’s first county councillor, representing the town, in 2009.
He contributed a clip of former Labour minister Shahid Malik speaking about British aid being given to Muslim countries to a website under the heading “The threat of Islam”. Mr Cave also wrote a letter to a local newspaper last year demanding that Britain’s political and religious leaders “admit their multicultural folly” and direct their efforts to benefit the majority.
Dorval mosque vandalized yet again
A Dorval mosque that has been plagued by vandalism in the past had two windows and several doors broken during an overnight break-in on Monday. “I’m not sure if it was thieves or vandals,” said Mehmet Deger, president of the Dorval Mosque. “But it’s very upsetting to our members when it happens.”
He said the culprits broke in through a fire exit door and stole a computer. But they also used some kind of slingshot to fire steel bolts through a couple of windows, including a large picture window. “This is very frustrating,” said Deger, who was collecting estimates on the cost of the repairs.
In 2009, the mosque was vandalized four times, usually with graffiti painted on walls. The last time it was vandalized was in September 2009. At the time, Deger invited the culprits to talk to leaders of the mosque rather than using a can of spray paint to communicate. And he said there have been no incidents since that time.
The mosque has about 2,000 members and has been operating since 1994. It is located at the corner of Neptune Blvd. and Nightingale Ave.
Deger said the mosque’s video surveillance showed two men had been responsible for the break-in this week. “These guys are a danger to the public,” he said.
Shout down the Sharia myth makers
Abe Foxman of the ADL warns against Sharia hysteria in the US:
The threat of the infiltration of Sharia, or Islamic law, into the American court system is one of the more pernicious conspiracy theories to gain traction in our country in recent years. The notion that Islam is insidiously making inroads in the United States through the application of religious law is seeping into the mainstream, with even some presidential candidates voicing fears about the supposed threat of Sharia to our way of life and as many as 13 states considering or having already passed bills that would prohibit the application of Sharia law….
If the hysteria over Sharia law continues to percolate through our political and social discourse, there is bound to be unintended consequences.
As we approach the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, in an uncertain economy with millions of Americans still out of work, we also face the prospect of a political season in which more political candidates may be tempted to invoke this mythological threat in an effort to pander to bigotry and fear, and to score political points.
We stand at a crossroads in American society. We have the option of heading down a path toward a greater tolerance of anti-Muslim xenophobia and fear of the “stranger in our midst,” or we can rededicate ourselves to the ideal of an America that is open and welcoming to immigrants as well as minority groups who have been here for decades. Let us hope that the better nature of America will enable us to proceed down the second path and reject those who seek to divide us for political gain, or those who wish to stereotype and scapegoat an entire people because of their religious faith.
Home Office rules out veil ban in UK
The prospect of any attempt to ban the Islamic full veil in public in Britain has been firmly ruled out by Theresa May, the Home Secretary. Ministers believe there is little pressure, either politically or among the public, for the UK to follow the French lead and outlaw the use of face-covering veils such as the niqab or burka.
Although David Cameron has warned of “different cultures” being encouraged by “state multiculturalism” to live separate lives, the Government is adamant that to impose a ban on the veil would run contrary to British instincts.
Calls for a ban have been limited so far to one Tory MP, Philip Hollobone, and the UK Independence Party. Mr Hollobone attempted last year to champion a Commons bill outlawing face coverings, but received no public declarations of support from any other MP.
The Home Office said yesterday: “It is not for government to say what people can and cannot wear. Such a proscriptive approach would be out of keeping with our nation’s longstanding record of tolerance. Accordingly we do not support a ban on wearing the burka.”
Baroness Warsi, the first woman Muslim Cabinet minister, has also defended the right of women to choose to wear a face veil.
This is not to the taste of Leo McKinstry who devotes his Daily Express column to denouncing Britain’s refusal to ban the veil:
Our British political elite constantly boasts of its tolerance and enthusiasm for cultural diversity.
Yet often this supposedly liberal attitude is nothing more than cowardice in the face of militant Islam. Terrified of accusations of racism, paralysed by the fashionable narrative of ethnic minority victimhood, our civic leaders simply do not have the backbone to uphold the values of Western civilisation against the onward march of Muslim fundamentalism.
This institutionalised feebleness, masquerading as enlightenment, is in graphic contrast to the much more robust outlook in France. Today a new French law comes into force banning people from covering their faces in public. In effect both the niqab, which conceals the face below the eyes, and the full burka, covering the body head to toe, will be prohibited outside home or mosque.
Some 2,000 women in France wear the burka and they will be heavily fined if they refuse to comply. The ban on the burka has the support of the French Parliament and people, determined to protect Gallic culture from oppressive alien customs. Many European nations are moving in this direction. Belgium has a ban while it’s under discussion in Spain and Italy.
But in Britain there is no chance our establishment will display such courage. The self-destructive dogma of diversity is too strong in all three major parties. Reflecting the supine outlook of Westminster, dripping wet Immigration Minister Damien Green said recently that a ban on the burka would be “unBritish” because it is “at odds with our tolerant and mutually respectful society”.
See also ENGAGE who pose “a question for the new editor of the Daily Express: why not invite a woman who wears the burqa or niqab to respond to McKinstry’s claims of her, and those like her, being subjected to a ‘barbaric tradition’ with its ‘cruel subjugation of women, literally incarcerating them within mobile prisons’?”
Muslim women arrested in protest against French veil ban
At least two women have been briefly detained in France while wearing Islamic veils, after a law banning the garment in public came into force. Police said they were held not because of their veils but for joining an unauthorised protest, and they were later released.
France is the first country in Europe to publicly ban a form of dress some Muslims regard as a religious duty. Offenders face a fine of 150 euros (£133; $217) and a citizenship course. People forcing women to wear the veil face a much larger fine and a prison sentence of up to two years.
The two women detained had taken part in a demonstration outside Notre Dame cathedral in Paris. Police said the protest had not been authorised and so people were asked to move on. When they did not, they were arrested.
One of the women, Kenza Drider, had arrived in Paris from the southern city of Avignon, boarding a train wearing a niqab, and unchallenged by police. “We were held for three and a half hours at the police station while the prosecutors decided what to do,” she told AFP news agency. “Three and a half hours later they told us: ‘It’s fine, you can go’.”
A French Muslim property dealer, Rachid Nekkaz, said he was creating a fund to pay women’s fines, and encouraged “all free women who so wish to wear the veil in the street and engage in civil disobedience”.
Mr Nekkaz said he and “a female friend wearing the niqab” were arrested at a separate demonstration in front of President Nicolas Sarkozy’s Elysee Palace. “We wanted to be fined for wearing the niqab, but the police didn’t want to issue a fine,” he told AFP.
See also “France arrests Muslim women as full-face veil ban begins”, AFP, 11 April 2011