EDL leader Lennon released from prison

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Bob Pitt

Stephen Lennon arrested The leader of the English Defence League, Stephen Lennon, has been released from Bedford Prison on bail until his trial for assault at the end of this month.

Mr Lennon, who calls himself Tommy Robinson, was held in custody at Bedford Prison for a week after breaking bail conditions by attending a demonstration in London. The EDL said their leader was on hunger strike while in prison, because he was a “political prisoner” and because he believed the food served was halal.

While at Bedford Prison he is understood to have been kept in segregation both for his own safety and over concerns about disruption at the prison. A source said: “There was a big concern because he is so high profile, so they kept him away from the other prisoners.”

The source said Mr Lennon was held in an underground cell where he was allowed a television, and that his exercise was taken in a yard boarded off so he could not be seen by other inmates. They added: “His hunger strike only lasted 24 hours and then he gave up.”

Luton Today, 13 September 2011

Only lasted 24 hours and then he gave up? A case of “No Surrender Ever – until I’m feeling hungry”.

Human rights activist warns of growing Islamophobia in Poland

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Bob Pitt

Rafal Pankowski A leading Polish human rights activist warned of growing Islamophobia in his country in an exclusive interview with IRNA in Berlin.

“In general Islamophobia has become one of the big issues. I would say it is growing and I am afraid it will grow further. We see more and more talk about the so-called danger of Islam,” said the coordinator of the Warsaw-based anti-racist organization NEVER AGAIN, Rafal Pankowski. He linked the rise of “the relatively new” phenomenon of Islamophobia in his country to the global situation, particularly to Poland’s role in the US-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Pankowski said Muslims in Poland have been repeatedly the target of racial assaults, especially since the September 11, 2011 terror attacks. He added Chechen refugees in Poland have also been victimized by anti-Islam hate crime. Pankowski emphasized that the Polish media is not always covering Islamophobic attacks against Muslims. He said “more than 50 people” have died as a result of racial assaults in Poland since the early 90s when hate crimes were monitored and registered.

Pankowski also stressed there were major segments within the Polish Catholic Church who were “quite hostile to Muslims”. “Radio Maria which is a (Catholic) radio station but is also a big social movement, is a xenophobic movement. They strongly spoke out against Islam,” Pankowski pointed out.

The activist said the Polish right-wing is influenced or tries to copy the anti-Islamic rhetoric in some of the other European countries. Pankowski said the issue of Muslim migration to Poland is being exploited politically by the right-wing scene. He added that plans for the construction of a much-needed mosque in Warsaw were used “to mobilize” against Muslims in Poland.

IRNA, 13 September 2011

CIA investigates whether laws broken helping NYPD spy on Muslims

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Bob Pitt

The CIA inspector general is investigating whether the agency broke the law by helping the New York Police Department build intelligence-gathering programs that monitored life in Muslim communities, the agency said Tuesday following an investigation by The Associated Press.

The agency’s unprecedented cooperation with the NYPD was part of an eight-month investigative reporting project by The Associated Press. The AP found that NYPD intelligence officers analyzed hundreds of mosques and student organizations, infiltrating dozens of them. Undercover officers eavesdropped in cafes and restaurants and wrote daily reports about what they overheard. The department also maintained a list of 28 countries that, along with “American Black Muslim,” the department labeled “ancestries of interest.”

A CIA officer, Lawrence Sanchez, helped create and guide these programs. From 2002 to 2004, when these programs were being built, Sanchez was on the CIA payroll and maintained an office at both the NYPD and the CIA’s offices in New York. The programs have continued with at least the tacit support of President Barack Obama, whose administration has repeatedly sidestepped questions about them.

Associated Press, 13 September 2011

See also “CAIR ‘cautiously’ welcomes CIA probe of role in NYPD mosque spying”, CAIR press release, 13 September 2011

Spiegel on Islamophobia in the USA

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Bob Pitt

Ullrich Fichtner of Spiegel interviews Brigitte Gabriel of ACT! for America:

To support her ideas, Gabriel jumps from the 7th to the 21st century and back, from the suras of the Koran to Europe’s transformation into “Eurabia,” from the Islamic militant group Hezbollah to American textbooks, and from the Crusades to the massacre of Israeli athletes during the Munich Olympics (which she seems to think took place in 1971, rather than 1972). She juggles Hitler and Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini and explains why each and every devout Muslim is a potential terrorist, and how all the pieces fit together in one grand scenario of doom: America is being infiltrated. Sharia law is coming soon. The government is looking away. Government agencies are asleep at the wheel.

The problem has less to do with the fact that nothing, or next to nothing, of what Gabriel and her disciples are spreading among the American people is actually true. The problem is that many Americans – perhaps half, perhaps the majority – see the world today in a very similar way.

Report on EDL to be published at University of Northampton conference

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Bob Pitt

A major report on the ideology, structure and development of the English Defence League (EDL) will be launched at an international conference at The University of Northampton next week.

The conference is entitled “Populist Racism in Britain in Europe since 1945” and will be held between 22-23 September.

The report, The EDL: Britain’s Far-Right Social Movement, also examines the EDL’s influence on far-right terrorism and “lone wolf” extremists. The latter are individuals who act alone with far-right extremist views; for example, Anders Breivik – perpetrator of the recent terrorists atrocities in Norway – allegedly acted alone and his manifesto praises the work of the EDL.

University of Northampton press release, 13 September 2011

Burnt Qur’an sent to Bronx mosque

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Bob Pitt

A Bronx Imam received a partially burnt Koran, delivered in an envelope to his mosque the day before Sept. 11th.

The Imam found the Koran in a brown envelope, which showed up at his mosque on East 198th Street at around noon Saturday. There were also papers inside the envelope covered with cartoon like drawing depicting hatred towards Muslims.

The Imam also found white powder inside the envelope. Tests determined the powder was actually pieces of the burnt Koran.

The incident is being investigated by the hate NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force.

WABC, 13 September 2011

US citizen on no-fly list detained in UK

Posted on September 12, 2011 by Bob Pitt

A 23-year-old Muslim convert who traveled by train and boat from the West Coast to England because of his apparent placement on the no-fly list has been detained in Great Britain.

Michael Migliore of Oregon tried unsuccessfully for months to fly to Italy, where he planned to live with his mother.

Migliore says he was told he is on the no-fly list, though U.S. officials refuse to confirm it. He believes he’s on the list because he refused to cooperate with FBI agents who wanted to question him after an acquaintance was charged in a plot to bomb a Christmas tree lighting ceremony in Portland.

He ended up taking a trans-Atlantic cruise that arrived in England Tuesday. His mother says British police told her that he’d been arrested.

Associated Press, 12 September 2011

Update: See “US citizen to Italy after detention in England”,Associated Press, 12 September 2011

US rabbis take part in anti-Islamophobia event

Posted on September 12, 2011 by Bob Pitt

Jewish rabbis took part in an anti-Islamaphobia in Washington on Thursday, days before the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 Twin Towers attack in New York, JTA reported.

“Ten years after 9/11, it has somehow become respectable to verbally attack Muslims and Islam in America,” Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the president of the Union of Reform Judaism, reportedly said at an event organized by Shoulder to Shoulder, a group founded a year ago to combat anti-Muslim rhetoric.

“There are very real consequences when entire populations are represented in the public imagination by their worst elements, when the sins of the few are applied to the group as a whole. I have watched in astonishment as prominent politicians, including candidates for president of the United States, have found it politically opportune to peddle divisive anti-Muslim bigotry,” Yoffie added.

Rabbi Burton Visotzky from the Conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary said Muslims “have always been part of the fabric of America,” the JTA report said.

Steve Gutow, a Reconstructionist rabbi and the president of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, the public policy umbrella group reportedly spoke at the event as well, saying “a great people and a great nation do not let their brothers and sisters suffer from bigotry and persecution.”

He condemned those who discriminate against Muslims throughout the United States, saying “our Muslim brothers and sisters suffer exactly that in all corners of this great country of ours. Today is a day to stand up and say we have had enough,” the report said.

Rabbi Marc Schneier, co-founder of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding, Rabbi Jack Moline, representing the Conservative movement’s Rabbinical Assembly, Rabbi Sidney Schwarz, representing the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association and the Faith and the Common Good project, and Rabbi Dr. Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer, representing the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, were also in attendance, the JTA report said.

Haaretz, 11 September 2011

NY congressional election – Republican candidate continues to exploit 9/11 and ‘Ground Zero mosque’

Posted on September 12, 2011 by Bob Pitt

NY Republican flier

New York Republicans have sent out a kitchen-sink mailer in the hotly-contested Queens congressional special election depicting a mosque superimposed over the scarred Ground Zero site on one side, and Democrat David Weprin alongside President Barack Obama on the other.

The mailer is one of a string that the New York State Republican Party sent out in this close race between state Assembly member Weprin and Republican businessman Bob Turner for the 9th congressional district seat that was held by scandal-singed Democrat Anthony Weiner.

But it’s also one of the more incendiary fliers in the contest that was supposed to be a lock for Democrats in a reliably blue district, but has turned into a dogfight in which Turner has the momentum.

The front of the flier features a golden-domed mosque rising in front of the demolished World Trade Center site, a shell of metal rising near a photo of Weprin and a quote of his from last September, saying: “I support the right of the mosque to build …”

The reverse page is a picture of Weprin juxtaposed against a photo of the president, and text reading: “Weprin stands with Obama – and they stand together in support of the mosque at Ground Zero.”

The piece was received by a registered voter in NY-9 in the past week, landing in the days leading up to the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

Politico, 10 September 2011