Author Archives: Bob Pitt

Muslim groups decry Quebec’s treatment of prison guard

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Quebec government is turning a blind eye to sensible alternatives by forcing a Muslim woman to choose between her hijab or prison guard training, say Muslim groups. Sondos Abdelatif, 19, was told that she would have to remove her hijab in order to continue with the training program at Montreal’s Bordeaux jail. She chose to withdraw from the program instead.

Quebec’s Public Security Department said the Muslim headwear could pose a threat to Abdelatif’s safety should prisoners get hostile. “As a security measure, the hijab cannot be accepted as an element of the uniform to execute the functions of a correctional officer,” department spokesman Real Roussy said Thursday.

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Islamophobia comes to Driffield

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Wolds vicar has penned a controversial column warning local Christians about the rise of Islam. The Rev Tony Kidd, vicar of the Beacon Benefice which includes Burton Agnes with Harpham, Lowthorpe and Ruston Parva, has spoken out in the latest issue of The Parish Magazine which is circulated throughout the Driffield area.

Vicars from all the area’s churches contribute to the magazine and tend to use it as a way of keeping parishioners up-to-date with church news and upcoming events. However, Mr Kidd has used his column to record his feelings on Islam and to try and rally local Christians.

Mr Kidd said he is concerned that the UK has abandoned Christianity and the gap that has been left is being filled by Islam. He writes:

“We are sleep-walking into problems through our own carelessness. There can be no justification for blind tolerance of a faith which sees itself as divinely inspired, righteous and true, namely Islam, when too often its expression of that belief conflicts directly with the hopes and aspirations of the majority of the population.

“But equally we can not be surprised by the progress that Islam is making. Our lack of national standards, beliefs and convictions give rise to a host of social problems, unsafe streets and increasing inequality. As a result the clear-sighted objectives of militant Islam are thriving and no appeal to moderation is likely to succeed while our own decadence is so obvious.”

He adds: “Is it not time for us, as Christians, to put our own house in order by making clear what we believe and why?”

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Tatchell complains he has been ‘smeared as anti-Muslim’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Outrage“Allegations of ‘Islamophobia’ and ‘racism’ are increasingly manufactured and manipulated to stop debate, silence critics and discredit opponents. I have been on the receiving end of this mud-slinging by the Mayor of London and his Socialist Action apparatchiks, the National Assembly Against Racism, the Muslim Council of Britain and the notorious Islamophobia Watch website.

“The unprincipled, sectarian ‘left’ colludes with right-wing Islamists, such as the sexist, homophobic and anti-Semitic fundamentalist cleric, Dr Yusuf al-Qaradawi. When I, and others, dared condemn Qaradawi’s support for suicide bombing and female genital mutilation, we were denounced as ‘Islamophobes.’ The idea was to marginalise our critique by smearing us as anti-Muslim. These dirty tricks are the copy-book tactics of the far right. They have nothing in common with humanitarian or socialist values.”

Poor picked-on Peter Tatchell has a whinge in Democratiya, Spring 2007

For a recent critique of Tatchell on the notorious Islamophobia Watch website, see here.

For an example of the support Tatchell has attracted in the right-wing blogoshere see here.

Defamed mosque secretary awarded damages

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A former staffer at a Sydney mosque has been awarded $125,000 in damages after being defamed by a newspaper report that claimed he was a supporter of terrorism.

Two articles and an editorial in News Limited’s The Australian newspaper in June 2003, claimed the then secretary of the Dee Why mosque, Romzi Ali, was involved with the terrorism linked group Laskar Jihad.

Handing down his judgment in the NSW Supreme Court today, Justice Bruce James said reading the articles had affected Mr Ali’s health and that he was “frightened, alarmed, shaken and broken”.

One article said Mr Ali was raising money for Laskar Jihad operations in 2000, adding that he had denied the claims.

In the defamation case against Nationwide News in 2005, a jury found the article contained meanings that Mr Ali was a supporter of terrorism and “that he has raised money for the operations of Laskar Jihad, an organisation which does not worry about doing killing in pursuit of its political objections”.

Justice James said the meanings were “serious” and had even caused Mr Ali to think about leaving Australia.

AAP, 15 March 2007

More nonsense on Islam and Islamism

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Reflections on IslamThe Canadian National Post publishes an excerpt from a new book, Reflections on Islam, written by one of its columnists, George Jonas:

“Islam is one of the world’s great religions. Islamism is a radical movement of intolerance, coercion and terror. The followers of Islam are a billion faithful Muslims around the world. The followers of Islamism include Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda, Sheikh Omar and his Taliban, the nuclear ayatollahs of theocratic Iran, the militants of Hezbollah, the Armed Islamic Group of Algeria, the late Shamil Bashayev’s human bombs from Chechnya and a string of other terrorists in far-flung parts of the globe. Unfortunately, they also include some of our neighbours down the block or around the corner….

“Islamism is not Islam. The two are not to be equated. But is there something about Islam that is conducive to the formation of extremist sects and radical movements? Is Islam a Petri dish in which a culture of fundamentalism thrives? Arguably, yes.”

National Post, 15 March 2007

Think-tank says Muslims in Germany facing social discrimination

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Germany’s leaders should concentrate on the practical problems that undermine social cohesion – political alienation, over-zealous policing and economic inequality – and avoid the temptation to score domestic political points with hardline rhetoric about Turkish and other Muslim immigration, recommends the Brussels-based think-tank International Crisis Group (ICG).

In its latest report titled ‘Islam and Identity in Germany’, the ICG explores issues that must be addressed effectively if the integration of Muslim immigrants and the country’s native-born, necessary to ensure social cohesion and political stability, is to be achieved. “The fundamental problems of Turkish Germans and other Muslims are rooted in disenfranchisement, social discrimination and the lack of economic and political integration, not religion,” notes the report.

“Germany has accepted its status as a country of immigration and is now struggling to define what kind,” says Jonathan Laurence, ICG consultant. “However, the view that integration and the demonstration of `German-ness’ should precede naturalization remains a formidable brake on the process.”

The report says the proposed use of demanding naturalization questionnaires requiring applicants to agree with current German public opinion on certain questions leads the authorities to stigmatize as inherently “un-German” immigrant opinion that subscribes to entirely non-violent varieties of Islamist thinking.

IRNA, 15 March 2007

See also ICG press release, 14 March 2007

Israeli ‘expert’ on Islam draws sell-out audiences in Australia

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Raphael Israeli (2)Controversial Islam expert Professor Raphael Israeli has delivered two sell-out lectures in Melbourne – but avoided the question of whether his grim warnings about Muslim population growth in Europe also applied to Australia.

Professor Israeli, a Hebrew University academic with more than 20 books to his name, told more than 360 people on Sunday night that Islam was at odds with the fundamental pillars that support a democracy.

In a talk sponsored by Issues of Concern for Justice and Society (ICJS), he said a clash between the Koran and democratic principles was inevitable because of Islam’s rigid adherence to shari’a law. Earlier, he told a separate audience of about 350 people that Turkey’s possible entry into the European Union (EU) could cause a major headache for Europe, effectively doubling the EU’s Muslim population.

The two talks proceeded despite a major controversy over Professor Israeli’s visit, triggered when the visiting academic told the AJN he believed the Australian Government should place a cap on Muslim immigrants.

One of the primary sponsors of the trip, the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council, withdrew its support following a storm of protest over the comments. But the State Zionist Council of Victoria (SZCV) and the Australian Friends of the Hebrew University continued to back the scholar, as did the Shalom Institute at the University of NSW, which initially brought the academic to Australia as a scholar-in-residence.

Members of Zionist youth movement Habonim Dror protested the SZCV’s support of Professor Israeli last Wednesday night, handing out flyers critical of his remarks and the council’s decision to give them voice.

“As an affiliate of the SZCV, we express our deepest disappointment at the council’s decision to co-sponsor this event,” the flyer said. “The suggestion that Australia should cap Muslim immigration to our country is racist and an allegation that we find deeply offensive and counterproductive.”

Australian Jewish News, 15 March 2007

Why not invite the BNP to write for the Grauniad?

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Picking up on an almost equally stupid piece by Sunny Hundal, David T asks why the Guardian doesn’t publish articles by fascists like BNP leader Nick Griffin: “It cannot be that the Guardian has an objection to far right sectarians, as it runs pieces by Muslim Brotherhood supporting Faisal Bodi, Anas Altikriti, Ismail Patel and Soumaya Ghannoushi.”

Harry’s Place, 14 March 2007

Comment is Free recently posted an interesting piece by Marc Lynch (of Abu Aardvark fame), reporting sympathetically on Muslim Brotherhood bloggers. Is Lynch a “far right sectarian” too, then? Nah, in David T’s hall of mirrors he’s probably categorised as a fascist fellow-traveller.

Islam motivates terrorism: Canadian psychologist

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Nearly a month since Israeli Apartheid Week was held on campuses across North America and Europe, campus and community groups answered back with Freedom and Democracy Week, a series of lectures about home-grown terrorism, religious extremism and the “war on terrorism”. The event, which was held at the Bahen Centre at the University of Toronto from March 5 to 8, was sponsored by Zionists at the University of Toronto, a chapter of Betar-Tagar Canada; B’nai Brith Canada; Hasbara Fellowships; Stand With Us; and the Canadian Coalition for Democracies.

Steven Stein, a psychologist who has offered his expertise to the US Air Force, Canadian Forces and special units of the Pentagon, and is the CEO of Multi-Health Systems, the largest Canadian publisher of psychological tests, presented a lecture titled “The Psychology of Terror: Inside the Head of Religious Extremists”. He said that while some may cite the “Israeli occupation” as the reason for terrorism in Israel, he believes that religion is the main reason. He said that it is the passion for the religion that drives terrorism. “It is a duty, a call to God, it’s what Allah wants.”

Canadian Jewish News, 15 March 2007

Idaho Senate passes human rights resolution after mosque hit by swastikas

Posted on by Bob Pitt

BOISE, Idaho – Senators passed a symbolic measure highlighting Idaho’s commitment to human rights, just days after an Islamic mosque in Boise was targeted by swastika stickers. It reaffirms the state’s commitment to “freedom from discrimination because of race, color, religion, sex or national origin or disability.” Senator Edgar Malepeai argued the resolution sends a message to racist or bigoted groups that Idaho doesn’t tolerate hateful acts.

In the 1980s and 90s, meetings of the Aryan Nations in Hayden Lake in northern Idaho earned the state a reputation as a haven for racist groups. Malepeai says he’s concerned the incident at the Islamic Center of Boise last week could be a harbinger of renewed neo-Nazi activity. Malepeai says, “We need to respond to this resurgence of hate, and a resolution is a necessary step.”

Associated Press, 14 March 2007