Category Archives: Anti-Muslim violence

Man gets 3 months jail for mosque arson

Posted on by Bob Pitt

AMSTERDAM — A man, 18, has been sentenced to 12 months in prison, nine months of which was suspended, for setting fire to building materials near the Rahmann mosque in Breda. A court in the city also ordered the local man to do 120 hours of community service.

The prosecutor said the defendant and a 17-year-old acquaintance decided to “teach the Muslims a lesson” just days after filmmaker Theo van Gogh was murdered in Amsterdam by a suspected Islamic militant. The judge said the defendant had contributed to the feeling of unrest in the Netherlands in the aftermath of Van Gogh’s killing.

The court ruled the arson attack was not a political crime, but was an act of profanity. The sentence conformed to the prosecutor’s demand.

Expatica, 7 April 2005

Attack on Dutch mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A group of youths smashed a mosque’s windows in the Netherlands, sparking street fighting with Muslim immigrants at the weekend.

One person was hurt and police arrested one man after the Saturday night disturbance in the city of Venray. Local media reported that the fight had involved about 60 Turkish immigrants and around 20 indigenous Dutch.

A surge of Islamophobic attacks hit the Netherlands in the weeks after the November murder of a Dutch film-maker, who was allegedly killed by a Muslim extremist. There were dozens of attacks on mosques and Islamic schools, including several bombings and cases of arson.

One man suffered unspecified injuries in Saturday’s fight and was hospitalised overnight, police said.

Morning Star, 4 April 2005

Muslim grave vandals spared jail

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Three boys who desecrated dozens of Muslim graves have each been given 12-month rehabilitation orders. The trio, aged 14, 16, and 17, carried out the attacks in a cemetery in Charlton, south-east London, on 17 March last year. They were found guilty of conspiracy to commit religiously aggravated criminal damage at an earlier hearing.

A judge at Inner London Crown Court ordered them to wear electronic tags and be under curfew for three months. Judge Lindsay Burn at Inner London Crown Court said: “You agreed to go together into that cemetery and deliberately damage graves.

“The jury were convinced, and I am satisfied, that at least one of your motivations was hostility to the religious beliefs of those buried in that section of the cemetery, namely those of the Muslim faith. That in itself is extremely serious conduct.”

He told them their behaviour had caused great distress to the relatives of the deceased, and the public. Some of the graves vandalised belonged to children.

BBC News, 1 April 2005

Fear and hatred of Muslims on increase in young generation

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Children as young as 13 are displaying signs of Islamophobia and are voicing their support for the British National Party, researchers have found.

Young teenagers are increasingly saying they have negative views towards Muslims and do not want Islamic culture expressed in the classroom. The study of 1,500 students aged 13 to 24 was presented at the annual conference of the British Psychological Society in Manchester yesterday.

Researchers asked students from 14 secondary schools and one further education college in York for their views on Islam since 11 September 2001. Three of the schools were from the independent sector and the others came from a wide geographical and socio-economic area.

Nathalie Noret, the lead researcher, from York St John’s College, said: “The younger pupils were more likely to exhibit extreme views and Islamophobia than older students, and there were no differences between schools.” She added that Islamophobia was a “double whammy” as it discriminated against people not just on the basis of religion but also the colour of their skin.

Overall, 43 per cent of the participants said their attitudes towards Muslims had got worse or much worse since the attacks. A quarter said they had worsened still further since the invasion of Iraq.

Ten per cent of girls and 23 per cent of the boys said they would object to female Muslim school pupils wearing a hijab in the classroom.

When asked about the British National Party, almost 10 per cent said they either agreed or agreed strongly with the views of its far-right politicians, with 15 per cent saying they were neutral.

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Dutch protest racism, anti-Muslim attacks

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Islam Online reports that police in the Netherlands have arrested a 17-year-old man suspected of trying to burn down an Islamic school against a backdrop of a mass rally in Amsterdam protesting against rising racism in the country, particularly against Muslims. The marchers carried banners reading “Islam is not an enemy”, and “Hatred is not the solution”.

Islam Online, 30 March 2005

Faith hate attack on Muslim graves

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The UK’s Islamic community was yesterday horrified to learn that 40 Muslim graves in a London cemetery had been desecrated in a faith hate attack thought to have been sparked by the Madrid bombings.

Headstones were smashed and pictures removed from the graves in Charlton cemetery in the south-east of the city.

Police believe the vandals struck between 4pm on Wednesday and 8am yesterday and are treating the desecration as a crime motivated by religious hatred.

Guardian, 19 March 2005

Police probe arson attack at Worthing mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A sickening fire-bomb attack on Worthing’s mosque has rocked the town’s Muslim community.

Muslims have been left deeply shocked by Friday’s arson attack on the mosque in Ivy Arch Road, which was started in a downstairs prayer room at around 5.30am.

The fire-bombers, according to members of the Worthing Islamic Society, broke in through the mosque’s back door and set light to a gas pipe they had cut. And if it wasn’t for worshippers turning up for early morning prayers, the mosque could have been burnt to cinders.

Ali Abdul Rahman, chairman of the Worthing Islamic Society, said: “We are very sad someone could do this and we are just hoping it is not a racist or religious attack. “We are peace-loving people and we would hope if the people who did it would come and see us and talk to us we could help them and make them better people.”

Two people, a 17-year-old girl and a 27-year-old man, who are both from Worthing, have since been arrested on suspicion of arson and have been released on bail. They have not been charged.

The fire started sometime before 5.30am and it is believed, by members of Worthing Islamic Society, arsonists broke into the mosque through a back door. Once inside, they started a fire in a ground floor room, which is used as an over-flow prayer room, by setting light to a gas pipe they had cut. They spread white spirit on the floor and attempted to make a bonfire of a mattress and some chairs.

The mosque was badly smoke damaged.

Worthing Herald, 17 March 2005

Update:  See “Man found guilty of mosque arson”, BBC News, 18 May 2007

Update 2:  See “Man who set fire to mosque jailed for three years”, The Argus, 11 June 2007

Justice watchdog finds Muslim mistreatment

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The warden and guards at a federal prison discriminated and retaliated against Muslim inmates, the Justice Department’s inspector general said Friday in a report that also detailed allegations of mistreatment of Muslims at other US lockups.

In one instance at the unidentified federal prison, the warden “unjustly and inappropriately” ordered an inmate transferred to special housing similar to solitary confinement for more than four months, Inspector General Glenn A. Fine said. The move came five days after the inmate talked to Fine’s investigators.

Federal prosecutors declined to pursue criminal charges against the warden, and the incident was referred to the federal Bureau of Prisons, he said.

The treatment of Muslim prisoners was part of a semiannual report Fine produces about possible civil rights or civil liberties violations by the Justice Department.

The inspector general began one new investigation in the last half of 2004. It involves allegations that guards at another federal prison abused a Muslim inmate and allowed other inmates to assault him.

Fine also noted that the federal prison officials have yet to discipline anyone for the abuse more than a year after he documented the mistreatment of Arabs and Muslims detained at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, N.Y., after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

In addition, prison officials told the inspector general they discovered more videotapes of the detainees at the Brooklyn facility, as well as of meetings between detainees and their lawyers. Previously disclosed tapes helped confirm that guards slammed detainees against walls, twisted their arms and conducted unnecessary strip searches. The prisons bureau and Fine are investigating why the other tapes were not given to them sooner.

Muslim News, 12 March 2005