Category Archives: Canada

Canadian Muslim organisation condemns prime minister’s Islam comments

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Islamic Supreme Council of Canada is urging Muslims to speak out against Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s recent remarks about their religion.

Harper told CBC this week that “Islamicism” poses the most pressing threat to Canada’s security, and that the country’s intelligence service is mostly preoccupied with Islamic extremism. Harper’s spokesman later clarified to CBC News that the prime minister was “referencing Islamic terrorism – the Islamists” in his remarks.

The council is urging Harper to apologize for the comments, saying the actions of fanatics do not represent Islamic beliefs. The council says Harper’s words will damage efforts to bridge cultural gaps and fight extremist activities in Canada.

It wants imams in its affiliated mosques to condemn the comments in today’s prayer gatherings. The council is also urging Canadians to contact the Prime Minister’s Office to demand an apology for “insulting the faith of 1.6 billion Muslims.”

“How can Mr. Harper associate Islam with radicalism and fanaticism?” the group asked in a statement. “We are working hard to bring people of all faiths together to fight extremism and radicalism but Mr. Harper’s comments about Islam have damaged those efforts.”

CBC, 9 March 2011

Tarek Fatah claims Dalai Lama is Islamist dupe … for sharing platform with Tariq Ramadan

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Dalai Lama will join controversial Muslim scholar Tariq Ramadan in Montreal on Wednesday for a conference on world religions and peace in the aftermath of 9/11.

But rather than promising inspiration in a world plagued by religious tumult, the conference has already stirred up controversy and dissension as critics charge that the Dalai Lama is being duped into promoting Islamc fundamentalism.

The Second Global Conference on World’s Religions After Sept. 11 is being organized by McGill University and the Université de Montréal and organizer Arvind Sharma, a professor of comparative religion at McGill, says the goal is to debate how religions can contribute to peace in the world.

He is also hoping to have the participants adopt three resolutions, including one that says violating the sanctity of the scripture of any religion amounts to violating the sanctity of all religions.

To Tarek Fatah, founder of the Muslim Canadian Congress, this is just a way of saying religions are above reproach and tacitly endorsing Sharia, or Islamic law, and he is furious the Dalai Lama would be asked to support that.

“This is a sugar-coated attempt by Islamists to co-opt other religious leaders being asked to come here in good faith,” said Fatah, a critic of Ramadan who, he charges, masks his true views of Muslim fundamentalism behind a fake facade of moderation.

Montreal Gazette, 6 September 2011

Yes, that’s the same Muslim Canadian Congress that recently joined the EDL-supporting Jewish Defence League in a protest against Muslims being allowed to pray in Toronto schools.

Update:  See “Stop painting religions in image of their destructive followers: Dalai Lama”, CTV, 7 September 2011

 

Muslim Canadian Congress joins Jewish Defence League to fight Islamic prayers in Toronto schools

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Toronto Stop Islamic Infiltration placardSome Muslim parents fear a handful of Toronto imams are turning their children into young radicals during Friday prayer services at some public schools.

“Who are these imams and what are their qualifications,” asked Sohail Raza, president of the Muslim Canadian Congress. “I am extremely concerned about what they are teaching our kids.” Raza was among 300 people who demonstrated outside the Toronto District School Board, on Yonge St., on Monday night.

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Toronto: protesters oppose Muslim prayer in state schools

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Toronto District School Board protest

They waved signs that warned of “creeping jihad” and proclaimed “Islam must be reformed or banned”. They chanted – “No Islam in our schools”; “No Mohamed in our schools”; “No Sharia law in our country”.

About 100 protesters, many from groups such as the Jewish Defense League, the Christian Heritage Party and Canadian Hindu Advocacy, came to the Toronto District School Board Monday evening to protest its approval of formal Friday prayer services for Muslim students at Valley Park Middle School.

Standing at the back of the crowds, far from the megaphone-wielding speakers, York University students Mariam Hamaoui and Sarah Zubaira had their own signs espousing their right to pray in school. They came to thank the school board for providing a place for the Valley Park students to pray. Previously those students had left their school to attend prayers at a nearby mosque on Fridays.

Bringing an imam into the school was a means of preventing some of the approximately 300 Muslim students from failing to return to classes after those prayers, said school board director Chris Spence. It also meant they don’t have to cross a busy street. Valley Park has been holding the prayers in the cafeteria for three years and there have been no complaints within the school community of about 1,200, he said.

Hamaoui, 18, said she had to go to the basement to pray when she attended Etobicoke Collegiate Institute because “there was no other place”. “I think people should be open minded. I don’t see the problem to go pray. Praying is helping everybody,” she told reporters and the protesters who aggressively confronted her. “Universities let anybody pray. I don’t see the problem with having middle schools,” she told one woman.

“It’s our constitutional right,” said Zubaira, who wore a hijab for the first time on Monday.

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Allow hijabs, say Quebec soccer players

Posted on by Bob Pitt

FIFA hijab protestA group of Montreal women gathered Thursday to protest a Quebec soccer association’s decision to sack a referee because she wears a hijab. The protestors also called for the end of a controversial policy that bans headscarfs during soccer games.

The demonstraters – who played a pickup game near Montreal’s old port – said the association’s position is unacceptable.

Headscarfs are also banned by the Fédération Internationale de Football Association, which governs international soccer. “We’re asking FIFA and any other organizations to get out of women’s wardrobes,” said Sana Saeed, who organized the protest.

Saeed was one of about a dozen women who wore hijabs Thursday afternoon as they played soccer to protest the firing of Sarah Benkirane – a 15-year old who officiated soccer games for two years in the West Island area of Montreal, and off island in Vaudreuil.

They also held their protest to show that it is possible to play soccer safely while wearing a headscarf. FIFA bans the hijab on the field saying it restricts a player’s breathing.

Naajia Isa, who has played soccer in Singapore where she said the hijab is more widely accepted, disagrees. “They don’t look at you and see the headscarf … they see a student, a mother, a daughter,” said Isa.

It was The Lac St. Louis Regional Soccer Association that fired Benkirane in June. At the time, it said it follows FIFA rules and won’t reverse its decision on hijabs.

The province’s soccer federation said Tuesday that Canada’s parallel organization also follows the FIFA rule prohibiting the hijab, and to change the rules, Benkirane would have to address the world soccer association.

In February 2007, five teams from across Canada walked out of a soccer tournament in Laval, Que., because a Muslim girl was ejected for wearing a hijab. FIFA upheld its rule banning the hijab the following week.

In early June, FIFA upheld a decision to prevent Iran’s women’s team from playing a 2012 Olympic qualifier game wearing head scarves.

CBC, 8 July 2011

See also “FIFA’s hijab hangup”, NOW Magazine, 7 July 2011

Soccer referee banned for wearing hijab

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Sarah BenkiraneMONTREAL — A former Lac St. Louis soccer referee is blowing the whistle on rules she said prevent her from practising her religion.

Sarah Benkirane, 15, was told after two years of refereeing for the soccer association that she was out of a job, after a complaint surfaced over her wearing her hijab while calling games.

“For me it’s not really an option to take it off,” she explained of her traditional Muslim head scarf. “It’s part of my religion. It’s part of who I am. It’s the way I express myself, so I think I should be allowed to wear it as long as I’m not causing any harm to anybody else and I’m not.”

Under Rule 4 of the FIFA guidelines, which govern the Lac St. Louis Soccer Association, players must not only avoid wearing any item which threatens to cause choking or injury, but also “must not have any political, religious or personal statements.” All rules for players also pertain to referees under FIFA rules.

Edouard St. Lo, executive director of the Lac St. Louis Soccer Association said he agrees with the regulations. “It’s not just safety, because it does talk about political, religious and any kind of personal feeling that the person wants to display on the field. That’s why they’re all wearing the same thing,” he said.

Benkirane has drawn support from some parents, who have signed a petition allowing her to play. “Absolutely she should be able to wear it – it’s her choice,” said one mother.

CTV, 18 June 2011

Update:  See “Soccer referee refused right to wear hijab a second time”, CTV, 20 June 2011

Ontario: mosque vandal gets 18 months for crime spree

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Waterloo mosque graffiti

A man who defaced a Waterloo mosque removed a cross from around his neck and gave it to his weeping mother for safekeeping before he was taken away to jail Monday. Jesse Coleman, 21, was sentenced to 18 months in custody – plus two years on probation – for a crime spree that caused more than $160,000 in damage.

Coleman admitted he and a teenager smashed windows and spray-painted graffiti on the mosque of the Muslim Society of Waterloo and Wellington Counties last spring. Members were shaken after they found pentagonal symbols and the numbers 666 on the building, which they took as “very offensive and threatening in nature.”

Coleman and the same youth also set fire to a house under construction on West Park Crescent in Waterloo, with damaged estimated at $130,000. He was part of a group of young males who went joyriding on carts at the Westmount Golf and Country Club, doing $30,000 damage before leaving them smashed and spray-painted. Others crimes included the theft of a University of Waterloo pickup truck, a break-in at the home of a friend who was trying to help him, and a small marijuana-growing operation.

The prosecution sought a sentence of two years less a day, stressing the “racial hatred” involved in the mosque incident and the complete disregard Coleman showed for others. Justice Gary Hearn, however, took into account that Coleman is still young, has a long list of mental health and addiction problems, and had an abusive, dysfunctional childhood. “He is in many ways the product of his upbringing,” Hearn said.

While on probation for two years after his release from jail, Coleman must perform 100 hours of community service.

A representative of the Muslim society was in court for the sentencing, but declined comment other than to thank police for their handling of the case.

The Record, 14 June 2011

Moazzam Begg denied entry to Canada

Posted on by Bob Pitt

-A well-travelled British human rights activist and former Guantanamo Bay detainee said he was barred from boarding a direct flight from London to Toronto Friday because of concerns the aircraft could be diverted to the U.S.

Moazzam Begg was supposed to speak at a Saturday conference on Islamophobia organized by the Canadian lawyer for Omar Khadr, 24, the Toronto-born Guantanamo prisoner who was convicted last fall of war crimes.

Begg said airline agents told him they had been in touch with Canada’s High Commission in London and the issue was one of security. “They said to me the reason why they would not board me and take me to Canada is because, in the unlikely event they were rerouted to America, there could be a security concern,” Begg said in a telephone interview with the Toronto Star.

Khadr’s lawyer, Dennis Edney, said a Canadian foreign affairs official informed him that Begg was denied entry due to a “U.S. policy”.

Toronto Star, 20 May 2011

Islam a threat to Western freedom, Wilders tells Toronto audience

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Wilders TorontoThe presence of Muslims in Canada threatens the country’s freedoms and democracy, and only if immigration from Islamic countries is suspended can the cultural deterioration of the country be stopped, controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders told a packed house Monday night in Toronto.

“Our Western culture is far superior to Islamic culture,” Mr. Wilders said. “And only once we are convinced of this will we be able to defend our civilization.”

The event, held at the Canadian Christian College in north Toronto, marked Mr. Wilders’ second stop on a three-city tour. The visit, his first to Canada, is sponsored by the International Free Press Society. He spoke in London on Sunday, and he will be in Ottawa on Tuesday.

Charles McVety, president of the Christian College, introduced Mr. Wilders to an ebullient crowd as a man with “a prophetic message.”

In his speech on Monday night, he said Muslim immigrants to Europe have changed the social and political landscape there. An increasingly vociferous Islamic lobby has led to the harassment of Christians, female genital mutilation and polygamy, he said, adding that with its own growing Muslim community, Canada faces the same fate.

His career has been driven by a belief that the Koran encourages violence, that moderate Islam is an impossibility and that in allowing Muslims to immigrate to Western nations, these countries open themselves up to inevitable Islamization. “We need the spirit of resistance to this evil,” he said. “That is our moral duty.”

Farooq Khan, executive director of the North American Muslim Foundation, expressed shock at Mr. Wilders’ being allowed into the country, and is dismayed by what he sees as a lack of nuance in the views of many Westerners about Islam.

“It is the political agenda of the far right, which is hell-bent on on creating an environment in which Muslims must get out of the West,” Mr. Khan said in an interview before Monday’s speech. “The Wilders event is nothing more than creating hatred.”

National Post, 10 May 2011

See also “Keep Islamic ideology out of Canada: Wilders”, 24 Hours Vancouver, 10 May 2011

Anti-Wilders protestors in Toronto
Anti-Wilders protestors in Toronto