Category Archives: Resisting Islamophobia

EDL ‘violently attacked’ journalists, NUJ reports

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Members of the right-wing EDL (English D
English Defence League members try to break through police lines on Saturday

Journalists covering an English Defence League rally in London were subjected to a series of “violent attacks” on Saturday – including sexual assault and a photographer being set on fire, according to the National Union of Journalists.

The NUJ has revealed that after the event it received “numerous reports of harassment, threats and abuse” including “physical assaults, racist abuse, bottles and fireworks being thrown at the press and photographers being punched and kicked”.

The union claimed that one journalist “was subjected to a sexual assault” and said that another NUJ member “suffered minor burns after an EDL supporter used a flammable accelerant to set the photographer on fire”. The union said it was now offering support and assistance to the journalists who were abused and condemned the attacks as a “violation of press freedom”.

“These violent attacks are an appalling abuse of press freedom and a clear attempt by members of the EDL to deter journalists from carrying out their work,” said NUJ general secretary Michelle Stanistreet. “These attacks are designed to intimidate NUJ members and those in the local community who are determined to stand up to far-right groups. The police need to take decisive action to ensure that the thugs who attacked journalists during the EDL protest are identified and prosecuted.”

NUJ London photographers’ branch secretary Jason Parkinson said Saturday’s violence was the “latest in a long history of violence, threats and even fatwas issued against the press”, which he claimed were designed to “intimidate and deter the media exposing the violent and racist behaviour of the far-right”. “An attack on the press is an attack on press freedom and on our democracy,” he added.

Before Saturday’s protests the NUJ warned there could be violence against journalists following instances of “verbal threats, intimidation and physical violence” at previous events.

Press Gazette, 6 September 2011

Update:  See “Eye-witness backs up NUJ account of EDL attacks”, Press Gazette, 7 September 2011

The consequences of Islamophobia, in the U.S. and abroad

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The July 2011 massacre in Norway was a tragic signal of a metastasizing social cancer — Islamophobia. The Norwegian assassin, Anders Behring Breivik’s, 1500-page manifesto confirmed the dangerous consequences of hate speech that has been spread by American and European xenophobes and websites that are quoted hundreds of times in his fear-filled tract.

Because the small number of extremists responsible for 9/11 and terrorist attacks in Europe and the Muslim world legitimated their acts in the name of Islam, we have seen an exponential increase in the past ten years of hostility and intolerance towards fellow Muslim citizens. This hatred threatens the democratic fabric of American and European societies and impacts not only the safety and civil liberties of Muslims but also, as the attacks in Norway demonstrate, the safety of all citizens.

The broad spectrum of preachers of hate that include politicians, media commentators, Christian Zionist ministers, and biased media and internet sites exploit legitimate concerns about domestic security and engage in a fear-mongering that conflates Islam and the majority of Muslims with a small but deadly minority of militants. The Gallup World Poll revealed that 57% of Americans when asked what they admired about Islam said “nothing” or “I don’t know.” So. too, a Washington Post poll revealed that a shocking 49% of Americans view Islam unfavorably.

John Esposito at CPOST, 3 September 2011

Tower Hamlets: community unites against EDL

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tower Hamlets anti-EDL protest (2)

Muslim Volunteers Maintain Calm Despite Far-Right Threat

• Mass peaceful protest in support of tolerance and hope
• EDL fails to march through Tower Hamlets
• IFE members praised by police for professionalism

Over 10,000 people of all faiths and ethnic backgrounds claimed the streets of the East End yesterday in the name of tolerance and hope, defying more than 1,000 hooligans from the far-right English Defence League (EDL) attempting to march on Tower Hamlets.

Continue reading →

IRR briefing paper on the Oslo massacre

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Institute of Race Relations has published a briefing paper by Liz Fekete, Breivik, the conspiracy theory and the Oslo massacre. The paper includes:

• An analysis of the various elements in the Islamic conspiracy theory that Breivik drew on, its discursive frameworks, its key shapers and followers. Here certain intellectual currents within neoconservativism and cultural conservatism, and concepts such as clash of civilisations, Islamofascism, new anti-Semitism and Eurabia, are examined. While these may not support the notion of a deliberate conspiracy to Islamicise Europe, they are often used by conspiracy theorists to underline the righteousness of their beliefs and actions.

• An appendix of ‘Responses to the Oslo massacre’ from official statements to ripostes from counter-jihadists, extreme-right politicians and neoconservative political commentators.

• Detailed documentation of anti-Muslim violence and related provocations throughout Europe in 2010 and 2011 including desecrations of mosques and Islamic cemeteries; petrol bombs and other attacks on mosques and worshippers; physical attacks and extreme-right campaigns.

See IRR press release, 1 September 2011

Coalition seeks actions on NYPD mosque spying

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A coalition of a dozen civil rights and advocacy organizations is calling on the Senate Intelligence Committee, the U.S. Marshals Service and the Department of Justice to take action in response to revelations that the New York City Police Department (NYPD) is engaged in widespread religious and ethnic profiling and monitoring of Muslim communities and houses of worship in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.

The revelations are contained in documents obtained by the Associated Press (AP) showing that undercover NYPD officers in a so-called “Demographics Unit” targeted the Muslim communities with the assistance of individuals linked to the CIA. NYPD officials denied the Demographics Unit ever existed, despite the AP’s publication of an NYPD presentation that described the mission and makeup of the unit.

A coalition letter to the Senate Intelligence Committee requests that the committee conduct “an immediate investigation into this affair and hold formal hearings on the civil rights implications of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) sponsoring domestic spying activities by the NYPD and its legality.”

The coalition letter to the U.S. Marshals Service requests that the organization “withdraw its deputization of those special unit police officers involved in the above mentioned NYPD intelligence gathering activities, taking into account their safety and liability, the legality of such activities, and the civil rights implications of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) sponsoring domestic spying activities by the NYPD.”

A similar coalition letter to the Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Special Litigation Section requests “an immediate investigation into this apparent pattern of profiling by the New York City Police Department.”

Coalition members include:

* Afghans for Peace
* Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund
* Asian Law Caucus
* Bill of Rights Defense Committee
* Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)
* Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility (CLEAR)
* Demand Progress
* Defending Dissent Foundation
* DownsizeDC.org
* Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM)
* Jews Against Islamophobia
* South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT)

CAIR press release, 2 September 2011

EDL’s Tower Hamlets demonstration faces obstacles

Posted on by Bob Pitt

United East End demo 2

It’s not going well for the English Defence League’s demonstration in Tower Hamlets tomorrow. They had planned to meet in Hainault and then travel by tube to Liverpool Street station, from which the police would escort them to the place where their static protest is to be held. But members of the rail union the RMT put a block on that, saying that they would stop work on health and safety grounds if the EDL were allowed to gather at Liverpool Street.

Denied the use of that assembly point, the EDL announced last night that they would be gathering at two pubs in Euston – O’Neills and the Euston Flyer. However, after being informed of the situation by Unite Against Fascism management declined to host the EDL and said they would close the pubs tomorrow if the EDL turned up. So this morning there was another change of plan. The EDL now intends to meet in three pubs in Kings Cross – the Flying Scotsman and Dun A Ri (now operating under the name of Millers) in Caledonian Road and the Driver in Wharfdale Road.

It remains to be seen whether they are allowed to meet there. Unite Against Fascism has circulated the phone numbers of the pubs – Flying Scotsman 020 7837 8271, Dun A Ri (Millers) 020 7837 4863, Driver 0207 278 8827 – and are asking supporters to POLITELY urge these pubs not to host the EDL.

Update:  UAF reports that the three Islington pubs will refuse to host the EDL too.

A decade of bias voiced at 9/11 hearing

Posted on by Bob Pitt

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – At an event here Aug. 27 to mark the 10-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, harrowing stories were related of bullying in schools, workplace harassment, hate crimes based on religious affiliations and persecution by law enforcement agencies due to wearing faith-based hair coverings.

The three-hour hearing, “Unheard Voices of 9/11”, dramatically presented the decade-long impact after 9/11 on Arab, Muslim and Sikh American communities.

“Most of the bullying that I faced happened in middle school,” said Sarah O’Neal, a young hijab-wearing Muslim at the first panel on school bullying. “I was called a ‘towel head’ and some students asked me if I had relatives in al-Qaeda.” Currently a junior at Wilcox High School in Santa Clara, Calif., she added, “I felt marginalized, upset and unaccepted. I don’t want other kids to experience what I experienced in school because of my religion and because I wear a hijab.”

Navneet Singh, 16, of Redwood City, Calif., said, “I have felt isolated from elementary school onwards. In the fourth grade, I got punched in my face by a high school (student). I have been asked if I am related to any terrorist. I feel like I have to walk around with my guard up all the time.”

Speakers at the program, organized by state Assemblyman Paul Fong, D-Cupertino, Calif., the Sikh Coalition and the Council on American Islamic Relations, besides voicing their experiences, emphasized the need for policies and ideas to combat bigotry.

India West, 2 September 2011

Meet the Islamophobes

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Eli Clifton, co-author of the Center for American Progress report Fear, Inc. The Roots of the Islamophobia Network in America, is publishing a series of articles at Think Progress based on the report’s findings. So far, the series has covered Richard Scaife, the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation and Steven Emerson.

Think Progress also has an article by another of the report’s authors, Faiz Shakir, responding to misrepresentation of Fear, Inc. on Fox News.

It is right to ban the English Defence League’s march

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Lutfur Rahman, mayor of Tower Hamlets, replies to an article (“Let the EDL racists march”) by Nina Power.

Guardian, 1 September 2011

Postscript:  I’m told that the title “Let the EDL racists march” was chosen by the Guardian, not by Nina Power, who objected to it.

Update:  And the title has now been changed to “A protest ban isn’t the way to stop the racist EDL”.