Following on from the One Community advert in Saturday’s Guardian, Lutfur Rahman, Mayor of Tower Hamlets, explains why he supports the call for a ban on the EDL marching through East London on 3 September.
Sign the petition calling on the Home Secretary to ban this march at www.towerhamlets.gov.uk.
As the local elections take place in Norway next month, politicians are said to lead their campaigns in a peaceful fashion after what happened in Utøya Island and at Oslo City Centre last month. However, some go that extra mile and cause further controversy.
Former Chairman of the Progress Party (FrP) Carl I. Hagen, who is running for Oslo Mayor, has continued his series of contentious remarks, saying most terrorists are Muslims, reports NRK.
Releasing his Party’s manifesto in 2005, he was quoted byAftenposten as criticising the foreigners in Norway, branding them as “perpetrators”. Already in 2004 he was censured for his controversial views of Islam, after he alleged that its extreme faction planned to Islamify the world.
Standing by what he said at the time, Mr Hagen tells Aftenpostentoday: “We had seen regular reports about suicide bombers down to 10-years old in the Middle East. What I said was when holding my speech was just a correct description.”
Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre was first to respond to Hagen’s recent comments, calling them “grotesque”, particularly when the country is still in mourning about Anders Behring Breivik’s twin massacres on July 22.
“The Progress Party has a tendency to talk about Muslims as large groups, giving them the features and characteristics because they are Muslims. Carl I. Hagen is repeating his message. He says that not all Muslims are terrorists, but almost that all terrorists are Muslims. I think it is a grotesque statement. It was then, and is especially today after what we have experienced in Norway.”
According to the Minister of Children, Equality, and Social Inclusion, Audun Lysbakken: “The Progress Party has talked about Islam and Muslims in a way that creates the impression they are a team with specific values and attitudes that do not fit in Norway. It has a responsibility for the attitudes expressed against Muslims in the hours when many thought that Muslims were behind the terror attacks.”
The family of a terror suspect has launched a fresh petition urging the government to finally give him his day in court.
This month marks seven years since Babar Ahmad, from Fountain Road, Tooting, was imprisoned without trial following an extradition request from the United States.
To mark the unhappy milestone, his family has set up an e-petition calling on the official government website urging them to put him on trial in the UK. They are aiming to get 100,000 signatures to force a parliamentary debate about the case.
Mr Ahmad’s father, Ashfaw Ahmad, said: “This anniversary brings back dreadful memories of that day seven years ago when I received a call from the police telling me that my son had been arrested. Babar – it’s been 7 years but we will not let you be forgotten.”
Babar Ahmad remains in a maximum security prison in Worcestershire where he has become the longest-serving British terror detainee without a formal charge.
An IT technician at Imperial College, London, he was believed to be the leader of a small UK based group providing “logistical support, financial assistance, recruits and computer expertise” for overseas Jihadi groups when he was arrested.
He was later released without charge but was placed back in custody in August, 2004, awaiting extradition to the United States on terror charges. His final appeal against extradition is currently with the European Court of Human Rights, with a judgement expected later this year.
Wandsworth Guardian, 13 August 2011
Sign the petition here
A major charity that tackles racism in schools has been forced to expand its work to combat the growing influence of the English Defence League (EDL), its chief executive has warned.
The EDL, which has organised a series of protests which have turned violent, has become a “significant street force”, according to Ged Grebby from Show Racism the Red Card.
“The rise of Islamophobia combined with organisations like the EDL show we have a real problem in society,” Mr Grebby said. “There’s no doubt some young white people do feel disenfranchised. The EDL has given us a kick up the backside. It has been a focus for young people in particular.”
Show Racism the Red Card, which delivers workshops to schools to tackle racist attitudes, has made a series of films to tackle anti-Muslim sentiments. It now also speaks to children about homophobia and prejudice against asylum-seekers.
The expansion of its work follows a report released by the charity last month, which found that racism is still a “very real issue” in English schools. More than eight out of 10 teachers questioned said they had witnessed racist jokes, name-calling and stereotyping by pupils; 31 per cent said they had witnessed racist attitudes among fellow teachers.
Mr Grebby said teachers needed better training to combat racism, especially anti-Muslim abuse. “On traditional racism teachers are quite confident,” he said. “But when it comes to Islamophobia they are terrified. They worry if it’s an issue they don’t know a lot about, it could make things worse if they tackle it.”
There is a lively debate taking place in the UK media between left and right wing commentators as to the causes of the English riots, in which hundreds of shops and businesses have been looted. However, both sides agree that the looting has been inexcusable. I hope both sides will also agree with me that Muslims have played an important role in helping to tackle the looting and preserve public safety. This would be an especially important acknowledgment if it came from those Islamophobic commentators who consistently denigrate Muslims.
“When accused of terrorism we are Muslims, when killed by looters, we become Asian”, a Muslim student explained to me. He was commenting on the media reporting of the death of three young Muslims in Birmingham on Tuesday night. Like many other Muslims, they were bravely defending shops and communities as rioters went on a violent rampage of looting.
In recent days Muslim Londoners, Muslims from Birmingham, and Muslims in towns and cities around England have been at the forefront of protecting small businesses and vulnerable communities from looting. Having worked closely with Muslim Londoners, first as a police officer and more recently as a researcher, for the last ten years this commendable bravery comes as no surprise to me. But their example of outstanding civic duty in support of neighbours is worth highlighting – especially when sections of the UK media are so quick to print negative headlines about Muslims on the flimsiest of pretexts.
Bob Lambert writes at Al Jazeera, 12 August 2011
Matt Duss doesn’t buy it.
Yes, really. The US State Department has awarded a $200,000 grant to the right-wing Zionist propaganda organisation the Middle East Media Research Institute. What were they thinking? Even leaving aside its reputation for attacking Muslim critics of Israel, and the inspiration this provided for Anders Breivik, MEMRI notoriously intervened in the 2004 US presidential election with the baseless claim that Osama bin Laden was supporting the Democrats’ campaign by offering to refrain from attacking US states that voted for Kerry rather than Bush.
See Jim Lobe and Philip Weiss. Also Ali Gharib at Think Progress.
A minister at Ely Cathedral has voiced his concerns over people’s attitude towards Muslims.
Alan Hargrave, Canon Missioner at the cathedral, is urging people of all religions to be more open-minded when it comes to Muslims wanting to build a small mosque in the city. Speaking in this month’s Ely Cathedral Newsletter, Canon Hargrave says people should be willing for Ely to be a multi-faith society.
His views come just weeks after the English Defence League (EDL) threatened to stage a protest in the city to fight plans to build the Muslim prayer centre.
Canon Hargrave said: “The reports about a possible EDL march in Ely are deeply disturbing. Muslims, along with Christians and Jews, have always been one of the great Abrahamic faiths, who share much in common. Over the centuries, for the most part, the three faiths have lived together relatively peacefully.
“If we oppose their building a place of worship, they will not go away and we will merely build the sort of tensions, fears and hatred that have fuelled the extremism we have witnessed in recent years – among Christians as well as Muslims. Freedom of worship is something we enjoy in our democracy – indeed it is central to it and something we ought to defend at all costs.”
Members of the Ely Muslims group announced they wanted to build a “miniature mosque” in Ely in February. The management committee of the Paradise Centre had told them they would lease them part of its land, along New Barns Road, if they gained planning permission to build the prayer centre.
The group currently has around 50 members who gather inside the Paradise Centre on Fridays.
‘A bad word whispered will echo a hundred miles’, a Chinese saying goes. ‘Wilders is not responsible for what Breivik did but words count for something and politicians should be aware of it.’
This was my reaction when I was asked whether Geert Wilders was in any way responsible for the attack in Oslo in which 7 people were killed and the massacre on Utoya where 69 young social democrats lost their lives, slaughtered by a man whose writings show he was inspired by right wing anti-Islam ideology. We must ask how this could have happened so we can do our utmost to make sure it never happens again….
What does it do to people who increasingly are born in this country when it is drummed into them that their efforts to help build a society counts for nothing because their faith is a totalitarian ideology which is completely alien to Western society? And what about those who are starting to believe that this is true and that this ideology is bent on destroying our society? …
My call to moderate our tone is not meant to avoid debate but to engage in it openly and with mutual respect.
Dutch Labour party leader Job Cohen writes in Volkskrant.
Translation by Dutch News.
The Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MN) today announced that more than a dozen Muslim employees it represented have won a favorable ruling by the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission (EEOC) in a complaint filed against H.J. Heinz Company subsidiary, Dianne’s Gourmet Desserts, in Le Center, Minn. CAIR-MN said the employees received a “reasonable cause” determination from the EEOC on all allegations of discrimination, including failure to accommodate religious practices and retaliation.
In December 2010, Muslim employees at the Heinz subsidiary were terminated from their jobs for requesting legally protected prayer accommodation. They were forcibly removed and local law enforcement was called to ensure they left the premises. The company had created a new policy that abolished a break time used by Muslim employees to pray their evening (Maghrib) prayer. The employees were prohibited from praying outside of the newly implemented work breaks, which did not coincide with prayer times. Performance of the five daily prayers is a mandatory and essential part of life for Muslims.
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Minnesota Human Rights Act prohibit employers from discriminating against employees or prospective employees on the basis of religion. Title VII also requires employers to reasonably accommodate the religious practices of their employees. Courts have been clear in articulating that each individual employee who has a bona fide religious belief must be reasonably accommodated by an employer.
CAIR-MN negotiated with Dianne’s Gourmet Desserts to rehire the employees in January 2011, however the issue of discrimination still prevailed and was investigated by the EEOC. CAIR-MN will be entering in the settlement phase with Dianne’s Gourmet Desserts to remedy their illegal acts. “Employers need to understand their legal obligation to accommodate bona fide religious practices in the workplace for all employees,” said CAIR-MN Civil Rights Director Taneeza Islam. “We thank the EEOC for its diligent investigation and commitment in mandating religious accommodation on employers.”