Category Archives: Resisting Islamophobia

London Assembly Member calls on Home Secretary to ban EDL march in Tower Hamlets

Posted on by Bob Pitt

John BiggsThe Home Secretary has been asked today to ban a threatened march by the English Defence League through London’s East End.

The call comes from the London Assembly’s budget chairman John Biggs, who represents East London at City Hall. He has written to Theresa May asking her to ban the “divisive” march through Whitechapel planned for September 3 – anniversary of the outbreak of the Second World War.

“I have real concerns that groups opposed to the Far Right EDL will also take to the streets if it goes ahead,” he said. “The results will be huge public disorder, a risk of injury to the public and damage to property.”

Today’s letter was the second in a week to the Home Secretary in which he outlines his concerns: “I believe the march will be totally divisive.” It would be staged the first weekend after Ramadan, he points out, if it goes ahead.

East London Advertiser, 12 July 2011

Muslim woman sues Duane Reade over hijab ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A former Duane Reade employee on Long Island says she was fired when she started wearing a hijab, a traditional Muslim head covering, a lawsuit charges. Hira Iqbal, 21, claims that boss Errol Smith told her store policy “does not allow people like that” to wear such clothes at work, claims the federal First Amendment lawsuit, filed in Central Islip. A spokesperson for Duane Reade said Iqbal quit and was not fired.

New York Post, 11 July 2011

Cambridge: EDL protestors prevented from attacking mosque and then throw Qur’ans at Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

EDL Camridge protest

Members of the English Defence League (EDL) made a failed bid to target a Cambridge mosque after they marched through the city.

The incident came after a relatively peaceful march by the EDL through the city centre in which scuffles with police broke out along with bottle-throwing. Officers threw up a cordon around the mosque in Mawson Road and managed to quell the troublemakers.

Officers quelled some of the flashpoints sparked as around 200 EDL marchers were taunted by a small number of counter-protesters from an earlier 1,500 strong demonstration by Unite Against Fascism.

But members of the EDL, who arrived in coaches from across the country to Queens’ Green, also began fighting amongst themselves.

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ECHR refuses to rule against Swiss minaret ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Europe’s rights court on Friday rejected two cases brought by Muslims against Switzerland’s constitutional ban on the construction of new minarets.

The Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights said it would not consider the cases because the plaintiffs “cannot claim to be ‘victims’ of a violation” of the European Convention on Human Rights, which the court enforces.

One of the cases was brought by a former spokesman for the mosque of Geneva and the other by a number of Swiss Muslim associations.

Switzerland held a referendum in November 2009 in which citizens voted to ban the construction of new minarets, a move that drew criticism worldwide. The vote inserted a new line in the Swiss constitution stipulating that “the construction of minarets is forbidden”.

The plaintiffs had said the ban violated their religious rights, but judges in Strasbourg said they had not proven the ban “had any concrete effect” on the plaintiffs.

As the plaintiffs could not prove they planned to imminently erect a mosque with a minaret, they could not show they were subject to any discrimination, the judges said. “The simple fact that this could be the case in the near or far future is not, in the eyes of the court, sufficient” to warrant the examination of the cases, the judges said.

The Strasbourg court is due to consider three more cases on the minaret ban.

AFP, 8 July 2011

See also “Strasbourg minaret ruling causes no surprise”, Swissinfo, 6 July 2011

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

EDL launches ‘summer of hate’, holds anti-Islam protests in four towns and cities

Posted on by Bob Pitt

EDL Bradford placardsThe English Defence League (EDL) is to march against against Islam today in four towns and cities.

Anti-fascists will put on counter-protests against what they have described as a “summer of hate” by the EDL. Hundreds of police are expected to be on duty to prevent a repeat of violent scenes at previous events.

In Cambridge, EDL supporters will march in opposition to plans to build a mosque in the Mill Road area. A rival demonstration by Unite Against Fascism (UAF) will also be staged as thousands of families are expected to attend the city’s Big Weekend celebrations of live music.

Both sides will also be taking to the streets in Plymouth. The EDL has been distributing leaflets in the city centre with pamphlets saying “defend our culture”.

A planned EDL march in Derby was called off although opponents will still hold a Love Music Hate Racism festival at different venues in the city.

EDL will be staging its first demonstration in Middlesbrough, again over plans to build a mosque.

Independent, 9 July 2011

Auckland: Muslim women in bid to lift veil of ignorance

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Hijab in the West meetingMuslim women in New Zealand want to lift the “veil of ignorance” surrounding the way they dress. They say women who choose to cover their faces do so out of personal choice, with one comparing it to the veils worn by nuns.

About 60 women gathered at Auckland University on Friday night to discuss “Hijab in the West”, organised by the Young Muslim Women’s Association to discuss the Muslim headscarf and veil.

The women-only meeting was organised before it was revealed last week that a bus driver refused entry to a woman in a veil in May. The Saudi Arabian student was left crying on an Auckland street when the bus driver refused to let her board because of her veil. In another incident two days earlier, a driver for the same company, NZ Bus, told another woman to remove her veil.

Stuff, 10 July 2011

For an example of the ignorance Muslim women in New Zealand are up against see here.

EDL take to streets of Plymouth to protest against ‘the lies of Islam’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

More than 400 officers took to the streets of Plymouth city centre to police two opposing marches – which numbered around about 300 people in total. Senior officers have defended the large deployment of officers, some of whom were drafted in from Avon and Somerset, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire forces, claiming it was necessary to “lessen the impact of the marches”.

While the far-right English Defence League (EDL) set off from the Wild Coyote public house in Exeter Street at 1pm on Saturday, a counter-rally, organised by unionists and the Unite Against Fascism group, set off from the Jigsaw Gardens in Cornwall Street. Both groups, which held around 100 to 150 marchers each, were accompanied on their separate routes through the city by a sizeable number of officers, some wearing protective gear and carrying riot helmets.

Labour councillors Chaz Singh (Drake) and Philippa Davey (Stoke) were joined by Plymouth Moor View MP Alison Seabeck at the Jigsaw gardens.

Ms Davey said: “We want to highlight the tactics of the EDL, where they claim they’re not racists and it’s only about extremist Muslims. We also want to show that despite their best attempts to show antifascist groups as anarchists, we are the peaceful ones and we will not rise to their intimidation.”

Mr Singh said: “We want to show that the true representation of diversity is here. We’re not here to exacerbate the problem, we’re here to show that we are the real people of Plymouth”.

One of the organisers of the EDL march – Hayley also known as Princess Angel – said their protest was to “wake people up to the lies of Islam”. She claimed a mosque was being build in Beaumont Road, Greenbank – which is described as an Islamic cultural centre by its owners the Plymouth Islamic Education Trust (Piety) – and that the “religion was full of hate and not peaceful at all.”

She said: “We’re not a racist organisation. We’re only against Muslim extremists. We’re not racists – we do have coloured members. There’s a non-white person here [today].”

Police said the day passed without major incident and only six arrests – a 28-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of possession of an offensive weapon at the Jigsaw gardens, a 45-year-old man on suspicion of breach of the peace in Notte Street and a 25-year-old man for assault occasioning actual bodily harm and possession of cannabis in Armada Way. Police say three more men were arrested during the marches for breach of the peace.

Police later charged the 28-year-old man and he is expected to appear before Plymouth magistrates on July 20 charged with possession of an offensive weapon. The remaining five arrested were later released on police bail.

Following the march, the EDL held speeches opposite the Holiday Inn by Citadel Road, while the opposing marchers carried out their shorter speeches close to the sundial in Armada Way. Both groups were then escorted back to the starting points by police.

This is Plymouth, 9 July 2011

‘Suspect Communities’ – Muslim and Irish experiences

Posted on by Bob Pitt

On the sixth anniversary of the London bombings, Keith Vaz MP, chair of the Home Affairs select committee, hosted the launch of the report “Suspect communities”? Counterterrorism Policy, the Press, and the impact on Irish and Muslim Communities in Britain at the House of Commons yesterday.

The report examines to what extent and in what ways Irish communities and Muslim communities were represented as ‘suspect’ in public discourse in the two eras researched – the period of the Irish ‘Troubles’and post-9/11. It also examined the similarities and differences in the impact of these representations and counter-terrorism measures on Muslim communities and Irish communities in Britain.

ENGAGE, 8 July 2011

Former Czech PM sued over statements on Islam

Posted on by Bob Pitt

POLITIKA - PRAHA - STRANA PRÁV OBÈANÙ - ZEMAN - TKRetired politician Milos Zeman, Czech prime minister in 1998-2002, faces a criminal complaint over the statements on Islam he made in June at an international conference on Europe.

“The enemy is the anti-civilisation spreading from North Africa to Indonesia. Two billion people live in it and it is financed partly from oil sales and partly from drug sales,” Czech news servers quoted Zeman as saying about Islam at the recent conference.

Zeman said Thursday Muslims believe in the Koran like Nazis believed in racial supremacy and anti-semitism and communists in class struggle and dictatorship of the proletariat.

He said Islam is far more aggressive and intolerant than present Christianity, Buddhism, Confucianism and other world religions.

He added that the Koran includes passages calling for the subjugation, enslavement and even elimination of non-believers.

ČTK, 8 July 2011