Category Archives: Resisting Islamophobia

Evening Standard’s ‘provocative and sensationalist’ reporting: MCB writes to London mayor

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Flames of HateThe Muslim Council of Britain has written to Ken Livingstone, asking for his support in combating “the often provocative and sensationalist style of reporting of Muslim affairs in the London paper, Evening Standard”.

The MCB is particularly concerned by the Standard’s misleading account of the recent protest outside the US embassy against the desecration of the Qu’ran at Guantánamo. The MCB includes a selection of the abusive and threatening emails it has received as a result of the Standard‘s irresponsible journalism.

EU anti-terror policies breach human rights: Amnesty

Posted on by Bob Pitt

An international human rights watchdog said on Tuesday, May 31, that the European Union’s awkward anti-terror policies have led to breaches of human rights. The EU launched a drive against terrorism after the 9/11 attacks and stepped it up after the Madrid train bombings 14 months ago. Muslim minorities have taken the brunt of the anti-terror measures, which include predawn raids and stop-and-search campaigns, for no reason other than being Muslims.

Islam Online, 31 May 2005

See also Amnesty International press release, 31 May 2005

Jihad Watch goes UK

Posted on by Bob Pitt

madmel“Political correctness is turning lethal. Stockport Council is now using resource packs provided by the Muslim Council of Britain to teach schoolchildren about Islam, an initiative which is to be extended across the nation.” Melanie Phillips in another frothing-at-the-mouth attack on the MCB.

Melanie Phillips’s Diary, 30 May 2005

Here’s a further reason why it would be a mistake to dismiss Robert Spencer as a politically marginal fruitcake. Mad Mel (whose views reach a mass audience via her Daily Mail column) not only bases her article on a post from Spencer’s blog (see here), she even borrows the title for her article from him – “Dhimmi Britain”.

Spencer, for his part, reciprocates with a tribute to “the incomparable Melanie Phillips”.

Dhimmi Watch, 30 May 2005

For a reply to Phillips by Yusuf Smith, see Indigo Jo Blogs, 30 May 2005

Why Islam is disrespected (according to Jeff Jacoby)

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Yes, Islam is disrespected. That will only change when throngs of passionate Muslims show up for rallies against terrorism, and when rabble-rousers trying to gin up a riot over a defiled Koran can’t get the time of day.”

Jeff Jacoby comments on the anti-US protests provoked by Newsweek‘s report, claiming they show that Muslims have a particular propensity to violence.

Boston Globe, 19 May 2005

Juan Cole replies: “Jacoby’s position is pure bigotry. We have to be clear about this. Anti-muslimism is a form of racial prejudice no different from any other. If Jacoby said, ‘What is wrong with those people of African descent, that they are so violent all the time when nobody else is?’ he’d probably be fired. It is not all right for him to do the same thing to Muslims. While Muslims are a religious group, in the contemporary United States they most often are racialized. It comes to the same thing.”

Informed Comment, 20 May 2005

Muslims denounce US Koran abuse

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Thousands of people across the Muslim world have rallied against the alleged abuse of the Koran by US personnel at the Guantánamo Bay military camp. Protesters in Egypt, Pakistan, Jordan, Lebanon and Malaysia demanded the US apologise and punish those responsible.

The demonstrations came after the US military admitted some of its guards had mishandled the Muslim holy book. But the camp commander said no credible evidence had been found that the Koran had been flushed down a toilet.

BBC News, 27 May 2005

Why do Americans hate Muslims?

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Horsey cartoon

“We have watched America attack us, destroy us, impose embargoes against our nations and then conquer our lands, imprison our people and generally deal with us as though we are savage animals whereby every single law be it international or even American is totally disregarded when it concerns the rights of Arab and Muslim individuals. Then they ask us why we hate them.”

Answering the question “Why do Muslims hate Americans?”, Reem Al-Faisal argues that a more appropriate question is “Why do Americans hate Muslims?”

Arab News, 26 May 2005

US Muslim sues over prison visit, headscarf

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Cynthia RhouniA Muslim woman who was ordered by male prison guards to take off her headscarf before she could visit an inmate has filed a federal lawsuit alleging her constitutional right to practice religion had been violated.

Cynthia Rhouni, 43, of Madison, says the scarf, or hijab, that always covers her head and shoulders in the presence of men shows the world she is a devout Muslim.

Rhouni’s lawsuit claims that male prison guards at the maximum-security Columbia Correctional Facility north of Madison told her rules prohibited any head covering in the visiting room. They ordered her to take off her scarf before she could see her estranged husband in 2003, the suit alleges.

Continue reading →

Guantánamo is gulag of our time, says Amnesty

Posted on by Bob Pitt

guantanamo-bayBritain and the US are betraying the cause of human rights in pursuit of their “war on terror”, Amnesty International says in its annual report published yesterday.

Irene Khan, Amnesty’s general secretary, launching the report, accused the two governments of condoning torture while trying to keep their consciences clear. Britain used the language of freedom and justice in the context of Iraq, yet insisted that the Human Rights Act did not apply to British soldiers operating there, she said.

The British government was seeking diplomatic assurances from countries, including Algeria, to which it wanted to deport people. By seeking assurances for particular cases, it was admitting that torture was entrenched in those countries and was therefore, in effect, condoning the practice, she said.

“A new agenda is in the making, with the language of freedom and justice being used to pursue policies of fear and insecurity. This includes cynical attempts to redefine and sanitise torture,” said Ms Khan.

She said the US claimed to be promoting freedom in Iraq, yet its troops had committed appalling torture and had ill-treated detainees. She described Guantánamo Bay as “the gulag of our time”.

Guardian, 26 May 2005

Blaming the victim for Qur’an desecrations

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Blaming the victim for Qur’an desecrations

By Haroon Siddiqui

Toronto Star, 26 May 2005

It is hard to believe but there are commentators who are berating those who protested the desecration of the Qur’an, not those who did the desecrating. This attitude of blaming the victims fits the tenor of the times. The colonial British and the French were also adept at holding the Indians and Algerians responsible for their own plight.

The pundits are being even more bizarre than the Bush administration, which skewered Newsweek for reporting the sacrilege, not those who committed it.

Even as the Bush administration continues its cover-up for presiding over one of the most shameful chapters in prisoner abuse, here is New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, reprinted in the Toronto Star no less, hectoring the Afghans and others for being stupid enough to take to the streets in dismay.

He is not alone, and he and the other new Orientalists are entitled to their views, as also their logical contortions to continue rationalizing the war on Iraq. But their myopia does cause concern.

Continue reading →