Category Archives: Resisting Islamophobia

Intolerant ban dressed up as secular ruling

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Intolerant ban dressed up as secular ruling

By Yasmin Qureshi

Morning Star, 23 March 2005

It has now been just over one year since the introduction of a new law in France forbidding the wearing of conspicuous religious symbols in French state schools.

This law has been of considerable concern to London’s Asian communities in particular.

Sikh and Muslim groups in Britain asked the mayor of London to take the issue up and look into the impact on community relations across Europe of the so-called “headscarf ban.”

I visited Paris last week on the mayor’s behalf, meeting, among others, representatives of Muslim organisation le Collectif des Musulmans de France, as well as the French civil rights group the Ligue des droits de l’Homme and representatives of the Sikh community – including the two Sikh boys who have been excluded from their school as a direct result of the law .

There is a widely held view among those opposed to the ban that it came at a time when the French government needed to divert from the country’s economic problems.

As an attempt to divert attention from high unemployment and budget cuts it was very successful, tapping into long-held French secular political traditions.

The overwhelming focus of the debate about the new law – which is why it has become known as the “headscarf ban” – was the Muslim community.

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Countering Islamophobia

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Islamophobes are aggressively organizing propaganda that portrays Islam as a foreign religion that came with the backward, violent Arabs, who oppress women and deny them their rights of education, driving, working, or even leaving their homes. This completely distorted image is ingrained in the minds of the majority of the American public as a result of organized efforts by bigoted figures.”

Salwa Rashad on Islamophobia in the USA.

Islam Online, 25 March 2005

Mayor of London condemns French hijab ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A basic right

Morning Star, 19 March 2005

By Ken Livingstone

This month marks the first anniversary of the French law banning students from wearing conspicuous religious symbols in schools.

I have given the fullest support to the campaign against this attack on the rights of minority religious communities in France.

In February last year, just before the French parliament voted overwhelmingly in favour of the ban, I wrote to prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin warning that the new law would be a blow to good community relations throughout Europe, and would inflame tensions between communities and encourage attacks on minorities.

Earlier this month the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination drew attention to the problem of racism in France.

The committee urged the French government to prevent the law against conspicuous religious symbols “from denying any pupil the right to education and to ensure that everyone can always exercise that right”.

But this is precisely the right that the French law does deny many pupils.

According to the French government’s own figures, when the law came into force at the start of the September 2004 school term, over 600 students defied the ban.

Some were forced out of the state system and into private education, while many others were obliged to comply with the law under threat of expulsion.

At least 47 Muslim girls have been excluded from French schools for continuing to wear the hijab (Islamic headscarf), and hundreds more have been compelled to renounce a form of dress that they believe is an important aspect of their religion.

In addition, three Sikh students have been expelled for refusing to remove their turbans and another two have been refused admission to their school.

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Aljazeera relieved by Alluni’s release

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Aljazeera has said it is relieved at the decision by Spanish authorities to release its correspondent Taysir Alluni after a stretch of 119 days in solitary confinement. Aljazeera also thanked rights groups for support during the detention of their correspondent.

“Aljazeera takes this opportunity to extend its sincere appreciation to its viewers, regional and international human rights organisation, professional and civil societies and all those who supported Taysir, his family and Aljazeera,” the channel said in a statement.

Aljazeera’s correspondent Alluni had arrived at his Granada home, two days after a Spanish court ordered him moved from a maximum security cell to house arrest.

A frail and visibly fatigued Alluni emerged from a police van parked outside his Granada home at 3am (0200 GMT) after what he said was a gruelling five-hour journey from Madrid. “I was strapped into a metal chair for five hours,” he said.

While thanking his peers and the various organisations and individuals who laboured for his release, Alluni also criticised the Spanish government for his detention. “I no longer believe that the rule of law exists in this country (Spain),” he said.

“The trial will be highly politicised and a media affair. The prosecutor who ordered me re-jailed because he alleged I was a flight risk never presented any evidence to support his claim,” Alluni said.

Al-Jazeera, 18 March 2005

Muslims reach settlement with Dell on workplace prayer

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group today announced that Muslim contract employees at a Dell Inc. plant in Nashville, Tenn., have reached a settlement on issues related to a recent dispute over prayer in the workplace.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said the 31 Muslim employees, who left work last month in a disagreement over Islamic prayers, will be reinstated, receive back pay and be granted continued religious accommodation. Managers will also receive additional training on existing religious accommodation policies and practices. Other terms of the settlement will not be made public.

Announcement of the settlement came following a meeting today between representatives of CAIR, Dell, the Muslim workers, the Nashville Metro Human Relations Commission, and Spherion Corp., the company that provided the workers to Dell. (In a meeting on Saturday, most of the Muslim workers retained CAIR as their legal counsel.)

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Neocon mag promotes anti-Muslim hate literature

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today called on a prominent national neoconservative magazine to clarify its policy on anti-Muslim hate following revelations that the publication distributed an Internet advertisement for an virulently Islamophobic book. CAIR’s request came in response to a complaint from a member of the National Review’s e-mail list who received a message promoting an apparently self-published book that, according to the magazine, is a “guide into the dark mind of [the Prophet] Mohammed.”

The National Review’s review of the book states: “[The author] explains why Mohammed couldn’t possibly be a true prophet, and reveals the true sources of his ‘revelations.’” It quotes the author as claiming: “Mohammed posed as the apostle of God…while his life is marked by innumerable marriages; and great licentiousness, deeds of rapine, warfare, conquests, unmerciful butcheries, all the time invoking God’s holy name to sanction his evil deeds.”

According to the National Review, the book shows how “Mohammed again and again justified his rapine and licentiousness with new ‘divine revelations.’” “This anti-Muslim screed is the literary equivalent of ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ and should not be promoted by a publication that has any sense of decency,” said CAIR Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper. “The National Review must clarify its position on Islamophobic hate speech and offer a public apology for promoting a book that so viciously attacks the faith of one-fifth of the world’s population.”

Hooper said anti-Muslim rhetoric often leads to discrimination and even violence.

CAIR news report, 17 March 2005

Update:  “Mohammed posed as the apostle of God … while his life is marked by innumerable marriages, and great licentiousness, deeds of rapine, warfare, conquests, unmerciful butcheries, all the time invoking God’s holy name to sanction his evil deeds.” Sounds fair enough to me, says Robert Spencer.

Jihad Watch, 23 March 2005

Mayor’s human rights adviser meets opponents of hijab ban in Paris

Posted on by Bob Pitt

On the first anniversary of the ban on the wearing of the Muslim headscarf in French schools, Yasmin Qureshi, the Mayor of London’s human rights adviser, is to visit Paris to meet opponents of the ban.

The visit follows a new poll conducted by MORI for the Greater London Authority which found that 53 percent of Londoners disagree with the ban with just 33 per cent supporting it.

In the same poll 63 percent said that children should be allowed to wear clothing or items that are part of their religion, such as the Muslim headscarf, Christian cross, Jewish skullcap and Sikh turban at school. Only 26 per cent disagreed.

Ms Qureshi will be in Paris to meet with faith, community, and human rights organisations as well as French local government representatives campaigning against the ban.  Among the groups she will be visiting are Collectif des Musulmans de France, United Sikhs and Ligue des Droits de l’Homme.

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Court orders 24-hour watch on Alluni

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Aljazeera has learned that a Spanish judge has ordered its correspondent Taysir Alluni released from jail and placed under mandatory house arrest pending his trial.

The release order was expected to be carried out late on Monday night or early on Tuesday, but has been set back after a series of delays.

Munzir al-Nimri, general-secretary of the International Committee for Defending Taysir Alluni, said Alluni had still not been released from prison due to procedural reasons and the need to complete more paperwork.

“The procedures involve accompanying Alluni, with his hands chained, by Spanish security guards and include signing an order that has not been signed yet. We are still awaiting completion of these procedures,” al-Nimri said.

Alluni will then be taken to his home in Granada where he was first arrested in September 2003.

Al-Jazeera, 15 March 2005

Protect Hijab vows to continue campaigning against the hijab ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“March 15th 2005 marks the first anniversary of the French Government’s decision to ban ‘religious symbols’. Since last year we have witnessed the oppression of an entire segment of the French society, namely, hundreds of Hijab wearing young Muslim women who have been forcibly excluded from schools by this draconian law. This open discrimination by France and other European countries is an unacceptable position for states that are party to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and makes a mockery of the French declaration of ‘Liberté, egalité, fraternité …’.”

Protect Hijab press release, 15 March 2005

Interview: William Montgomery Watt

Posted on by Eddie Truman

The Reverend Professor William Montgomery Watt has written over 30 books including Islamic Political Thought (1968) and Muslim-Christian Encounters: Perceptions and Misconceptions (1991). In Scotland he has been a member of the ecumenical Iona Community since 1960. Amongst Islamic scholars he has been held in an esteem described as “most reverential.” The Muslim press have called him “the Last Orientalist.” This interview was conducted in 1999, his ninetieth year, at his home in Dalkeith. With Professor Watt’s approval and careful agreement of the final text, it uses both spoken material and statements drawn from some of his most important articles of recent years. It is, in a sense, a distillation of his life’s work.

Alastair McIntosh’s website