Minnesota: Tea Party candidate for state rep. compares Muslim women to garbage bags

Cindy Pugh garbage bags photoTea Party candidate for state representative Cindy Pugh uses her Facebook profile to defend Scott Walker, criticize Barack Obama, and boast about her ongoing campaign to defeat incumbent state Rep. Steve Smith, a Republican from Mound.

But she also used it recently to compare Muslim women and children clad in traditional Islamic garb to garbage bags.

Pugh shared the above photo on May 21 with the following commentary: “Disturbing … that women & little girls are OK with dressing like this!!! What will it take for these women to stand up and say, ‘NO’!? Wondering if they will ever do that?!”

The photo was originally uploaded by “Proud to be an Infidel,” a Muslim-bashing page with the following slogan: “It’s not Islamophobia when they are really trying to kill you.”

City Pages Minneapolis, 7 June 2012

Revoked-plates man had first asked for ‘HAJIKLR’

ICUHAJI plateWhen an Iraq War veteran filed an appeal last month to get back his personalized license plates, his attorney claimed the Department of Motor Vehicles had misinterpreted them.

The tag that read “ICUHAJI” was intended only as a message of support for U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, he said. Not as a threat against Arabs.

What Andrew D. Meyer failed to mention was the content of the previous message his client had tried to get on his plates: HAJIKLR.

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Why Warsi, not Hunt, is being thrown to the wolves

James Macintyre examines the double standards behind the prime minister’s differential treatment of Sayeeda Warsi and Jeremy Hunt.

Comment is Free, 5 June 2012

If anything, Macintyre is too soft in his criticism of what to any independent observer looks like the result of blatant anti-Muslim bigotry directed against Warsi by the Tory right. Recent articles in the Sunday Telegraph (see here and here), trying to associate Warsi with Hizb ut-Tahrir, are in the classic tradition of Islamophobic witch-hunting. It’s only surprising that Andrew Gilligan isn’t on the case.

The right sort of Muslim – Yedioth Ahronoth profiles Kasim Hafeez

Kasim Hafeez Stand With UsAs a child, Kasim Hafeez often heard his father praising Adolf Hitler, lamenting only the Nazi tyrant’s failure to kill even more Jews during World War II.

A son to a British family of Pakistani origin, he grew up in a fundamentalist Muslim community that called for the destruction of all Jews and taught him to believe that that Israel is a terror state.

But after years of taking part in anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic activity, Hafeez’s beliefs took an unexpected 180-degree turn. The man who now calls himself “a proud Muslim Zionist” has arrived in Israel for a four-day visit on Saturday as part of his effort to battle misinformation about the Jewish state.

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Church shows support for Murfreesboro Islamic Center

Christian and Muslim leaders came together to support the Murfreesboro Islamic community and imam Ossama Bahloul Sunday afternoon at The Village Church in East Nashville. “We just really wanted to reach out to him and to let him know that we cared about his community and him and that we would be praying with them,” said Dr. Andrew Anyabwile, Village Church pastor.

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Germany: how far-right Islamophobes hijacked political debate

Freiheit statt IslamGermany’s Salafist Muslims are back in the spotlight. Since early May, hardly a week has gone by without another regional or national politician in the country proposing new ways to counter the group’s extremist version of Islam or a major German newspaper publishing yet another exposé on the group’s insular isolation from the mainstream. Just on Friday, interior ministers from Germany’s 16 states, at a regularly scheduled conference with federal Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich, resolved to be increasingly firm in their dealings with the Salafists.

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Businessman launched bigoted rant against Muslim airport worker … after reading article in Daily Mail

Anthony HoltA high-flying businessman was hauled before the court for a tirade of religious abuse at a Muslim immigration official waiting to check his passport.

Anthony Holt, 65, had become wound up after reading an article in the Daily Mail about the “victimisation of Christianity” on a flight into Manchester. When he landed, the retired consultant refused to go through a desk where Sayima Mohammed was on duty.

He astonished witnesses by pointing at her and saying: “I don’t want to be seen by that. I don’t want to be seen by any Muslim in a position of authority. I want to be seen by someone who’s English. This is England. This is my country. I’m not into all this Islam.”

As Ms Mohammed burst into tears, her colleagues refused to check Mr Holt’s documents and ordered him to calm down. When police arrived, Holt turned his attention to a cop, saying: “That’s Islam. I’m not going to that. This is my country.” The 15-minute row only ended when he was arrested.

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