Category Archives: Right wing

French veil bill criminalises ‘incitement to hide the face’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

French passportA bill to ban Muslim veils covering the face to be presented to France’s Cabinet on Wednesday calls for fines and, in some cases, citizenship classes.

The bill turns on the “dignity of the person,” rather than security issues as many speculated would be the case, according to a copy obtained by The Associated Press. Article 1 of the bill stipulates that “no one can wear a garment intended to hide the face in the public space.” The ban covers streets.

The divisive legislation proposed by the conservative government of President Nicolas Sarkozy is to go to the lower house of parliament for debate in July and to the Senate in September. There is little doubt the bill will pass despite opposition.

The bill calls for a fine of €150 ($185) for those breaking the law and eventual citizenship classes. The measure creates a new crime – inciting to hide the face – and anyone convicted of forcing a woman to wear such a veil would risk a year in prison and a €15,000 ($18,555) fine.

Associated Press, 18 May 2010

Update:  See also “Women protest as French Cabinet gets veil ban bill”, Associated Press, 19 May 2010

Ann Widdecombe makes a contribution to interfaith harmony

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Writing in the Daily Express, Anne Widdecome offers her views on the case of the Ellesmere Port pupil whose mother refused to allow her to participate in a school visit to a mosque (a story from last month belatedly latched onto by the Daily Mail, followed by the Express, the Telegraph, the Daily Star and the Mirror):

Learning about another religion should not mean having to practise it and insisting that a Catholic schoolgirl should dress as a Muslim and visit a mosque is a nonsense that her parents would not have expected to encounter when they chose a specifically Catholic school.

Indeed why does the head think they selected a Catholic school? Presumably it was to enable that child to learn that faith.

The bishop should have a quiet word with the headmaster of Ellesmere Port Catholic High School and suggest that he revert to the usual practice of teaching children to defend not surrender their faith and to know the difference between tolerating other faiths and adopting them.

If he cannot pass that test the diocese should find a head who can. Would that same head insist a Muslim child attend Mass wearing a crucifix?

No, of course he wouldn’t, but he would undoubtedly ask pupils to dress appropriately for a visit to any place of worship. And that is what the pupil at the centre of this controversy was asked to do – not “dress as a Muslim”. Is Widdecombe perhaps suggesting that the head would have no problem with a pupil attending Mass dressed in a bikini?

It’s worth noting that other parents at Ellesmere Port Catholic High School voiced their objections to the mosque visit, without bothering to hide behind the nonsense about “dressing as a Muslim”. As one of them explained: “I’m not racist or anything but I live in England, I send my daughter to an English speaking catholic school, so I don’t see why she should go to a mosque.”

Catalan town council to debate veil ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Spanish town is to debate calls for a ban on wearing the full-face Islamic veil in public amid growing cross-party opposition to the burqa in the country, a local party said Tuesday.

The moderate Catalan nationalists of the Convergence and Union (CiU) party proposed the ban, calling the veil “an obstacle to the dignity and integration of women in our society,” they said in a statement.

The presence in the town Lerida “of Salafist representatives (hardline Islamists) has facilitated the spread of practices incompatible with the values of sexual equality and respect for women.”

El Pais daily said the town’s socialist mayor Angel Ros has also expressed his opposition to the Islamic veil in the past.

Spain’s Labour and Immigration Minister Celestino Corbacho said Monday he was in favour of a ban on the full veil in work spaces. “Totally covering women with a piece of clothing, whatever the symbolism, completely goes against our society and stops the move towards equality between men and women,” he said.

The council debate in Lerida, a town of some 140,000 inhabitants in north east Catalonia, will take place on May 28.

Expatica, 18 May 2010

Miss USA controversy: ‘It is simply Muslims that they hate’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Rima Fakih“Personally, I’m not fond of either extreme in feminine clothing – burkas or bikinis. I believe that beauty contests exploit women, and I’m pleased that they seem to be less and less popular with each passing year, and will not be at all sad when they are no more.

“Nevertheless, women have the right to express themselves however they see fit, and the reaction of some Americans to Rima Fakih’s winning the Miss USA beauty pageant should be enough to prove once and for all that Islamophobia does exist, and that it has nothing to do with ‘political Islam’, ‘radical Islamists’, ‘Islamism’, or any of the other carefully crafted terms used to attempt to hide their hatred of Muslims as actually being a defense of western civilization against extremist or ‘radical’ Muslims.

“The truth is out there now for everyone to see. It is simply Muslims that they hate.”

Sheila Musaji at The American Muslim, 18 May 2010

See also Khaled Diab, “Miss USA 2010 and a confused conspiracy theory”, Comment is Free, 18 May 2010

Hysterical right-wing Islamophobes oppose new mosque and community centre in New York

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Outraged family members and community groups are accusing a Muslim group of trying to rewrite history with its plans to build a 13-story mosque and cultural center just two blocks from Ground Zero, where Islamic extremists flew two planes into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.

“This is a place which is 600 feet from where almost 3,000 people were torn to pieces by Islamic extremists,” said Debra Burlingame, whose brother died in the attack on the Pentagon that day. “I think that it is incredibly insensitive and audacious really for them to build a mosque, not only on that site, but to do it specifically so that they could be in proximity to where that atrocity happened,” said Burlingame, who is co-founder of 9/11 Families for a Safe and Strong America.

The 13-story mosque and cultural center will be built on the site of a four-story building that was a Burlington Coat Factory retail store until 9/11, when part of a plane’s landing gear crashed through the roof. The building, which will be razed, currently houses a mosque. The New York City Mayor’s office says “It’s private property, and the area is zoned for uses that include this one.”

Pamela Gellar, executive director of Stop Islamization of America, blasted the organization behind the plans, Cordoba Initiative, and its leader, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, saying the project is “an insulting flag of conquest of Islamic supremacism.”

“How can you build a shrine to the very ideology that brought down the World Trade Center?” asked Geller, whose group is planning a June 6 rally to protest the project. “We have to do everything we can to stop this … a huge Muslim monument, a stone’s throw from Ground Zero, with a mosque pointing toward Mecca.”

She called it an act of deception that the group has been able to get the green light from the Lower Manhattan Community Board, whose finance committee gave it a thumbs-up last week.

Though the Cordoba Initiative’s website calls part of the $100 million-plus project a mosque, its founder, Imam Rauf, says the project is not a mosque but a community center for all faiths that will include recreational facilities, a prayer space and a 500-seat theater that can be a part of the neighborhood’s trendy Tribeca Film Festival.

Rauf insists the effort is meant to help heal the wounds of 9/11, “We’ve approached the community because we want this to be an example of how we are cooperating with the members of the community, not only to provide services but also to build a new discourse on how Muslims and non-Muslims can cooperate together to push back against the voices of extremism.”

Fox News, 14 May 2010

Fred Nile calls on NSW parliament to ban veil

Posted on by Bob Pitt

FredNileThe Reverend Fred Nile will introduce a Bill to parliament calling for a ban on the Islamic burqa head and body veil.

The Christian Democrats MP wants NSW to follow France and other European countries, which have moved to ban women from wearing the full head and body covering in public. The private member’s Bill will likely be introduced next Thursday.

“We should establish that in Australia we are an open society, that people don’t cover up their faces. If they are involved in criminal activity they do,” Mr Nile said yesterday. “They do it with the burqa, it is not part of our culture and tradition.”

Muslim spokesman Keysar Trad attacked the proposed law, and said it was an attack on women’s freedom. “Muslim women will be disgusted, especially that a man who is supposedly a man of God is telling them to remove items of clothing and telling them how to dress,” he said. “While I don’t advocate the face cover, I will defend the rights of any Muslim woman who wishes to wear it and if she doesn’t choose to wear it, I defend her as well.”

Mr Nile asked the State Government to ban the burqa eight years ago in a move that sparked a furore at the time. But his private member’s Bill will almost certainly not succeed because he lacks the required numbers.

Mr Nile told parliament on Wednesday night there were also security fears as terrorists in the Middle East and Russia had launched attacks while concealing their identity under a burqa.

Daily Telegraph, 14 May 2010

BRANDED Schoolgirl who refused to dress as up as Muslim

Posted on by Bob Pitt

BrandedThus the front page headline in today’s Daily Star, which has belatedly latched on to the case of Amy Owen, whose mother refused to allow her to join a school trip to a mosque. Inside the paper an editorial offers the following observations:

“It’s political correctness gone mad. Schoolgirl Amy Owen was punished for refusing to dress as a Muslim on a trip. The school branded her a ‘truant’ and wrote a stern letter to her family. The headmaster insisted it was ‘compulsory’ for the 14-year-old to visit a local mosque. And he tried to force Amy to wear a Muslim-style headscarf.

“It’s disgusting. Everyone involved should hang their head in shame. Amy is a Catholic. Her beliefs should be respected. Demanding she ditch her faith for Islam is the ultimate religious insult.”

“Ditch her faith for Islam” – because she was asked to cover her head in a visit to a mosque? What are these people on?

See also the Daily Mail and the Sun.

French parliament adopts resolution condemning veil nem con

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Veil ban protestFrench lawmakers unanimously passed a resolution on Tuesday asserting that face-covering Muslim veils are contrary to the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity on which France is founded.

The non-binding resolution, passed 434 to 0, lays the groundwork for a planned law forbidding face-covering veils in public, including in the streets.

One lawmaker compared women who fully cover themselves to “phantoms” and “walking coffins.”

The bill calling for a global ban on such garments goes before parliament in July. A draft text is to be reviewed by the Cabinet on May 19. A similar veil ban is in the works in neighboring Belgium.

Tuesday’s resolution, sponsored by President Nicolas Sarkozy’s conservative party, had been widely expected to win approval in the National Assembly with rival Socialists backing it despite concerns about the wording of an eventual law. Lawmakers in the 577-seat house who opposed the resolution abstained.

“The freedom of women is what brings us here … Have we the choice (to say no) when the symptoms of the regression of women are in the streets?” asked Nicole Ameline, a lawmaker from Sarkozy’s UMP party and former minister for women’s rights.

Associated Press, 11 May 2010

Italy: another council decides to fine veiled women

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The northern city of Cossato on Friday became the third local authority in Italy to impose fines on women who cover their faces in public. The head-to-toe Islamic burqa and the niqab, which leaves the eyes visible are not specifically named in the by-law but are understood to be its target.

The fines will range from 25 to 100 euros. Elsewhere in northern Italy, Varallo and Novara city councils have already imposed fines on burqa and niqab wearers.

“There’s no security emergency in Cossato. But I want to stress that people coming to our country have obligations as well as rights,” said mayor Claudio Corradino, who belongings to Italy’s anti-immigrant Northern League party.

AKI, 7 May 2010

Franklin Graham prays outside Pentagon, says ‘Islam got a pass’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Franklin GrahamEvangelist Franklin Graham prayed on a sidewalk outside the Pentagon Thursday after his invitation to a prayer service inside was withdrawn because of comments that insulted Muslims.

“It looks like Islam has gotten a pass,” he told reporters. “They are able to have their services, but just because I disagree … I’m excluded.”

In 2001, Graham, the son of famed evangelist Billy Graham, described Islam as evil. More recently, he said he finds Islam offensive and wants Muslims to know that Jesus Christ died for their sins. The Pentagon’s chaplain office called those comments inappropriate and, at the request of the Army, withdrew Graham’s invitation to attend a multi-denominational “National Day of Prayer” service that was held in the Defense Department auditorium.

He came anyway, arriving in the Pentagon parking lot just before 8 a.m. EDT – his party of a half dozen people forming a circle on the sidewalk and praying.

Asked why he had come, Graham said it was to pray for the men and women serving at the warfront, including his son, who he said had already been wounded in Iraq and now serves in Afghanistan.

He said he doesn’t believe “all religions are equal” but does believe there is only “one way to God” – and that is through Jesus.

Asked if he still believes Islam is evil, he said: “I believe the way they treat women is evil, yes I do.” And, can he understand how some of his comments would be offensive to Muslims? “Oh, I’m sure,” he said. “But I find what they teach and what they preach and what’s on the Internet – I find that to be offensive, too.”

Associated Press, 7 May 2010