With tensions at an all time high in Afghanistan following the Koran burnings, the urination video, and the killing of 16 civilians, attention is now falling on a long line of “Infidel” apparel and gear.
Exhausted from how they feel they’re being perceived, troops have taken to wearing patches and carrying items that label themselves infidels, and offer translation in local dialect.
Houston state senator Rodney Elliswon’t let up trying to get a private school association to let a Muslim school join them.
The Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools rejected Houston’s Iman Academy back in 2010. But Iman isn’t the only Islamic school TAPPS turned down. Iman and the others say the application process makes it pretty clear that Muslims are not welcome.
This all came out when TAPPS said it would not change its state basketball play-offs schedule to keep Houston’s Robert M. Beren Academy, an orthodox Jewish school, from playing on the Sabbath. TAPPS backed down when parents went to court.
Ellis joined the fray for both schools. And, with the basketball season over, that leaves the Iman question still out there.
An invitation to an American lawyer who specialises in fighting Western lawsuits by Islamic extremists has been withdrawn at 48 hours’ notice by Leeds University Jewish Society over fears that she is “too controversial”.
New York-based Brooke Goldstein, director of the Lawfare Project, has been touring Britain this week with UK Lawyers for Israel, speaking about the ways Arab dictatorships and Islamist leaders use “lawfare” to sue those who publish articles against radical Islam.
Students were said to be concerned about her association with right-wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders, whom she gave legal advice after he was sued for anti-Muslim remarks.
A crowd gathered at the Brookfield Public Library raised questions Tuesday not just about a proposed mosque in the area, but about the faith and ideology of those who plan to use it.
“We’re not fighting against a religion, what we’re fighting against is a tyrannical ideology,” said Janet Spiewak of the conservative Eagle Forum, which hosted the discussion.
She urged residents to raise concerns about the mosque’s traffic impact and other zoning issues at the city’s upcoming meetings on the project, presumably as a way of stopping it from being built. “We can, through public pressure, force the aldermen and the mayor to acknowledge where the majority of Brookfield stands,” she said.
About 20 minutes after David Horowitz began speaking Monday, nearly all the students in attendance walked out of Hamilton Hall in protest. The action came in response to what participants said were slanderous remarks about Muslims and members of Arab nations.
Eight Muslim cab drivers in Orlando, Fla., claim their employer prohibited them from praying during work hours, and even assaulted and fired one of them for doing so. Now they’re filing complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleging that they were discriminated against on the basis of their religion and national origin.
The eight Arab-American employees worked for Star Taxi, a member of the Transtar Transportation Group, which provides taxi, luxury SUV and limousine services in the Orlando area. They allege that various supervisors told them that they would be fired if they were caught praying at any of the company’s service stations, even though employees of other faiths regularly prayed and read religious material.
Members of the Brookfield-Elm Grove Interfaith Network are coming to the defense of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee’s proposal to build a mosque in Brookfield, the Journal Sentinel reported as the religious leaders started a letter of support.
“This is about the rights of decent human beings to have a place to worship,” Rabbi Steven Adams of Congregation Emanu-El in Waukesha, who was drafting the letter on behalf of the group, told the Journal Sentinel.
“I’ve looked at about a dozen right wing sites this morning to see how they’d react to the news from Afghanistan, and the comments at every single one of them were full of people celebrating the killings, praising the soldier who allegedly committed them, and denying there was any crime, while at the same time frantically trying to blame the crime on President Obama. But the worst site by far is the right wing’s premier news channel, Fox News.”
Charles Johnson provides the details.
Little Green Footballs, 11 March 2012
Via LoonWatch
An outreach effort to Muslims initiated by Saddleback Church in Lake Forest has sparked a national uproar among evangelical Christians, with some accusing the Rev. Rick Warren, Saddleback’s pastor, of betraying core Christian principles and Warren responding that his beliefs and intentions have been misrepresented.
Since an Orange County Register article published Feb. 26 detailed the outreach effort, evangelicals across the country have taken to blogs, social media and Christian news outlets to debate whether and how Christians should forge relationships with people of other faiths. Longtime critics of Warren have published lengthy online accusations that the influential pastor, who delivered the invocation at President Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration, has gone too far in seeking theological common ground with Muslims.
Chris Rosebrough, a religious studies graduate of Concordia University in Irvine who hosts an online Christian radio talk show in Indianapolis, said that response to Saddleback’s outreach “has created a national, even an international uproar…. Looking at the Christian blogosphere, this is the number one viral story.”
The Muslim Al Salam Day School off Weidman Road is closed Friday due to a Christian group’s promise to tout Christianity at the location, school officials said.
A letter, that reads as follows, was sent home to parents telling them there was no school on Friday. “Earlier this week we had informed members and parents of the community about a protest that will be taking place outside of the Islamic Foundation Property tomorrow. Due to the overwhelming incoming of increasing safety concerns from parents and teachers, we have decided to cancel school and after school activities for tomorrow, Friday, March 9.”
Ghazala Hayat with the Islamic Foundation of Greater St. Louis tells Patch that the group Reclaiming Missouri for Christ contacted St. Louis County Police to inform them the group planned to distribute literature during the Dar-Ul-Salam Mosque’s prayer services Friday between noon and 2 p.m. The Islamic Foundation offices, mosque and school are all located on the same property off Weidman Road.