Category Archives: USA

Prepare for the Islamic Antichrist, warns new book

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Islamic AntichristRichard Bartholomew draws our attention to the publication by WorldNetDaily of a new book, The Islamic Antichrist: The Shocking Truth about the Real Nature of the Beast, by one Joel Richardson. It is advertised on the WND site as a “devastating account of the possible connection between the Biblical Antichrist and the Islamic Mahdi”.

WND explains: “The Bible predicts that in the last days a charismatic leader will establish a global following in the name of peace. The Koran also predicts that a man will rise up to lead the nations, pledging to usher in an era of peace. The man in the Koran is called the Mahdi, or Islam’s savior. However, the man in the Bible is the Antichrist. Could it be possible that this is the same person?

“Richardson’s stunning research and analysis suggest that it is. In ‘The Islamic Antichrist’, he exposes Western readers to the traditions of Islam and predicts that the end times may not be that far away. His book will stun readers who are unaware of the similarities between the Antichrist and the ‘Islamic Jesus’.”

Richard Barthlomew also notes a follow-up post at WND in which Joel Richardson suggests that the election of Barack Obama may well foreshadow the arrival of the “Islamic Antichrist”. The article is subtitled: “Massive wealth redistribution will be economic policy of the Beast”!

WND explains: “Richardson says the Book of Daniel reveals the Antichrist will invade the wealthy nation of Israel specifically to plunder and gain control of its commodities and wealth. ‘But what is so interesting is the Bible tells us his reason for seizing this wealth is to give it away to his followers,’ says the author. ‘While slightly more violent than Obama’s tax plan, it is no less populist in its methodology of radical wealth redistribution’.”

Scary Muslim visits East London Mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tatchell No Islamic StateThe usual suspects – Harry’s Place, Peter Tatchell – have been trying to whip up a scare over the fact that Sheikh Abdul Rahman al-Sudais, imam of the Grand Mosque in Mecca, will be speaking at the East London Mosque this evening. “I don’t understand why the Home Secretary is allowing al-Sudais into Britain, given that similar hate preachers have been banned”, Tatchell has declared.

This is not al-Sudais’s first visit to the East London Mosque. In 2004, on the occasion of the opening of the London Muslim Centre (see here and here), he told thousands of worshippers:

“Muslims should exemplify the true image of Islam in their interaction with other communities and dispel any misconceptions portrayed in some parts of the media…. Muslims should remember that throughout this long history Islam has carried the message of building communities, not isolating themselves…. The history of Islam is the best testament to how different communities can live together in peace and harmony.”

Frightening, huh? Clearly Tatchell is right. This preacher of hate should be banned.

Update:  And here’s the Evening Standard and the East London Advertiser – both of which take their cue from Tatchell – making their usual helpful contributions to building harmonious relations between London’s diverse communities.

Further update:  Tatchell has also inspired the coverage over at Jihad Watch. He must be so proud of himself.

Student hate group in Michigan gets new faculty adviser

Posted on by Bob Pitt

WichmanMichigan State University (MSU) mechanical engineering professor Indrek Wichman made international headlines in February 2006, when, using his faculty E-mail account, he sent a blistering E-mail to the university’s Muslim Student Association, calling on Muslim students to either accept Western cultural standards or return to their “ancestral lands.”

“I counsel you dissatisfied, aggressive, brutal, and uncivilized slave-trading Moslems … [i]f you do not like the values of the West – see the 1st Amendment – you are free to leave,” Wichman wrote. “I hope for God’s sake that most of you choose that option.”

Although Provost Kim Wilcox formally admonished Wichman, the anti-Muslim professor remained on the MSU faculty. Now, he’s apparently taken on a new role in the MSU campus community: faculty adviser for the MSU chapter of Young Americans for Freedom, or MSU-YAF, an extreme-right student organization. The Southern Poverty Law Center has designated MSU-YAF a hate group for its hosting of white supremacist lecturers and repeated bigoted statements against Muslims and Latinos, among other groups.

According to the MSU Department of Student Life guide for the upcoming academic year, Wichman has replaced William Allen, a professor of political philosophy, as MSU-YAF’s faculty adviser.

Wichman’s association with MSU-YAF dates back at least to February 2008, when he was scheduled to give a lecture on “How Muslims Suppress Free Speech” at an MSU-YAF event that was booked at the Holocaust Memorial Center in Farmington Hills, Mich. That lecture was canceled after Holocaust Memorial Center administrators learned of MSU-YAF’s background, including that MSU-YAF had previously sponsored a lecture on the MSU campus by Nick Griffin, a Holocaust denier who heads the racist British National Party.

Southern Poverty Law Center, 29 July 2009

Judge clears way for lawsuit by 6 imams arrested at Minneapolis airport

Posted on by Bob Pitt

In a strongly worded ruling, a federal judge on Friday cleared the way for a lawsuit by six Muslim men who claim they were falsely arrested on a US Airways jet in Minneapolis three years ago to move forward.

“The right not to be arrested in the absence of probable cause is clearly established and, based on the allegations … no reasonable officer could have believed that the arrest of the Plaintiffs was proper,” U.S. District Judge Ann Montgomery ruled Friday.

The case of “the flying imams” has sparked ongoing debate about the power of law enforcement to override personal rights in the name of security.

The imams were arrested in November 2006 as they were returning home from the North American Conference of Imams. A passenger had passed a note to a flight attendant noting what he considered suspicious activity.

FBI Special Agent Michael Cannizzaro and airport police officers had argued that the arrest and removal of the imams was valid because there were reasons to be suspicious of a crime. They argued that a law passed by Congress to protect people who report suspicious activity from being sued also extends to them.

But Montgomery’s opinion and order stated that they were bound by longstanding rules requiring probable cause before arresting someone.

Being of Middle Eastern descent, praying aloud before their flight and asking for seat belt extenders did not constitute reasonable suspicion to arrest the Muslim spiritual leaders, Montgomery ruled. The officers are not immune to being held accountable for their actions, she said. She did dismiss a false arrest claim against Cannizzaro.

Continue reading →

Georgia courts to allow religious head coverings

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Lisa_ValentineGeorgia courtrooms will allow religious headgear after last year’s arrest of a Muslim woman who refused to remove her headscarf in a west Georgia courthouse.

The Judicial Council of Georgia voted unanimously this week to allow religious and medical headgear into Georgia courtrooms. It also allows a person to request a private inspection if a security officer wants to conduct a search.

“If this had been a nun, no one would have required her to remove her habit,” said Georgia Supreme Court Chief Justice Carol Hunstein, who heads the Judicial Council. “I think this is a good rule, and I think it’s clear.”

The policy shift stems from the December 2008 arrest of Lisa Valentine, who was ordered to serve 10 days in jail for contempt of court after she refused to remove her hijab at a courtroom in Douglasville, a town of about 20,000 people west of Atlanta.

Associated Press, 24 July 2009

See also CAIR press release, 24 July 2009

US court reverses ban on Tariq Ramadan

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tariq Ramadan cartoon (1)A federal appeals court in Manhattan on Friday reversed a lower-court ruling that had allowed the government to bar a prominent Muslim scholar from entering the United States on the ground that he had contributed to a charity that had connections to terrorism.

The scholar, Tariq Ramadan, 46, a Swiss academic, was to become a tenured professor at the University of Notre Dame, but the Bush administration revoked his visa in 2004 and again denied him a visa in 2006. The government cited evidence that from 1998 to 2002, he donated about $1,300 to a Swiss-based charity that the Treasury Department later categorized as a terrorist organization because it provided money to Hamas, the militant Palestinian group.

Professor Ramadan said in a later court affidavit that he was not aware of any connections between the charity, the Association de Secours Palestinien, and Hamas or terrorism, and that he believed that the organization was involved in legitimate humanitarian projects. “I have condemned terrorism at every opportunity,” he wrote.

In its ruling on Friday, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held unanimously that the government was required to “confront Ramadan with the allegation against him and afford him the subsequent opportunity to demonstrate by clear and convincing evidence that he did not know, and reasonably should not have known, that the recipient of his contributions was a terrorist organization.”

The panel sent the case back to the lower court for a determination on whether Professor Ramadan had been confronted with the allegation, and then given a chance to deny it. If that did not happen, the panel said, a new visa hearing should be held.

“I am gratified that the court has found that my exclusion from the United States is without basis,” Professor Ramadan said in a statement on Friday. Professor Ramadan, who had frequently visited the United States in the past, lecturing and attending conferences, said he was eager to “engage once again with Americans in the kinds of face-to-face exchanges” that were “crucial to bridging cultural divides.”

New York Times, 17 July 2009

Islam-basher will not speak at American Library Association conference

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Robert Spencer 4The Chicago office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Chicago) announced that Robert Spencer, one of the nation’s leading Islam-bashers, will not speak today at the annual conference of the American Library Association (ALA) following intervention by CAIR and concerned librarians, and the withdrawal of the other scheduled panelists who protested Spencer’s participation.

Librarians from across the country contacted the ALA questioning the appropriateness of inviting Spencer to speak on a panel titled “Perspectives on Islam: Beyond the Stereotyping” because of his history of intolerant views. The other speakers invited to join the panel withdrew after hearing of Spencer’s scheduled participation.

“We thank all those who stood up for tolerance and mutual understanding to challenge Robert Spencer’s Islamophobic views,” said CAIR-Chicago Executive Director Ahmed Rehab, who had written to the ALA questioning why an anti-Islam bigot was invited to a panel on dispelling stereotypes about Islam.

“Because stereotyping of Islam is such an important issue, we hope a future panel on this topic can be arranged with credible scholars and representatives of the American Muslim community,” said CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad. “We strongly support open and honest discussion of difficult issues, but Mr. Spencer’s agenda-driven polemics promote the very stereotypes that the ALA event sought to dispel.”

CAIR press release, 12 July 2009

Man charged with hate crime for threatening Muslim woman

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A self-proclaimed white supremacist with a history of threats and harassment was charged under the state’s hate crime statute after he allegedly threatened a young Muslim woman with a knife while she was waiting in line for services at the Seattle Indian Health Board.

According to charging papers, Eric Lee Garner walked up to the woman on July 1, pointed at her head scarf and said, “you Muslim people scare people when you wear things like that!” He followed up with other derogatory remarks.

The woman, who was holding her six-month-old son, tried to reason with the 24-year-old Auburn man by saying that her “her clothing does not make her a bad person,” court documents said. When the insults didn’t stop, prosecutors said, the woman backed away from Garner and tried to shield her son from him.

Garner then cursed at the woman, got in her face and pulled out a large sheathed knife, court papers said. Garner told the woman he was going to “cut” the woman and her baby with the knife, charging documents said.

A health board employee then grabbed the knife and retreated behind the counter, prosecutors said. Garner jumped over the counter, grabbed the knife and ran out of the building.

Seattle Times, 7 July 2009

Update:  See “Auburn man sentenced in attack of Muslim woman, baby”, KOMO News, 23 April 2010

US Anglicans warned against dialogue with Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

ACNADelegates to the 2009 ACNA convocation in Bedford, Texas, last week were warned not to be lulled into complacency by the siren song dialogue with “moderate Islam.” Canon Julian Dobbs, the canon missioner for the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA) told the June 22-25 meeting that “so-called moderate Islam” was a myth.

The American variety of “moderate Islam” was “no more moderate than the militant Islam of Saudi Arabia or Indonesia,” Canon Dobbs said. Quoting the founder of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), he explained that “Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. Don’t be misled or misguided, the peace Islam offers is not the peace of sitting around the camp fire singing. Islam’s peace is the implementation of Sharia Law and the global submission to Islamic ideology,” he argued.

Canon Dobbs stated that in the West, a “resurgent Islam” sought to “infiltrate the Church and win the loyalty and trust of large numbers of churchgoers.” Claiming the full backing of Archbishop Duncan of the ACNA, Canon Dobbs urged the delegates not to let “polite multi-faith conversations” become a substitute for the “proclamation of the historic Christian message.” The opportunities for the evangelization of Muslims had never been greater he said.

Religious Intelligence, 6 July 2009

Via Bartholomew’s Notes on Religion

FBI investigating death of Muslim leader

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Yermo Nazi graffiti1The FBI is investigating the death of a Muslim leader whose body was found inside a burned home in Yermo that had recently been spraypainted with racial epithets and Nazi symbols. Authorities have deemed the June 27 fire suspicious, but said it could take weeks before they are able to determine how the blaze started.

Neighbors who reported the fire told 911 dispatchers they heard a loud boom – almost like an exploding propane tank – just before the fire erupted. When firefighters doused the flames 40 minutes later, they found the body of 51-year-old Imam Ali Mohammed inside the East Yermo Road house he had moved his family out of last month.

Mohammed recently left Yermo for Victorville because he was being harassed, said CAIR spokeswoman Munira Syeda. Coupled with the anti-Muslim graffiti and the fact that Mohammed’s Yermo mosque was torched by arsonists two years ago, CAIR attorney Ameena Qazi asked the FBI to investigate “the possibility of a bias motive in his death.”

San Bernardino Sun, 7 July 2009