Following on the heels of the Tuesday decision by The Associated Press to discontinue use of the term “illegal immigrant,” the news agency on Thursday revised its stylebook entry for another politically charged term.
The term “Islamist,” the AP clarified in a Thursday afternoon alert to online stylebook subscribers, should not be used as “a synonym for Islamic fighters, militants, extremists or radicals.”
The measure banning Sharia law in Oklahoma courts passed by Oklahoma voters in 2010 was shot down by a senate committee Thursday.
State Question 755 banned the consideration of Islamic Sharia law, derived from the Quran, when deciding Oklahoma court cases. It passed with 70 percent of the vote in November 2010, so then came House Bill 1552, by State Rep. Sally Kern.
That bill passed the Oklahoma House of Representatives on a bipartisan 76-3 vote on its third reading in March 2011. During a hearing this week, members of the Senate Rules Committee voted 6-9 against the measure.
A former bus cleaner is suing the NYCTA for “persistent harassment due to his Muslim beliefs” and denying him “reasonable workplace accommodation of his religious observances,” according to a statement from DRUM, an advocacy group based in Queens.
According to the complaint, Bangladesh-born Sheikh Ahmed worked as a cleaner with NYCTA’s Department of Buses with a clean record for more than 10 years. Trouble apparently began, however, when Ahmed transferred to Brooklyn’s East New York Depot in 2009, where he claimed to be subjected to various forms of mistreatment for observing his daily prayer requirements, as well as denied leave to observe Jumah, which stipulates attendance of Friday afternoon service at an Islamic mosque.
Over at Informed Comment, Juan Cole argues that US politicians and media are refusing to take the threat of far-right terrorism seriously.
HARRIS COUNTY, Texas — Authorities are investigating possible hate crimes at several convenient stores in north Houston and Harris County.
On Monday morning, Harris County Precinct 4 deputy constables arrested 32-year-old Carlos Marroquin after a convenience store clerk at the Shell gas station at 6007 FM 2920 reported a man saying racial slurs and making terroristic threats.
Deputy constables said the suspect threatened to kill the store clerk and burn his store down because he was a Muslim.
Marroquin went to at least three different convenient store locations Monday morning making similar threats, according to investigators. Deputy constables obtained statements from witnesses at each location.
See also Cypress Creek Mirror, 3 April 2013
And “CAIR-Texas asks that bail be revoked for anti-Muslim threats”, CAIR press release, 3 April 2013
A Federal Way man accused of viciously beating a Sikh cab driver while shouting anti-Muslim slurs now faces a federal hate crime indictment.
Initially charged in King County Superior Court, Jamie W. Larson is accused of attacking a cab driver during an Oct. 17 ride after commenting on the man’s turban. Larson, who is alleged to have torn at the man’s beard and injured his mouth in the attack, apparently believed the Sikh driver to be Muslim.
Chris Stedman, author of Faitheist: How an Atheist Found Common Ground with the Religious, takes on Pamela Geller over her current ad campaign aimed at turning the LGBT community against Muslims.
A federal judge has ruled that DuPage County was “arbitrary and capricious” when it denied permission for an Iranian Muslim group to build a mosque on a 3-acre residential property near west-suburban Naperville. Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer issued a 70-page summary judgment Friday that could force the county to reconsider the zoning petition of the Irshad Learning Center.
“I think it’s significant not only for this one Muslim institution but all Muslim religious institutions who are facing problematic decisions by their local governments,” said Kevin Vodak, an attorney with the Chicago chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which represented the center. DuPage County has had a number of disputed zoning bids by mosques in recent years, but this is the only one that CAIR has stepped in to represent.
An investigation is underway after an arson attack at a mosque in Bury Park in the early hours of this morning (April 2).
Fire crews were called to the Bury Park Jamia Masjid in Bury Park Road at 4.30am, after two large metal bins were pushed up against a door and set alight. The scene has been cordoned off by police while a fire investigation takes place.
Alan Hays, a Republican state senator in Florida, likened Sharia law to a “dreadful disease” requiring vaccination to protect Americans.