Sheila Musaji has posted the text of the keynote speech given by Nathan Lean, author of The Islamophobia Industry, at the “Facing religious intolerance: Islamophobia in 21st century America” symposium at the American Islamic College in Chicago.
Category Archives: USA
NYPD Muslim surveillance report details ‘collateral damage’ of program
A coalition of Muslim groups delivered a new report on the NYPD’s surveillance program to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly’s doorstep on Monday, hoping to put pressure on the department a day before its annual budget hearing.
The report, based on interviews with 57 Muslims in New York, details the life of a religious community under police suspicion. It was prepared by the Muslim American Civil Liberties Coalition, the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund and the Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility (CLEAR) project.
“They have repeatedly said that as long as you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear,” said Diala Shamas, a fellow at CLEAR who co-authored the report, called “Mapping Muslims.” To the contrary, she said, the study “shows that there are many disturbing impacts and consequences of the irresponsible, costly, harmful, completely ineffective surveillance program.”
Huffington Post, 11 March 2013
See also AALDEF press release, 11 March 2013
Geller: CPAC has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood and is ‘enforcing the Sharia’
Pamela Geller has discovered the reason for her exclusion from the forthcoming Conservative Political Action Conference – CPAC has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood.
She claims that the conference organisers have always taken a negative attitude towards her “because of the influence of what can only be described as Muslim Brotherhood facilitators or operatives like Suhail Khan and Grover Norquist”. This is of course the same conspiracy theory that got Frank Gaffney banned from CPAC two years ago.
Geller: CPAC has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood and is ‘enforcing the Sharia’
Pamela Geller has discovered the reason for her exclusion from the forthcoming Conservative Political Action Conference – CPAC has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood.
She claims that the conference organisers have always taken a negative attitude towards her “because of the influence of what can only be described as Muslim Brotherhood facilitators or operatives like Suhail Khan and Grover Norquist”. This is of course the same conspiracy theory that got Frank Gaffney banned from CPAC two years ago.
Geller continues: “I think at this point people need to know just how deeply we have been infiltrated. What are they doing at CPAC? Essentially they are enforcing the Sharia. Under the Sharia, the blasphemy laws, you cannot say, you cannot offend, you cannot criticize and you cannot insult Islam. That is effectively what they’re doing, they are enforcing the Sharia.”
Meanwhile, Geller’s partner in hate crime Robert Spencer reveals that he too has been banned from CPAC. Spencer was due to receive the People’s Choice Blog Award, sponsored by Right Wing News and TheTeaParty.net, having topped an online poll. But he says CPAC organisers told him he couldn’t attend the conference to accept the award unless he agreed not to attack Grover Norquist and Suhail Khan, which he refused to do.
So, well done to Geller and Spencer. Through their extremist views and crazed talk of Muslim Brotherhood infiltrators they have managed to get themselves denied a platform at one of the most influential gatherings of the US Right, where other more mainstream Islamophobes are made welcome.
(Via Salon)
Florida: ‘Anti-Sharia’ law is back
A renewed attempt to pass a controversial “foreign law” bill proposed by Sen. Alan Hays, R-Umatilla, and Rep. Larry Metz, R-Yahala, was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday, after more than an hour of sometimes emotional public testimony.
The bill, SB 58, bans courts or other legal authorities from using religious or foreign law as a part of a legal decision or contract relating to family law. Florida law would supercede foreign law regarding divorce, alimony, the division of marital assets, child support and child custody. The bill is ready to be heard on the House floor but it has more committee stops in the Senate. Last year, the bill passed the House but died in the Senate.
Supporters say the proposal isn’t targeting religious groups, but the bill has been criticized as anti-Sharia, a Koran-based code followed in some Islamic countries, by Islamic groups as well as Jewish organizations and the American Civil Liberties Union.
Muslim students kicked out of church after challenging Islamophobic fraud Walid Shoebat
Two exchange students attending school in Perham, Minnesota say they were kicked out of a church there when they questioned a nationally known speaker who says “Islam equals terrorism.”
The boys were kicked out of the Assembly of God church in Perham during a question answer period following a speech by Walid Shoebat. Shoebat says he is a former terrorist, and claims to be an anti-terrorism expert. He now calls Islam the devil and tours the country speaking to churches and schools – even collecting fees from Homeland Security.
CNN has exposed Shoebat, calling him a fraud. Today, the DC based Council on American-Islamic Relations contacted WDAY and said it is calling for a meeting with Assembly of God church leaders in Perham, in hopes of strengthening interfaith relations and promoting understanding.
Group launches grassroots campaign to counter anti-Muslim New York subway ads
A grassroots campaign aimed at countering hateful anti-Muslim ads in New York’s subway system has gone live, placing posters in ten locations across New York City.
Called Talk Back to Hate, the campaign first launched its crowdfunding appeal in January in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, seeking to raise the money necessary to post advertisements in major subway stations from among the citizens of New York.
“I started the project because, like many people I’ve spoken to, these ads feel like an attack on our most basic communal values,” Akiva Freidlin, the creator of the project, said in an interview with ThinkProgress at the time. “They’re doubly offensive, for both attempting to demonize and intimidate individual members of a particular religious group, and trying to exploit the city’s grief and anger.”
Talk Back to Hate’s poster message was chosen from various suggestions submitted by contributors to the campaign. The image depicts a pair of arms wrapped around the Big Apple that is New York and the winning words “Hatred is easy. It is love that requires true strength.” The poster also features the names of those who donated to make the poster a reality. The ad is currently running at some of the New York subway’s most-trafficked stops, including Times Square and Rockefeller Center, as well as eight other locations throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn. Fundraising for asecond round of ads is already on-going.
California: Republican Party official denounced for anti-Muslim smear … against Sikh
The leader of a San Bernardino County Republican club is being denounced for a Facebook posting that fellow conservatives are calling racist.
Vera Eyzendooren, president of the San Bernardino County Federation of Republican Women, accused a San Francisco attorney who is running for a leadership role in the state party of being a terrorist sympathizer, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Harmeet Dhillon is chairwoman of the San Francisco Republican Party and a candidate for vice chairwoman of the state organization.
US conservatives exclude Geller from conference
Anti-Muslim activist Pam Geller has been turned away from the upcoming Conservative Political Action Conference, despite speaking at the event for the past four years, she says. “This year, I applied to speak and was ignored,” she wrote on her blog. “So, for the first time in five years, I won’t be at CPAC.”
CPAC is the largest annual gathering of conservatives in the country, and one of the few places where conservative politicians, movement leaders, media personalities and big donors all come together under one roof.
See also Loonwatch, 3 March 2013
Bullitt County, Kentucky: residents’ opposition fuels rejection of Islamic cemetery
Bullitt County residents applaud rejection of cemetery plan
Rarely has a simple 10-acre tract of land so united a community.
But the staunch opposition to a proposed Islamic cemetery near the eastern edge of Mount Washington wasn’t as uncomplicated as it appeared.
Strongly voiced objections on religious grounds were numerous at a recent meeting of the county board of adjustments, but they were hardly the only reasons residents on and around Hubbard Lane wanted to stop the plan.