Category Archives: Women

Caroline Fourest fined €6000 for defaming young Muslim victim of racist attack

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Rabia-B. (2)Saphir News has reported that Caroline Fourest – the French “left-wing” Islamophobe who wrote Brother Tariq: The Doublespeak of Tariq Ramadan – has been successfully sued for defamation over comments she made in June last year on the radio station France Culture.

Fourest was responding to the attacks on two Muslim women in Argenteuil, one of whom lost her baby after being kicked in the stomach by her assailants. This followed an earlier incident in which a 17-year-old woman named Rabia Bentot (pictured) was punched and kicked by racists, who also tore off her headscarf while shouting “dirty Arab” and “dirty Muslim”

Instead of Fourest declaring her outrage at the assaults, and her solidarity with the victims, this self-styled feminist expressed scepticism about the women’s accounts.

Fourest claimed that Rabia Bentot was being manipulated by her father and by the Coordination contre le Racisme et l’Islamophobie, assisted by what Fourest described as the “communalist” website Oumma.com, and she suggested that the story of an attack might well have been fabricated. Even if an assault did take place, Fourest asserted, the police had not excluded the possibility that Rabia was the victim of violence by her own family, who could have beaten her up as punishment for living too free a lifestyle.

Needless to say, Fourest offered no evidence whatsoever to back up these disgraceful slurs.

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New South Wales: Muslim mum says racial abuse now worse than after September 11 and Bali bombings

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A mother who wears Islamic head coverings says local Muslims are now suffering more racist abuse than after the September 11 and Bali terrorist attacks.

Nahid Mohamed and her mother are Muslims and both wear a Niqab, where the body and face are covered except for the eyes. Both have lived at Killarney Vale for many decades. Ms Mohamed was born on the Central Coast and went to preschool, primary school and high school in the Killarney Vale district.

But still, it came as a shock when she and her mother were abused for speaking Arabic and wearing a Niqab in a doctor’s surgery last week. Ms Mohamed took the insults for as long as she could before defending herself and her mother.

“As soon as we walked into the surgery you could tell this guy was not happy,” Ms Mohamed said. “Mum started telling me about her trip away in Arabic and he started swearing at us, this went on for 10 or 15 minutes before I said, hello, is there a problem?

“He continued going on about how we should not be in the country and that we should speak English. The receptionist asked us both to be quiet, which was extremely insulting. We sat in silence and Mum whispered what’s happened in the last three weeks?”

ISIS has happened and just like after the September 11 attacks and the Bali bombings, Muslims like Ms Mohamed and her mother are targets again.

“It’s way worse, every media report affects us. I was horrified at the images I was seeing on television and I knew it had implications for every Muslim in Australia. I thought oh my God this is going to be disastrous and it was.”

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More anti-Muslim bigotry from Sun columnist Katie Hopkins

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Nurun AhmedNot ever having watched a single episode of the TV show The Apprentice I admit I missed this, but on yesterday’s programme two contestants were “fired” by Alan Sugar for reportedly failing in their task of selling luxury candles.

One of them was Nurun Ahmed, who wears hijab. In response to her departure Katie Hopkins tweeted: “Nurun has left the building. Thank crap for that. The token headscarf wearer is no more.”

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Paris Opera expels veiled woman during performance

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Opéra BastilleFrance’s government is drawing up a new set of rules for theatres after the Paris Opera ejected a woman for wearing a veil during a performance, the institution’s deputy director said Sunday.

The incident took place when a veiled woman was spotted on the front row of a performance of La Traviata at the Opera Bastille, Jean-Philippe Thiellay told AFP, confirming a media report.

France brought in a law in 2011 banning anyone from wearing clothing that conceals the face in a public space, or face a 150 euro ($190) fine.

The woman was sitting just behind the conductor, visible to monitors, wearing a scarf covering her hair and a veil over her mouth and nose during the performance on October 3.

“I was alerted in the second act,” said Thiellay, adding that “some performers said they did not want to sing” if something was not done.

France’s ministry of culture said a bill was currently being drafted to remind theatres, museums and other public institutions under its supervision of the rules regarding veils.

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‘Burqa ban’: Bronwyn Bishop backs down on parliament segregation proposal

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The presiding officers of Australia’s parliament house have backed down from a controversial decision to segregate Muslim women wearing facial coverings such as burqas or niqabs in the public galleries.

The speaker, Bronwyn Bishop, and the Senate president, Stephen Parry, met on Sunday to reconsider the “interim access arrangements” announced just over two weeks ago.

Bishop and Parry faced criticism over the decision to force visitors wearing facial coverings to sit in a separate area of parliament’s public gallery shielded by glass panels. The prime minister, Tony Abbott, had called on the pair to rethink the segregation policy, noting that all members of the public in the galleries had already cleared airport-style security checkpoints.

In a new information circular issued to parliamentarians and staff on Monday morning, the Department of Parliamentary Services backed down on the most controversial element.

Explaining the new interim arrangements, the department said: “All visitors entering Parliament House will be required to temporarily remove any coverings that prevent the recognition of facial features. This will enable DPS security staff to identify any person who may have been banned from entering Parliament House or who may be known, or discovered, to be a security risk. Once this process has taken place, visitors are free to move about the public spaces of the building, including all chamber galleries, with facial coverings in place.”

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‘Muslim men are raping women’ – investment banker caught on camera launching racist rant on train

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Neil DochertyAn investment banker was caught on camera launching a racist rant at a woman on an inter-city train in front of shocked passengers.

Police issued CCTV stills, and a mobile phone snap of Neil Docherty taken by a disgusted witness, in bid to track him down. Within hours members of the public called cops with his name and place of work, Livingston Sheriff Court heard yesterday, and he later handed himself in to police.

Docherty, of Linlithgow, West Lothian, appeared on bail and admitted two racially aggravated offences. He pleaded guilty to assaulting Fella Hammach, 33, on board a Glasgow Queen Street to Edinburgh train at Linithgow, West Lothian, on August 28.

The 43-year-old also pleaded guilty to acting in a racially aggravated manner which caused or was intended to cause alarm and distress to Ms Hammach by shouting and swearing, acting in an aggressive manner and directing religious remarks towards her using racially offensive language.

Procurator fiscal Catherone Knowles said the assault was witnessed by several passengers on the train, which was packed with revellers returning from a night out.

As the train pulled into Linlithgow station at around 11pm Ms Hammach was unexpectedly slapped to the right side of her head from behind. She said: “The accused was overheard shouting at her: ‘Go back to your own f*****g country. Muslim men are raping women’.”

Mrs Knowles said a female passenger told the accused to stop but he ignored her and shouted: “It’ll be a different story when they take over the world and you’re all wearing burkhas!”

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French politician harasses veiled Muslim woman … who tells her to get lost

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Nadine Morano burqa tweet

French UMP politician Nadine Morano had a shocking experience earlier today when she got off a train at the Gare de l’Est in Paris.

To her horror she came upon a Muslim woman traveller pulling a wheeled suitcase and wearing a niqab. “The woman was fully veiled,” Moran told LOR’Actu. “You could only see her eyes. I find that unacceptable in France. It is a provocation.”

Morano immediately confronted the woman, told her the garment was illegal and instructed her to remove it. To Morano’s indignation, the woman’s simply replied “je m’en fous” and continued on her way.

Having reported her to the police, Morano then took to Twitter and Facebook to proclaim her outrage at this uppity Muslim who had treated her with “total contempt”.

According to Morano, the niqab is a public security issue: “Who is under that outfit? What is in that suitcase … suspicion is permissible when someone is concealed.” She pontificates: “Our vigilance must be unfailing during this period of radicalisation of communalist behaviour, of recruitment to jihad.”

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Toronto council candidate’s election sign defaced with words ‘Go Back Home’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Munira Abukar election sign defaced

On Friday night, Ward 2 city council candidate Munira Abukar got a phone call from a supporter saying that some of her campaign signs had been kicked over and it looked like they had been vandalized. The signs were found on the corner of Martin Grove and Dixon Rds. in Etobicoke.

“We figured it was just general mischief,” she told the Star. “And then we turned over this one sign and saw an intentional and very hateful message.” The message read “go back home,” and Abukar’s face had been scribbled out in red marker. Someone had crossed off her name and written “b—-”

At about 2:30 p.m. Sunday, Abukar reported the incident to the police.

Abukar said she was “disappointed and shocked” when she first read the message, but it was her parent’s reaction that upset her the most. Her mother is a refugee and her father an immigrant, and both experienced racism when they first arrived in Canada. “To see the heartbreak on your parent’s face … It’s hard to want to protect your child and not be able to.”

Abukar isn’t very concerned about finding the person responsible for the hateful messages. Instead, she wants to create an opportunity for the city to discuss racism. “I think we need to understand that there is an underlying racism in our city, and there are people who believe that just because you look different that you aren’t from Toronto.”

The response on social media has been mostly positive, Abukar said. Mayoral candidate Olivia Chow tweeted her support on Saturday, writing that “there is no place for racism in this city.”

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Dozens of anti-Muslim attacks as Islamic leaders warn of community fear

Posted on by Bob Pitt

There have been at least 30 attacks on Muslims – mainly against women wearing the hijab – in the three weeks since the police anti-terror raids and threats by Islamic State put relations between the Islamic community and mainstream Australia on edge.

Muslim community leaders are compiling a register of religiously motivated incidents, which includes reports of physical and verbal assaults, threats of violence against senior clerics and damage to mosques.

They claim “mistrust” with police had led to the real rate of anti-Islamic episodes going unreported and the threat of segregation for women wearing the niqab into Parliament had licensed a new wave of people willing to vent against Muslim women in public in recent days. Muslim groups have begun arranging escorts for women to go shopping.

While national security agencies have been boosted with almost $650 million in new funding, Muslim leaders are critical of the level of police resources put into stopping hate crimes at street level.

Among recorded incidents, a woman was threatened with having her hijab torn from her head and set alight, a cup of coffee was thrown through the car window of a woman driving in a hijab, and a pig’s head and cross were thrown into the grounds of a Brisbane mosque.

A mother in western Sydney was spat on and had the pram carrying her baby kicked, according to the list of incidents compiled by the western Sydney-based Muslim Legal Network and the recently launched Islamophobia Register.

A list of verbal attacks includes a Muslim mother in Melbourne who was warned to remove her child from playing with group of non-Muslim children at a play park.

At least four mosques have been targeted with written threats, graffiti and thrown objects. Queensland has the highest rate of personal assaults and threats to mosques, according to the list.

Solicitor Lydia Shelly, of the Muslim Legal Network, said:  “We have noticed an increase in attacks against Muslim women in public places, of those who wear a scarf or a hijab. As a Muslim woman, I am very concerned that this is impacting on the rights or perhaps the freedom of movement for Muslim women, because they simply do not feel safe any more.

“We have had property defaced. We have had death threats issued to our spiritual leaders and threats to bomb the mosques and things like that.”

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The Sun’s ‘Unite against Isis’ campaign is a proxy for anti-Muslim bigotry

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Imagine your average British Muslim family sitting around the breakfast table with the papers this morning. On the front page of the Sun, an image of a woman in a hijab fashioned out of the Union Jack and the headline “United Against IS” hollers out at them. In the right-hand corner, a subheadline urges them to “stand up to extremists”.

Yes, you there, Muslim – bleary eyed, sipping your coffee, who thought the activities of a militant group thousands of miles away had nothing to do with you – are you standing up to extremism right now? Is your Islam “British”? If not, then you are Part of the Problem.

It doesn’t end there. Inside, there is a flag cutout with “United Against IS” on it. Please stick it on your window or somewhere else highly visible to make it clear where you stand. Now, time for cornflakes.

The implications of this stunt are clear. Even though the editors shoehorned in an appeal to “Brits of all faiths”, this can only be a figleaf as the image clearly screams “Muslims”.

What the Sun says is that Muslims have to prove their British credentials with a display of loyalty – that their Britishness is not taken for granted until they do so. You are a shady Muslim first, and a citizen second. It may be masquerading as a jolly exercise in solidarity of the “Keep calm and carry on” type. But the subtext is pretty clear: “We are united against IS, Are they?”

Nesrine Malik responds to the “anti-extremism” campaign in today’s Sun.

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