Right-wing bloggers in the US have been sneering at Nancy Pelosi for wearing a headscarf during her visit to the Umayyad mosque in Damascus – “yielding to a misogynistic culture’s expectations”, “behold Pelosi queen of the dhimmis”, you know the sort of thing. However, as one critic points out, Little Green Footballs et al are being rather selective in their Islamophobia: “Apparently they never saw Laura Bush when she visited al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem.”
Emails whipping up communal hatred over ‘mega-mosque’
The Mayor of London today revealed an organised email campaign around an online poll being conducted by the Evening Standard aimed at stirring up communal hatred by spreading entirely false statements about plans for a new mosque in East London.
Parties unite in opposition to BNP as poll looms
Politicians from all parties have put their differences aside in a bid to oppose the far-right British National Party. Sitting Assembly Members abandoned their campaigning and joined candidates and community members to discuss the BNP. The group is putting up a record 20 candidates in the National Assembly election, with the most high profile bid for power coming from leader Nick Griffin in the South Wales West constituency.
At a meeting in the Glamorgan Muslim Community Centre, Aberkenfig, near Bridgend, on Saturday, politicians including Environment Minister and Bridgend AM Carwyn Jones and Plaid Cymru candidate Bethan Jenkins pledged their commitment to tackling discrimination against ethnic minorities.
The Bridgend Unite Against Fascism Group, which organised the gathering, believes the BNP is a racist party which poses a threat to democracy and freedom. Unite spokesman Jeff Hurford said: “The highlight of the day was being able to get all of the parties together and a commitment to showing unity against the BNP. This all bodes well for future co-operation between the parties ahead of next year’s council elections.”
Hijab day: women at Canadian university show support
For a small piece of cloth meant to conceal the hijab has never been a more conspicuous or controversial symbol. It may be more visible than ever today at McMaster University, where a professor organized a Wear My Hijab day. Women, whether Muslim or not, were invited to wear a head scarf all day to show support for those who regularly wear it.
Professor Muriel Walker, who teaches French literature at Mac, organized the hijab day. “It can be difficult for women to wear the hijab,” she said. “I want this to help sensitize people about Islam … you should not be afraid of Muslims.”
Plan for Muslim prayer in Texas Senate angers Christian right
AUSTIN – The first prayer ever by a Muslim cleric in the Texas Senate will be delivered today – outraging some conservatives because it is occurring just before Easter.
The invocation will be delivered by the Imam Yusuf Kavakci of the Dallas Central Mosque at the invitation of state Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano. Shapiro is Jewish. Shapiro spokeswoman Jennifer Ransom Rice said the invitation was extended to Kavakci because Wednesday is the Texas Muslims Legislative Day at the Capitol.
Harris County Republican Chairman Jared Woodfill said the timing of the Muslim prayer outraged him. “I’m shocked that the day before the Easter recess that a Muslim is leading the prayer,” Woodfill said. “They should be having a celebration about the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.” Woodfill said the invocation should be delivered by someone who represents Judeo-Christian values.
Houston & Texas News, 3 April 2007
See also World Net Daily, which manages to accuse Yusuf Kavakci of being both “pro-Khomeini” and a proponent of Wahhabism.
Terrorists – coming to a school near you
“Authorities fear the school massacre that shook Russia a few years ago may be a dress rehearsal for what al-Qaida plans to do in America – only on a grander scale, launching multiple school attacks simultaneously across the country…. The FBI and Homeland Security Department last month distributed a bulletin to law enforcement across the country warning that Muslims with ‘ties to extremist groups’ are signing up to be school bus drivers….
“‘The enemy is infiltrating us at all levels, and certainly school bus drivers are one area to look at,’ warned retired Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, president of an anti-terror consultancy Killology Research Group [sic] that trains the FBI and other law enforcement. ‘And how about high school, middle school and elementary school cafeteria workers? Janitors? Delivery people?’ Grossman says some school district security officials he works with have expressed concerns about some of the Muslim employees schools are hiring. ‘But no one dares profile them,’ he told WND.”
Vandals wreck Muslim graves
Bereaved relatives have been left devastated after vandals targeted their loved ones’ graves. Police are treating the desecration – in a Muslim section of Cottingley Cemetery – as a racist incident. Families were distraught to find headstones kicked over, memorial plaques removed, rubbish strewn around and a bin even placed over one of the graves.
Tell your Muslim friends: ‘Let our sailors go now’ – BNP call to MCB
“BNP leader Nick Griffin has today written to the Muslim Council of Britain, urging them to lend their support to the campaign for the release of the 15 Royal Navy hostages seized by Iran”, the British National Party announces.
BNP news article, 3 April 2007
We know the fascists are not exactly the brightest people around, but you’d have thought that even the knuckledraggers of the BNP might have noticed that the MCB have already done just that. See MCB press release, 1 April 2007
Vandals wreck Muslim graves
Bereaved relatives have been left devastated after vandals targeted their loved ones’ graves. Police are treating the desecration – in a Muslim section of Cottingley Cemetery – as a racist incident. Families were distraught to find headstones kicked over, memorial plaques removed, rubbish strewn around and a bin even placed over one of the graves.
‘The enemy within’
Sunny Hundal takes issue with Inayat Bunglawala’s statement that Hizb ut-Tahrir are “a non-violent party and have every right to spread their ideas peacefully”.
Predictably, Hundal wins the approval of that other expert in self-promotion, Peter Tatchell, who comments:
“The political goals of Hizb ut-Tahrir are the Islamist equivalent of the BNP – only much worse. Why are there no anti-fascist campaigns against Hizb ut-Tahrir, just like there are anti-fascist campaigns against the BNP?”
This illustrates very clearly how Tatchell’s Islamophobia has led him to lose all contact with reality.
The British National Party is a white supremacist organisation which, according to its own constitution, is “wholly opposed to any form of racial integration between British and non-European peoples” and aims to restore “the overwhelmingly white makeup of the British population that existed in Britain prior to 1948”.
HT, by contrast, is an organisation based on a small section of the Muslim community – a minority ethno-religious community who are in fact the primary victims of the BNP’s malevolent racism.
On these grounds alone, it should be obvious that equating the BNP and HT is an absurdity, never mind declaring that HT is “much worse” than the Nazi-inspired BNP.
The criticism to be made of HT’s members is that they have drawn mistaken conclusions about how racism and imperialism are to be resisted, which has led them to abstain from mainstream politics in Britain. This is why other Muslims have sought to engage in dialogue with HT.
Sunny Hundal condemns Inayat Bunglawala of the Muslim Council of Britain for adopting this approach. Who exactly would gain if the MCB were to accept Hundal’s demands and break all relations with HT?