Thugs jailed for racist attack on Muslim they blamed for Lee Rigby killing

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Three Ashford thugs launched a nasty racist attack on an innocent man talking on a mobile phone to his mother in Pakistan.

The drunken yobs – who were carrying beer cans – spat at their victim Sarfaraz Khan before screaming the vile accusation: “You kill our soldiers”… followed by the taunt “Lee Rigby” – the soldier who died in an unprovoked attack in London. Now James Carpenter, 26, from Mallards, Ashford, Benjamin Gordon, 24, of no fixed address and Daniel White, 23 of Wellesley Road, Ashford have all been jailed for the racially-aggravated attack.

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Discrimination Olympics: Meddling with Muslims in Sochi

Posted on by Bob Pitt

During its buildup, NBC’s Bob Costas stated that the Sochi Games will, “take place against a backdrop of questions about policy differences, security, cost overruns and human rights issues, including Russia’s anti-gay propaganda law”.

The firestorm against Sochi’s brazen homophobia leading up and during the Olympics was fierce, capped by President Barack Obama sending a US delegation led by openly gay athletes. The message, from news desks and the Oval Office, was clear – the US opposed the structural homophobia built into the Sochi Olympics.

No similar statements were made of the pervasive Islamophobia encircling the Games. Rather, the media and political rhetoric in the US toward Muslims and Islam are aligned with those of Russia, and linked inextricably to terrorism. American misalignment with Russia’s per se homophobia, and its converging interests with Moscow’s framing of Muslim threat, highlights the ever more relevant observation of Derrick Bell, who held that: “Domestic civil rights policies are only promoted when they advance majoritarian (white) interests abroad.”

The policing of Muslims stateside, and its nexus to the “global war on terrorism”, has – in large part – erased word of Sochi’s brazen Islamophobia from news headlines, and hushed the US government from calling into question the religious freedoms of Muslims in Russia.

Khaled A. Beydoun explains why Putin’s Islamophobic policies pervade the Winter Olympics at Sochi.

Al Jazeera, 17 February 2014

Reports and comment from Islamophobia Watch 10‑16 February

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Reports and comment from Islamophobia Watch 10-16 February 2014

‘Moderate Muslim’ wants family fun day cancelled

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Under the headline “EDL to target Legoland after Muslim HATE preacher hires park for day out”, the Daily Star Sunday has thrown its weight behind the campaign to pressurise Legoland Windsor into cancelling a booking by the Muslim Research and Development Foundation, who have hired the theme park for a family fun day on 9 March. According to the Star, Legoland’s decision to “has outraged ­moderate Muslims”.

Now, which “moderate Muslim” do you suppose would be so vicious and embittered as to want to deprive Muslim children of a harmless day out at Legoland? No prizes for guessing that it’s Taj Hargey. He tells the Star: “I would ask Legoland that if they are happy to let his group hire the park, then would they be happy to let the BNP and other extremist far-right groups hold their family fun day there? Both groups spread hatred and intolerance.”

An English Defence League supporter applauds the role that Hargey is playing: “Legoland can cancel the booking without losing face by saying that they have considered the opinion of sensible Muslims like Dr Hargey and thus etc etc.”

US religious freedom rep funded by Islamophobes

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the US’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, repeated its request to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) to investigate one of its own members, this time for being funded by the same group that backs a notorious Islamophobe.

Earlier this year, CAIR asked for an investigation of USCIRF Vice Chair Zuhdi Jasser for apparently seeking to deny religious rights to Muslim military personnel. In a letter sent to USCIRF Chairman Dr. Robert P. George, Corey Saylor, director of CAIR’s Department to Monitor and Combat Islamophobia, wrote in part:

“We are writing today to expand upon the concerns regarding Dr. Zuhdi Jasser that were expressed on our letter to you dated January 24, 2014. Additional information has come to light regarding the financial dependence of Dr. Jasser’s American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) on groups known for promoting Islamophobia in the United States.

“Tax filings for the New York-based Abstraction Fund reveal that between 2010 and 2012, Jasser’s organization accepted $45,000 in grants and contributions. In 2012, 82 percent of the Fund’s total $1,982,930 contributions and grants went to groups known for their active role in spreading anti-Islam prejudice.”

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Quebec halal butchers vandalised and shot at

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Souibgui AbdelbariA halal shop owner in Quebec’s Eastern Townships is blaming the provincial government’s secularism charter for acts of vandalism and violence, including air-rifle shots fired at his window.

Vandals have also showered Souibgui Abdelbari’s store with “No to Islam” placards and hundreds of paper crosses. “In my opinion, this is related to the charter,” he said, referring to the Parti Quebecois’ proposed ban on religious symbols in the public service. These things didn’t happen in Sherbrooke before that.”

Attacks against Abdelbari’s shop have intensified in recent weeks. A storefront window was shattered twice and he also found bullet holes in a window. More recently, the front of his shop was littered with about 500 small crosses. “It makes me fear for my family’s safety,” he said. “Someone who does things like that could do something worse.”

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Outrage at hate threat to ‘burn’ planned Cambridge mosque as city shows its support for the £17m project

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Cambridge UnitedOutraged anti-fascists have hit back at a threat to “burn” a planned mosque in Cambridge’s Mill Road. Cambridge Unite Against Fascism (CUAF) was reacting to a 1,600-signature petition against the £17.5 million mosque in another attack by the English Defence League (EDL). And a protest group was also criticised for a legal application to block the mosque being built claiming it could be “a front for terrorism”, as the News reported.

The online petition launched by a Cambridge resident and EDL supporter also has anti-Muslim hate comments on it from contributors who claim to be from the city. But many of those posting comments appear to be from America – where the host website is based. One hate comment said: “If they still build it, burn it.” The News has passed details to police.

Now a petition supporting the mosque signed by residents including Cambridge MP Julian Huppert and Richard Howitt MEP, has been relaunched.

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Anti-Islamic mob of ‘football fans’ smashes windows of Plovdiv mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Plovdiv demonstration 14.2.14Hurling paving stones, rocks and fireworks, a large mob of protesters – many of them from football fan clubs – smashed windows of Plovdiv’s historic Dzhumaya Mosque in the centre of Bulgaria’s second city.

The February 14 protest was the latest in a series against court applications by the office of the Chief Mufti, spiritual leader of Bulgaria’s Muslims, for properties historically owned by the Muslim community. The court applications have been lodged under the country’s Religious Denominations Act, which makes provision for such applications by all officially recognised religious groups in Bulgaria.

A large cordon of police in riot gear stood between the crowd and the mosque building, which also features a recently-reopened cafe offering Turkish delicacies, but the missiles were hurled over the heads of the police.

While the crowd were at the mosque, each blast of a firecracker or sound of breaking glass was greeted by cheers from the mob. After the smashing of windows, police began to attempt to move the crowd, unofficially estimated at 2000 people, back. During this engagement, three people were injured and one arrested.

Reporters at the scene said that at the Turkish consulate, which is some distance away adjoining Plovdiv’s city park, demonstrators shouted, “you are not Europeans, you are barbarians”. Demonstrators also marched in the direction of the city headquarters of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, the party led and supported in the main by Bulgarians of ethnic Turkish descent, saying that they wanted to occupy the building. Demonstrators chanted “freedom or death” and “down with the MRF”.

Bulgarian-language news website Plovdiv24.com has video of the mosque incident.

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Islamophobia in Pocatello, Idaho

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Rev. Jim JonesA variance request hearing that was supposed to be focused on parking and public safety concerns surrounding the placement of an Islamic Center at 1513 S. Fifth Avenue turned into testimony about religious tolerance and fear of Islam Thursday night.

Originally scheduled for the small Paradise meeting room in Pocatello City Hall, the hearing was moved to the City Council Chamber to accommodate more than 100 people — most of them Muslims. Hearing officer Jim Mullen tried to limit input to planning and zoning issues, but citizen comments soon expanded — at times resembling a spirited religious debate.

A doctor from Portneuf Medical Center and a native of Somalia, Jamal Mustafa strayed from zoning concerns in his opening remarks in favor of the Islamic Center and talked about the growing needs of Muslim students at Idaho State University. “For the past 10 years ISU has quadrupled its Muslim student population,” Mustafa said, adding the new center would expand the chance for students to practice their faith and pray. “This is for the benefit of Pocatello,” Mustafa said.

Later in the hearing when opponents to the variance spoke, they said the mosque would actually hurt Pocatello and put its residents in danger. The Rev. Jim Jones of the Blazing Grace Church in Pocatello [pictured] brought a copy of the Koran to the lectern. He said Islam faith preaches intolerance of others and promotes the killing of Christians and Jews. “I get very fearful because I live close to this place,” he said about the proposed Islamic Center.

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Posted in USA

Another French mosque desecrated

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Souna de Blois mosque desecration (3)

The mosque of the Moroccan cultural association in Sounna de Blois, a town situated between Orléans and Tours, was desecrated during the night of 11-12 February (see reports by La Nouvelle République and Atlasinfo).

On Wednesday morning worshipers arrived at the mosque to find a pig’s head and several pieces of pork at the site, along with the slogan “MLE France” sprayed on the door of the mosque. The meaning of these initials is unknown, although it may be that ML stands for “mouvement de libération”. Boujama Hannou, the president of the association, has appealed for calm.

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