Over half of Dutch say Wilders’ anti-Islamic rhetoric is fine

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A majority of Dutch believe that Geert Wilders, the anti-immigration politician much admired by Norway’s mass murderer, does not need to tone down his inflammatory anti-Islamic comments, a poll on Friday showed.

The Norwegian gunman, Anders Behring Breivik, reproduced anti-Islamic comments that Wilders made to the Dutch parliament and expressed his admiration of the Dutch politician in his 1,500-page manifesto.

Polling firm Maurice de Hond said on Friday that 52 percent of those surveyed thought Wilders did not need to moderate his stance on the supposed “Islamisation of Europe” in the wake of the Norway killings, while 44 percent said Wilders should tone it down.

In the opinion poll published on Friday, 29 percent of those questioned said they supported the Freedom Party’s approach to Islam and Muslims in the Netherlands, more than those who agreed on the issue with the Liberals and the Christian Democrats combined.

Reuters, 29 July 2011

FN member defends Norway attacker

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A member of the Front National has been suspended for defending the work of the Oslo attacker, who killed 76 people on Friday.

Jacques Coutela, who represented the far-right party in local elections in the Yonne earlier this year, wrote a blog post describing Anders Behring Breivik as “an icon” and a “defender of the west”.

The post, which has since been deleted, said: “The reason for the Norway terror attacks: fighting the Muslim invasion, that’s what people don’t want you to know.”

Anti-racism movement MRAP has filed a complaint against Mr Coutela for inciting racial hatred.

However, FN leader Marine Le Pen has accused MRAP of “taking advantage of a terrible event” to target her party. She said: “The Front National of course has nothing to do to the Norwegian slaughter, which is the work of a lone lunatic who must be ruthlessly punished.”

Another Front National member, Laurent Ozon, posted comments on Twitter this weekend linking the attacks to a rise in immigration in Norway.

The Connexion, 27 July 2011

Right wing warns against threat of ‘Islamisation’ – in the Czech Republic, where Muslims are 0.1% of the population

Posted on by Bob Pitt

AntiMesitaThe twin terror attacks in Norway have refocused attention on Islamophobia in Europe and closer to home are sparking questions about a recent decision to use taxpayer money to fund an anti-Islamic campaign group.

“I can confirm it,” said Imrich Dioszegi, a spokesman for the Hradec Králové Regional Authority. “The council supports two [campaign] groups of a similar name with a total amount of 15,000 Kč.”

Those groups, both going by the name AntiMešita, or anti-mosque, are headed by Valentin Kusák, who said their goal is to “fight against the Islamization of the Czech Republic”. “A month ago, we got a financial gift for our activities from the Hradec Králové region, which really delighted us,” he added. “This gift will help us to cover our expenses.”

The groups were formed in response to what Kusák said were plans to create a mosque in the city of Hradec Králové. The project he originally opposed has turned out to be an already-existing 50-square-meter building where members of the local Muslim community – many of them students at the nearby university – gather. The building was purchased by the Organization of Muslim Communities in the Czech Republic (UMO-ČR), and leaders of that group term it “a small house for worship.”

“Islam is in its nature aggressive, and it tries to be dominant everywhere it enters,” Kusák said. “Muslims are lying to us about their intentions; after all, that is what the Koran orders them to do in relationships with ‘infidels.’ The mosque is for me one the elements of Islamization, and that is why I oppose it. I am for religious freedom. … But Islam – as preached by Muslim representatives and lecturers around the world as well as in the Czech Republic – is incompatible with democracy.”

The Czech Statistical Office has no official numbers on the country’s Muslim population, but estimates put it at around 15,000, a number that would account for just more than 0.1 percent of the population, as compared with an estimated 8 percent in France, Germany’s 5.4 percent and Norway’s 3.4 percent.

“The fact that a council supports the activities of AntiMešita is totally not right, but others are to judge such actions,” said UMO-ČR Chairman Muneeb Hassan Al Rawi. “I compare such initiatives to fascism. Especially after Friday in Norway, everyone should clear up their perspective, because it came to light that not only Muslims have a patent on terrorism.”

Asked if he was worried about Islamophobia in Europe and the Czech Republic, Al Rawi said: “Of course, the concerns are growing.”

“I am a Czech citizen. I have lived here for 25 years, and still every time I return from abroad I get stopped at the airports by customs officers,” Al Rawi said. “Now, after Norway, when a guy does it to his own people and he is not Muslim, basically anything can happen. We knew this a long time ago, but if I said this a week ago you would have considered me a fool.”

Prague Post, 28 July 2011

Murfeesboro Muslim mom: Road rage incident ‘a hate crime’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

It was a scary night for a Murfreesboro mother and son after a road rage incident took an ugly turn. The mother told DNJ news partner WSMV-TV that not only did the driver threaten to kill them, he started yelling racial slurs because of the way she was dressed.

Converted Muslim Lisa Sallaj, 43 of Murfreesboro said she hasn’t slept a wink since road rage incident. “I’ve been sick to my stomach. I’ve been shaking, nervous, lying in bed tossing and turning,” Sallaj told WSMV reporter Larry Flowers.

It all started on Medical Center Parkway near Interstate 24 around 8:30 Tuesday night. “He had just received his driver’s license. I was in the car with him,” the mother said.

Sallaj’s 18-year-old son was in a left turn lane, but needed to go straight. He pulled out right out in front of a black Mustang. “The guy went ballistic,” said Sallaj. “He went nuts.”

It got much worse. “He started yelling and cussing saying you (expletive) need to learn how to drive,” Sallaj told Flowers. “Then I look over and he has a knife out shaking at me saying, ‘I’ll kill you.'”

Sallaj told her son to pull over so she could get the tag number, she said. She started driving, but ended up right next to the black Mustang at a traffic light where the driver revved up his engine.

She said he then started using anti-Islamic slurs, mocking an Islamic prayer chant and making “racial slurs.” The mother said she really got scared when the man began yelling at her son. “He said he would put a red bullet dot in the center of his eyes,” Sallaj said.

The mother said the man followed them onto Broad Street. It was only after she shouted she was heading to the police station that he decided to leave them alone.

“I’m already under a lot of stress from all the discrimination and everything that’s been going on in Murfreesboro lately with everybody giving me dirty looks,” Sallaj said.

Murfreesboro police are investigating. “It’s something we’re not going to tolerate especially with the current situation with the mosque,” said Murfreesboro Police spokesman Kyle Evans, referring to vandalism at the site of the proposed Veals Road Islamic Center of Murfreesboro. “We’re not going to let that situation get out of hand.”

Sallaj said there is no doubt in her mind she was targeted because of her Muslim head dress. “This was definitely, definitely a hate crime,” Sallaj told WSMV.

Daily News Journal, 28 July 2011

Lutfur Rahman joins calls to Home Secretary to ban EDL march

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Mayor of Tower Hamlets has tonight formally called on the Home Secretary to ban a proposed march through London’s East End by the English Defence League.

Lutfur Rahman has written to Theresa May urging police to use their powers to stop the EDL coming to Whitechapel on September 3, adding yet more weight to calls for a ban from MPs, councillors, London Assembly figures and church leaders.

“The EDL has a history of provocative marches in areas with large Muslim populations,” he said in a Town Hall statement. “They relish the opportunity to reap division on one of the most diverse communities in Britain and turning residents against one another.”

Mr Rahman claimed efforts to keep the EDL out “have not been helped by a handful of politicians and bloggers stoking the flames, seeking to paint Tower Hamlets as an ‘Islamic republic’ and its mayor as a ‘fundamentalist sympathiser’.”

He is speaking at a rally tomorrow evening at the London Muslim Centre in Whitechapel, calling for the EDL march to be stopped.

The mayor is joined on the platform by politicians of all parties and church leaders including the new Bishop of Stepney in his first public role since his inauguration last Friday. Anti-fascist campaigners from Norway are also flying to London to speak at the rally.

East End Advertiser, 28 July 2011

Update:  See also “EDL’s online links with Norway killer fuel calls to ban London march”, Guardian, 29 July 2011

FN member defends Norway attacker

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A member of the Front National has been suspended for defending the work of the Oslo attacker, who killed 76 people on Friday.

Jacques Coutela, who represented the far-right party in local elections in the Yonne earlier this year, wrote a blog post describing Anders Behring Breivik as “an icon” and a “defender of the west”.

The post, which has since been deleted, said: “The reason for the Norway terror attacks: fighting the Muslim invasion, that’s what people don’t want you to know.”

Anti-racism movement MRAP has filed a complaint against Mr Coutela for inciting racial hatred.

However, FN leader Marine Le Pen has accused MRAP of “taking advantage of a terrible event” to target her party. She said: “The Front National of course has nothing to do to the Norwegian slaughter, which is the work of a lone lunatic who must be ruthlessly punished.”

Another Front National member, Laurent Ozon, posted comments on Twitter this weekend linking the attacks to a rise in immigration in Norway.

The Connexion, 27 July 2011

Police probe EDL death threat to George Galloway

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Daryl Hobson with Stephen LennonA death threat to George Galloway is being investigated by police in London. Mr Galloway asked the Metropolitan Police to investigate after a threat was posted online by a member of the far-right English Defence League (EDL).

He contacted the police at Streatham near his south London home after a senior EDL member Daryl Hobson [pictured, with EDL leader Stephen Lennon], who has boasted of the group’s links with Norwegian killer Anders Breivik, posted a message reading “Kill George Galloway” on his own Facebook page. Mr Hobson, who organises EDL demonstrations, encouraged others to add comments. One claimed he would kill the controversial former MP.

Mr Galloway said: “This is a clear incitement to murder me and I have passed on, through my lawyer, my complaint to the Metropolitan Police. Hobson admits that the crypto-fascist EDL have had extensive links with Breivik so I would be mad not to take this threat seriously. I have, in the past, been attacked at a meeting by EDL thugs. But they will not silence me or anyone else campaigning against their vile, violent, racist methods.”

Officers from Streatham Police office visited Mr Galloway’s home yesterday and have arranged to interview him today. A Met spokesman confirmed that officers were investigating the internet threat.

The Herald, 28 July 2011

Update:  The EDL have issued a statement. Daryl Hobson is not and never was a senior member of the EDL, Stephen Lennon hasn’t a clue who he is, and he’s now been expelled.

Blame multiculturalism, mass immigration and Islamisation for Norway terrorist attacks, says Sweden Democrat politician

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Sweden Democrat Erik Hellsborn has written on his blog that the twin attacks in Norway are the fault of “mass immigration” and “Islamisation”, denying that he feels any shame for sharing the same views as the perpetrator.

“If there hadn’t been any Islamisation or mass immigration then there wouldn’t have been anything to trigger Behring Breivik to do what he did,” wrote Hellsborn, who represents the party in Varberg in western Sweden.

“The ultimate responsibility is with the perpetrator, but if you are to discuss the underlying reasons which motivated him then it was caused by multiculturalism,” Hellsborn explained to the local Hallands Nyheter daily.

Hellsborn furthermore writes that he feels no shame or guilt that he and Anders Behring Breivik share the same nationalist ideology. Those who should feel guilt are those he calls “cosmopolitans” and argues that “in a Norwegian Norway this tragedy would never have happened”.

The political agenda detailed in Anders Behring Breivik’s “manifesto” bears striking similarity to the ideology professed by the Sweden Democrats and when asked if the the party should shoulder some responsibility, Hellsborn replied:

“No, Breivik is a product of the multicultural society. If Europe had not become multicultural then the shootings would not have happened.”

The Local, 26 July 2011