FPÖ politician faces legal action over mosque ‘game’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

SCREENSHOT Moschee / FP… / WahlwerbungAustrian authorities have filed incitement charges against a right-wing politician for commissioning a video game that required players to target and stop mosques, minarets and muezzins as they pop up on a screen.

Prosecutors in the city of Graz accuse Gerhard Kurzmann of the far-right Freedom Party of commissioning the game as promotional material in the run-up to regional elections last year.

The game – called “Moschee Baba,” German for “See ya, mosque” – was posted online and sparked widespread condemnation.

Prosecutors said Wednesday they also have filed charges against Alexander S., the head of an unnamed Swiss advertising company, who allegedly designed the game.

A court date has yet to be set.

Associated Press, 25 May 2011

South Shields churchgoer denies hate campaign against Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

John WhiteA church stalwart accused of leaving rashers of bacon outside a mosque and Muslim homes has denied running a religious hate campaign. John White was arrested as police investigated a spate of incidents in South Shields earlier this year.

He pleaded not guilty at Newcastle Crown Court to five offences of religiously aggravated harassment, alarm, or distress. The charges all involve the deliberate targeting of Muslims on different days between January 2 and 29. White, who has been attending the same church for 30 years, also faces a string of racially-aggravated offences. But those were not put to him during his brief plea and case management hearing.

Tom Moran, prosecuting, said: “We are likely to nail our colours to the mast because really this case is about religious aggravation rather than racial. It may be a decision is taken not to try him on those other counts but I can’t confirm that today.”

White, 63, of Homestall Close, South Shields, will now go before a jury in the week beginning July 25. He was further remanded on bail with a number of conditions. One of those – an exclusion area – is to be challenged by White’s lawyers. Stuart Graham, defending, said: “One condition is not to enter Baring Street. That causes difficulty for the church he has gone to for 30 years.”

White’s arrest followed a series of disturbing attacks in South Shields. Bacon and pork was thrown at the homes of Muslim families around the town centre. A slab of bacon was also left outside one of the community’s most popular mosques – the Jam-E-Masjid Bangladeshi Muslim Culture and Welfare Association in Baring Street.

Evening Chronicle, 20 May 2011

Via London Muslim

Posted in UK

How the Terrorism Act is used to bully Muslims into spying on their communities

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Vikram Dodd examines evidence that the police and MI5 are abusing Schedule 7 stop and search powers to try and turn innocent people into informers.

Guardian, 24 May 2011

See also “Asian people 42 times more likely to be held under terror law”, Guardian, 24 May 2011

And “Black and Asian people unfairly targeted by anti-terror law”, FOSIS press release, 23 May 2011

FOSIS quotes Lord Ahmed as stating: “Ten years after it was first introduced, Schedule 7 is having an extremely damaging impact on community relations. This government has failed to adequately investigate and regulate Schedule 7 in the way that it has with other stop and search powers such as Section 44. That’s why I think it’s time we had an independent review into the use of Schedule 7.”

The FOSIS and StopWatch briefing paper on Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000 can be consulted here.

Islamophobia and the media

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Pointing the FingerPress TV reports on the launch of Pointing the Finger: Islam and Muslims in the Contemporary UK Media, the collection of articles edited by Julian Petley and Robin Richardson.

Julian Petley, who is a professor of Screen Media and Journalism at London’s Brunel University, said that newspapers in Britain are more inclined toward right-wing perspectives than TV and radio.

Petley said among the British newspapers only the Guardian and the Independent are “to some extent” liberal though the two have a tiny circulation compared with right-wing papers.

Petley added that while TV and radio are generally more liberal than the print media the situation is changing as the private sector – especially media linked to Rupert Murdock – takes hold in the industry.

He said that even the BBC is joining the rightists as TV and radio networks are rapidly moving toward Islamophobic content in line with the shift in the media atmosphere.

He stated that based on their findings, published as part of Pointing the Finger, the Islamophobic content in British media centres on four common clichés about Muslims.

Petley said the four beliefs are: all Muslims are the same, all Muslims are under the influence of religious teachings, all of them are lower than other people in moral, human, cultural and political terms and “all of them are considered a threat”.

The launch meeting also featured a speech by AbdoolKarim Vakil, joint editor of Thinking Through Islamophobia: Global Perspectives, who described Islamophobia as effectively a new form of racism that tries to reduce Muslims to a race. He added that such attitudes are to be expected from right-wingers yet even leftists in Britain hold racist anti-Islamic views.

Amir Khan: ‘They took the p*** because I’m a Muslim’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Boxing star Amir Khan has hit out at US customs for keeping him in a holding room for more than two hours.

Amir flew out to Los Angeles on Saturday to start training for his next fight. But the Bolton boxer was not happy at being held in a holding room and being asked about his relatives. He tweeted:

“They took the £!@%*£ because I’m a Muslim. Kept me in some holding room for over 2hours asking y my uncles with me. They where so arrogant and unprofessional. Didn’t know how to talk to pple, well I’m out now an it can’t get any worse.”

Asian Image, 23 May 2011

Ataka prepares second protest at Sofia mosque but mayor unlikely to impose ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Sofia mosque attack victim
Victim of last Friday’s attack on worshippers at the Banya Bashi mosque

Bulgaria’s far-right and nationalist party Ataka is getting ready to stage a new protest rally during the Friday prayer at the Sofia Mosque Banya Bashi.

According to unconfirmed reports, Ataka, whose activists shocked Bulgaria by assaulting praying Muslims in the Sofia mosque last Friday during a rally protesting against the loudspeakers of the mosque, are getting ready for a new rally just a week later.

The Ataka party has not confirmed the reports. However, there are indications that the Sofia Municipality and Sofia Mayor Yordanka Fandakova, a representative of the ruling party GERB, who can technically ban the provocative rally, will adopt a hands-off policy.

The reason for that is that by banning the rally of the nationalist party Ataka, which is the only ally, though an informal one, of the ruling center-right party GERB, the Sofia Municipality might lead Ataka leader Volen Siderov to withdraw support from the minority government of Prime Minister Boyko Borisov.

GERB has 117 MPs out of 240, and Ataka’s 21 MPs provide it with a comfortable majority, after the rightist Blue Coalition with its 14 MPs declared itself to be in opposition. One of the reason Borisov did not make a formal coalition with Ataka, in addition to his widely proclaim desire not to be dependent on coalition partners, is the protest of the European People’s Party, of which GERB is a member.

Siderov has threatened Borisov he will stop backing the government unless the authorities took measures to investigate what he claims to be a “nest of radical Islamism” in the Sofia mosque.

Borisov himself and his party GERB initially denounced the actions of their ally; however, Borisov subsequently sought to downplay Friday’s incident, saying that the nationalist party Ataka and the ethnic Turkish party DPS (Movement for Rights and Freedoms) are both going down the same road by seeking to pump up their electoral support through incidents with propaganda effect.

Bulgaria must consider outlawing the far-right and nationalist party Ataka over its recent attack on praying Muslims in Sofia, according to Guy Verhofstadt, leader of the liberals in European Parliament.

Novinite, 24 May 2011

See also “European Parliament Liberals’ leader: Bulgaria must ban far-right party”, Novinite, 24 May 2011

Ataka used to be part of the far-right Identity, Tradition, Sovereignty (ITS) group in the European Parliament, until the withdrawal of the Greater Romania Party in 2007 reduced the ITS to below the 20 MEPs required to qualify as an official group. Ataka’s allies in the ITS included the Front National, the FPÖ, Vlaams Belang and Alessandra Mussolini’s Alternativa Sociale.

Update:  See “Bulgaria’s far right on the defensive, vows to counter ‘Islamist aggression'”, Novinite, 24 May 2011

This states that Ataka have denied reports that they are planning another protest at the Banya Bashi mosque.

Mail gives more free publicity to irrelevant nutter

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Daily Mail continues its campaign to boost the profile of Anjem Choudary’s tiny group of supporters and provide ammunition for far-right racists like the EDL. The latest report is headlined: “The Bin Laden backlash: Angry Muslims demonstrate outside Downing Street as Obama visits Britain.”

The original version of the report began: “Today a handful of protesters from Muslims Against Crusades demonstrated outside 10 Downing Street in London during Barack Obama’s visit.”

But that obviously wasn’t good enough for the Mail‘s editor. The amended version now begins: “Muslim activists descended on Downing Street today in protest at Barack Obama’s state visit to London.”

And the report has been beefed up with a collection of photos that have been carefully cropped to avoid revealing how few MAC supporters actually participated in the Downing Street protest.

(For another recent example of the right-wing press’s irresponsible coverage of Choudary and MAC, see ENGAGE.)

Update:  The Mail‘s report has been reproduced on mad Pamela Geller’s Atlas Shrugs blog. This the sort of vile anti-Muslim propaganda that the UK media’s promotion of Anjem Choudary is assisting.

Muslims replacing Jews as Europe’s scapegoat, says Tariq Ramadan

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tariq RamadanMuslims in Europe have replaced the continent’s Jews of yesteryear as the largest target of discrimination and prejudice, according to a prominent Swiss academic and Islamic expert.

“There are new alliances in Europe against the Muslim presence, and people who were against Judaism are now against the Muslim presence in Europe,” Tariq Ramadan, an Oxford professor and grandson of Hasan al-Banna, the founder of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, said Friday at a seminar at Istanbul Bilgi University.

“[These discriminatory European attitudes] are not only about Islamism; they are about a power struggle. It is not integrated into people’s minds that Islam is also a Western religion,” Ramadan said, criticizing the attitudes of some Europeans he described as “Islamophobic”.

“People like the head of France’s far-right National Front Party, Marine Le Pen, and Dutch politician Geert Wilders are imposing the politics of fear against Islam and this is very dangerous,” the academic said. He added that what lies beneath the growing anti-Islamism in Europe is the changing demographics of the continent’s Muslim population.

“The more Muslims become European, the more Islam becomes a problem for Europeans,” Ramadan said.

Hürriyet Daily News, 22 May 2011

Court rules that Wilders trial will continue

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Amsterdam district court has rejected a call by Geert Wilders’ legal team that the inciting hatred and discrimination case against him be dropped.

Wilders’ lawyer Bram Moszkowicz said at the beginning of this month that his client would not get a fair trial and urged the court to abandon the case.

Moszkowicz’ argument centres on a senior court official who was influential in ensuring Wilders was taken to court even though the public prosecution department was unwilling to pursue the case.

But the court said on Monday it did not accept Moszkowicz’ claim that the anti-Islam party leader would not get a fair trial and said claims Tom Schalken had tried to influence a key witness during a dinner party were implausible.

Schalken was no longer involved in the case, and although he should have acted with greater caution to ensure no signs of partiality, he had not gone too far, the court said.

Dutch News, 23 May 2011

See also AFP, 23 May 2011

Organiser of EDL mosque protest: ‘we are not racist, we are not right winged and we are not hooligans’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

EDL Shotton protest May 2011More than 100 members of the English Defence League marched through Shotton on Saturday to protest against attempts to convert a former social club into an Islamic cultural centre. Shotton Lane Social Club, which was destroyed by a suspicious fire in February, had been earmarked as a potential site for a new multi-cultural centre by Flintshire Muslim Cultural Society.

The march was organised by EDL Deeside division member Graeme England to oppose what the group describes as “militant Islam”. Protestors met outside The Clwyd pub and marched to the site of the former social club, where speeches were made.

The group, which refers to itself as a “human rights organisation”, first marched through Shotton in protest against the planned cultural centre in January – just weeks before the social club site was torched in a suspected arson attack. No one has ever been caught in relation to the incident.

On Saturday an anti-EDL event was also held at Connah’s Quay Civic Hall, organised by the Deeside Trades Council.

Flintshire Chronicle, 23 May 2011

See also “Hain slates nationalist march against Muslim culture centre bid site as ‘poison'”, Wales Online, 22 May 2011

Expose draws our attention to a post on the Flintshire Chronicle discussion forum by Graeme England, the organiser of the EDL protest, who insists that “we are not racist, we are not right winged and we are not hooligans”.

England then goes on to assert that “Islam hates the western world and our way of life, Sharia law is already starting to infect our society, its happening because nobody will stand up and say NO!!! there are streets in our country where no non muslim would dare to walk…. i have spoken to many muslims in the country and they all say the same ‘ITS NOT YOUR COUNTRY ANYMORE… ITS OURS!’.” But then, don’t you see, “Islam isnt a race its a religion”. So how can inciting hatred against Muslims be racist?

As for not being “right winged”, the EDL’s leaders are former BNP members while their PA backs the British First Party, an openly neo-Nazi organisation. And Graeme England himself was happy to announce that the Shotton demonstration was supported by the North West Infidels, a group who make no attempt to conceal their links with organised fascism.

And to describe the EDL as mere “hooligans” errs on the side of mildness. The EDL Casuals United blog followed up the latest march in Shotton by celebrating the arson attack on the social club that was to serve as the premises of the new mosque.

In short, the EDL is a far-right racist organisation that doesn’t just engage in hooliganism but openly promotes violence. This only serves to reinforce the view that there is indeed a two-tier legal system in this country – because, if a Muslim group behaved in the way the EDL does, it would have been banned long ago.