Pakistani is a bad word in Britain
July 25, 2005
It has been thirty years since I first set foot in London, and I can't help musing over the changes that have been wrought in those decades. You can no longer ask your taxi driver to take you past Downing Street, the men at the immigration counter peruse you much more intently (though they are still as polite), and there is a definite chill in the air which has nothing to do with London's famously gloomy skies and everything to do with how one looks. Until they are reassured that I am a (Hindu) Indian and not a (Muslim) Pakistani, there is a wariness everywhere.
'Paki' has long been a term of abuse in Britain (though not in the United States). It goes back at least twenty years to the days of the infamous race riots. But where it was once mere tinged with contempt there is now more than a little loathing and hatred too.
"Don't be fooled by the apparent normalcy," was the grim warning delivered by a senior figure in the police services, "London has changed after the blasts, and so has Europe." And it all has to do with the apparent role of the 'Pakistanis' in the London blasts. The quotation marks are deliberate since the criminals who carried out the explosions were not really Pakistanis, but British citizens of Pakistani origin. That is a significant difference.
In the past, so the wry quip goes, they were born in Pakistan and would come to Britain for higher studies; today they are born in the United Kingdom but make the trip to Pakistan to finish off their education. My interlocutor may have been speaking tongue in cheek, but I cannot imagine such a comment being made three decades ago.
The old illusion that the terrorists are simply a misguided minority is fast giving way to the new conventional wisdom, namely that the terrorists are simply the most visible face of militant Islam. The second point being hammered away by the security forces into the heads of their political masters is that the most advanced colleges of terrorism, their Oxford and Cambridge as it were, are all in Pakistan. Hasib Hussain, Mohammed Sidique Khan, and Shahzad Tanweer -- three of the four suspects in the London blasts -- were either of Pakistani origin or attended some institution in that country. Other British citizens of Pakistani origin are being questioned in connection with the case.
The three men named above died in the July 7 blasts they are suspected of having set off, and cannot speak for themselves. In the popular imagination, however, the voice of Islamic fundamentalism was heard loud and clear across the Channel in The Netherlands. Muhammad Bouyeri is on trial for murdering Dutch film-maker Theo Van Gogh (a distant relative of the famous painter) because the director had been critical of some Islamic customs in one of his films. (Never having seen the film, I am not sure what the fuss was about.) Confronted with the victim's mother, Bouyeri contemptuously told her that he could feel no pity for an 'infidel.' He followed this with the defiant proclamation, 'If I'm ever released, I'd do the same again. Exactly the same!'
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Thursday, July 28, 2005
Mark Steyn: Wake up, folks - it's war!
Mark Steyn: Wake up, folks - it's war!
07/30/05
A couple of items from Tuesday’s papers. On the death of Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian pilot programme for the Met’s new shoot-to-kill policy, the Daily Telegraph reports:
‘A Home Office spokesman last night admitted that it had not yet identified his immigration status: “We are looking into the case and will provide more information as soon as we are able to do so.’’’
Meanwhile, the Times includes this background information on one of the thwarted bombers of the 21 July attacks — Yassin Hassan Omar, a Somali ‘asylum-seeker’:
‘Omar, who was last seen vaulting a barrier at Warren Street station, has been the registered occupant of the flat since 1999. Ibrahim, who was last seen in Hackney Road, East London, after his failed attempt to blow up a No. 26 bus, shared it with him for the past two years. Omar received £88 a week in housing benefit to pay for the council property and also received income support, immigration officials say.’
So here’s how things stand:
1) Four days after Mr de Menezes became the most famous foreigner in the United Kingdom, Her Majesty’s Government is unable to give a definitive answer on his immigration status.
2) Four years after 9/11, British taxpayers are subsidising the jihad — in Mr Omar’s Bounds Green council flat and in many other places.
There’s a pleasant thought the next time you’re on a bus when some Islamakazi self-detonates: it’s on your tax bill; P-A-Y-E — pay as you explode.
Number One comes at a time when the relevant department, the Home Office, not content with being unable to run its existing records system for foreigners, is determined to inflict an expensive and cumbersome bureaucracy on every non-foreigner in the land. Indeed, the Home Secretary has now upgraded it into a fundamental human right: ‘Just let us put in place our hierarchy of rights,’ Charles Clarke told MEPs just before the second attacks. ‘The right to live. The right to go to work on the Underground. The right to have an ID card.’ Human rights-wise, that last one is right up there with the right to be subject to confiscatory taxation.
And Number Two isn’t some stunning shocking development, either. In The Spectator of 29 December 2001, I noted the likes of Zac Moussaoui, the French citizen who became an Islamist radical while living on welfare in London, and wrote:
‘If you’re looking for “root causes” for terrorism, European-sized welfare programmes are a good place to start. Maybe if they had to go out to work, they’d join the Daily Mirror and become the next John Pilger. Or maybe they’d open a drive-thru Halal Burger chain and make a fortune. Instead, Tony Blair pays Islamic fundamentalists in London to stay at home, fester and plot.’
I wasn’t the first to notice the links between Euro-Canadian welfare and terrorism. Mickey Kaus, an iconoclastic California liberal, was way ahead. But, after three-and-a-half years, one would be entitled to assume that a government whose fortunes are as heavily invested in the terrorist threat as this one’s might have spotted it, too — especially given the ever greater numbers of British jihadi uncovered from Pakistan and Afghanistan to Israel and America.
That’s why I regretfully have to disagree with the editor of this great publication in his prescription of the current situation which appeared in these pages a week or two back under the headline ‘Just don’t call it war’. As you’ll have gathered, the boss objects to the language of ‘war, whether cultural or military.... Last week’s bombs were placed not by martyrs nor by soldiers, but by criminals.’
Sorry, but that’s the way to lose. A narrowly focused ‘criminal’ approach means entrusting the whole business to the state bureaucracy. The obvious problem with that is that it’s mostly reactive: blow somewhere up, we’ll seal it off, and detectives will investigate it as a crime scene. You could make the approach less reactive by a sustained effort to improve scrutiny of immigration, entitlement to welfare and other matters within the purview of government. But consider those two snippets from the Tuesday papers and then figure out the likelihood of that happening. A ‘criminal’ approach gives terrorists all the rights of criminals, and between British and European ‘human rights’ that’s quite a bundle. If it’s a war, you can take wartime measures — including withdrawal from the UN Convention on Refugees, repeal of the European Human Rights Act, and a clawback of sovereignty from the EU. But if you fight this thing as a law-enforcement matter, Islamist welfare queens will use all the above to their full extent and continue openly promoting the murder of the Prime Minister, British troops, etc. with impunity.
Softly-softly won’t catchee monkey. Slo-mo conflicts are the hardest to win, in part because in advanced societies the public finds it hard to stay focused. Granted, there are exceptions to that rule: the government, battling the commies in Malaya, went the Boris Johnson route and declined to call it a war; and the eventual victory in the Malayan ‘Emergency’ might tend to support his thesis. It was said that London was reluctant to use the term ‘war’ for reasons of home and business insurance, but it’s also a broader kind of insurance: it lowers the stakes, it softens the people up for a non-victory — as in the Irish ‘Troubles’. Sometimes, as in Malaya, you happen to win one of these ‘emergencies’ or ‘troubles’, and that’s a bonus. But the point is, by designating something as other than a war, you tend to make it peripheral, and therefore loseable.
That’s not an option here. Madrid and London — along with other events such as the murder of Theo Van Gogh — are, in essence, the opening shots of a European civil war. You can laugh at that if you wish, but the Islamists’ most often-stated goal is not infidel withdrawal from Iraq but the re-establishment of a Muslim caliphate living under Sharia that extends to Europe; and there’s a lot to be said for taking these chaps at their word and then seeing whether their behaviour is consistent.
Furthermore, there’s a lot more of the world that lives under Sharia than there was, say, 30 years ago: Pakistan adopted it in 1977, Iran in 1979, Sudan in 1984.... Fifty years ago, Nigeria lived under English common law; now, half of it’s in the grip of Islamic law. So, as a political project, radical Islam has made some headway, and continues to do so almost every day of the week: since the beginning of the year, for example, some 10 per cent of southern Thailand’s Buddhist population have abandoned their homes — a far bigger disruption than the tsunami, yet all but unreported in the Western press. And whatever one’s opinion of the various local conflicts around the world — Muslims vs Buddhists in Thailand, Muslims vs Hindus in Kashmir, Muslims vs Jews in the Holy Land, Muslims vs Russians in Chechnya, Muslims vs Christians in Africa — the fact is that the jihad has held out a long time against very tough enemies. If you’re not shy about taking on the Israelis and Russians, why wouldn’t you fancy your chances against the Belgians and Spaniards?
If the jihad has its war aims, maybe we should start thinking about ours. What would victory look like? As fascism and communism were in their day, Islamism is now the ideology of choice for the world’s grievance-mongers. That means we have to destroy the ideology, or at least its potency — not Islam per se, but at the very minimum the malign strain of Wahabism, which thanks to Saudi oil money has been transformed from a fetish of isolated desert derelicts into the most influential radicalising force in contemporary Islam, from Indonesia to Leeds. Europeans who aren’t prepared to roll back Wahabism had better be prepared to live with it, or under it.
Mustering the popular will for that sort of struggle isn’t easy. But the longer you leave it the harder it becomes. Whether or not one accepts the Johnson line that Iraq is irrelevant to the war on terror, it requires a perverse genius on the part of Tony Blair to have found the political courage to fight an unpopular war on a distant shore but not the political courage to wage it closer to home where it would have commanded far more support.
On a couple of very fleeting visits to London and Belfast in recent weeks, I had the vague feeling that Britain is on the brink of a tragedy it doesn’t quite comprehend. America’s post-9/11 muscular nationalism was easily mocked by Europeans, but its absence in London is palpable: try to imagine Mayor Giuliani uttering half the stuff Ken Livingstone said in the last fortnight (‘The bombings would never have happened if the West had simply left the Arab nations alone in the wake of the first world war’). Even if he’s right, the message it communicates is weakness: bomb us, and we apologise — or at the very least go to comically absurd lengths to distinguish terrorism against London from terrorism against Israel. Tony Blair, in his recitation in the House of Commons of nations afflicted by terrorism, couldn’t even bring himself to mention the Zionist Entity. Boris Johnson, in his call to non-arms, began with an elaborate riff on the difference between Brits and Jews in these matters:
‘If we were Israelis, we would by now be doing a standard thing to that white semi-detached pebbledash house at 51 Colwyn Road, Beeston. Having given due warning, we would dispatch an American-built ground-assault helicopter and blow the place to bits. Then we would send in bulldozers to scrape over the remains....’
More
07/30/05
A couple of items from Tuesday’s papers. On the death of Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian pilot programme for the Met’s new shoot-to-kill policy, the Daily Telegraph reports:
‘A Home Office spokesman last night admitted that it had not yet identified his immigration status: “We are looking into the case and will provide more information as soon as we are able to do so.’’’
Meanwhile, the Times includes this background information on one of the thwarted bombers of the 21 July attacks — Yassin Hassan Omar, a Somali ‘asylum-seeker’:
‘Omar, who was last seen vaulting a barrier at Warren Street station, has been the registered occupant of the flat since 1999. Ibrahim, who was last seen in Hackney Road, East London, after his failed attempt to blow up a No. 26 bus, shared it with him for the past two years. Omar received £88 a week in housing benefit to pay for the council property and also received income support, immigration officials say.’
So here’s how things stand:
1) Four days after Mr de Menezes became the most famous foreigner in the United Kingdom, Her Majesty’s Government is unable to give a definitive answer on his immigration status.
2) Four years after 9/11, British taxpayers are subsidising the jihad — in Mr Omar’s Bounds Green council flat and in many other places.
There’s a pleasant thought the next time you’re on a bus when some Islamakazi self-detonates: it’s on your tax bill; P-A-Y-E — pay as you explode.
Number One comes at a time when the relevant department, the Home Office, not content with being unable to run its existing records system for foreigners, is determined to inflict an expensive and cumbersome bureaucracy on every non-foreigner in the land. Indeed, the Home Secretary has now upgraded it into a fundamental human right: ‘Just let us put in place our hierarchy of rights,’ Charles Clarke told MEPs just before the second attacks. ‘The right to live. The right to go to work on the Underground. The right to have an ID card.’ Human rights-wise, that last one is right up there with the right to be subject to confiscatory taxation.
And Number Two isn’t some stunning shocking development, either. In The Spectator of 29 December 2001, I noted the likes of Zac Moussaoui, the French citizen who became an Islamist radical while living on welfare in London, and wrote:
‘If you’re looking for “root causes” for terrorism, European-sized welfare programmes are a good place to start. Maybe if they had to go out to work, they’d join the Daily Mirror and become the next John Pilger. Or maybe they’d open a drive-thru Halal Burger chain and make a fortune. Instead, Tony Blair pays Islamic fundamentalists in London to stay at home, fester and plot.’
I wasn’t the first to notice the links between Euro-Canadian welfare and terrorism. Mickey Kaus, an iconoclastic California liberal, was way ahead. But, after three-and-a-half years, one would be entitled to assume that a government whose fortunes are as heavily invested in the terrorist threat as this one’s might have spotted it, too — especially given the ever greater numbers of British jihadi uncovered from Pakistan and Afghanistan to Israel and America.
That’s why I regretfully have to disagree with the editor of this great publication in his prescription of the current situation which appeared in these pages a week or two back under the headline ‘Just don’t call it war’. As you’ll have gathered, the boss objects to the language of ‘war, whether cultural or military.... Last week’s bombs were placed not by martyrs nor by soldiers, but by criminals.’
Sorry, but that’s the way to lose. A narrowly focused ‘criminal’ approach means entrusting the whole business to the state bureaucracy. The obvious problem with that is that it’s mostly reactive: blow somewhere up, we’ll seal it off, and detectives will investigate it as a crime scene. You could make the approach less reactive by a sustained effort to improve scrutiny of immigration, entitlement to welfare and other matters within the purview of government. But consider those two snippets from the Tuesday papers and then figure out the likelihood of that happening. A ‘criminal’ approach gives terrorists all the rights of criminals, and between British and European ‘human rights’ that’s quite a bundle. If it’s a war, you can take wartime measures — including withdrawal from the UN Convention on Refugees, repeal of the European Human Rights Act, and a clawback of sovereignty from the EU. But if you fight this thing as a law-enforcement matter, Islamist welfare queens will use all the above to their full extent and continue openly promoting the murder of the Prime Minister, British troops, etc. with impunity.
Softly-softly won’t catchee monkey. Slo-mo conflicts are the hardest to win, in part because in advanced societies the public finds it hard to stay focused. Granted, there are exceptions to that rule: the government, battling the commies in Malaya, went the Boris Johnson route and declined to call it a war; and the eventual victory in the Malayan ‘Emergency’ might tend to support his thesis. It was said that London was reluctant to use the term ‘war’ for reasons of home and business insurance, but it’s also a broader kind of insurance: it lowers the stakes, it softens the people up for a non-victory — as in the Irish ‘Troubles’. Sometimes, as in Malaya, you happen to win one of these ‘emergencies’ or ‘troubles’, and that’s a bonus. But the point is, by designating something as other than a war, you tend to make it peripheral, and therefore loseable.
That’s not an option here. Madrid and London — along with other events such as the murder of Theo Van Gogh — are, in essence, the opening shots of a European civil war. You can laugh at that if you wish, but the Islamists’ most often-stated goal is not infidel withdrawal from Iraq but the re-establishment of a Muslim caliphate living under Sharia that extends to Europe; and there’s a lot to be said for taking these chaps at their word and then seeing whether their behaviour is consistent.
Furthermore, there’s a lot more of the world that lives under Sharia than there was, say, 30 years ago: Pakistan adopted it in 1977, Iran in 1979, Sudan in 1984.... Fifty years ago, Nigeria lived under English common law; now, half of it’s in the grip of Islamic law. So, as a political project, radical Islam has made some headway, and continues to do so almost every day of the week: since the beginning of the year, for example, some 10 per cent of southern Thailand’s Buddhist population have abandoned their homes — a far bigger disruption than the tsunami, yet all but unreported in the Western press. And whatever one’s opinion of the various local conflicts around the world — Muslims vs Buddhists in Thailand, Muslims vs Hindus in Kashmir, Muslims vs Jews in the Holy Land, Muslims vs Russians in Chechnya, Muslims vs Christians in Africa — the fact is that the jihad has held out a long time against very tough enemies. If you’re not shy about taking on the Israelis and Russians, why wouldn’t you fancy your chances against the Belgians and Spaniards?
If the jihad has its war aims, maybe we should start thinking about ours. What would victory look like? As fascism and communism were in their day, Islamism is now the ideology of choice for the world’s grievance-mongers. That means we have to destroy the ideology, or at least its potency — not Islam per se, but at the very minimum the malign strain of Wahabism, which thanks to Saudi oil money has been transformed from a fetish of isolated desert derelicts into the most influential radicalising force in contemporary Islam, from Indonesia to Leeds. Europeans who aren’t prepared to roll back Wahabism had better be prepared to live with it, or under it.
Mustering the popular will for that sort of struggle isn’t easy. But the longer you leave it the harder it becomes. Whether or not one accepts the Johnson line that Iraq is irrelevant to the war on terror, it requires a perverse genius on the part of Tony Blair to have found the political courage to fight an unpopular war on a distant shore but not the political courage to wage it closer to home where it would have commanded far more support.
On a couple of very fleeting visits to London and Belfast in recent weeks, I had the vague feeling that Britain is on the brink of a tragedy it doesn’t quite comprehend. America’s post-9/11 muscular nationalism was easily mocked by Europeans, but its absence in London is palpable: try to imagine Mayor Giuliani uttering half the stuff Ken Livingstone said in the last fortnight (‘The bombings would never have happened if the West had simply left the Arab nations alone in the wake of the first world war’). Even if he’s right, the message it communicates is weakness: bomb us, and we apologise — or at the very least go to comically absurd lengths to distinguish terrorism against London from terrorism against Israel. Tony Blair, in his recitation in the House of Commons of nations afflicted by terrorism, couldn’t even bring himself to mention the Zionist Entity. Boris Johnson, in his call to non-arms, began with an elaborate riff on the difference between Brits and Jews in these matters:
‘If we were Israelis, we would by now be doing a standard thing to that white semi-detached pebbledash house at 51 Colwyn Road, Beeston. Having given due warning, we would dispatch an American-built ground-assault helicopter and blow the place to bits. Then we would send in bulldozers to scrape over the remains....’
More
CNN.com - UK 'blocked bomb plotter' arrest - Jul 28, 2005
UK 'blocked bomb plotter' arrest
British police continue to make arrests in July 21 incidents
Thursday, July 28, 2005; Posted: 7:44 p.m. EDT (23:44 GMT)
Police detained nine people in an early morning raid in south London on Thursday.
Nine more arrests in connection to July 21 failed bombings. (4:34)
Four suspects arrested in Birmingham (5:32)
(CNN) -- About a month before the July 7 bombings in London, British authorities balked at giving U.S. officials permission to apprehend a man now believed to have ties to the bombers, according to sources familiar with the investigation.
Haroon Rashid Aswat, 30, of Indian heritage, is currently in custody in Zambia, U.S. and Zambian officials told CNN.
U.S. authorities wanted to capture Aswat, who was then in South Africa, and question him about a 1999 plot to establish a "jihad training camp" in Bly, Oregon.
According to the sources, U.S. officials had located Aswat in South Africa weeks before the July 7 attacks that killed 52 bus and subway travelers and the four bombers.
U.S. authorities had asked South Africa if they could take Aswat into custody. South Africa relayed the request to Britain, but authorities there balked because he was a British citizen, the sources said. While the debate was ongoing, Aswat slipped away. (Full story)
British authorities now suspect Aswat lent support to the July 7 bombers.
According to U.S. officials, Aswat was an unindicted co-conspirator in the terrorist camp case, which resulted in a guilty plea in 2003 by the main defendant, James Ujaama, of Seattle, Washington. (Full story)
Meanwhile Thursday in Britain -- one week after failed attacks on London's transit system that appeared to imitate the July 7 bombings -- a nationwide manhunt focused on three of the suspected terrorists.
Authorities have taken 20 people in custody, including one of the suspected bombers, as part of the investigation into the July 21 attacks on three Underground trains and a double-decker bus.
Nine men were arrested in the Tooting area of south London early Thursday -- six at one address and three at another, according to Metropolitan Police. Searches at the addresses were ongoing.
But as those arrests were announced, the country's top police official said more attacks were possible if the three other suspects in the attempted bombings remained at large.
"It does remain possible that those at large will strike again," Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair said. "It does also remain possible that there are other cells who are capable and intent on striking again."
As part of its investigation into the attempted bombings, police have taken 1,800 witness statements, have received 5,000 calls to the terrorist tip line, and are examining 15,000 closed-circuit television tapes.
The British government also announced that the Brazilian man mistakenly shot and killed by police at an Underground station last week had a false stamp on his passport and had been in Britain for two years with an expired visa. (Full story)
Police arrested three women Wednesday night on suspicion of "harboring offenders" in connection with the July 21 plot.
They were taken from a south London apartment raided by armed police and remained in custody Thursday in central London.
Three neighbors told CNN that one of the suspected would-be bombers -- the one who allegedly tried to set off a bomb at the city's Shepherd's Bush Underground Station -- lived there, having recognized him in a new photo released by police.
More
British police continue to make arrests in July 21 incidents
Thursday, July 28, 2005; Posted: 7:44 p.m. EDT (23:44 GMT)
Police detained nine people in an early morning raid in south London on Thursday.
Nine more arrests in connection to July 21 failed bombings. (4:34)
Four suspects arrested in Birmingham (5:32)
(CNN) -- About a month before the July 7 bombings in London, British authorities balked at giving U.S. officials permission to apprehend a man now believed to have ties to the bombers, according to sources familiar with the investigation.
Haroon Rashid Aswat, 30, of Indian heritage, is currently in custody in Zambia, U.S. and Zambian officials told CNN.
U.S. authorities wanted to capture Aswat, who was then in South Africa, and question him about a 1999 plot to establish a "jihad training camp" in Bly, Oregon.
According to the sources, U.S. officials had located Aswat in South Africa weeks before the July 7 attacks that killed 52 bus and subway travelers and the four bombers.
U.S. authorities had asked South Africa if they could take Aswat into custody. South Africa relayed the request to Britain, but authorities there balked because he was a British citizen, the sources said. While the debate was ongoing, Aswat slipped away. (Full story)
British authorities now suspect Aswat lent support to the July 7 bombers.
According to U.S. officials, Aswat was an unindicted co-conspirator in the terrorist camp case, which resulted in a guilty plea in 2003 by the main defendant, James Ujaama, of Seattle, Washington. (Full story)
Meanwhile Thursday in Britain -- one week after failed attacks on London's transit system that appeared to imitate the July 7 bombings -- a nationwide manhunt focused on three of the suspected terrorists.
Authorities have taken 20 people in custody, including one of the suspected bombers, as part of the investigation into the July 21 attacks on three Underground trains and a double-decker bus.
Nine men were arrested in the Tooting area of south London early Thursday -- six at one address and three at another, according to Metropolitan Police. Searches at the addresses were ongoing.
But as those arrests were announced, the country's top police official said more attacks were possible if the three other suspects in the attempted bombings remained at large.
"It does remain possible that those at large will strike again," Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair said. "It does also remain possible that there are other cells who are capable and intent on striking again."
As part of its investigation into the attempted bombings, police have taken 1,800 witness statements, have received 5,000 calls to the terrorist tip line, and are examining 15,000 closed-circuit television tapes.
The British government also announced that the Brazilian man mistakenly shot and killed by police at an Underground station last week had a false stamp on his passport and had been in Britain for two years with an expired visa. (Full story)
Police arrested three women Wednesday night on suspicion of "harboring offenders" in connection with the July 21 plot.
They were taken from a south London apartment raided by armed police and remained in custody Thursday in central London.
Three neighbors told CNN that one of the suspected would-be bombers -- the one who allegedly tried to set off a bomb at the city's Shepherd's Bush Underground Station -- lived there, having recognized him in a new photo released by police.
More
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
Dutch Filmmaker's Killer Gets Life Sentence - Yahoo! News
Dutch Filmmaker's Killer Gets Life Sentence - Yahoo! News
Dutch Filmmaker's Killer Gets Life Sentence
By ANTHONY DEUTSCH, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 43 minutes ago
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - A Dutch court sentenced the killer of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh to life in prison Tuesday, the harshest sentence possible for a murder that heightened ethnic tensions and raised concerns about homegrown Islamic terrorism.
Mohammed Bouyeri, 27, had mounted no defense at his two-day trial earlier this month for the Nov. 2 slaying of Van Gogh, whom he accused of insulting Islam, and told the court he would do it again if given the chance.
Presiding judge Udo Willem Bentinck said life in prison was the only fitting punishment for a crime that sought to undermine Dutch democracy and the political system. He said the three-judge panel had concluded there was no possibility for Bouyeri to return to society, citing his lack of remorse.
Bouyeri, wearing a black and white checkered headscarf, showed no emotion as he shook his lawyer's hand following the verdict. He had earlier told the court he had intended to die in the action and become a martyr for his faith.
Bouyeri has two weeks if he wants to lodge an appeal, but that appeared unlikely.
He was convicted of the murder, described in the judgment as a terrorist attack, the attempted murder of bystanders and police officers, illegal possession of firearms and of impeding the work of a member of parliament, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, whom he had threatened to kill in a letter impaled in Van Gogh's chest.
The judgment said Bouyeri had shown "a complete disregard for human life." Van Gogh was "butchered mercilessly," it said, and it was "a miracle that only two bystanders were hit by stray bullets."
Dutch Filmmaker's Killer Gets Life Sentence
By ANTHONY DEUTSCH, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 43 minutes ago
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - A Dutch court sentenced the killer of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh to life in prison Tuesday, the harshest sentence possible for a murder that heightened ethnic tensions and raised concerns about homegrown Islamic terrorism.
Mohammed Bouyeri, 27, had mounted no defense at his two-day trial earlier this month for the Nov. 2 slaying of Van Gogh, whom he accused of insulting Islam, and told the court he would do it again if given the chance.
Presiding judge Udo Willem Bentinck said life in prison was the only fitting punishment for a crime that sought to undermine Dutch democracy and the political system. He said the three-judge panel had concluded there was no possibility for Bouyeri to return to society, citing his lack of remorse.
Bouyeri, wearing a black and white checkered headscarf, showed no emotion as he shook his lawyer's hand following the verdict. He had earlier told the court he had intended to die in the action and become a martyr for his faith.
Bouyeri has two weeks if he wants to lodge an appeal, but that appeared unlikely.
He was convicted of the murder, described in the judgment as a terrorist attack, the attempted murder of bystanders and police officers, illegal possession of firearms and of impeding the work of a member of parliament, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, whom he had threatened to kill in a letter impaled in Van Gogh's chest.
The judgment said Bouyeri had shown "a complete disregard for human life." Van Gogh was "butchered mercilessly," it said, and it was "a miracle that only two bystanders were hit by stray bullets."
Thursday, July 14, 2005
Mirror.co.uk - News - EXCLUSIVE: THEY TRIED TO MAKE ME A SUICIDE BOMBER
14 July 2005
EXCLUSIVE: THEY TRIED TO MAKE ME A SUICIDE BOMBER
Matt Roper
THREE years ago Muhammed Yusuf was approached by two strangers who tried to recruit him as a suicide bomber.
The 18-year-old has already informed anti-terrorist police about his encounter with the hardliners at a North London mosque. Here he tells MATT ROPER what happened:
THEIR words, spoken with calm and conviction, were powerful and persuasive. But as I realised they wanted me to become a martyr for the cause of Islam I felt sick to the stomach.
"You'll go instantly to heaven," they repeated. "All the problems and pain in your life will go away. You'll be rewarded for all eternity."
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For two weeks two men had befriended and groomed me. I was just 14, naive yet idealistic, and I had no idea why they were so interested in me. But after days of observing me, the moment had arrived to finally come clean.
They wanted me to avenge the deaths of my Muslim brothers and sisters around the world.
And they cynically exploited a time of turmoil and confusion in my life to convince me to end it - not shamefully but gloriously - by blowing myself to bits in a terrorist attack.
I was prime recruitment material. I was young and malleable, I had never been in trouble with the police and I'd never had anything to do with extremist groups.
I attended a good Muslim school and came from a respected family from north London.
But my father, a pillar of the community and a regular at our mosque, had recently passed away suddenly and I was trying to come to terms with my grief.
After my father's death I had started attending the local mosque more regularly. I wanted to know my dad better and lead the same exemplary life he'd lived.
I started going to prayers five times a day, even getting up early to attend the 6am prayer meeting.
I also got involved in many other activities at the mosque, such as teaching groups and day trips.
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EXCLUSIVE: THEY TRIED TO MAKE ME A SUICIDE BOMBER
Matt Roper
THREE years ago Muhammed Yusuf was approached by two strangers who tried to recruit him as a suicide bomber.
The 18-year-old has already informed anti-terrorist police about his encounter with the hardliners at a North London mosque. Here he tells MATT ROPER what happened:
THEIR words, spoken with calm and conviction, were powerful and persuasive. But as I realised they wanted me to become a martyr for the cause of Islam I felt sick to the stomach.
"You'll go instantly to heaven," they repeated. "All the problems and pain in your life will go away. You'll be rewarded for all eternity."
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For two weeks two men had befriended and groomed me. I was just 14, naive yet idealistic, and I had no idea why they were so interested in me. But after days of observing me, the moment had arrived to finally come clean.
They wanted me to avenge the deaths of my Muslim brothers and sisters around the world.
And they cynically exploited a time of turmoil and confusion in my life to convince me to end it - not shamefully but gloriously - by blowing myself to bits in a terrorist attack.
I was prime recruitment material. I was young and malleable, I had never been in trouble with the police and I'd never had anything to do with extremist groups.
I attended a good Muslim school and came from a respected family from north London.
But my father, a pillar of the community and a regular at our mosque, had recently passed away suddenly and I was trying to come to terms with my grief.
After my father's death I had started attending the local mosque more regularly. I wanted to know my dad better and lead the same exemplary life he'd lived.
I started going to prayers five times a day, even getting up early to attend the 6am prayer meeting.
I also got involved in many other activities at the mosque, such as teaching groups and day trips.
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Terrorists Have Feelings Too
The American Spectator
Terrorists Have Feelings Too
By R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.
Published 7/14/2005 12:08:07 AM
LONDON -- Well, in less than a week it appears the British authorities got them! But what are they? The BBC last week edited out the word 'terrorist' in its coverage of July 7th's subway and bus bombings in favor of the word 'bombers.' The BBC believed that the word would be less offensive to certain aggrieved British groups. Yes, terrorists have feelings too. Now that the men who committed these grisly crimes appear to be Islamicists with terrorist sympathies and suicidal intent, can we call them terrorists? Can we call them Muslim terrorists? Can we call them Muslim suicide bombers and terrorists?
London was stalwart and inspiring last week. In the aftermath of the, dare I say, terrorist attacks, the Londoners went about their business, vowing to apprehend the criminals and otherwise carrying on just as they had during the War whose victory they celebrated on the weekend -- German sensibilities be damned. But the longer I am in London, the more I discover that there are unsettling undercurrents within the government and among elites. One is the application of politically correct rules to coverage of the news. Another is to outlaw free speech as it relates to the treatment of Islamofascism and the bloody consequences of Islamofascism.
They have been very effective. As Mark Steyn pointed out in the Daily Telegraph, "In most circumstances it would be regarded as appallingly bad taste to deflect attention from an actual 'hate crime' [last week's bombings] by scaremongering about a non-existent one." Yet apparently this has been going on for some time, and now Prime Minister Tony Blair is hustling through Parliament a so-called Racial and Religious Hatred Bill. If passed it would send a person to jail for seven years if he is accused and convicted of authoring words found offensive by aggrieved religious and racial groups, for instance, I suppose, aggrieved terrorists. Opponents argue that would protect Satanists and other unusual believers.
How would it affect another journalist writing recently in a British paper, Charles Moore, former editor of the Sunday Telegraph and London's Spectator? Recently he quoted from a Saudi imam welcomed to Britain by Mohammed Abdul Bari of the East London Mosque. The Rev. imam a couple of years back in Mecca described Jews as "scum of the earth," "rats of the world," "monkeys and pigs who should be annihilated." When the imam is criticized by the likes of Moore, Abdul Bari furiously defends him. Moore went on to quote the local Muslim Weekly's Sheikh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi writing that parliamentary democracy in Britain must be replaced by "a new civilization based on the worship of Allah," and he described the leader of the Tory party as "an illegal Jewish immigrant from Romania." He also referred to the "near-demented Judaic banking elite.
More
Terrorists Have Feelings Too
By R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.
Published 7/14/2005 12:08:07 AM
LONDON -- Well, in less than a week it appears the British authorities got them! But what are they? The BBC last week edited out the word 'terrorist' in its coverage of July 7th's subway and bus bombings in favor of the word 'bombers.' The BBC believed that the word would be less offensive to certain aggrieved British groups. Yes, terrorists have feelings too. Now that the men who committed these grisly crimes appear to be Islamicists with terrorist sympathies and suicidal intent, can we call them terrorists? Can we call them Muslim terrorists? Can we call them Muslim suicide bombers and terrorists?
London was stalwart and inspiring last week. In the aftermath of the, dare I say, terrorist attacks, the Londoners went about their business, vowing to apprehend the criminals and otherwise carrying on just as they had during the War whose victory they celebrated on the weekend -- German sensibilities be damned. But the longer I am in London, the more I discover that there are unsettling undercurrents within the government and among elites. One is the application of politically correct rules to coverage of the news. Another is to outlaw free speech as it relates to the treatment of Islamofascism and the bloody consequences of Islamofascism.
They have been very effective. As Mark Steyn pointed out in the Daily Telegraph, "In most circumstances it would be regarded as appallingly bad taste to deflect attention from an actual 'hate crime' [last week's bombings] by scaremongering about a non-existent one." Yet apparently this has been going on for some time, and now Prime Minister Tony Blair is hustling through Parliament a so-called Racial and Religious Hatred Bill. If passed it would send a person to jail for seven years if he is accused and convicted of authoring words found offensive by aggrieved religious and racial groups, for instance, I suppose, aggrieved terrorists. Opponents argue that would protect Satanists and other unusual believers.
How would it affect another journalist writing recently in a British paper, Charles Moore, former editor of the Sunday Telegraph and London's Spectator? Recently he quoted from a Saudi imam welcomed to Britain by Mohammed Abdul Bari of the East London Mosque. The Rev. imam a couple of years back in Mecca described Jews as "scum of the earth," "rats of the world," "monkeys and pigs who should be annihilated." When the imam is criticized by the likes of Moore, Abdul Bari furiously defends him. Moore went on to quote the local Muslim Weekly's Sheikh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi writing that parliamentary democracy in Britain must be replaced by "a new civilization based on the worship of Allah," and he described the leader of the Tory party as "an illegal Jewish immigrant from Romania." He also referred to the "near-demented Judaic banking elite.
More
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
BBC NEWS | UK | London blasts: 'People were screaming'
Last Updated: Thursday, 7 July, 2005, 10:51 GMT 11:51 UK
London blasts: 'People were screaming'
The blasts caused panic across London
At least 50 people have been killed and hundreds injured, some seriously, after a series of explosions on London's underground network.
BBC News website reader Scott Wenbourne was on the train travelling in to Aldgate station when there was an explosion in the carriage in front of him.
It was about 8.50am when it happened. I was one carriage down from where it happened and had my back to the carriage door.
All of a sudden there was a loud bang and a flash of bright light. It threw me to the floor in the middle of the train.
At first some people thought it wasn't serious, perhaps just a minor derailment, although some people were screaming.
But straight away, as soon I hit the floor my first thought was 'it's a bomb', although I can't be sure.
It all happened in slow motion, I thought the windows would blow through.
More
London blasts: 'People were screaming'
The blasts caused panic across London
At least 50 people have been killed and hundreds injured, some seriously, after a series of explosions on London's underground network.
BBC News website reader Scott Wenbourne was on the train travelling in to Aldgate station when there was an explosion in the carriage in front of him.
It was about 8.50am when it happened. I was one carriage down from where it happened and had my back to the carriage door.
All of a sudden there was a loud bang and a flash of bright light. It threw me to the floor in the middle of the train.
At first some people thought it wasn't serious, perhaps just a minor derailment, although some people were screaming.
But straight away, as soon I hit the floor my first thought was 'it's a bomb', although I can't be sure.
It all happened in slow motion, I thought the windows would blow through.
More
Suspect in Dutch filmmaker's murder makes dramatic court room confession
Tuesday July 12, 9:51 PM
Suspect in Dutch filmmaker's murder makes dramatic court room confession
The man accused of killing Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh confessed to a Dutch court that he acted out of his religious beliefs, saying he would do 'exactly the same' if he were ever set free.
'I take complete responsibility for my actions. I acted purely in the name of my religion,' 27-year-old Dutch-Moroccan national Mohammed Bouyeri told the court in Amsterdam on the final day of his trial.Prosecutor Frits van Straelen demanded a life sentence for Bouyeri for killing Van Gogh on an Amsterdam street on November 2, 2004. He recalled the particular brutality of the murder in broad daylight saying Bouyeri not only shot Van Gogh 15 times but also stabbed him and finally slit his throat.
According to the prosecutor the murder of Van Gogh, an outspoken columnist who often criticised Islam and the multi-cultural society, deeply shocked Dutch society.
The killing -- which happened in plain view of more than 50 witnesses while the filmmaker was cycling to work -- stoked ethnic tensions and sparked a wave of reprisal attacks primarily directed at the Muslim community here.
In addition to a life sentence, the prosecution also demanded that Bouyeri be stripped of his right to vote or stand for election for the rest of his life, 'to literally place him outside of our democracy'.
After the prosecution's closing statement Bouyeri, who had refused to say anything about his motives during the trial, took the opportunity to make a final statement.'I can assure you that one day, should I be set free, I would do exactly the same thing.
More
Suspect in Dutch filmmaker's murder makes dramatic court room confession
The man accused of killing Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh confessed to a Dutch court that he acted out of his religious beliefs, saying he would do 'exactly the same' if he were ever set free.
'I take complete responsibility for my actions. I acted purely in the name of my religion,' 27-year-old Dutch-Moroccan national Mohammed Bouyeri told the court in Amsterdam on the final day of his trial.Prosecutor Frits van Straelen demanded a life sentence for Bouyeri for killing Van Gogh on an Amsterdam street on November 2, 2004. He recalled the particular brutality of the murder in broad daylight saying Bouyeri not only shot Van Gogh 15 times but also stabbed him and finally slit his throat.
According to the prosecutor the murder of Van Gogh, an outspoken columnist who often criticised Islam and the multi-cultural society, deeply shocked Dutch society.
The killing -- which happened in plain view of more than 50 witnesses while the filmmaker was cycling to work -- stoked ethnic tensions and sparked a wave of reprisal attacks primarily directed at the Muslim community here.
In addition to a life sentence, the prosecution also demanded that Bouyeri be stripped of his right to vote or stand for election for the rest of his life, 'to literally place him outside of our democracy'.
After the prosecution's closing statement Bouyeri, who had refused to say anything about his motives during the trial, took the opportunity to make a final statement.'I can assure you that one day, should I be set free, I would do exactly the same thing.
More
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Hate mob attacks Galloway
Hate mob attacks Galloway
By Paul Waugh And Flora Stubbs, Evening Standard
20 April 2005
The bitter election battle in the East End has spilled into violence, with extremist Muslims and anti-war protesters targeting George Galloway and Oona King.
Anti-war campaigner Mr Galloway was forced to take refuge from Islamic militants who denounced him as a 'false prophet'.
The former Labour MP said 'the police saved my life' after supporters of radical group Hizb-Ut-Tahrir clashed with members of his Respect party last night.
Labour's Ms King had her car tyres slashed and the vehicle was pelted with eggs by a gang of youths angry at her support for the Iraq war. Both incidents triggered fears for the safety of Mr Galloway and Ms King as they prepared for a stormy hustings meeting in Bethnal Green and Bow tonight.
Labour's 10,000 majority in the seat is under serious threat from Respect and the contest has been marked by some of the most vitriolic campaigning in the general election.
Mr Galloway was electioneering on the Osier council estate in Bethnal Green last night when a gang of 30 Muslim fundamentalists, who claim voting is un-Islamic, surrounded him and his supporters.
The men said they were angry at Mr Galloway's attempt to woo Muslim voters. They said they were "setting up the gallows" for him and warned any Muslim who voted for his anti-war Respect party that they faced a "sentence of death".
After a fight broke out between the two groups, police were called and Mr Galloway was forced to hide in his car in an alley until the violence calmed down. Two men were later arrested.
One resident said: "I heard shouting and looked out into the street to see a large group of Asian men. Many of them were fighting.
"There were punches and kicks thrown, then a large number of police arrived and broke up the riot."
Speaking to the Standard minutes after the attack, Mr Galloway said it was clear the men were worried that he could become MP for an area with a large Muslim population.
"I was meeting people who live in the flats. Hizb-ut-Tahrir suddenly filled the room and blocked the door. I tried speaking calmly. They then said I was parading as a false prophet and served a sentence of death on me. They were claiming I was representing myself as a false deity and for this apostasy I would be sentenced to the gallows," he said.
More
By Paul Waugh And Flora Stubbs, Evening Standard
20 April 2005
The bitter election battle in the East End has spilled into violence, with extremist Muslims and anti-war protesters targeting George Galloway and Oona King.
Anti-war campaigner Mr Galloway was forced to take refuge from Islamic militants who denounced him as a 'false prophet'.
The former Labour MP said 'the police saved my life' after supporters of radical group Hizb-Ut-Tahrir clashed with members of his Respect party last night.
Labour's Ms King had her car tyres slashed and the vehicle was pelted with eggs by a gang of youths angry at her support for the Iraq war. Both incidents triggered fears for the safety of Mr Galloway and Ms King as they prepared for a stormy hustings meeting in Bethnal Green and Bow tonight.
Labour's 10,000 majority in the seat is under serious threat from Respect and the contest has been marked by some of the most vitriolic campaigning in the general election.
Mr Galloway was electioneering on the Osier council estate in Bethnal Green last night when a gang of 30 Muslim fundamentalists, who claim voting is un-Islamic, surrounded him and his supporters.
The men said they were angry at Mr Galloway's attempt to woo Muslim voters. They said they were "setting up the gallows" for him and warned any Muslim who voted for his anti-war Respect party that they faced a "sentence of death".
After a fight broke out between the two groups, police were called and Mr Galloway was forced to hide in his car in an alley until the violence calmed down. Two men were later arrested.
One resident said: "I heard shouting and looked out into the street to see a large group of Asian men. Many of them were fighting.
"There were punches and kicks thrown, then a large number of police arrived and broke up the riot."
Speaking to the Standard minutes after the attack, Mr Galloway said it was clear the men were worried that he could become MP for an area with a large Muslim population.
"I was meeting people who live in the flats. Hizb-ut-Tahrir suddenly filled the room and blocked the door. I tried speaking calmly. They then said I was parading as a false prophet and served a sentence of death on me. They were claiming I was representing myself as a false deity and for this apostasy I would be sentenced to the gallows," he said.
More
Thursday, April 14, 2005
The Next Pope and Islamic Prophecy
The Next Pope and Islamic Prophecy
By Steven Stalinsky
FrontPageMagazine.com | April 14, 2005
Following Pope John Paul II's visit to the Middle East in 2000 and 2001, some prominent Muslim leaders openly discussed the future dominance of Islam in Europe, including conquesting the Vatican.
While the identity of the next pope is decided, one of the pressing issues he will have to deal with is the growing Muslim community in Europe, part of which have Islamist inclinations. As the New York Times reported this week, the next pope will be facing 'increasing secularism in Europe, contrasting with the religious revival in the Islamic world… and the rising number of Muslim immigrants in Europe.'
Saudi Sheikh Muhammad bin Abd Al-Rahman Al-'Arifi, Imam of the mosque of King Fahd Defense Academy, discussed the coming Muslim conquest of the Vatican. Citing a Hadith in an article posted on the Kalemat website in 2002, he stated: '… We will control the land of the Vatican; we will control Rome and introduce Islam in it. Yes, the Christians, who carve crosses on the breasts of the Muslims … will yet pay us the Jiziya [poll tax paid by non-Muslims under Muslim rule], in humiliation, or they will convert to Islam…'
Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and head of The European Council for Fatwa and Research and the founder of European based International Council of Muslim Scholars (Imams) posted a fatwa on the website www.islamonline.net, in 2002 about the 'signs of the victory of Islam' in Europe.
Also citing a well-known Hadith, Al-Qaradhawi wrote: '… The Prophet Muhammad was asked: 'What city will be conquered first, Constantinople or Romiyya?' He answered: 'The city of Hirqil [i.e. the Byzantine emperor Heraclius] will be conquered first' - that is, Constantinople… Romiyya is the city called today 'Rome,' the capital of Italy."
By Steven Stalinsky
FrontPageMagazine.com | April 14, 2005
Following Pope John Paul II's visit to the Middle East in 2000 and 2001, some prominent Muslim leaders openly discussed the future dominance of Islam in Europe, including conquesting the Vatican.
While the identity of the next pope is decided, one of the pressing issues he will have to deal with is the growing Muslim community in Europe, part of which have Islamist inclinations. As the New York Times reported this week, the next pope will be facing 'increasing secularism in Europe, contrasting with the religious revival in the Islamic world… and the rising number of Muslim immigrants in Europe.'
Saudi Sheikh Muhammad bin Abd Al-Rahman Al-'Arifi, Imam of the mosque of King Fahd Defense Academy, discussed the coming Muslim conquest of the Vatican. Citing a Hadith in an article posted on the Kalemat website in 2002, he stated: '… We will control the land of the Vatican; we will control Rome and introduce Islam in it. Yes, the Christians, who carve crosses on the breasts of the Muslims … will yet pay us the Jiziya [poll tax paid by non-Muslims under Muslim rule], in humiliation, or they will convert to Islam…'
Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and head of The European Council for Fatwa and Research and the founder of European based International Council of Muslim Scholars (Imams) posted a fatwa on the website www.islamonline.net, in 2002 about the 'signs of the victory of Islam' in Europe.
Also citing a well-known Hadith, Al-Qaradhawi wrote: '… The Prophet Muhammad was asked: 'What city will be conquered first, Constantinople or Romiyya?' He answered: 'The city of Hirqil [i.e. the Byzantine emperor Heraclius] will be conquered first' - that is, Constantinople… Romiyya is the city called today 'Rome,' the capital of Italy."
Monday, April 04, 2005
Expatica - Living in, moving to, or working in the Netherlands, plus Dutch news in English
Expatica - Alarm over radicalisation of Dutch youth
4 April 2005
AMSTERDAM — Police have sparked alarm about the speed with which youths are becoming radicalised in the Netherlands, with the Utrecht intelligence service RID claiming it potentially poses a threat more dangerous than Islamic terrorism.
Police and municipal councils have started investigating 'Lonsdale youths', typified by native Dutch teeangers who wear the Lonsdale clothing brand.
These hardcore youths are responsible for more racist incidents, street disturbances and violence than previously estimated, newspaper NRC reported on Saturday.
The Leiden University and Anne Frank Foundation recorded 106 violent anti-Muslim incidents in the month after the November 2004 murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a suspected Islamic militant.
Lonsdale youths were involved in about 25 percent of these cases and new incidents have occurred recently.
An Islamic primary school in Uden was set on fire earlier this month, the second arson attack against the school since Van Gogh's death. A 17-year-old boy has been arrested for the attack.
Researcher J. van Donselaar is still compiling the nation-wide incidents involving Lonsdale youths from recent months, but asserts that the figures show a multiplication on previous statistics.
More
4 April 2005
AMSTERDAM — Police have sparked alarm about the speed with which youths are becoming radicalised in the Netherlands, with the Utrecht intelligence service RID claiming it potentially poses a threat more dangerous than Islamic terrorism.
Police and municipal councils have started investigating 'Lonsdale youths', typified by native Dutch teeangers who wear the Lonsdale clothing brand.
These hardcore youths are responsible for more racist incidents, street disturbances and violence than previously estimated, newspaper NRC reported on Saturday.
The Leiden University and Anne Frank Foundation recorded 106 violent anti-Muslim incidents in the month after the November 2004 murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a suspected Islamic militant.
Lonsdale youths were involved in about 25 percent of these cases and new incidents have occurred recently.
An Islamic primary school in Uden was set on fire earlier this month, the second arson attack against the school since Van Gogh's death. A 17-year-old boy has been arrested for the attack.
Researcher J. van Donselaar is still compiling the nation-wide incidents involving Lonsdale youths from recent months, but asserts that the figures show a multiplication on previous statistics.
More
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Outside View: Immigrants in France - (United Press International)
Outside View: Immigrants in France
By Robert Levine
Outside View Commentator
Washington, DC, Dec. 10 (UPI) -- The United States and France face the parallel problem of assimilating large groups of culturally different immigrants: Hispanics in the United States, North Africans in France. History suggests the United States will incorporate the new entrants more or less smoothly while the French are likely to fail.
The first immigrants to enter the United States in large numbers were the Irish in 1845. Italians and East European Jews followed, starting 40 years later. The key to their assimilation has been that U.S. culture has changed even as it 'Americanized' the newcomers. In spite of current alarms, the Hispanic wave looks little different.
France remains the European nation most open to immigrants, assimilating individuals into traditional French culture. The North Africans constitute the first massive wave. Many want to retain elements of their own culture and the other French are resisting mightily.
Until 1845, the United States could be characterized as an Anglo-Saxon Protestant society; although black slaves modified the culture from the start. Catholicism was tolerated but mistrusted. Germans constituted a small node.
The Irish potato famine forced emigration so rapid that by 1850, 10 percent of the U.S. population was Irish. They were different. Anti-Catholicism burgeoned and employers refused to hire the Irish, forcing them to depend on their own economy. Communal clashes were common. They gradually found public jobs, many as policemen. They forced their way into politics -- in 1905, John Fitzgerald Kennedy's grandfather became the first Irish mayor of Boston.
More
By Robert Levine
Outside View Commentator
Washington, DC, Dec. 10 (UPI) -- The United States and France face the parallel problem of assimilating large groups of culturally different immigrants: Hispanics in the United States, North Africans in France. History suggests the United States will incorporate the new entrants more or less smoothly while the French are likely to fail.
The first immigrants to enter the United States in large numbers were the Irish in 1845. Italians and East European Jews followed, starting 40 years later. The key to their assimilation has been that U.S. culture has changed even as it 'Americanized' the newcomers. In spite of current alarms, the Hispanic wave looks little different.
France remains the European nation most open to immigrants, assimilating individuals into traditional French culture. The North Africans constitute the first massive wave. Many want to retain elements of their own culture and the other French are resisting mightily.
Until 1845, the United States could be characterized as an Anglo-Saxon Protestant society; although black slaves modified the culture from the start. Catholicism was tolerated but mistrusted. Germans constituted a small node.
The Irish potato famine forced emigration so rapid that by 1850, 10 percent of the U.S. population was Irish. They were different. Anti-Catholicism burgeoned and employers refused to hire the Irish, forcing them to depend on their own economy. Communal clashes were common. They gradually found public jobs, many as policemen. They forced their way into politics -- in 1905, John Fitzgerald Kennedy's grandfather became the first Irish mayor of Boston.
More
The Death of France's "Multiculturalism" by Nidra Poller
The Death of France's "Multiculturalism" by Nidra Poller
By Nidra Poller
FrontPageMagazine.com | March 30, 2005
October 2000, Place de la République in Paris: the first of what would become an endless series of ambiguous pro-Palestinian demonstrations welcomed the snake of anti-Semitism into its heart. “Death to the Jews” rang out loud and clear that day as policemen stood by, journalists watched with apparent indifference, and the mass of demonstrators thronged and thrust as demonstrators do.
8 March 2005, Place de la République: a thousand young toughs pierced the heart of a student demonstration and unleashed their rage…not against the police but against the “privileged classes” in their own age group—the protesting lycée students. Operating in gangs of ten and twenty, the casseurs (smashers) in brand-name sweat suits swept through the march like pirate ships, zeroed in on their prey, attacked from behind. They threw kids to the ground, gratuitously beating and kicking them, snatching handbags, ipods, wallets, and cell phones. Riot police looking like robots with their thick leather padding stood by as the predators cut through the crowd wielding knives, clubs, and tear gas bombs.
In the space of a few hours the hallowed tradition of student protest imploded. But trouble had been brewing since January when the lycée students started organizing to oppose la loi Fillon, an umpteenth educational reform project proposed by the current Minister of Education, François Fillon. The previous minister was brought down by similar protests against a different sort of reform. This is the way the system goes, educational reform followed by protest and so on and so forth, while no one is offering any project that could address the acute crisis that is shaking the very foundations of the French educational system. And, precisely, the lycée--which is the equivalent of high school
More
By Nidra Poller
FrontPageMagazine.com | March 30, 2005
October 2000, Place de la République in Paris: the first of what would become an endless series of ambiguous pro-Palestinian demonstrations welcomed the snake of anti-Semitism into its heart. “Death to the Jews” rang out loud and clear that day as policemen stood by, journalists watched with apparent indifference, and the mass of demonstrators thronged and thrust as demonstrators do.
8 March 2005, Place de la République: a thousand young toughs pierced the heart of a student demonstration and unleashed their rage…not against the police but against the “privileged classes” in their own age group—the protesting lycée students. Operating in gangs of ten and twenty, the casseurs (smashers) in brand-name sweat suits swept through the march like pirate ships, zeroed in on their prey, attacked from behind. They threw kids to the ground, gratuitously beating and kicking them, snatching handbags, ipods, wallets, and cell phones. Riot police looking like robots with their thick leather padding stood by as the predators cut through the crowd wielding knives, clubs, and tear gas bombs.
In the space of a few hours the hallowed tradition of student protest imploded. But trouble had been brewing since January when the lycée students started organizing to oppose la loi Fillon, an umpteenth educational reform project proposed by the current Minister of Education, François Fillon. The previous minister was brought down by similar protests against a different sort of reform. This is the way the system goes, educational reform followed by protest and so on and so forth, while no one is offering any project that could address the acute crisis that is shaking the very foundations of the French educational system. And, precisely, the lycée--which is the equivalent of high school
More
Monday, March 21, 2005
Wednesday, March 02, 2005
"She deserved what she got --the whore lived like a German." - Berlin's Honor Killings by Sonia Phalnikar
FrontPage magazine.com :: Berlin's Honor Killings by Sonia Phalnikar
Berlin's Honor Killings
By Sonia Phalnikar
Frontpage Magazine via Deutsche Welle | March 2, 2005
On a cold afternoon this week, Hatin Sürücü gazed gravely from a large poster behind a bus stop lined with flowers, cards and candles.
To the people who came to this bleak part of Berlin's Tempelhof district for Tuesday's solemn vigil -- called not by the city's Muslim community but a gay and lesbian organization -- the image of the young woman in a headscarf, a baby in her arms, was familiar from newspapers and television. A few notes at the memorial read, 'Hope you get a better deal in your next life,' and 'Live a life on your own terms.'
'It's a scandal,' said Ali K, 33. 'All Muslims in Berlin should take to the streets to protest.' Yasemin, 22, said, 'It's horrific. All Hatin was doing was leading her life the way she wanted.'
But it was a choice she paid for with her life. On Feb. 7, 23-year-old Hatin Sürücü was gunned down at the aforementioned bus stop. She died on the spot. Shortly afterwards, three of her brothers -- who reportedly had long been threatening her -- were arrested. Investigators suspect it was a so-called 'honor killing,' given the fact that Sürücü's ultra-conservative Turkish-Kurdish family strongly disapproved of her modern and 'un-Islamic' life.
Sürücü grew up in Berlin and was married off at 16 to a cousin in Istanbul. After a few years, she returned to the German capital with her young son, moved into a home for single mothers, completed school and began to train as an electrician. She stopped wearing a headscarf and was said to be outgoing and vivacious.
"She lived like a German"
Though not the first of its kind, the brazen shooting has sent shockwaves through Berlin, home to a large foreign community and which for years has fretted over steady ghetto-building in districts dominated by Turkish and Arab immigrants. While the incident has reopened debate on the integration of immigrants and the compatibility of Islamic values with Western ones, it’s the reaction of a small group of Turkish students to the murder that has rattled the German capital.
Days after Hatin Sürücü was killed, some male students of Turkish origin at a high school near the scene of the crime reportedly downplayed the act. During a class discussion on the murder, one said, "She (Hatin Sürücü) only had herself to blame," while another remarked "She deserved what she got --the whore lived like a German." The school's director promptly dashed off a letter to parents and students, castigating the students and warning that the school didn’t tolerate incitement against freedom.
"Her lifestyle didn't fit"
The comments have sparked outrage and left many asking if it was just a one-off or whether such thinking is in fact not entirely uncommon among sections of the Muslim community in the city.
According to some, it isn't. "There isn't a single school with a high foreign population where teachers haven't faced this kind of thing, where individual students sometimes regard murder as a just sentence," said Heinz Wagner, head of school and education policy at the VBE teachers trade union and a school director himself. Referring to the controversial remarks on Sürücü's murder, he said, "The very fact that they decided to provoke with something like that tells you that they're getting their ideas from somewhere."
At Berlin's Turkish-dominated neighborhood near Kottbusser Tor in the Kreuzberg district, 17-year-old Erkan, a high school student of Turkish origin, was divided about the issue. "I'm not saying you should murder, but Hatin's lifestyle just didn't fit the way traditional Muslims live," he said.
More
Berlin's Honor Killings
By Sonia Phalnikar
Frontpage Magazine via Deutsche Welle | March 2, 2005
On a cold afternoon this week, Hatin Sürücü gazed gravely from a large poster behind a bus stop lined with flowers, cards and candles.
To the people who came to this bleak part of Berlin's Tempelhof district for Tuesday's solemn vigil -- called not by the city's Muslim community but a gay and lesbian organization -- the image of the young woman in a headscarf, a baby in her arms, was familiar from newspapers and television. A few notes at the memorial read, 'Hope you get a better deal in your next life,' and 'Live a life on your own terms.'
'It's a scandal,' said Ali K, 33. 'All Muslims in Berlin should take to the streets to protest.' Yasemin, 22, said, 'It's horrific. All Hatin was doing was leading her life the way she wanted.'
But it was a choice she paid for with her life. On Feb. 7, 23-year-old Hatin Sürücü was gunned down at the aforementioned bus stop. She died on the spot. Shortly afterwards, three of her brothers -- who reportedly had long been threatening her -- were arrested. Investigators suspect it was a so-called 'honor killing,' given the fact that Sürücü's ultra-conservative Turkish-Kurdish family strongly disapproved of her modern and 'un-Islamic' life.
Sürücü grew up in Berlin and was married off at 16 to a cousin in Istanbul. After a few years, she returned to the German capital with her young son, moved into a home for single mothers, completed school and began to train as an electrician. She stopped wearing a headscarf and was said to be outgoing and vivacious.
"She lived like a German"
Though not the first of its kind, the brazen shooting has sent shockwaves through Berlin, home to a large foreign community and which for years has fretted over steady ghetto-building in districts dominated by Turkish and Arab immigrants. While the incident has reopened debate on the integration of immigrants and the compatibility of Islamic values with Western ones, it’s the reaction of a small group of Turkish students to the murder that has rattled the German capital.
Days after Hatin Sürücü was killed, some male students of Turkish origin at a high school near the scene of the crime reportedly downplayed the act. During a class discussion on the murder, one said, "She (Hatin Sürücü) only had herself to blame," while another remarked "She deserved what she got --the whore lived like a German." The school's director promptly dashed off a letter to parents and students, castigating the students and warning that the school didn’t tolerate incitement against freedom.
"Her lifestyle didn't fit"
The comments have sparked outrage and left many asking if it was just a one-off or whether such thinking is in fact not entirely uncommon among sections of the Muslim community in the city.
According to some, it isn't. "There isn't a single school with a high foreign population where teachers haven't faced this kind of thing, where individual students sometimes regard murder as a just sentence," said Heinz Wagner, head of school and education policy at the VBE teachers trade union and a school director himself. Referring to the controversial remarks on Sürücü's murder, he said, "The very fact that they decided to provoke with something like that tells you that they're getting their ideas from somewhere."
At Berlin's Turkish-dominated neighborhood near Kottbusser Tor in the Kreuzberg district, 17-year-old Erkan, a high school student of Turkish origin, was divided about the issue. "I'm not saying you should murder, but Hatin's lifestyle just didn't fit the way traditional Muslims live," he said.
More
Friday, February 18, 2005
The emerging 'Eurabia' - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - February 18, 2005
The emerging 'Eurabia' - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - February 18, 2005
The emerging 'Eurabia'
By Diana West
It was just a coincidence that 'Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis' appeared in the mail the same day a New York Times article on the subject of Eurabia landed on the doorstep. 'Eurabia,' the long-awaited book by Bat Ye'or, is a comprehensive, even overwhelming and absolutely shocking explication of how and why it is that Europe is transforming itself into what the Egyptian-born historian calls 'a new geopolitical entity ' Eurabia.' The New York Times article, on the other hand, a muddled analysis by Craig S. Smith about the 'fear of Islamists' and the 'far right' in Belgium, is one more illustration of how desperately Bat Ye'or's trail-blazing work is needed.
Few of us have the long-view vision to make sense of the sweep of history as it smokes past our eyes; Bat Ye'or, as a historian of Islam, and, in particular, the dhimmi (the non-Muslim peoples who live as second-class citizens under Islamic rule), has precisely the laser-lens required. She also has the fortitude of the historian/gumshoe to wade through the stacks of articles, memoranda and conference declarations generated by something called the Euro-Arab Dialogue (EAD).
Created 30-odd years ago at the instigation of France and the Arab League, the practically unknown EAD has provided structural and theoretical underpinnings to a Euro-Arab axis ' Eurabia. These have fostered the political, economic and cultural bonds between Europe and the Arab world that Bat Ye'or maintains were designed to create 'a global alternative to American power.'
How? Very basically ' and this is detailed in the book ' by shepherding a meeting of Euro-Arab minds, first and foremost, on the Arab League war on Israel. This would come about in exchange for freely flowing Arab oil into Europe, which would come about in exchange for freely flowing Muslim immigration into Europe, ...
The emerging 'Eurabia' - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - February 18, 2005
The emerging 'Eurabia'
By Diana West
It was just a coincidence that 'Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis' appeared in the mail the same day a New York Times article on the subject of Eurabia landed on the doorstep. 'Eurabia,' the long-awaited book by Bat Ye'or, is a comprehensive, even overwhelming and absolutely shocking explication of how and why it is that Europe is transforming itself into what the Egyptian-born historian calls 'a new geopolitical entity ' Eurabia.' The New York Times article, on the other hand, a muddled analysis by Craig S. Smith about the 'fear of Islamists' and the 'far right' in Belgium, is one more illustration of how desperately Bat Ye'or's trail-blazing work is needed.
Few of us have the long-view vision to make sense of the sweep of history as it smokes past our eyes; Bat Ye'or, as a historian of Islam, and, in particular, the dhimmi (the non-Muslim peoples who live as second-class citizens under Islamic rule), has precisely the laser-lens required. She also has the fortitude of the historian/gumshoe to wade through the stacks of articles, memoranda and conference declarations generated by something called the Euro-Arab Dialogue (EAD).
Created 30-odd years ago at the instigation of France and the Arab League, the practically unknown EAD has provided structural and theoretical underpinnings to a Euro-Arab axis ' Eurabia. These have fostered the political, economic and cultural bonds between Europe and the Arab world that Bat Ye'or maintains were designed to create 'a global alternative to American power.'
How? Very basically ' and this is detailed in the book ' by shepherding a meeting of Euro-Arab minds, first and foremost, on the Arab League war on Israel. This would come about in exchange for freely flowing Arab oil into Europe, which would come about in exchange for freely flowing Muslim immigration into Europe, ...
The emerging 'Eurabia' - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - February 18, 2005
Sunday, February 13, 2005
Encounter with Islam
Encounter with Islam
Encounter with Islam
The nexus has given rise to incidents of terrorism, complications in integrating the European Union and a rethinking of foreign policy.
By Diane Wolff
Special to the Orlando Sentinel
February 13, 2005
The Europeans have discovered they, too, have a terrorism problem, which is exacerbated by demographics and geography.
Europe is having a new encounter with Islam, in domestic politics and foreign affairs. However, it's not the first; the two have had 13 centuries of ups and downs.
The new European-Islamic nexus has given rise to incidents of terrorism, a shift of some traditional European political parties to the right, complications in integrating the European Union and a re-thinking of foreign policy.
Immediately after Sept. 11, 2001, Europe stood shoulder to shoulder with America.
Time and political differences, including but not limited to disagreement about the war in Iraq, have led to frosty relations between Washington and much of Europe.
The realization is dawning on the members of the European Union that their initial notion that terrorism was only America's problem is wrong. In fact, there now may be more reason for concern in Paris than Philadelphia, Amsterdam than Albany and Bonn than Boston.
Timothy Savage, division chief of the Office of European Analysis at the U.S. State Department, explains the situation well.
'The Islamic challenge that Europe faces today is twofold. Internally, Europe must integrate a ghettoized but rapidly growing Muslim minority that many Europeans view as encroaching on the collective identity and public values of European society. Externally, Europe needs to devise a viable approach to the primarily Muslim-populated volatile states stretching from Casablanca to the Caucasus,' he wrote last summer.
After Sept. 11, the thinking on the Continent was that Europeans were tolerant and progressive and Americans were unenlightened. We went after the radicals. They opened their arms to their Mediterranean neighbors. They concluded that we were wrong and they were right.
Europe's attitude changed with the Madrid train bombings March 11 that killed 191 people. It was a devastating wake-up call for Europe, a different kind of terrorism than the homegrown Irish Republican Army or Basque separatist movement.
It is beginning to dawn on the Continent that things could get much worse. In preparation for President Bush's visit later this month, security police have been rounding up terror suspects by means the American Civil Liberties Union would take to court.
French law permits detention for three years of people suspected of terror. Britain has proposed placing electronic-surveillance monitors on suspected terrorists to keep track of their whereabouts. This is Britain's way of avoiding the U.S. practice of detention.
Below the surface, there are less immediate, but much more serious, concerns.
More than 23 million Muslims live in Europe, 5 percent of the population. If Turkey joins the European Union, that figure will increase to 90 million, or 15 percent of the total. As EU citizens, they could reside anywhere in Europe, work and cross borders without passports.
This comes as many EU nations have decided that to balance America's status as the lone superpower, they want to carve out their own foreign and security policies. This has led to disputes with Washington about Iraq, how to deal with the emerging possibility of a nuclear threat in Iran, the Kyoto Treaty on global warming and myriad other issues.
But, when it comes to the war on terror, the EU attitude may have more to do with Europe's growing Muslim minorities than with the United States.
In the quarter-century before George W. Bush became president, many European nations increasing found themselves at odds with the U.S. policy on the Middle East, especially in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. The EU tilt toward the Palestinians in that confrontation and a generally more sympathetic view of Arab causes is at least partially a result of immigration from Europe's former colonies.
Efforts to assimilate the newcomers, the vast majority of whom are Muslim, into European life has been aimed at building interfaith societies. Yet, there is a segment of the immigrants who are resistant to the secular nature of 21st-century Europe.
They think that once Islam has conquered a territory, as it conquered Spain, Portugal, Italy and parts of France in the Middle Ages, it will remain Muslim.
Europe has done a poor job of integrating its Muslim immigrants. The Madrid bombings, numerous examples of street violence and recruitment efforts by al-Qaeda on the Continent suggest that militant Islam has become a problem.
More
Encounter with Islam
The nexus has given rise to incidents of terrorism, complications in integrating the European Union and a rethinking of foreign policy.
By Diane Wolff
Special to the Orlando Sentinel
February 13, 2005
The Europeans have discovered they, too, have a terrorism problem, which is exacerbated by demographics and geography.
Europe is having a new encounter with Islam, in domestic politics and foreign affairs. However, it's not the first; the two have had 13 centuries of ups and downs.
The new European-Islamic nexus has given rise to incidents of terrorism, a shift of some traditional European political parties to the right, complications in integrating the European Union and a re-thinking of foreign policy.
Immediately after Sept. 11, 2001, Europe stood shoulder to shoulder with America.
Time and political differences, including but not limited to disagreement about the war in Iraq, have led to frosty relations between Washington and much of Europe.
The realization is dawning on the members of the European Union that their initial notion that terrorism was only America's problem is wrong. In fact, there now may be more reason for concern in Paris than Philadelphia, Amsterdam than Albany and Bonn than Boston.
Timothy Savage, division chief of the Office of European Analysis at the U.S. State Department, explains the situation well.
'The Islamic challenge that Europe faces today is twofold. Internally, Europe must integrate a ghettoized but rapidly growing Muslim minority that many Europeans view as encroaching on the collective identity and public values of European society. Externally, Europe needs to devise a viable approach to the primarily Muslim-populated volatile states stretching from Casablanca to the Caucasus,' he wrote last summer.
After Sept. 11, the thinking on the Continent was that Europeans were tolerant and progressive and Americans were unenlightened. We went after the radicals. They opened their arms to their Mediterranean neighbors. They concluded that we were wrong and they were right.
Europe's attitude changed with the Madrid train bombings March 11 that killed 191 people. It was a devastating wake-up call for Europe, a different kind of terrorism than the homegrown Irish Republican Army or Basque separatist movement.
It is beginning to dawn on the Continent that things could get much worse. In preparation for President Bush's visit later this month, security police have been rounding up terror suspects by means the American Civil Liberties Union would take to court.
French law permits detention for three years of people suspected of terror. Britain has proposed placing electronic-surveillance monitors on suspected terrorists to keep track of their whereabouts. This is Britain's way of avoiding the U.S. practice of detention.
Below the surface, there are less immediate, but much more serious, concerns.
More than 23 million Muslims live in Europe, 5 percent of the population. If Turkey joins the European Union, that figure will increase to 90 million, or 15 percent of the total. As EU citizens, they could reside anywhere in Europe, work and cross borders without passports.
This comes as many EU nations have decided that to balance America's status as the lone superpower, they want to carve out their own foreign and security policies. This has led to disputes with Washington about Iraq, how to deal with the emerging possibility of a nuclear threat in Iran, the Kyoto Treaty on global warming and myriad other issues.
But, when it comes to the war on terror, the EU attitude may have more to do with Europe's growing Muslim minorities than with the United States.
In the quarter-century before George W. Bush became president, many European nations increasing found themselves at odds with the U.S. policy on the Middle East, especially in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. The EU tilt toward the Palestinians in that confrontation and a generally more sympathetic view of Arab causes is at least partially a result of immigration from Europe's former colonies.
Efforts to assimilate the newcomers, the vast majority of whom are Muslim, into European life has been aimed at building interfaith societies. Yet, there is a segment of the immigrants who are resistant to the secular nature of 21st-century Europe.
They think that once Islam has conquered a territory, as it conquered Spain, Portugal, Italy and parts of France in the Middle Ages, it will remain Muslim.
Europe has done a poor job of integrating its Muslim immigrants. The Madrid bombings, numerous examples of street violence and recruitment efforts by al-Qaeda on the Continent suggest that militant Islam has become a problem.
More
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Spain starts illegal immigration amnesty
Spain starts illegal immigration amnesty
Spain starts illegal immigration amnesty
07.02.2005 - 18:10 CET
By Honor Mahony
EUOBSERVER/BRUSSELS - Madrid's decision to grant an amnesty to illegal immigrants living and working in the country is set to have consequences well beyond Spain.
The amnesty, which is likely to affect up to one million immigrants, began on Monday (7 February).
Over the coming three months, Madrid will accept applications from immigrants who can prove that they have been in Spain for at least six months and who have a job.
The government's aim is to get some control over the country's illegal immigration problem.
But Madrid's move could have consequences for the rest of Europe as granting Spanish residency to the immigrants means that they would have the right to live and work anywhere in the European Union.
Its decision has caused anger in some other capitals.
'Those affected can simply travel further to France or Germany', said German interior minister Otto Schily.
'We should have first examined what consequences this initiative would have for the rest of Europe', he added.
He was backed up by Dutch immigration minister Rita Verdonk.
The European Commission, which is pushing for common rules in this area, said Spain was within its rights to introduce these measures.
More
Spain starts illegal immigration amnesty
07.02.2005 - 18:10 CET
By Honor Mahony
EUOBSERVER/BRUSSELS - Madrid's decision to grant an amnesty to illegal immigrants living and working in the country is set to have consequences well beyond Spain.
The amnesty, which is likely to affect up to one million immigrants, began on Monday (7 February).
Over the coming three months, Madrid will accept applications from immigrants who can prove that they have been in Spain for at least six months and who have a job.
The government's aim is to get some control over the country's illegal immigration problem.
But Madrid's move could have consequences for the rest of Europe as granting Spanish residency to the immigrants means that they would have the right to live and work anywhere in the European Union.
Its decision has caused anger in some other capitals.
'Those affected can simply travel further to France or Germany', said German interior minister Otto Schily.
'We should have first examined what consequences this initiative would have for the rest of Europe', he added.
He was backed up by Dutch immigration minister Rita Verdonk.
The European Commission, which is pushing for common rules in this area, said Spain was within its rights to introduce these measures.
More
Monday, February 07, 2005
European Cinema Exposes Anti-Muslim Practices
European Cinema Exposes Anti-Muslim Practices
European Cinema Exposes Anti-Muslim Practices
Yasmin wears her hijab in the house and takes it off while with workmates.
By Khaled Shawkat, IOL Correspondent
ROTTERDAM, February 7 (IslamOnline.net) – Two European films shown at the 34th Rotterdam international film festival caused quite a stir among cinema critics and the audience.
Reason? Presenting anti-western attacks by extremists as a retaliation for the mounting hate and persecution campaigns targeting Muslims in the West in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.
An Arab film critic hailed the two movies as “a way more effective than bullets to expose the unjust practices” perpetrated by some Western governments against their Muslim communities.
Scottish movie “Yasmin”, directed by Kenny Glenaan, blamed the “racism” of British authorities in dealing with Muslims after the 9/11 attacks as the main reason for many young British Muslims joining Al-Qaeda and other extremist groups.
“Private”, an Italian film directed by Saverio Costanzo, featured the detentions and killing of children and women, in addition to other repressive practices by the Israeli occupation army against the Palestinians, as the main driving force behind Palestinian attacks.
Identity Crisis
The events of “Yasmin” take place in a Scottish city, centering around the life of a Muslim family -- of a Pakistani origin – whose widower head owns a store for fixing TV and radio sets, while posing as a mosque imam at the same time.
The father lives with his son “Nasser”, while his daughter “Yasmin” lives at another house in the same street with her husband, who is also a relative of the family.
The film depicts both Nasser and Yasmin as an example of the second Muslim generation in the West, living a deep identity crisis and torn apart between two contradicting principles.
The first is an Islamic one, represented in a pious father, the second is represented in the culture and habits of Western society that seems to give little consideration to the rules of religious ethics.
That crisis was clearly reflected in the duplicate behavior of both Nasser and Yasmin, with the latter appearing in her hijab and living a traditional conservative Muslim life among her family, while taking off her hijab and following Western traditions among her workmates.
The film highlights how the violent attitude of British security and judicial authorities, coupled with the racist anti-Muslim tendency that gripped British society after 9/11 have haunted Nasser and Yasmin.
They are left with the impression that the country where they were born and grew up (Scotland) still views them as Muslim migrants, posing a risk to its security and stability.
The film ends with Yasmin going to the mosque to pray, while Nasser migrates to Afghanistan to join a militant group, stressing his next destination would be occupied Palestine.
More
[ The march toward dhimmitude continues ]
European Cinema Exposes Anti-Muslim Practices
Yasmin wears her hijab in the house and takes it off while with workmates.
By Khaled Shawkat, IOL Correspondent
ROTTERDAM, February 7 (IslamOnline.net) – Two European films shown at the 34th Rotterdam international film festival caused quite a stir among cinema critics and the audience.
Reason? Presenting anti-western attacks by extremists as a retaliation for the mounting hate and persecution campaigns targeting Muslims in the West in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.
An Arab film critic hailed the two movies as “a way more effective than bullets to expose the unjust practices” perpetrated by some Western governments against their Muslim communities.
Scottish movie “Yasmin”, directed by Kenny Glenaan, blamed the “racism” of British authorities in dealing with Muslims after the 9/11 attacks as the main reason for many young British Muslims joining Al-Qaeda and other extremist groups.
“Private”, an Italian film directed by Saverio Costanzo, featured the detentions and killing of children and women, in addition to other repressive practices by the Israeli occupation army against the Palestinians, as the main driving force behind Palestinian attacks.
Identity Crisis
The events of “Yasmin” take place in a Scottish city, centering around the life of a Muslim family -- of a Pakistani origin – whose widower head owns a store for fixing TV and radio sets, while posing as a mosque imam at the same time.
The father lives with his son “Nasser”, while his daughter “Yasmin” lives at another house in the same street with her husband, who is also a relative of the family.
The film depicts both Nasser and Yasmin as an example of the second Muslim generation in the West, living a deep identity crisis and torn apart between two contradicting principles.
The first is an Islamic one, represented in a pious father, the second is represented in the culture and habits of Western society that seems to give little consideration to the rules of religious ethics.
That crisis was clearly reflected in the duplicate behavior of both Nasser and Yasmin, with the latter appearing in her hijab and living a traditional conservative Muslim life among her family, while taking off her hijab and following Western traditions among her workmates.
The film highlights how the violent attitude of British security and judicial authorities, coupled with the racist anti-Muslim tendency that gripped British society after 9/11 have haunted Nasser and Yasmin.
They are left with the impression that the country where they were born and grew up (Scotland) still views them as Muslim migrants, posing a risk to its security and stability.
The film ends with Yasmin going to the mosque to pray, while Nasser migrates to Afghanistan to join a militant group, stressing his next destination would be occupied Palestine.
More
[ The march toward dhimmitude continues ]
Saturday, February 05, 2005
lgf: More Dhimmitude by the Dutch
lgf: Iran is Laughing at the West
OT - More Dhimmitude by the Dutch -
link from the Netherlands, in Dutch, described as -
In the Netherlands the national flag is now banned on most schools. If a student wears the national flag of his own country he will be suspended or expelled from school. The reason for this is that this provokes the immigrants (the muslims) and therefore it is considered discrimination if you wear your country's flag in your own country. Even people who have an bumpersticker whit the flag on their car are harassed and called a facist by the Muslims. Most schools also ban certain clothing like the Lonsdale brand and combat boots with white or red laces. This is also concidered a sign of racism.
There are of course no restrictions for the immigrants on clothing. "
[ I have no way to verify this personally as I don't speak Dutch. Here's the link to the original: http://www.telegraaf.nl/binnenland/17755231/Vlagverbod_is_wijdverspreid.html so take this with a dose of skepticism ]
OT - More Dhimmitude by the Dutch -
link from the Netherlands, in Dutch, described as -
In the Netherlands the national flag is now banned on most schools. If a student wears the national flag of his own country he will be suspended or expelled from school. The reason for this is that this provokes the immigrants (the muslims) and therefore it is considered discrimination if you wear your country's flag in your own country. Even people who have an bumpersticker whit the flag on their car are harassed and called a facist by the Muslims. Most schools also ban certain clothing like the Lonsdale brand and combat boots with white or red laces. This is also concidered a sign of racism.
There are of course no restrictions for the immigrants on clothing. "
[ I have no way to verify this personally as I don't speak Dutch. Here's the link to the original: http://www.telegraaf.nl/binnenland/17755231/Vlagverbod_is_wijdverspreid.html so take this with a dose of skepticism ]
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
The New York Times: Militant Imams Under Scrutiny Across Europe
Militant Imams Under Scrutiny Across Europe
By DON VAN NATTA Jr.
and LOWELL BERGMAN
Published: January 25, 2005
LONDON, Jan. 24 - In nightly sermons broadcast on the Internet, Sheik Omar Bakri Muhammad, a 46-year-old Syrian-born cleric, has urged young Muslim men all over the world to support the Iraq insurgency on the front line of "the global jihad," investigators say.
He struck a similarly defiant tone this month at a rally attended by 500 people at a central London meeting hall, where a giant screen behind him showed images of the World Trade Center falling. "Allah akbar!" - "God is great" - some audience members shouted at the images.
After eavesdropping for months on his nightly praise of the Sept. 11 hijackers and of suicide bombings, Scotland Yard said last week that it was investigating Sheik Omar, the leader of Al Muhajiroun, Britain's largest Muslim group, and officials are exploring whether they can deport him. "We're fed up with him," said a senior British official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "He needs to be stopped, or he needs to go."
The more aggressive approach toward Sheik Omar is part of an increasing effort to monitor and restrict militant imams in Britain and across Europe. Authorities have stepped up surveillance of militant mosques in several countries, including Germany and France. French officials deported an imam this month after officials said he was inspiring men to join the jihad.
One major concern, officials say, is that more heated religious rhetoric is encouraging young men to leave home to fight in Iraq.
Although the dimensions of the recruitment effort from Europe to Iraq are not clear, there are indications that it is intensifying.
On Sunday, the German police arrested a man suspected of being a member of Al Qaeda and charged him with recruiting men to carry out suicide bombings in Iraq. These arrests were part of an ongoing investigation in cooperation with the United States of recruitment and other terrorist activities in Europe. A senior German official said he was certain there would be additional arrests of militants inside the country who have set up sophisticated recruitment and smuggling networks that lead to Iraq.
Italian investigators say several recruits from Italy carried out bombing attacks in Baghdad. Swiss officials say they are concerned that several militant clerics have openly urged men to become terrorists. And in Jordan, senior officials say they have recently arrested several dozen men who intended to cross the Iraqi border to serve as foreign fighters.
Bohre Eddine Benvahia, the 33-year-old imam recently deported by France to Algeria, had urged young men in a working-class neighborhood of L'Ariane, outside Nice, to join jihad, French intelligence officials said.
More
By DON VAN NATTA Jr.
and LOWELL BERGMAN
Published: January 25, 2005
LONDON, Jan. 24 - In nightly sermons broadcast on the Internet, Sheik Omar Bakri Muhammad, a 46-year-old Syrian-born cleric, has urged young Muslim men all over the world to support the Iraq insurgency on the front line of "the global jihad," investigators say.
He struck a similarly defiant tone this month at a rally attended by 500 people at a central London meeting hall, where a giant screen behind him showed images of the World Trade Center falling. "Allah akbar!" - "God is great" - some audience members shouted at the images.
After eavesdropping for months on his nightly praise of the Sept. 11 hijackers and of suicide bombings, Scotland Yard said last week that it was investigating Sheik Omar, the leader of Al Muhajiroun, Britain's largest Muslim group, and officials are exploring whether they can deport him. "We're fed up with him," said a senior British official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "He needs to be stopped, or he needs to go."
The more aggressive approach toward Sheik Omar is part of an increasing effort to monitor and restrict militant imams in Britain and across Europe. Authorities have stepped up surveillance of militant mosques in several countries, including Germany and France. French officials deported an imam this month after officials said he was inspiring men to join the jihad.
One major concern, officials say, is that more heated religious rhetoric is encouraging young men to leave home to fight in Iraq.
Although the dimensions of the recruitment effort from Europe to Iraq are not clear, there are indications that it is intensifying.
On Sunday, the German police arrested a man suspected of being a member of Al Qaeda and charged him with recruiting men to carry out suicide bombings in Iraq. These arrests were part of an ongoing investigation in cooperation with the United States of recruitment and other terrorist activities in Europe. A senior German official said he was certain there would be additional arrests of militants inside the country who have set up sophisticated recruitment and smuggling networks that lead to Iraq.
Italian investigators say several recruits from Italy carried out bombing attacks in Baghdad. Swiss officials say they are concerned that several militant clerics have openly urged men to become terrorists. And in Jordan, senior officials say they have recently arrested several dozen men who intended to cross the Iraqi border to serve as foreign fighters.
Bohre Eddine Benvahia, the 33-year-old imam recently deported by France to Algeria, had urged young men in a working-class neighborhood of L'Ariane, outside Nice, to join jihad, French intelligence officials said.
More
Monday, January 31, 2005
Expatica - Dutch Muslims find a voice - of reason?
Expatica - Living in, moving to, or working in the Netherlands, plus Dutch news in English
Dutch Muslims find a voice - of reason?
The establishment of a political party to represent Muslims in the Netherlands is as welcome as it is overdue. But it also entails very real risks.
The announcement by columnist Mohammed Jabri that moves are afoot to launch a political party for Dutch Muslims by the beginning of summer should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed events in the Netherlands in recent years.
The Muslim Democratic Party (MDP) could be a real force for good if it plays a positive role. It should forthrightly defend aspects of Muslim life that are worth defending; help spread understanding and acceptance of Muslims among the native Dutch and vice versa; and perhaps most importantly, expose as a lie the convenient myth that Muslims are the root of all that is wrong or bad in the Netherlands today.
On the other hand, if the MDP fails to get off the ground, embroils itself in extremist rhetoric or suffers the internal disputes that have set the anti-immigration LPF on the way to an agonisingly slow self-destruction, the consequences would be terrible. Politics would be seen by many in the Muslim community as a dead-end, leaving imams and radical thugs to represent the community.
Already there are daily reports of young Muslim men — a minority, but an active one — in the major cities who look on the native Dutch as the enemy and fair game for crimes of theft. It is common for unveiled women, both Muslim and native Dutch, in parts of Amsterdam to be branded "whores" and "sluts" by self-righteous Muslims.
But giving Muslims a real voice on the political stage — and who knows, perhaps a seat at the Cabinet table — would go a long way to helping Muslims to look on Dutch society as their society also.
A Muslim party would have real potential: there are an estimated one million Muslims in the Netherlands and the number is growing.
[ The European march to dhimmitude continues apace. Godspeed Holland! (err, that's Allahspeed in Dutch) ]
More
Dutch Muslims find a voice - of reason?
The establishment of a political party to represent Muslims in the Netherlands is as welcome as it is overdue. But it also entails very real risks.
The announcement by columnist Mohammed Jabri that moves are afoot to launch a political party for Dutch Muslims by the beginning of summer should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed events in the Netherlands in recent years.
The Muslim Democratic Party (MDP) could be a real force for good if it plays a positive role. It should forthrightly defend aspects of Muslim life that are worth defending; help spread understanding and acceptance of Muslims among the native Dutch and vice versa; and perhaps most importantly, expose as a lie the convenient myth that Muslims are the root of all that is wrong or bad in the Netherlands today.
On the other hand, if the MDP fails to get off the ground, embroils itself in extremist rhetoric or suffers the internal disputes that have set the anti-immigration LPF on the way to an agonisingly slow self-destruction, the consequences would be terrible. Politics would be seen by many in the Muslim community as a dead-end, leaving imams and radical thugs to represent the community.
Already there are daily reports of young Muslim men — a minority, but an active one — in the major cities who look on the native Dutch as the enemy and fair game for crimes of theft. It is common for unveiled women, both Muslim and native Dutch, in parts of Amsterdam to be branded "whores" and "sluts" by self-righteous Muslims.
But giving Muslims a real voice on the political stage — and who knows, perhaps a seat at the Cabinet table — would go a long way to helping Muslims to look on Dutch society as their society also.
A Muslim party would have real potential: there are an estimated one million Muslims in the Netherlands and the number is growing.
[ The European march to dhimmitude continues apace. Godspeed Holland! (err, that's Allahspeed in Dutch) ]
More
Friday, January 28, 2005
International News Article | Reuters.com
Islamists Arrested in Paris Planned France Attacks
Fri Jan 28, 2005 2:48 PM ET
By Thierry Leveque
PARIS (Reuters) - Suspected Islamists arrested by secret service agents in Paris this week were plotting terrorist attacks on French and foreign targets in the country, the Paris public prosecutor's office said on Friday. Anti-terrorism magistrates are to prosecute three of the 11 people detained in a series of swoops in a northern district of the French capital on Monday and Tuesday, the prosecutor's office said in a statement.
The others have been released or will be shortly.
'This network is suspected of drawing up plans for attacks in France against French and foreign interests,' said the prosecutor's office in a statement. It did not elaborate.
The prosecutor's office confirmed two people had been charged with association with criminals engaged in a terrorist enterprise. They were to be remanded in custody later on Friday.
A third was to be questioned on Saturday by the anti-terrorism judges leading the investigation, Jean-Louis Bruguiere and Jean-Francois Richard.
Intelligence services believe the trio were part of an 'Iraq network' recruiting guerrillas to fight U.S.-led forces. Officials said the network had now been dismantled.
Anti-terrorism experts fear Iraq, like Afghanistan in the 1980s, will attract Islamic militants bent on resorting to political violence once they return home.
More
Fri Jan 28, 2005 2:48 PM ET
By Thierry Leveque
PARIS (Reuters) - Suspected Islamists arrested by secret service agents in Paris this week were plotting terrorist attacks on French and foreign targets in the country, the Paris public prosecutor's office said on Friday. Anti-terrorism magistrates are to prosecute three of the 11 people detained in a series of swoops in a northern district of the French capital on Monday and Tuesday, the prosecutor's office said in a statement.
The others have been released or will be shortly.
'This network is suspected of drawing up plans for attacks in France against French and foreign interests,' said the prosecutor's office in a statement. It did not elaborate.
The prosecutor's office confirmed two people had been charged with association with criminals engaged in a terrorist enterprise. They were to be remanded in custody later on Friday.
A third was to be questioned on Saturday by the anti-terrorism judges leading the investigation, Jean-Louis Bruguiere and Jean-Francois Richard.
Intelligence services believe the trio were part of an 'Iraq network' recruiting guerrillas to fight U.S.-led forces. Officials said the network had now been dismantled.
Anti-terrorism experts fear Iraq, like Afghanistan in the 1980s, will attract Islamic militants bent on resorting to political violence once they return home.
More
Quelling Racist Murder in France - January 28, 2005 - The New York Sun
Quelling Racist Murder in France - January 28, 2005 - The New York Sun
Quelling Racist Murder in France
BY NIDRA POLLER - Special to the Sun
January 28, 2005
The murder of Sebastien Selam, one of the most popular DJs in France, has been widely ignored. Sebastien lived with his widowed mother in a modest but comfortable low-rent apartment building in the 10th arrondissement, a half hour from the Place de la Republique. In November 2003, during the month of Ramadan, Sebastien was murdered by a neighbor, Adel Boumedienne. The Selams are Jewish, of Algerian origin; the Boumediennes are Muslims from Morocco. Relations between Jews and Muslims in the neighborhood, which had been normal or even cordial, radically deteriorated in the fall of 2000.There were incidents, anti-Semitic graffiti, ominous signs of violent hostility. And yet Sebastien let Adel get into his car as he was going into the underground garage to park. There, Adel slashed Sebastien's throat almost severing his head, and mutilated his face beyond recognition with a carving fork. The coroner states in his report that he had never seen such severe mutilation in all his decades of practice.
Aside from a brief article filled with factual errors in the tabloid Le Parisien and an equally incompetent article in a Jewish weekly paper, there was hardly any press coverage of the Selam murder. When Israeli photographer Avi Rosen, who was in Paris at the time, heard what happened to the DJ, he immediately recognized the hallmarks of ritual murder. He took photos of the crime scene, interviewed the Selam family, and has stood by them ever since in their almost hopeless efforts to bring the murderer to justice and expose the true nature of the crime not only for the honor of Sebastien, but to warn others of the danger that confronts them.
Adel's mother saw her son take the carving knife and fork from the kitchen; he came back a short time later, covered in blood, and told her, "I've killed my Jew, I can go to paradise." He told the police that he had no remorse, no regrets, because Allah told him to kill Sebastien. They transferred him from the police station to a general hospital and from there to a psychiatric hospital. As of this writing, the Selam family lawyer is playing his last card; he has one last chance to convince the court to open an investigation. If the request is denied, the case will be closed. No investigation, no arrest, no trial. The murderer will some day be released from the mental hospital. The Selam family is sentenced to a life of mourning.
Chantal Piekolek was murdered in her shoe store in the 17th arrondissement of Paris earlier that same November day. The murderer, a hardened criminal recently released from prison, stabbed her 25 times. He was quickly apprehended and jailed, but died of cancer before he could be put on trial. Piekolek, who was Jewish, was murdered by a Muslim. Did he know she was Jewish? If robbery was the motive, why did he stab her 25 times? The mystery died with him. But one day the press, including the Jewish press, may be asked to explain why they transformed a Jewish divorcee - who had recently taken over a store after her father died - into the Christian widow of a Jewish husband. Why? Were two Jewish murders in one day during the month of Ramadan too much to bear? Or too much to hide?
More
[This is why Islam can NEVER be reformed. Christians go to hell for murder, Muslims go to heaven.]
Quelling Racist Murder in France
BY NIDRA POLLER - Special to the Sun
January 28, 2005
The murder of Sebastien Selam, one of the most popular DJs in France, has been widely ignored. Sebastien lived with his widowed mother in a modest but comfortable low-rent apartment building in the 10th arrondissement, a half hour from the Place de la Republique. In November 2003, during the month of Ramadan, Sebastien was murdered by a neighbor, Adel Boumedienne. The Selams are Jewish, of Algerian origin; the Boumediennes are Muslims from Morocco. Relations between Jews and Muslims in the neighborhood, which had been normal or even cordial, radically deteriorated in the fall of 2000.There were incidents, anti-Semitic graffiti, ominous signs of violent hostility. And yet Sebastien let Adel get into his car as he was going into the underground garage to park. There, Adel slashed Sebastien's throat almost severing his head, and mutilated his face beyond recognition with a carving fork. The coroner states in his report that he had never seen such severe mutilation in all his decades of practice.
Aside from a brief article filled with factual errors in the tabloid Le Parisien and an equally incompetent article in a Jewish weekly paper, there was hardly any press coverage of the Selam murder. When Israeli photographer Avi Rosen, who was in Paris at the time, heard what happened to the DJ, he immediately recognized the hallmarks of ritual murder. He took photos of the crime scene, interviewed the Selam family, and has stood by them ever since in their almost hopeless efforts to bring the murderer to justice and expose the true nature of the crime not only for the honor of Sebastien, but to warn others of the danger that confronts them.
Adel's mother saw her son take the carving knife and fork from the kitchen; he came back a short time later, covered in blood, and told her, "I've killed my Jew, I can go to paradise." He told the police that he had no remorse, no regrets, because Allah told him to kill Sebastien. They transferred him from the police station to a general hospital and from there to a psychiatric hospital. As of this writing, the Selam family lawyer is playing his last card; he has one last chance to convince the court to open an investigation. If the request is denied, the case will be closed. No investigation, no arrest, no trial. The murderer will some day be released from the mental hospital. The Selam family is sentenced to a life of mourning.
Chantal Piekolek was murdered in her shoe store in the 17th arrondissement of Paris earlier that same November day. The murderer, a hardened criminal recently released from prison, stabbed her 25 times. He was quickly apprehended and jailed, but died of cancer before he could be put on trial. Piekolek, who was Jewish, was murdered by a Muslim. Did he know she was Jewish? If robbery was the motive, why did he stab her 25 times? The mystery died with him. But one day the press, including the Jewish press, may be asked to explain why they transformed a Jewish divorcee - who had recently taken over a store after her father died - into the Christian widow of a Jewish husband. Why? Were two Jewish murders in one day during the month of Ramadan too much to bear? Or too much to hide?
More
[This is why Islam can NEVER be reformed. Christians go to hell for murder, Muslims go to heaven.]
Expatica - PM, Nato boss 'included on terror suspect's death list'
Expatica - Living in, moving to, or working in the Netherlands, plus Dutch news in English
PM, Nato boss 'included on terror suspect's death list'
28 January 2005
AMSTERDAM — Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende and Finance Minister Gerrit Zalm were allegedly on a death list drawn up by suspected terrorist Jason W., who was arrested after a 14-hour stand-off with police in The Hague last November.
The stand-off developed after hand grenades were thrown at a specialist police unit moving in to arrest W. and another man.
Current affairs programme Nova reported on Thursday night that internet chat sessions indicated that W. was thinking about killing Balkenende and several other high-profile politicians. The chat sessions are part of the public prosecutor's evidence against the 19-year-old convert to Islam.
W., whose father is American and his mother Dutch, became a Muslim at the age of 14.
The names of Nato Secretary-General and former Dutch foreign minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer (who took over as Nato chief in January 2004), populist LPF MP Mat Herben and Liberal VVD MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali and "all the fake Muslims" on the board of management of Dutch Muslim broadcaster NMO were also allegedly on W.'s death list.
The names appeared in a chat session that W. was involved in on 19 September 2003, in which W. is said to have used the internet name Mujaheed. He chatted with another person identified as Galas. Parts of the chat session were broadcast by Nova on Thursday night.
The chat session files were found on W.'s computer in his home in the central Dutch city of Amersfoort on 17 October 2003 when he was arrested with several others on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack. The computer was seized by police, but the suspects were released eight days later and the case was dismissed.
More
PM, Nato boss 'included on terror suspect's death list'
28 January 2005
AMSTERDAM — Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende and Finance Minister Gerrit Zalm were allegedly on a death list drawn up by suspected terrorist Jason W., who was arrested after a 14-hour stand-off with police in The Hague last November.
The stand-off developed after hand grenades were thrown at a specialist police unit moving in to arrest W. and another man.
Current affairs programme Nova reported on Thursday night that internet chat sessions indicated that W. was thinking about killing Balkenende and several other high-profile politicians. The chat sessions are part of the public prosecutor's evidence against the 19-year-old convert to Islam.
W., whose father is American and his mother Dutch, became a Muslim at the age of 14.
The names of Nato Secretary-General and former Dutch foreign minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer (who took over as Nato chief in January 2004), populist LPF MP Mat Herben and Liberal VVD MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali and "all the fake Muslims" on the board of management of Dutch Muslim broadcaster NMO were also allegedly on W.'s death list.
The names appeared in a chat session that W. was involved in on 19 September 2003, in which W. is said to have used the internet name Mujaheed. He chatted with another person identified as Galas. Parts of the chat session were broadcast by Nova on Thursday night.
The chat session files were found on W.'s computer in his home in the central Dutch city of Amersfoort on 17 October 2003 when he was arrested with several others on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack. The computer was seized by police, but the suspects were released eight days later and the case was dismissed.
More
[ www.armenialiberty.org ] Wednesday 26, January 2005
Turkey Wins Removal Of Armenian Genocide From German Schools
Turkey Wins Removal Of Armenian Genocide From German Schools
(dpa) - Pressure from Turkey has resulted in the removal of a reference to the Armenian genocide from a German school curriculum, reports said Wednesday.
The eastern German state of Brandenburg has eliminated half a sentence on the Armenians included in ninth and tenth grade history classes after a Turkish diplomat complained to state Prime Minister Matthias Platzeck, the newspaper Die Welt reported.
In a chapter entitled 'War, Technology and Civilian Populations' the school book text said 'for example, the genocide of the Armenians population of Anatolia.' That passage has now been removed from school textbooks, the newspaper said.
Platzeck met regularly with Turkish diplomats and was 'steeled' against their influence, the newspaper quoted him as saying. The prime minister added that genocide was too important an issue to be dealt with in just half a sentence. 'Brandenburg's curriculum was the only one in Germany which up until now included a reference to the murder of the Armenians,' said Die Welt.
Most historians say that between 600,000 and 1.5 million Armenians were killed in 1915 and 1916 under the Ottoman Turks during World War I. The Turkish government, which denies that a genocide took place, speaks of 200,000 dead.
A Turkish embassy spokesman in Berlin declined to comment directly on the report, but noted the initiative had come from the Turkish consulate responsible for Berlin and Brandenburg - not from the embassy itself.
Prime Minister Platzeck is a member of Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats (SPD). Schroeder is a strong supporter of Turkey's bid to become a member of the European Union. Germany has almost two million resident Turks - the biggest Turkish minority in the EU.
Turkey Wins Removal Of Armenian Genocide From German Schools
(dpa) - Pressure from Turkey has resulted in the removal of a reference to the Armenian genocide from a German school curriculum, reports said Wednesday.
The eastern German state of Brandenburg has eliminated half a sentence on the Armenians included in ninth and tenth grade history classes after a Turkish diplomat complained to state Prime Minister Matthias Platzeck, the newspaper Die Welt reported.
In a chapter entitled 'War, Technology and Civilian Populations' the school book text said 'for example, the genocide of the Armenians population of Anatolia.' That passage has now been removed from school textbooks, the newspaper said.
Platzeck met regularly with Turkish diplomats and was 'steeled' against their influence, the newspaper quoted him as saying. The prime minister added that genocide was too important an issue to be dealt with in just half a sentence. 'Brandenburg's curriculum was the only one in Germany which up until now included a reference to the murder of the Armenians,' said Die Welt.
Most historians say that between 600,000 and 1.5 million Armenians were killed in 1915 and 1916 under the Ottoman Turks during World War I. The Turkish government, which denies that a genocide took place, speaks of 200,000 dead.
A Turkish embassy spokesman in Berlin declined to comment directly on the report, but noted the initiative had come from the Turkish consulate responsible for Berlin and Brandenburg - not from the embassy itself.
Prime Minister Platzeck is a member of Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats (SPD). Schroeder is a strong supporter of Turkey's bid to become a member of the European Union. Germany has almost two million resident Turks - the biggest Turkish minority in the EU.
Yahoo! News - France Worried About Terrorism at Home
Yahoo! News - France Worried About Terrorism at Home
By JAMEY KEATEN, Associated Press Writer
France Worried About Terrorism at Home
PARIS - The ongoing violence in Iraq (news - web sites) "encourages terrorism," has created instability and has pushed some French youths toward holy war, France's defense minister said in an interview with The Associated Press.
Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie appeared eager to rebuild frayed French-U.S. ties, but expressed deep concern about the insurgency ahead of Sunday's election in Iraq.
She pointed to arrests this week of 11 French youths as part of an investigation into a network suspected of dispatching Islamic combatants from France to Iraq. One of the youths was later released.
"France cannot be satisfied with the situation in Iraq," she said in Thursday's interview. "What's happening in Iraq is bad for everyone. It encourages terrorism and creates a zone of instability that can spread."
Alliot-Marie expressed concern that the young French fighters "could one day carry out suicide attacks elsewhere ... that worries us." France itself could be targeted, she said.
France's DGSE spy agency, which works for the Defense Ministry, was active in helping counterintelligence agents ahead of the arrests, providing information on "routes of passage" to Iraq, the minister said.
More
By JAMEY KEATEN, Associated Press Writer
France Worried About Terrorism at Home
PARIS - The ongoing violence in Iraq (news - web sites) "encourages terrorism," has created instability and has pushed some French youths toward holy war, France's defense minister said in an interview with The Associated Press.
Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie appeared eager to rebuild frayed French-U.S. ties, but expressed deep concern about the insurgency ahead of Sunday's election in Iraq.
She pointed to arrests this week of 11 French youths as part of an investigation into a network suspected of dispatching Islamic combatants from France to Iraq. One of the youths was later released.
"France cannot be satisfied with the situation in Iraq," she said in Thursday's interview. "What's happening in Iraq is bad for everyone. It encourages terrorism and creates a zone of instability that can spread."
Alliot-Marie expressed concern that the young French fighters "could one day carry out suicide attacks elsewhere ... that worries us." France itself could be targeted, she said.
France's DGSE spy agency, which works for the Defense Ministry, was active in helping counterintelligence agents ahead of the arrests, providing information on "routes of passage" to Iraq, the minister said.
More
Thursday, January 27, 2005
TCS: Tech Central Station - Where Have All the Children Gone?
TCS: Tech Central Station - Where Have All the Children Gone?
"Go to any child-care store in Vienna. Its clients will be predominantly Arabic, Iranian, Pakistani, Turkish, Japanese, Korean, and Black African. Viennese women never bear children -- they cherish their figures and careers instead. The Western-European pension systems made the bringing up of children less advantageous than social climbing and maximization of income.
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"Go to any child-care store in Vienna. Its clients will be predominantly Arabic, Iranian, Pakistani, Turkish, Japanese, Korean, and Black African. Viennese women never bear children -- they cherish their figures and careers instead. The Western-European pension systems made the bringing up of children less advantageous than social climbing and maximization of income.
More
Saturday, January 22, 2005
Most Dutch see Muslims as a threat
Most Dutch see Muslims as a threat
International news from swissinfo, the Swiss news platform
January 22, 2005 3:30 PM
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A large majority of Dutch people are afraid of Muslims, according to a poll taken after the murder
of a Dutch filmmaker critical of Islam.
The poll, conducted by TNS NIPO in The Netherlands, as well as in Spain and Italy, since the November murder of Dutch
filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a suspected radical Islamist, showed only 19 percent of Dutch people do not see the presence
of Muslims in the country as a threat.
Home to almost 1 million Muslims or 6 percent of the population, The Netherlands' reputation for tolerance and social
harmony has been shattered by the murder and a wave of attacks on mosques and churches and death threats against
politicians.
Racial tensions surfaced again this week after a Dutch woman killed a youth with Moroccan roots after he stole her bag.
Highlights of the poll, to be launched formally on Monday, were published by De Volkskrant daily on Saturday.
The newspaper said the results were surprising given that Spain and Italy were much more frequently confronted with illegal
immigration of Muslims from North Africa than the Dutch.
The survey showed 67 percent of Dutch people had no contact with Muslims and 65 percent hardly know anything about
Islam in spite of broad coverage in the media.
Those who see Muslims as a threat say they are afraid they will eventually have to live under Islamic religious rules. Those
living outside big cities, women and the well educated were more likely to have negative views, the newspaper said.
Half the Dutch polled said they would move house if their neighbourhood became more dominated by immigrants and the
same proportion said they were afraid women would no longer be able to move about freely in public because of Muslims.
International news from swissinfo, the Swiss news platform
January 22, 2005 3:30 PM
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A large majority of Dutch people are afraid of Muslims, according to a poll taken after the murder
of a Dutch filmmaker critical of Islam.
The poll, conducted by TNS NIPO in The Netherlands, as well as in Spain and Italy, since the November murder of Dutch
filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a suspected radical Islamist, showed only 19 percent of Dutch people do not see the presence
of Muslims in the country as a threat.
Home to almost 1 million Muslims or 6 percent of the population, The Netherlands' reputation for tolerance and social
harmony has been shattered by the murder and a wave of attacks on mosques and churches and death threats against
politicians.
Racial tensions surfaced again this week after a Dutch woman killed a youth with Moroccan roots after he stole her bag.
Highlights of the poll, to be launched formally on Monday, were published by De Volkskrant daily on Saturday.
The newspaper said the results were surprising given that Spain and Italy were much more frequently confronted with illegal
immigration of Muslims from North Africa than the Dutch.
The survey showed 67 percent of Dutch people had no contact with Muslims and 65 percent hardly know anything about
Islam in spite of broad coverage in the media.
Those who see Muslims as a threat say they are afraid they will eventually have to live under Islamic religious rules. Those
living outside big cities, women and the well educated were more likely to have negative views, the newspaper said.
Half the Dutch polled said they would move house if their neighbourhood became more dominated by immigrants and the
same proportion said they were afraid women would no longer be able to move about freely in public because of Muslims.
Yahoo! News - Germany to Deport Hundreds of Islamists - Magazine
Yahoo! News - Germany to Deport Hundreds of Islamists - Magazine
Germany to Deport Hundreds of Islamists
Sat Jan 22,11:10 AM ET
BERLIN (Reuters) - German officials are drawing up lists of hundreds of Islamic militants to be deported from the country under a new law making expulsions easier, the German weekly magazine Der Spiegel said on Saturday.
Der Spiegel said authorities were already using their powers under an immigration law introduced this month in conducting an operation dubbed 'Aktion Kehraus' ('Action Sweep Out').
The Interior Ministry declined to comment on the report beyond saying that deportations were a matter for Germany's 16 federal states.
Under new rules, potential deportees will not be able to use normal legal channels to challenge an expulsion order. A special panel of the Federal Administrative Court will be responsible, with no right of appeal.
Der Spiegel said judges were expected to deal with up to 2,000 cases per year.
Since the revelations in 2001 that Arab students who had lived for years in Hamburg led the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, Germans have questioned their liberal laws under which some suspected militants even draw welfare benefits.
Interior Minister Otto Schily has suggested that evidence of training at an al Qaeda camp should be clear grounds for expelling a foreign national. Distributing videos calling for 'holy war' could also be punished the same way.
"
Germany to Deport Hundreds of Islamists
Sat Jan 22,11:10 AM ET
BERLIN (Reuters) - German officials are drawing up lists of hundreds of Islamic militants to be deported from the country under a new law making expulsions easier, the German weekly magazine Der Spiegel said on Saturday.
Der Spiegel said authorities were already using their powers under an immigration law introduced this month in conducting an operation dubbed 'Aktion Kehraus' ('Action Sweep Out').
The Interior Ministry declined to comment on the report beyond saying that deportations were a matter for Germany's 16 federal states.
Under new rules, potential deportees will not be able to use normal legal channels to challenge an expulsion order. A special panel of the Federal Administrative Court will be responsible, with no right of appeal.
Der Spiegel said judges were expected to deal with up to 2,000 cases per year.
Since the revelations in 2001 that Arab students who had lived for years in Hamburg led the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, Germans have questioned their liberal laws under which some suspected militants even draw welfare benefits.
Interior Minister Otto Schily has suggested that evidence of training at an al Qaeda camp should be clear grounds for expelling a foreign national. Distributing videos calling for 'holy war' could also be punished the same way.
"
Friday, January 21, 2005
Bag thief death fans Dutch racial tensions - Yahoo! UK & Ireland News
Bag thief death fans Dutch racial tensions - Yahoo! UK & Ireland News
Bag thief death fans Dutch racial tensions
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The death of a man with Moroccan roots who was run over by a woman after he stole her bag has inflamed Dutch racial tensions that have smouldered since the murder of a filmmaker critical of Islam.
Several hundred people, including many Moroccans, marched on Friday from the site in an immigrant neighbourhood in Amsterdam where the 19-year-old died on Monday. The woman whose bag he stole drove her car into his moped, crushing him against a tree.
The friends and family of the youth, named by the media as Ali El Bejjati, say his death was a racially motivated murder. Two months ago, filmmaker Theo van Gogh was killed in the same district, allegedly by a 26-year-old Dutch-Moroccan.
The story has been front-page news all week in the Netherlands, home to about one million Muslims, more than a quarter of Moroccan descent. De Telegraaf daily said on Friday it was the man's own fault.
Geert Wilders, an anti-immigration politician whose popularity has soared since Van Gogh was murdered, called for the government to strip criminals with dual citizenship of their Dutch nationality.
'Arresting the woman makes the victim the criminal and the criminal a victim. It's turning the world on its head,' he said.
More
Bag thief death fans Dutch racial tensions
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The death of a man with Moroccan roots who was run over by a woman after he stole her bag has inflamed Dutch racial tensions that have smouldered since the murder of a filmmaker critical of Islam.
Several hundred people, including many Moroccans, marched on Friday from the site in an immigrant neighbourhood in Amsterdam where the 19-year-old died on Monday. The woman whose bag he stole drove her car into his moped, crushing him against a tree.
The friends and family of the youth, named by the media as Ali El Bejjati, say his death was a racially motivated murder. Two months ago, filmmaker Theo van Gogh was killed in the same district, allegedly by a 26-year-old Dutch-Moroccan.
The story has been front-page news all week in the Netherlands, home to about one million Muslims, more than a quarter of Moroccan descent. De Telegraaf daily said on Friday it was the man's own fault.
Geert Wilders, an anti-immigration politician whose popularity has soared since Van Gogh was murdered, called for the government to strip criminals with dual citizenship of their Dutch nationality.
'Arresting the woman makes the victim the criminal and the criminal a victim. It's turning the world on its head,' he said.
More
Muslim group targets poster nudity
Muslim group targets poster nudity - Britain
Muslim group targets poster nudity
By Nicola Woolcock
Activists are getting bolder in a campaign of vandalising adverts that display naked flesh
BILLBOARD adverts featuring partial nudity are being defaced by Muslim activists who are offended by displays of flesh.
The advertising watchdog has confirmed that increasing numbers of posters are being torn down or painted over in predominantly Islamic areas.
A website giving advice on how to vandalise billboards and listing potential targets has been set up by a group calling themselves Muslims Against Advertising (MAAD).
The campaign has gathered momentum since the Advertising Standards Authority banned an underwear advert from being sited near mosques.
Advertisements for perfume, hair dye, bras and television programmes are among those that have been attacked. Photographs of semi-dressed women are the most frequently targeted, with the offending body parts painted over or ripped off.
A poster advertising the Channel 4 programme Desperate Housewives is the most recent target; the images of two scantily-clad actresses have been torn from an East London billboard but three fully-dressed characters were left intact. Adverts bearing Dove’s “Real Women” adverts — six ordinary women pictured in their underwear — were painted over at several locations last year.
MAAD, based in Birmingham, gives an index of defaced adverts in the city, including Levi’s, Wonderbra, PaddyPower, a radio station and a strip club. It says on its website that it believes in “direct action” and “has paint and isn’t afraid to use it”, adding: “There is no longer any need to cringe as you walk past a sleazy poster, we’ll improve it.”
Advice on how to attack posters is also given: “The procedures outlined here are based on our six months’ experience of executing poster attacks professionally, safely and without injury or arrest.
“A paint roller, a blithe spirit and a balmy night are all you really need.
“After choosing your board, be sure to inspect it both during the day and at night. Take note of all activities in the area. Who is about at 2am? How visible will you be?
“Bring a camera — it’s a good cover for doing anything you’re not supposed to. Check your escape routes.
“For work on larger boards we recommend walkie-talkies . . . the ground crew should monitor oncoming traffic and maintain radio contact with the lookout on the board.”
The ASA told Triumph to remove its advert for Sloggi thongs from a billboard near a mosque in Bury, after complaints and a petition.
One Muslim reportedly complained that it was “insulting” and constituted “environmental pollution”.
An advert for hair dye, which showed a woman peering into her bikini bottoms, was painted over by Muslims in Luton. A spokesman said the poster would be “extremely offensive” to a Muslim man if he passed it on his way to prayers.
More
Muslim group targets poster nudity
By Nicola Woolcock
Activists are getting bolder in a campaign of vandalising adverts that display naked flesh
BILLBOARD adverts featuring partial nudity are being defaced by Muslim activists who are offended by displays of flesh.
The advertising watchdog has confirmed that increasing numbers of posters are being torn down or painted over in predominantly Islamic areas.
A website giving advice on how to vandalise billboards and listing potential targets has been set up by a group calling themselves Muslims Against Advertising (MAAD).
The campaign has gathered momentum since the Advertising Standards Authority banned an underwear advert from being sited near mosques.
Advertisements for perfume, hair dye, bras and television programmes are among those that have been attacked. Photographs of semi-dressed women are the most frequently targeted, with the offending body parts painted over or ripped off.
A poster advertising the Channel 4 programme Desperate Housewives is the most recent target; the images of two scantily-clad actresses have been torn from an East London billboard but three fully-dressed characters were left intact. Adverts bearing Dove’s “Real Women” adverts — six ordinary women pictured in their underwear — were painted over at several locations last year.
MAAD, based in Birmingham, gives an index of defaced adverts in the city, including Levi’s, Wonderbra, PaddyPower, a radio station and a strip club. It says on its website that it believes in “direct action” and “has paint and isn’t afraid to use it”, adding: “There is no longer any need to cringe as you walk past a sleazy poster, we’ll improve it.”
Advice on how to attack posters is also given: “The procedures outlined here are based on our six months’ experience of executing poster attacks professionally, safely and without injury or arrest.
“A paint roller, a blithe spirit and a balmy night are all you really need.
“After choosing your board, be sure to inspect it both during the day and at night. Take note of all activities in the area. Who is about at 2am? How visible will you be?
“Bring a camera — it’s a good cover for doing anything you’re not supposed to. Check your escape routes.
“For work on larger boards we recommend walkie-talkies . . . the ground crew should monitor oncoming traffic and maintain radio contact with the lookout on the board.”
The ASA told Triumph to remove its advert for Sloggi thongs from a billboard near a mosque in Bury, after complaints and a petition.
One Muslim reportedly complained that it was “insulting” and constituted “environmental pollution”.
An advert for hair dye, which showed a woman peering into her bikini bottoms, was painted over by Muslims in Luton. A spokesman said the poster would be “extremely offensive” to a Muslim man if he passed it on his way to prayers.
More
The Scotsman - International - Self-doubt leaves French feeling down in the mouth
The Scotsman - International - Self-doubt leaves French feeling down in the mouth
Self-doubt leaves French feeling down in the mouth
SUSAN BELL
IN PARIS
IT IS official: the French are a nation of depressed pessimists, wracked with self-doubt and unable to see a positive future.
This gloomy portrait of the current state of Gallic morale - or rather the lack of it - was made public yesterday in a damning report by France’s prefects, the country’s top administrators.
"The French no longer believe in anything," the report said. "That is the reason that the situation is relatively calm, for they believe that it is not even worthwhile expressing their opinions or trying to be heard any more."
The country’s 100 prefects went on to use the words "lifelessness", "resignation", "anxiety" and "pessimism" to describe the attitudes they believe prevail in France today.
The report, which is dated December 2004 but has only just been made public, would appear to be contradicted by the three days of strikes launched by public sector workers this week.
However, analysts point to the fact that disillusionment and apathy are so great that not even France’s formerly powerful unions were able to predict the turnout for the strike. Opinion polls show that 65 per cent of the French support the strikers, leading observers to say that the country is showing its discontent by proxy via the strikers.
"It’s a fact: France and the French are pessimists," said Alain Duhamel, a respected French commentator.
He said: "The French doubt themselves and worry about the future. They do so more than the citizens of neighbouring countries, even when those neighbouring countries are doing less well than we are and have a more negative future ahead.
More
Self-doubt leaves French feeling down in the mouth
SUSAN BELL
IN PARIS
IT IS official: the French are a nation of depressed pessimists, wracked with self-doubt and unable to see a positive future.
This gloomy portrait of the current state of Gallic morale - or rather the lack of it - was made public yesterday in a damning report by France’s prefects, the country’s top administrators.
"The French no longer believe in anything," the report said. "That is the reason that the situation is relatively calm, for they believe that it is not even worthwhile expressing their opinions or trying to be heard any more."
The country’s 100 prefects went on to use the words "lifelessness", "resignation", "anxiety" and "pessimism" to describe the attitudes they believe prevail in France today.
The report, which is dated December 2004 but has only just been made public, would appear to be contradicted by the three days of strikes launched by public sector workers this week.
However, analysts point to the fact that disillusionment and apathy are so great that not even France’s formerly powerful unions were able to predict the turnout for the strike. Opinion polls show that 65 per cent of the French support the strikers, leading observers to say that the country is showing its discontent by proxy via the strikers.
"It’s a fact: France and the French are pessimists," said Alain Duhamel, a respected French commentator.
He said: "The French doubt themselves and worry about the future. They do so more than the citizens of neighbouring countries, even when those neighbouring countries are doing less well than we are and have a more negative future ahead.
More
Stop playing victim, Forum tells Moroccans - Expatica
Stop playing victim, Forum tells Moroccans - Expatica
Stop playing victim, Forum tells Moroccans
21 January 2005
AMSTERDAM — As mourners marched on Friday to commemorate the death of a Moroccan man during an alleged bag snatch, multicultural institute Forum urged Moroccan immigrants in Amsterdam to stop portraying themselves as victims.
Forum spokesman Halim el Madkouri said Moroccans are not victims and should stop blaming the rest of Dutch society for everything, newspaper De Volkskrant reported.
His comments came after El B. was killed on Monday night after he and an accomplice allegedly stole a bag from a woman's car. The motorist reversed her car to try and reclaim the bag, but collided with the mens' scooter and crushed the victim up against a tree.
Outrage
erupted in Amsterdam East around the scene of El B.'s death as many people from the immigrant community claimed that the 43-year-old woman killed the 19-year-old on purpose. They claim it was evidence that Moroccans are victims of serious injustice in the Netherlands.
"Nonsense, of course, because the woman who crashed into him did not really think: 'Hey, a Moroccan. I'm going to kill him'. Moroccans are in a vicious circle of frustration and dissatisfaction. They continually feel they are a victim," El Madkouri said.
A spokesman for the Koepelorganisatie van Marokkaanse Moskeeën (a Moroccan mosque association) blamed the emotional outbursts by Moroccans after El B.'s death on negative publicity in the media.
"But some of them have contributed to this picture themselves. It is time Moroccans looked into the mirror and recognised their own faults," he said.
More
Stop playing victim, Forum tells Moroccans
21 January 2005
AMSTERDAM — As mourners marched on Friday to commemorate the death of a Moroccan man during an alleged bag snatch, multicultural institute Forum urged Moroccan immigrants in Amsterdam to stop portraying themselves as victims.
Forum spokesman Halim el Madkouri said Moroccans are not victims and should stop blaming the rest of Dutch society for everything, newspaper De Volkskrant reported.
His comments came after El B. was killed on Monday night after he and an accomplice allegedly stole a bag from a woman's car. The motorist reversed her car to try and reclaim the bag, but collided with the mens' scooter and crushed the victim up against a tree.
Outrage
erupted in Amsterdam East around the scene of El B.'s death as many people from the immigrant community claimed that the 43-year-old woman killed the 19-year-old on purpose. They claim it was evidence that Moroccans are victims of serious injustice in the Netherlands.
"Nonsense, of course, because the woman who crashed into him did not really think: 'Hey, a Moroccan. I'm going to kill him'. Moroccans are in a vicious circle of frustration and dissatisfaction. They continually feel they are a victim," El Madkouri said.
A spokesman for the Koepelorganisatie van Marokkaanse Moskeeën (a Moroccan mosque association) blamed the emotional outbursts by Moroccans after El B.'s death on negative publicity in the media.
"But some of them have contributed to this picture themselves. It is time Moroccans looked into the mirror and recognised their own faults," he said.
More
Thursday, January 20, 2005
French army to recruit Muslim clerics
Expatica - Living in, moving to, or working in France, plus French news in English: "French army to recruit Muslim clerics
PARIS, Jan 20 (AFP) - The French armed forces are to create an Islamic chaplaincy to cater to the spiritual needs of Muslim recruits, Le Monde newspaper reported Thursday.
A serving officer - Lieutenant Colonel Hait Al Hocine - was appointed earlier this week to examine how the body should be set up and is due to present his report by the end of June, the newspaper said.
It would be the first time that Muslim clerics are given an official position in the armed services. Today only Catholic, Jewish and Protestant chaplaincies exist.
Large numbers of France's five-million strong Muslim community are believed to have signed up to the armed forces recently, but because of France's official
blindness on colour, race and religion there are no figures.
Le Monde said the decision to appoint Muslim chaplains had not been taken in response to an observed demand from Muslim serving men and women.
'Nothing suggests there is a need (for a Muslim chaplaincy) at the moment, but we do not want to have to improvise one if the need did arise,' a defence ministry official told the paper.
'We are going to set up a framework in which it will be possible to practice the Muslim religion - but we don't even know if we will find candidates for the job of chaplain,' he said.
PARIS, Jan 20 (AFP) - The French armed forces are to create an Islamic chaplaincy to cater to the spiritual needs of Muslim recruits, Le Monde newspaper reported Thursday.
A serving officer - Lieutenant Colonel Hait Al Hocine - was appointed earlier this week to examine how the body should be set up and is due to present his report by the end of June, the newspaper said.
It would be the first time that Muslim clerics are given an official position in the armed services. Today only Catholic, Jewish and Protestant chaplaincies exist.
Large numbers of France's five-million strong Muslim community are believed to have signed up to the armed forces recently, but because of France's official
blindness on colour, race and religion there are no figures.
Le Monde said the decision to appoint Muslim chaplains had not been taken in response to an observed demand from Muslim serving men and women.
'Nothing suggests there is a need (for a Muslim chaplaincy) at the moment, but we do not want to have to improvise one if the need did arise,' a defence ministry official told the paper.
'We are going to set up a framework in which it will be possible to practice the Muslim religion - but we don't even know if we will find candidates for the job of chaplain,' he said.
Tuesday, January 18, 2005
FrontPage magazine.com :: The Islamists' Favorite Brits by Melanie Phillips
FrontPage magazine.com :: The Islamists' Favorite Brits by Melanie Phillips
The Islamists' Favorite Brits
By Melanie Phillips
FrontPageMagazine.com | January 18, 2005
Tony Blair’s staunch support for President Bush over Iraq has done the Labour Prime Minister great electoral damage in Britain, not least among the country’s 1.8 million Muslims. Despite being traditional Labour voters, many are now threatening at the forthcoming general election to support either the Liberal Democrats, who have taken a strong line against the war, or Respect, an alliance between the far-left MP George Galloway and Islamic fundamentalists.
The British government’s reaction has been a panicky attempt to appease the Muslim community. In particular, there have been suspicions that a proposal to outlaw incitement to religious hatred is a crude attempt to buy Muslim votes. This is because British Muslims, who have been complaining about a rise in “Islamophobia” since 9/11, are aggrieved that they are not covered by the existing law against incitement to racial hatred, which applies to Jews and Sikhs whom it designates for these purposes as racial groups.
Of course, real prejudice against Muslims exists and should not be tolerated. But a law against incitement to religious hatred will very likely criminalize legitimate discussion about religion, which almost invariably gives rise to intemperate passions, hatred and the giving and taking of offence.
Fears that such a law may put people in jail merely for telling the truth have been fuelled by the fact that to many Muslims, any criticism of Islam — including any reference to Islamic terrorism — constitutes “Islamophobia.” If such a law had existed when a fatwa was issued against Salman Rushdie’s life for writing The Satanic Verses, he might have been prosecuted rather than protected by the British state. The idea that such a law should be introduced by the British government at the behest of a minority seeking to suppress any discussion of the role of their faith in global terror is alarming in the extreme.
Yet according to a government minister, this is indeed what has happened. In a grovelling article written in The Muslim Weekly in which he effectively pleaded for votes, Energy Minister Mike O’Brien boasted of the lengths to which the government had gone to accede to British Muslim demands. Two weeks after the Muslim Council of Britain asked for a new law banning religious discrimination, he said, Tony Blair promised he would provide it. “It was,” wrote O’Brien, “a major victory for the Muslim community in Britain.”
So a law that has the power to shut down legitimate comment about Islam; potentially put Christians, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, secularists and others in the dock for speaking the truth; and make the giving of offence a greater offence than intimidating Britons into silence; is being introduced to buy Muslim votes. The price to be paid for invading Iraq, in other words, is to be Britain's freedom of speech.
More
The Islamists' Favorite Brits
By Melanie Phillips
FrontPageMagazine.com | January 18, 2005
Tony Blair’s staunch support for President Bush over Iraq has done the Labour Prime Minister great electoral damage in Britain, not least among the country’s 1.8 million Muslims. Despite being traditional Labour voters, many are now threatening at the forthcoming general election to support either the Liberal Democrats, who have taken a strong line against the war, or Respect, an alliance between the far-left MP George Galloway and Islamic fundamentalists.
The British government’s reaction has been a panicky attempt to appease the Muslim community. In particular, there have been suspicions that a proposal to outlaw incitement to religious hatred is a crude attempt to buy Muslim votes. This is because British Muslims, who have been complaining about a rise in “Islamophobia” since 9/11, are aggrieved that they are not covered by the existing law against incitement to racial hatred, which applies to Jews and Sikhs whom it designates for these purposes as racial groups.
Of course, real prejudice against Muslims exists and should not be tolerated. But a law against incitement to religious hatred will very likely criminalize legitimate discussion about religion, which almost invariably gives rise to intemperate passions, hatred and the giving and taking of offence.
Fears that such a law may put people in jail merely for telling the truth have been fuelled by the fact that to many Muslims, any criticism of Islam — including any reference to Islamic terrorism — constitutes “Islamophobia.” If such a law had existed when a fatwa was issued against Salman Rushdie’s life for writing The Satanic Verses, he might have been prosecuted rather than protected by the British state. The idea that such a law should be introduced by the British government at the behest of a minority seeking to suppress any discussion of the role of their faith in global terror is alarming in the extreme.
Yet according to a government minister, this is indeed what has happened. In a grovelling article written in The Muslim Weekly in which he effectively pleaded for votes, Energy Minister Mike O’Brien boasted of the lengths to which the government had gone to accede to British Muslim demands. Two weeks after the Muslim Council of Britain asked for a new law banning religious discrimination, he said, Tony Blair promised he would provide it. “It was,” wrote O’Brien, “a major victory for the Muslim community in Britain.”
So a law that has the power to shut down legitimate comment about Islam; potentially put Christians, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, secularists and others in the dock for speaking the truth; and make the giving of offence a greater offence than intimidating Britons into silence; is being introduced to buy Muslim votes. The price to be paid for invading Iraq, in other words, is to be Britain's freedom of speech.
More
Tuesday, January 11, 2005
Asia Times
Asia Times: "Why Europe chooses extinction
By Spengler
Demographics is destiny. Never in recorded history have prosperous and peaceful nations chosen to disappear from the face of the earth. Yet that is what the Europeans have chosen to do. Back in 1348 Europe suffered the Black Death, a combination of bubonic plague and likely a form of mad cow disease, observes American Enterprise Institute scholar Ben Wattenberg. 'The plague reduced the estimated European population by about a third. In the next 50 years, Europe's population will relive - in slow motion - that plague demography, losing about a fifth of its population by 2050 and more as the decades roll on.'
In 200 years, French and German will be spoken exclusively in hell. What has brought about this collective suicide, which mocks all we thought we knew about the instinct for self-preservation? The chattering classes have nothing to say about the most unique and significant change in our times. Yet the great political and economic shifts of modern times are demographic in origin. Three examples suffice:
1) The great trans-Atlantic rift. Europeans are pacifists, not merely in the Persian Gulf, but on their own Balkans doorstep. If they cannot be bothered to reproduce, why should any European soldier sacrifice himself for future generations that never will be born?
2) The shift in global capital flows to the United States: old people lend money to young people. The aging populations of Europe and Japan lend money to younger people in the US.
3) The deflation danger. To illustrate, an economist of my acquaintance proposes a thought experiment. Suppose by a magic spell all the inhabitants of the United Kingdom instantaneously aged by 30 years. What would be the effect on the current account balance, the rate of interest, the price level and the exchange rate? (Answer at the end of this essay).
Little enough has been said about the "how" but almost nothing about the "why" of Europe's demographic suicide. Suicidal behavior is common among (for example) stone-age tribes who have encountered the modern world. One can extend this example to Tamil or Arab suicide bombers (See Live and Let Die, Asia Times Online, April 13, 2002). But the Europeans are the modern world. Have the Europeans taken to heart existentialism's complaint that man is alone in a chaotic universe in which life has no ultimate meaning, and that man responds to the anxiety about death by embracing death?
Detest as I might the whole existentialist tribe, there is a grain of truth here, and it bears on a parallel development, that is, the death of European Christianity. Fifty-three percent of Americans say that religion is very important in their lives, compared with 16 percent, 14 percent and 13 percent respectively of the British, French and Germans, according to a 1997 University of Michigan survey. Here I draw on the German-Jewish theologian Franz Rosenzweig (1886-1929), an existentialist of sorts. Few Asians (including Jews) can make sense of Christianity's core doctrine, namely, original sin, handed down to all humans from Adam and Eve. Original sin motivates God's self-sacrifice on the cross to remove this stain from mankind; without it, Jesus was just an itinerant preacher with a knack for anecdotes.
More
By Spengler
Demographics is destiny. Never in recorded history have prosperous and peaceful nations chosen to disappear from the face of the earth. Yet that is what the Europeans have chosen to do. Back in 1348 Europe suffered the Black Death, a combination of bubonic plague and likely a form of mad cow disease, observes American Enterprise Institute scholar Ben Wattenberg. 'The plague reduced the estimated European population by about a third. In the next 50 years, Europe's population will relive - in slow motion - that plague demography, losing about a fifth of its population by 2050 and more as the decades roll on.'
In 200 years, French and German will be spoken exclusively in hell. What has brought about this collective suicide, which mocks all we thought we knew about the instinct for self-preservation? The chattering classes have nothing to say about the most unique and significant change in our times. Yet the great political and economic shifts of modern times are demographic in origin. Three examples suffice:
1) The great trans-Atlantic rift. Europeans are pacifists, not merely in the Persian Gulf, but on their own Balkans doorstep. If they cannot be bothered to reproduce, why should any European soldier sacrifice himself for future generations that never will be born?
2) The shift in global capital flows to the United States: old people lend money to young people. The aging populations of Europe and Japan lend money to younger people in the US.
3) The deflation danger. To illustrate, an economist of my acquaintance proposes a thought experiment. Suppose by a magic spell all the inhabitants of the United Kingdom instantaneously aged by 30 years. What would be the effect on the current account balance, the rate of interest, the price level and the exchange rate? (Answer at the end of this essay).
Little enough has been said about the "how" but almost nothing about the "why" of Europe's demographic suicide. Suicidal behavior is common among (for example) stone-age tribes who have encountered the modern world. One can extend this example to Tamil or Arab suicide bombers (See Live and Let Die, Asia Times Online, April 13, 2002). But the Europeans are the modern world. Have the Europeans taken to heart existentialism's complaint that man is alone in a chaotic universe in which life has no ultimate meaning, and that man responds to the anxiety about death by embracing death?
Detest as I might the whole existentialist tribe, there is a grain of truth here, and it bears on a parallel development, that is, the death of European Christianity. Fifty-three percent of Americans say that religion is very important in their lives, compared with 16 percent, 14 percent and 13 percent respectively of the British, French and Germans, according to a 1997 University of Michigan survey. Here I draw on the German-Jewish theologian Franz Rosenzweig (1886-1929), an existentialist of sorts. Few Asians (including Jews) can make sense of Christianity's core doctrine, namely, original sin, handed down to all humans from Adam and Eve. Original sin motivates God's self-sacrifice on the cross to remove this stain from mankind; without it, Jesus was just an itinerant preacher with a knack for anecdotes.
More
Monday, January 10, 2005
British Muslims called to take up jihad - (United Press International)
British Muslims called to take up jihad - (United Press International): "British Muslims called to take up jihad
By Hannah K. Strange
UPI UK Correspondent
London, England, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- Muslims living in Britain are facing two choices; either to migrate or to join the jihad, a key Islamic figure has said.
Sheikh Omar Bakir Muhammed, leader of the now officially disbanded Islamic militant group Al Muhajiroun told United Press International Saturday that as the covenant of security under which Muslims previously lived in Britain has been broken, Muslims must now consider themselves at war.
'And I declare we should ourselves join the global Islamic camp against the global crusade camp,' he said.
What violated the covenant, according to Sheikh Omar, was the anti-terrorist legislation introduced in the United Kingdom after the 9/11 attacks. If the British government would review these policies and release those detained without trial in Belmarsh prison and elsewhere, Muslims could live at peace in Britain. Otherwise, they must prepare themselves to fight.
'The response from the Muslims will be horrendous if the British government continues in the way it treats Muslims,' he said, adding that suicide bombings were a possibility.
He called on Muslims to form a new coalition united behind al-Qaida with Osama Bin Laden as their leader.
This jihadi group would replace Al-Muhajiroun, which is no longer needed, he said. By dissolving such parties the Muslim community will have to come together, and as the judge of the Sharia court in Britain, he is the one to unite them, he added.
Those who did not wish to either leave or fight would not be regarded as Muslims, said Sheikh Omar, condemning in particular the Muslim Council of Britain for urging the Muslim community to cooperate with the British government.
"They are hypocrites, we don't believe they are Muslims," he told UPI. "In a time of crisis, who ever allies with them (the kuffaar -- non-believers) is one of them, so I don't believe they are Muslims in the first place."
"I doubt if one of them would dare to walk the streets of Mecca by themselves," he added.
Muslims are facing wars on two fronts, in Britain and abroad, he explained. Though they will live at peace in Britain should the government meet their demands, the fight will continue elsewhere in the Islamic world.
"We have the right to support our brothers and sisters abroad financially," he said. "They're recruiting us to join the British Army to go and kill our brothers and sisters. Why? We believe that everybody that does this becomes apostate, but we don't stop them because they can do whatever they want.
By Hannah K. Strange
UPI UK Correspondent
London, England, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- Muslims living in Britain are facing two choices; either to migrate or to join the jihad, a key Islamic figure has said.
Sheikh Omar Bakir Muhammed, leader of the now officially disbanded Islamic militant group Al Muhajiroun told United Press International Saturday that as the covenant of security under which Muslims previously lived in Britain has been broken, Muslims must now consider themselves at war.
'And I declare we should ourselves join the global Islamic camp against the global crusade camp,' he said.
What violated the covenant, according to Sheikh Omar, was the anti-terrorist legislation introduced in the United Kingdom after the 9/11 attacks. If the British government would review these policies and release those detained without trial in Belmarsh prison and elsewhere, Muslims could live at peace in Britain. Otherwise, they must prepare themselves to fight.
'The response from the Muslims will be horrendous if the British government continues in the way it treats Muslims,' he said, adding that suicide bombings were a possibility.
He called on Muslims to form a new coalition united behind al-Qaida with Osama Bin Laden as their leader.
This jihadi group would replace Al-Muhajiroun, which is no longer needed, he said. By dissolving such parties the Muslim community will have to come together, and as the judge of the Sharia court in Britain, he is the one to unite them, he added.
Those who did not wish to either leave or fight would not be regarded as Muslims, said Sheikh Omar, condemning in particular the Muslim Council of Britain for urging the Muslim community to cooperate with the British government.
"They are hypocrites, we don't believe they are Muslims," he told UPI. "In a time of crisis, who ever allies with them (the kuffaar -- non-believers) is one of them, so I don't believe they are Muslims in the first place."
"I doubt if one of them would dare to walk the streets of Mecca by themselves," he added.
Muslims are facing wars on two fronts, in Britain and abroad, he explained. Though they will live at peace in Britain should the government meet their demands, the fight will continue elsewhere in the Islamic world.
"We have the right to support our brothers and sisters abroad financially," he said. "They're recruiting us to join the British Army to go and kill our brothers and sisters. Why? We believe that everybody that does this becomes apostate, but we don't stop them because they can do whatever they want.
Thursday, January 06, 2005
Oddly Enough News Article | Reuters.com
Oddly Enough News Article | Reuters.com: "By Matthew Jones
LONDON (Reuters) - Mohammed has joined perennial favorites Jack and Joshua as one of the most popular names given to British boys in 2004, a sign of the country's growing ethnic diversity and a legacy of Muslim immigration decades ago.
The Office of National Statistics said on Thursday Mohammed -- meaning variously 'one who is praiseworthy' or 'exalted' -- had moved up two places to enter the top 20 for the first time.
'It is all about demographics. There are now more Muslims being born in Britain than previously,' said Dr Jamil Sherif of the Muslim Council of Britain, an umbrella group of 400 organizations.
'About 40 percent of Muslims here are under 25,' he told Reuters. 'There are a lot of young families.'
Emigration from Asia and Africa surged during the 1960s and 1970s and Britain -- population around 61 million -- is now home to about 1.6 million Muslims.
But despite its increased popularity, the name has a long way to go before it takes the laurels from Jack which has topped the charts for 10 years.
Last year, Joshua was at number two, Thomas at three, James at four and Daniel at five. Since 2000 these names have all been in the top five.
Girls' names saw more change in the top five than boys, but only marginally so.
Emily held the top spot for the second year running as did the number two name, Ellie. Jessica, the third most popular name moved up one place as did Sophie at four.
Chloe, which was top for six years until 2003, dipped to number five while Evie was the highest new entry at 39, up 22 places.
One of the fastest movers in the boys' names was Charlie, which gained nine places to 16, while last year's big climber Alfie dropped nine places to 27 and Spencer slumped 47 places.
"
LONDON (Reuters) - Mohammed has joined perennial favorites Jack and Joshua as one of the most popular names given to British boys in 2004, a sign of the country's growing ethnic diversity and a legacy of Muslim immigration decades ago.
The Office of National Statistics said on Thursday Mohammed -- meaning variously 'one who is praiseworthy' or 'exalted' -- had moved up two places to enter the top 20 for the first time.
'It is all about demographics. There are now more Muslims being born in Britain than previously,' said Dr Jamil Sherif of the Muslim Council of Britain, an umbrella group of 400 organizations.
'About 40 percent of Muslims here are under 25,' he told Reuters. 'There are a lot of young families.'
Emigration from Asia and Africa surged during the 1960s and 1970s and Britain -- population around 61 million -- is now home to about 1.6 million Muslims.
But despite its increased popularity, the name has a long way to go before it takes the laurels from Jack which has topped the charts for 10 years.
Last year, Joshua was at number two, Thomas at three, James at four and Daniel at five. Since 2000 these names have all been in the top five.
Girls' names saw more change in the top five than boys, but only marginally so.
Emily held the top spot for the second year running as did the number two name, Ellie. Jessica, the third most popular name moved up one place as did Sophie at four.
Chloe, which was top for six years until 2003, dipped to number five while Evie was the highest new entry at 39, up 22 places.
One of the fastest movers in the boys' names was Charlie, which gained nine places to 16, while last year's big climber Alfie dropped nine places to 27 and Spencer slumped 47 places.
"
Tuesday, January 04, 2005
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