 The face-covering burqa and niqab veils worn by some Muslim women have no place in Denmark, Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen says, adding his government was considering restricting them. Rasmussen stopped short, however, of calling for a ban on the veils, noting "legal and other limits". "The government's position is clear: the burqa and the niqab have no place in Danish society.
They symbolise a view of women and humanity that we totally oppose and that we want to combat in Danish society," Rasmussen told reporters on Tuesday. Denmark is "an open, democratic society where we look at the person to whom we are talking, whether it's in a classroom or on the job," he said. "That is why we don't want to see this garment in Danish society," he added. He said his centre-right government was "discussing ways of limiting the wearing" of the veils without violating the Scandinavian country's constitution. The prime minister's comments came a day after the publication of a report which showed that use of the burqa was "extremely rare" in Denmark, though no figures were given, and that the niqab was worn by "between 100 and 200" women. The report was commissioned by the social affairs ministry and written by researchers at the University of Copenhagen. It follows a heated debate on the burqa that has divided the two-party coalition government since the summer amid pressure from its key parliamentary ally the far-right Danish People's Party. Some 100,000 Muslim women live in Denmark, representing about 1.9 per cent of Denmark's total population of 5.5 million. Some 0.15 per cent of the Muslim women wear the niqab, according to the report. Denmark has had tense relations with the Muslim world following the publishing in 2005 of cartoons depicting Islam's Prophet Mohammed that were considered blasphemous and insulting by much of the Islamic world. It triggered violent protests in Muslim countries. SMH 
 Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten reprinted the Muhammad cartoons to illustrate a story about the attack on Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. Both Iran and Pakistan condemned the publication. Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehman-Parast: "Such acts are against the sanctity of religious values and are strongly condemned." "One cannot harm the religious sentiments of over one billion Muslims under the banner of freedom of speech," he said. "Such blasphemous acts will not contribute to the establishment of world peace. They will only make the Norwegian government liable before the international community for failing to prevent provocative behaviors that are in violation of human rights." The Pakistani Foreign Office also strongly condemned the reprinting of the cartoons, and urged Norway to take appropriate measures and ensure that the people who committed this blasphemous act were appropriately reprimanded. Aftenposten's chief editor, Hilde Haugsgjerd, says they did not get any direct responses from Muslim groups. They have got some reactions from individuals but nothing serious. Pakistani organization Jamaat-ud-Dawa, which is on the UN's terror list, called on Muslims to protest. A small group of Islamists protested in Lahore last Friday, carrying a sign saying that "anyone who kills Kurt Westergaard will be hero of Islam" and calling to boycott all Norwegian products. Professor Tore Bjørgo of the Police University College in Oslo doesn't expect any violent responses. Aftenposten is just one of many newspapers who have reprinted the cartoons. Laila Bokhari of the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs says that it all depends on how the news spreads and who will pick up on it and use it. Norwegian Parliamentarian Ulf Erik Knudsen (Progress Party) posted the cartoon on his Facebook page, leading to further rage in Pakistan, but later removed the image. At least 6 other newspapers in Belgium, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Portugal and Suriname published the cartoons following the attacks. Norwegian site Nettavisen published the cartoon for a short time before removing it. In Belgium, the ex-Muslim group "People Against Islam" announced a Muhammed cartoon contest on their site, saying they were inspired by Aftenposten. Meanwhile, more details are coming out about the US plot against Jyllands-Posten. The American-Canadian terrorists planned to blow up a truck outside the Jyllands-Posten offices. A Pakistani terror group put the two in touch with associates in European countries, who could supply them with money, weapons and manpower for the attack. Following the attack on Westergaard Danish authorities decided to provide him with additional security. The 30 agents needed for round-the-clock cover are expected to cost about 19.5 million kroner a year. Sources: PressTV, DAWN, Washington Times, Copenhagen Post 1, 2 (English), NRK, Nettavisen, VG, Aftenposten (Norwegian), Fyens Stiftstidende (Danish), Standaard (Dutch)
 Google, the Internet’s ubiquitous search engine, is under fire this week for censoring negative search results about Islam. If you type “Christianity is” into the Google search box, there immediately pop up a series of suggested completions to the sentence, most of them derogatory: “Christianity is bulls—t,” “Christianity is not a religion,” “Christianity is a lie,” “Christianity is false,” “Christianity is wrong,” “Christianity is fake.” No positive suggests come up. Likewise with “Buddhism is,” and the sentence is once again completed with numerous negative suggestions: “Buddhism is wrong,” “Buddhism is not what you think,” and so on. But type in “Islam is,” and nothing comes up at all. The negative suggestions inundating the searcher for other religions are nowhere to be seen. Google, however, says it was all a mistake, and denies have done anything to favor Islam. “This is a bug,” insisted a Google spokesman, “and we’re working to fix it as quickly as we can.” Oddly enough, however, even with all of Google’s technical savvy, this “bug” persisted for days and continues as of this writing, long after Google’s announcement that it would quickly be fixed. Or perhaps it isn’t so odd, in light of Google’s long-established penchant for favoring the hard Left and its allies in the global jihad. Critics have complained for years about Google’s tendency to decorate its logo colorfully for cherished days of the Left such as Earth Day and International Women’s Day, while ignoring Christmas (aside from bland Holiday greetings) and Easter. What’s more, Google-owned YouTube has more than once removed material critical of Islamic jihad supremacism, while allowing blood-curdling pro-jihad and vile anti-Semitic material to remain on the site. Google’s policies on removing videos all too often has appeared to follow a consistent Leftist line: anti-American, anti-Israel, pro-jihad. It is also a remarkable coincidence that Google’s “bug” would appear in Google not about Judaism or Christianity or Hinduism or Buddhism, but in connection with the world’s most thin-skinned religion.
The one religion shielded from adverse judgment at Google is also the only religion that has is currently engaged in an organized campaign to stifle honest discussion about its texts and teachings that inspire violence. In 2008 the Secretary General of the 57-government Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the largest voting bloc at the United Nations today, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, warned the West about “red lines that should not be crossed” regarding free speech about Islam and terrorism. For years now the OIC has spearheaded an effort at the UN to compel member states to criminalize what it calls “defamation of religions,” but by which it clearly means any honest discussion of the texts and teachings of Islam that jihadists invoke to justify violence and supremacism. Interestingly enough, the OIC stepped up this campaign in the wake of the publication of cartoons of Muhammad in a Danish newspaper that touched off worldwide Muslim riots. Google, at the time those riots were raging, was dutifully removing from YouTube videos that depicted the cartoons. Thus when the OIC has Google, it doesn’t need international edicts muzzling free speech. Like many on the Left, Google seems all too willing to carry water for the Islamic bloc’s war against free speech and to oblige the OIC’s totalitarian and thuggish influences, by voluntarily refraining from doing anything that might offend Muslims. While its restriction of the automated search suggestions may seem insignificant, its overall willingness to conform to notoriously fragile Islamic sensibilities and deep-six criticism of Islam is anything but trivial. What’s more, what with Google’s influence as by far the premier search engine, the idea that Western non-Muslims must make special allowances for easily-offended Muslims sets a precedent that can only bear bitter fruit in the future.
Ultimately Google, and every individual, group, business, and governing authority in the West, is going to have to decide whether it is going to stand for the hard-won principles of free speech and free inquiry, or kowtow to Islamic supremacism and intimidation. When the censorship is voluntary and self-imposed, as in Google’s case, it is all the more shameful. FPM
 Concerns are growing in the intelligence community that Somalia could be acting like Yemen in terms of its expanding ability to serve as a training ground for terrorists able to pick up and head out of country to attack other nations. Already one terror-related case involves a man from that troubled African country. The suspect, who was injured by police during his attack earlier this month, was carried into court where he faced attempted murder charges. The 28-year-old Somali man is accused of terrorism. Allegedly carrying a knife and an axe, he broke into the home of a Danish cartoonist whose controversial images of Mohammad led to threats on his life. The attack is believed to be the first documented case of an operative trained by the Al Qaeda-linked group Al Shabaab launching a mission outside of Somalia. Until now, Al Shabaab was seen as a regional player. "They are gaining global presence so to speak, at least getting a global reach, where Somalia can reach out, where Al Shabaab can reach out and conduct an attack. That's troubling," said Rick Nelson at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The Western face of Al Shabaab is an American, Omar Hammami, from Daphne, Ala. In propaganda videos, he goes by the name of Al-Amriki, which simply means "the American." The FBI is investigating the disappearance of two dozen Somali Americans into the Shabaab camps in Somalia. The camps are also drawing recruits form England, Canada and Western Europe. "Al Shabaab controls much of southern Somalia. It has, as I said. apparently set up camps from which they have run at least several hundred foreign fighters. They've introduced and uh, made use of suicide bombings which up until a few years ago were virtually unknown in Somalia," said Mark Bellamy, former U.S. ambassador to Kenya. Al Qaeda is established in the Far East, along the Afghan-Pakistan border, in Iraq, in Yemen, through Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, which claimed responsibility for Flight 253. Al Qaeda is also hooked up in Somalia through Al Shabaab. As for the connection to Al Qaeda leader Usama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman Al-Zawahiri, some analysts say Al Qaeda in Yemen and Somalia are now taking their lead from the core players. "AQAP and Al Shabaab are ultimately receiving influence and guidance from that senior leadership, and they're going to seek ways to coordinate together," Nelson said. So is the group capable of launching its own attack like the flight on Christmas Day? It’s possible, said Bellamy. "I should add that Somalia is probably not the best location from which to try to stage international jihad, , it's not, it's not connected, it's hard to get to," Bellamy said. FoxNews
 Islam is a Religion of Peace -- or else. "Somali Faces Terror Charge for Cartoonist Attack," from AP, January 11 COPENHAGEN (AP) -- Prosecutors filed a preliminary charge of terrorism Monday against a Somali man accused of trying to kill a Danish cartoonist who caricatured the Prophet Muhammad. The man had faced a preliminary charge of attempted murder for breaking into Kurt Westergaard's home in Aarhus, in western Denmark, Jan. 1 armed with a knife and an ax. Prosecutor Marian Thomsen said investigators changed the preliminary charge to terrorism, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison, after questioning the suspect over the weekend for the first time since his arrest. Westergaard, 74, locked himself in a safe room and was not injured. The suspect was shot by police in the hand and knee, but was not seriously injured and is being held in jail pending the outcome of the investigation.... The suspect claims he only wanted to scare Westergaard and has denied all the allegations except the weapons charge, according to his lawyer, Niels Christian Strauss. He only wanted to "scare" Westergaard by hacking through one door with an axe and working on another before he was stopped by police? He needs to work on his taqiyya technique. Thanks to JihadWatch
 Is the Met afraid of Mohammed? The Metropolitan Museum of Art quietly pulled images of the Prophet Mohammed from its Islamic collection and may not include them in a renovated exhibition area slated to open in 2011, The Post has learned. The museum said the controversial images -- objected to by conservative Muslims who say their religion forbids images of their holy founder -- were "under review." Critics say the Met has a history of dodging criticism and likely wants to escape the kind of outcry that Danish cartoons of Mohammed caused in 2006. "This is typical of the Met -- trying to avoid any controversy," said a source with inside knowledge of the museum. The Met currently has about 60 items from its 60,000-piece Islamic collection on temporary display in a corner of its vast second-floor Great Hall while larger galleries are renovated. But its three ancient renderings of Mohammed are not among them. "We have a very small space at the moment in which to display the whole sweep of Islamic art," said spokeswoman Egle Zygas. "They didn't fit the theme of the current installation." But it's not certain Mohammed will go on display when the Met finishes its $50 million renovation in 2011. Three years ago, the Met changed its "Primitive Art Galleries" to the "Arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas" for the sake of political correctness, said author Michael Gross, author of "Rogues' Gallery," a book about the Met. Just recently, it decided its highly anticipated "Islamic Galleries" will be given an awkward new name ahead of the 2011 opening.
Visitors will stroll around rooms dedicated to art from "Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia and Later South Asia," according to a museum press release. Islamic art expert Kishwar Rizvi said the Met -- which has one of the world's best Islamic collections -- has nothing to fear from Mohammed. "Museums shouldn't shy away from showing this in a historical context," said Rizvi, historian of Islamic Art at Yale University. Rizvi said it was "a shame" the museum dropped the word Islamic from the title. "It's cumbersome and problematic to base it on nationalistic boundaries," the historian said. NYPost
 by Ryan Mauro Pajamas Media has a great article about a moderate Muslim organization called LIM in Norway that is reacting to the attack on one of the Prophet Mohammed cartoonists by organizing a demonstration for free speech.
The spokesperson, Sheikh Rehman, is challenging the Islamic Council of Norway to do the same, but says he thinks they won’t do it because they worry they will “lose face in the Muslim world.” Rehman even supports the publication of the cartoons, saying: Muhammed didn’t want to be depicted, because he didn’t want to be turned into a false god. When Muslims believe that depictions of the prophet insult him, then they are turning him into just such a false god. There should thus be no reason not to caricature him. I would go so far as to say that Muslim leaders are unqualified. The second article comes from the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada.
Twenty imams that are patrt of the group published a fatwa on January 8 saying any attack on the U.S. or Canada is an attack on all the Muslims living there, and “Islam requires Muslims to stand up to this evil.” And there’s also this very important line in the fatwa: In fact, the constitutions of the United States and Canada are very close to the Islamic guiding principles of human rights and freedom. There is no conflict between the Islamic values of freedom and justice and the Canadian /US values of freedom and justice. Irfan al-Alawi and Stephen Schwartz in The Weekly Standard write about the All-India Ulema Mashaikh Board, and how the group’s secretary-general has called for Wahhabist control of the country’s Islamic institutions to be ended. They write that the majority of Sunni Muslims in India and Pakistan “are conservative but adhere to the spiritual Islam of Sufism.” He even puts a number on it, saying 80% of India’s Muslims practice Sufi traditions. World Threats 
 The 28 year old Somali who is suspected of the attempted murder of caricaturist Kurt Westergaard, (pictured), worked at a Danish Red Cross center.
Up to the day before the 28 year old Somali MMG went to Aarhus to attack caricaturist Kurt Westergaard he was on watch on a Danish Red Cross center, where he dealt with young unaccompanied immigrants.
The Danish Red Cross confirmed to Jyllands-Posten that MMG was working through a temp employment agency at three Danish Red Cross centers for children and youth.
These are the centers in Gribskov, Sjælsmark and Avnstrup, which house children and youth aged 15-17 who typically come to Denmark as unaccompanied refugees. The Somali worked in keeping the children and youth occupied with the various activities in the centers.
The head of the Danish Red Cross Asylum division, Jørgen Chemnitz, discovered Thursday that the Somali had been employed in the organization.
He says that the Red Cross made sure by the Mano Crew employment agency that he had no criminal record or any problems with a former sexual offense, so he could work with children.
Jørgen Chemnitz says they think they've guarded themselves by requesting the two certificates, and that nobody among the regular staff who had worked with the Somali has anything bad to say against him. Everybody describes him as helpful, friendly and accommodating. They've never seen anything which would indicate that the man did anything against the children and youth in the center. Additionally, they have a principle that a temporary worker can't work along with the children.
According to the Mano Crew agency, the 28 year old Somali worked 600 hours altogether, but they did not say how many of those were for the Red Cross.
Source: JP (Danish)
With thanks to Islam in Europe
 Hot on the heels of the axe attack on Motoonist Kurt Westergaard comes this. The Islamic supremacists are clearly feeling free to act as the wish to in Europe. "Somali threats against Swedish illustrator," from The Local, January 4 Swedish artist Lars Vilks, who sparked outrage with caricatures of the Muslim prophet Muhammad as a dog, has received threats via telephone from Somalia. Police in Helsingborg in southern Sweden are taking seriously the threats made against Vilks, which come just three days after Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard was subjected to an axe attack at his home in Denmark. The first of two phone calls to Vilks came on Monday morning. A subsequent check by the Swedish artist revealed that the call originated in Somalia, where the Islamic militant group al-Shabaab has gained increasing influence in the war torn country. Al-Shabaab is also believed to have ties to al-Qaeda. In the last month, al-Shabaab supporters who reportedly used to live in Denmark have killed at least 22 people, including three ministers, in a suicide bomb attack carried out in the Somali capital of Mogadishu. According to Vilks, the man who threatened him spoke Swedish. "The man, who spoke accented Swedish, asked me if I knew about what happened in Denmark and to the artist Kurt Westergaard. I said I certainly did," Vilks told the Helsingborgs Dagblad newspaper. "The man then explained that they were out after more and that they would soon come for me. I told them they were welcome," said Vilks.... Bravo. No one in the West should allow themselves to be intimidated. I have received so many death threats I have lost count of how many there have been. But I don't care. They can kill me, but I was going to die anyway. They can't make me bow. With thanks to JihadWatch
 Danish media say the man who attacked an artist who depicted the Prophet Muhammad in a cartoon has previously been arrested in Kenya. The Politiken newspaper reported Sunday that Danish intelligence knew the 28-year-old Somali man was held in Kenya in September for allegedly plotting an attack against US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Citing unnamed sources, the newspaper said he was later released due to lack of evidence.
But Denmark's ambassador to Kenya, Bo Jensen, told the news agency Ritzau the man was arrested in Kenya for incomplete travel documents.
He said Kenyan authorities never told the embassy he was suspected in any terror plot. Denmark's PET intelligence agency would not comment. The armed suspect was charged with attempted murder Saturday after breaking into artist Kurt Westergaard's home.
 AN axe-wielding Somali terrorist is behind a foiled attempt to break into the home of a Danish cartoonist whose depictions of Islam's Prophet Mohammed infuriated Muslims. The 28-year-old Somali national armed with an axe and a knife had terrorist intent and was close to the Somali Shebab movement and al-Qaeda, which was responsible for the 9/11 attacks in the United States, the internal security service PET said in a statement. Danish police shot and wounded the man who tried to enter Westergarrd’s home. He was shot in a knee and a hand but his life was not in danger, according to reports. He was expected to be charged with attempted murder of Westergaard and a police officer. It is understood the Somali man had a legal permit to be in Denmark. Kurt Westergaard, who has received several death threats since a Danish newspaper four years ago published his drawing featuring Prophet Mohammed wearing a turban in the shape of a bomb, was at home in Viby near the western city of Aarhus guarded by police when the intruder tried to get in. Prosecutors said a Chicago-based men spent at least a year working with a Pakistan-based terrorist group to plan an attack. The security alarm was set off when the man tried to enter the house before being shot by the guards, the daily Politiken reported online. The intruder, wounded in the arm and leg, was hospitalised. It is unclear whether the Somali man managed to enter the home. “I locked myself in our safe room. He tried to smash the entrance door with an axe,'' Westergaard, 74, who was in the house with a five-year-old grandson, told Danish news agency Ritzau. PET said in a statement: “The attempted murder of cartoonist Kurt Westergaard is linked to terrorism. The person arrested ... has close links with the Somali terrorist organisation al-Shebab as well as with the heads of al-Qaeda in east Africa. “He is also suspected of being implicated in terrorist activities when he was in east Africa. The individual arrested has also been a member of a terrorist network implanted in Denmark that has been under surveillance by PET for a long time.'' Police had earlier reported there were three intruders before saying there was just one. Ritzau said a dozen police vehicles were at the scene while sappers were sent in to look for a bomb that might have been laid. Westergaard is one of 12 cartoonists whose drawings of the Muslim prophet were first published in Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten in September 2005, sparking controversy among Muslims worldwide. The 12 cartoons were considered offensive by many Muslims and their publication sparked violent protests worldwide in January and February 2006. Two men had already been arrested in 2006 for plotting Westergaard's murder. Demonstrators burned Danish flags in protests that culminated in February 2006 with the torching of Danish diplomatic offices in Damascus and Beirut and dozens of deaths in Nigeria, Libya and Pakistan. The Australian
 The Danish cartoonist, who has received several death threats since a Danish newspaper four years ago published his drawing featuring Mohammed wearing a turban in the shape of a bomb, was at home in Viby near the western city of Aarhus when the 27-year-old and two others tried to get in, daily Politiken reported online. Guards repulsed the three intruders as security alarms were set off, and the wounded man was hospitalised. Denmark's Ritzau news agency said a dozen police vehicles were at the scene while sappers were sent in to look for a bomb that might have been laid. Contacted by AFP, Jutland police confirmed an incident near the home of the 74-year-old cartoonist but refused to give details pending the release of a statement later. The 12 cartoons were considered offensive by many Muslims and their publication sparked violent protests worldwide in January and February 2006. Demonstrators burned Danish flags in protests that culminated in February 2006 with the torching of Danish diplomatic offices in Damascus and Beirut and dozens of deaths in Nigeria, Libya and Pakistan. The Australian
 Nearly monthly, new studies and books about the problems with the integration of Muslims in Germany and whole Europe are published. In France, Great Britain and the Netherlands the problems seem to be most obviously, but also in small Denmark. In the aftermath of the Mohammed-cartoon crisis, there have been some changes concerning Muslims in politics and public opinion. The German Review of Books talked to Nicolai Sennels, a psychologist who worked for several years with young criminal Muslims in a Copenhagen prison, about recent developments.
Mr. Sennels, since the publishing of your book “Among Criminal Muslims” in 2008 and our last interview, there have been some changes in the Danish integration policy. For instance, the Danish government just announced a tenfold increase in payments to encourage reverse migration. This is one of your main requests: paying Muslims, who are not willing to integrate, to return to their countries of origin.
It is clear that my book had an influence on the debate. Many politicians quoted my book, and it is clear that the book has contributed to a more free debate in Denmark.
My experiences from extensive travelling throughout our continent, my lectures and of course international media, is, that Denmark is Europe’s tip of the spear when it comes to acknowledging the problems with Islam and Muslim immigration. Parties that talk openly about these problems are growing, and parties that don’t are close to extinction. Even the two biggest left wing parties agree – the Social Democracy Party and Socialistic Peoples Party – that they will not change the strict immigration laws that have been made by the Dansk Folkeparti.
Soon we will probably get a law that will kick immigrants out of Denmark if they block or interfere with police work.
This law is crucial to regain secular control of Muslim-dominated areas. While the prospect of imprisonment does not seem to scare immigrants from committing serious and dangerous crimes, it seems that losing the chance to live in our country is the only thing that really scares them. This is also my own experience from working with criminal Muslims: The one thing they fear is being deported.
Unfortunately, the chiefs of the police are very much holding back their efforts in Muslim areas. They claim that they “do not want to throw gasoline on the fire.” In the short run, this may of course be a reasonable strategy, but it also means that Islamic laws and authorities become more powerful in these areas every day.
My experience from working psychologically with Muslims shows that the Muslim culture does not find it easy to be “equal.” Either you are over or you are under: You can be different and unequal, but you cannot be different and equal. The chiefs of the police and many politicians hope for some kind of “mutual acceptance,” but this is not possible in cultures developed under Islam.
Concerning these no-go-areas, even for the police, and the growing influence of the Islamic clerics, you recently wrote in your blog at Jyllands Posten about Muslim imams as a kind of Fourth Branch of Government.
Imams, Islamic priests, have a strong influence on their followers. For many Muslims the words of an imam are law – and for even more Muslims they are guidelines for lifestyle and political views. The power of Islamic authorities among Muslims is very often much more influential and respected than secular laws and norms.
Representatives for secular authorities are very often attacked in Muslim-dominated areas in Denmark and the rest of Europe. The police and politicians are not safe in these areas.
Police get mocked, receive threats and are often attacked physically when entering Muslim areas. We recently had the tragic yet comical experience of seeing one of our most politically correct politicians, the mayor of integration in Copenhagen, Jakob Hougaard, being attacked by Muslims who tried to stone him and a journalist during an interview in the Muslim ghetto, Tingbjerg.
The ironic thing is that Hougaard is “on their side,” claiming that there are no problems with violence in Tingbjerg and that Islam has nothing to do with terror and integration problems. Hougaard even promised in the Islamic magazine “Akhbar” to sponsor religious Islamic festivals if he got re-elected as mayor at the elections on November 17th, 2009 – which, by the way, he did not win.
Policemen and politicians are not the only ones who are attacked, stoned, etc. Ambulance drivers, firemen and even completely normal people who assist the elderly are also attacked. The problem they have with the people assisting the elderly is apparently that these people wear clothes that bear the logo of the state.
(more)
Source: German Review of Books (English), h/t EuropeNews
With thanks to Islam in Europe
 MUMBAI, India -- The accused gunman in last year's bloody siege of Mumbai retracted his detailed confession Friday, saying police tortured him into admitting his role in the attacks that left 166 people dead. Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, 21, who is being tried in a special court and was photographed carrying an assault rifle during the attack on Mumbai's main train station, told the judge he came to Mumbai as a tourist and was arrested 20 days before the siege began. On the day the attacks started, Mr. Kasab said, police took him from his cell because he resembled one of the gunmen, shot him to make it look like he had been involved in the violence and re-arrested him. Friday's statement was not the first reversal from Mr. Kasab. In February, he told a judge he wanted to attack India in order to free the divided region of Kashmir where Muslim militants are fighting for independence. He later recanted that statement, saying it was obtained under duress. It was unclear what impact Mr. Kasab's statement would have on the case, and the prosecution brushed it off. "All the while, I expected that Mr. Kasab was about to take a U-turn in the case," said Ujjwal Nikam, the prosecutor. "He is a military-trained commando. It's not going to affect our case." In July, Mr. Kasab, who could face the death penalty if convicted, surprised the court when he suddenly confessed, saying he would rather be hanged in this world than face "God's punishment" in the next. In his confession, he spoke of spraying gunfire into the crowd at the train station and described in detail a network of training camps and safe houses across Pakistan, revealing the names of four men he said were his handlers. The photo of Kasab casually walking through the station with his rifle has become the enduring image of the attacks. But Kasab said police tortured him into falsely confessing. The assault 13 months ago lasted nearly three days and paralyzed India's commercial hub. During the attacks, 10 young men armed with assault rifles stormed two luxury hotels, a Jewish center and the train station. Nine of the gunmen were killed, leaving only Mr. Kasab, who was wounded in a shootout with police, authorities said. He told the court Friday he was initially arrested last year after wandering around Mumbai late at night looking for a place to stay, and his Pakistani citizenship aroused suspicion. After he was re-arrested for the Mumbai attack, he said, four white men came to visit him in jail, including David Coleman Headley, who is jailed in Chicago on charges he conspired in the siege. The judge then told Mr. Kasab not to reveal any more details on Headley. Mr. Headley, the 49-year-old son of an American mother and Pakistani father, is also charged with planning to attack a Danish newspaper. WSJ
 Robin Shepherd's Robust Defense of Israel. Why should a secular non-Jew support the Jewish State of Israel? Foreign policy expert, Robin Shepherd convincingly answers this and related questions in his important new book, A State Beyond the Pale: Europe's Problem With Israel. Shepherd is a non-Jew whose defense of Israel led to his dismissal from a prominent British policy institute. But despite this set back he continues to be a vigorous defender of the Jewish State. Shepherd is an effective advocate because he is not a knee-jerk Zionist ideologue.
In Beyond the Pale he explores why European elites have turned from advocates for Israel to vociferous critics. His analysis is based on facts, not emotions, and he counters their bias with rational reasoning. Shepherd understands that Europe's turn against Israel is part of Europe's turn against itself.
Europe no longer believes in its own values so why should we expect it to come to the defense of Israel, the West's outpost in the Middle East? Europe is allowing foreign cultures to profoundly change its own societies. Europe refuses to defend its own values as it bends over backward to accommodate the most outrageous demands of its Muslim immigrants. If, for example, Europe had any strong beliefs in its Western values would it have made excuses for the violent reactions to the Mohammad cartoons?
Would Europe be creating systems of Sharia finance that compete with its established financial systems? Would Europe be ostracizing Israel (the latest being the labeling of West Bank products being sold in the UK) while tolerating the inhuman actions of Iran's dictatorial regime? Why does Europe side with terrorists who attack innocent Israeli civilians? Europe's identity crisis (and a tinge of anti-Semitism) coupled with its belief that international institutions like the United Nations can solve all the world's conflicts are major influences on Europe's policy toward Israel. For the Europeans, negotiations are central to relations among adversaries. They are not shaken from this belief by adversaries (like Iran and North Korea) who use negotiations to buy time not to come to mutually beneficial agreements. Shepherd's reasoning is impeccable and his writing is wonderful. This is not a dull intellectual tome. It is a pleasurable and an important read. Every friend of Israel will benefit for buying and reading A State Beyond The Pale. One Jerusalem
 Swiss magazine Die Weltwoche reports on an a study of Swiss imams.
Switzerland has about 200 mosques, but nobody really knows what is preached in them.
Neither does the government, who investigated the issue. The study was presented to the parliamentary security committee. The media asked for it to be published, but the government classified it as confidential. The Federal Council says that it's not being published since it doesn't include anything which hasn't been dealt with in the media before.
The 17 page study "Islamist Imams", is dated from Jan. 29, 2008. It apparently contains several controversial findings.
The study begins by saying that most Muslims can practice their faith while following the constitution. Religion is rarely the main reason for integration problems.
A minority of imams, however, preach radically, in a way which prevents the integration of Muslims. At least 8 imams in a dozen mosques preach a radical interpretation of Islam. These mosques are located in the cantons of Geneva, Neuenburg (2), Vaud (2), Valais, Bern, Basel (2), Lucerne and Zurich (2). These mosques are mostly Arab mosques, and seven of the eight imams are North Africans. This corresponds to the known pattern that most of the Islamist activists in Switzerland are Arabs.
It's possible that these eight imams are just the tip of the iceberg, since there is a shortage of data and resources. The report says that it isn't possible to know how many imams carry on extremist and violent propaganda, or in how many mosques such an Islamist vision is being preached. The reason is legal barriers for intelligence gathering and lack of specific studies.
The report notes that the DAP, the Swiss Security Service, has no concrete information about preaching ongoing in the 200 Swiss mosques. There is only one exception: an imam in the Canton of Bern (apparently in Biel), who 'voluntarily' handed in to the authorities eight of his sermons made in 2000 to 2004.
The imam, who preaches a Wahhabi interpretation of Islam, supports suicide attacks in the occupied areas of the Muslim world. He also says regularly that Jihadists in these regions should be encouraged and asked his flock for financial support for Jihadists.
According to the report, the sermons were usually explosive. He preached about the eternal irreconcilability between the Christian 'crusaders' and the Muslims. The imam told his listeners that violent Jihad against non-Muslims could also be practiced in the West, once converts to Islam will achieve a critical mass.
Quoting the Koran, the imam taught that Muslims were called for violence against Christians and Jews to get them to submit to Islamic domination. The Muslims were urged not to submit to a non-Islamic secular order. It was necessary to champion violent Jihad in order to establish an Islamic state in the Arab world and to re-establish the Caliphate. The preacher called specifically for violent Jihad against the Crusaders in the Arab world, particularly in Iraq. The moderate Muslims were branded the 'worst enemies of Islam'.
This imam was also one of the organizers of the protest against the Danish Mohammed cartoons, which took place on Feb. 2006 in the Bundesplatz. About 600 people attended, almost all Arabs, and a few dozen Salafists, according to the report.
The hate preaching of the imams has an effect. A young Tunisian, who was radicalized under the influence of the imam, went to Syria in 2005 and then to Iraq to join the Jihad. In Iraq he joined the 'martyr's brigade', fighting for the local al-Qaeda. Apparently the Tunisian from the Bern mosque couldn't achieve his wish for an act of martyrdom, and he was killed by the coalition forces in April 2006.
In addition to the imam from Biel, the report mentions other examples of hate preachers. In the mosque of Kriens, a Libyan with a permanent residence permit incites his followers to violence. The report says that it's said that he calls the Swiss apes and infidel pigs and supports their extermination. While the report was being written the man was still active in calling for violence in occupied Muslim areas, whether perceived or real.
The information about the Kriens imam is based on 'hearsay'. Which indicates a basic problem for Swiss intelligence: by law their work ends at the door to the mosque. The Muslim mosques are considered private areas, and the intelligence services have their hands tied. They cannot tape the sermons, neither video nor audio. In order to know what is being taught in the mosques, the intelligence services need a person who is continuously in the mosque, who knows the language and who memorizes the sermons.
Once an imam is identified as a hate preacher, there are means to confront him, which are described in the report as 'adequate'. These only apply if the imam is officially registered in Switzerland. For 'unofficial' imams, who come to Switzerland for a limited amount of time and then move on, the available resources to confront them are 'limited'.
The report suggests several ways to deal with the phenomenon of Islamist imams. The Federal Office for Migration was commissioned to check the possibility by the end of 2008 of a Swiss university project to study the number, original and theological bent of official Swiss imams. The Justice Ministry was asked to submit proposals by mid-2009, on how to better control the entry of hate preachers. And the Ministry of Internal Affairs was asked to develop imam training following the example of other European countries.
When Weltwoche tried to check on whether these proposals were followed, they got the run-around.
An attempt to change the law and allow for intelligence gathering in the private space did not pass parliament.
Source: Weltwoche (German), h/t PI Thanks to Islam in Europe
 Terror suspect David Headley was questioned by an airport inspector in August and deceptive answers about his travels abroad helped officials begin to unravel Mr. Headley's alleged double life. The 49-year-old Chicago man was charged this week for helping plot the terror attack in Mumbai a year ago that killed 166 people. Federal authorities, already suspicious of him, used his return to the U.S. this summer as an opportunity, according to officials.
A border inspector asked Mr. Headley about his overseas travel, according to court records and people familiar with the case. Mr. Headley said he was working for a company called First World Immigration Service. First World is a business that allegedly provided Mr. Headley with cover as he traveled to scout terrorist targets for Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group responsible for the November 2008 assault in Mumbai, according to the federal charges. Agents searched Mr. Headley's luggage and found it "contained no papers or other documents relating to such a business," according to court documents. They also searched tax records and found no record of income paid to Mr. Headley by the company, court records show. U.S. officials said Tuesday the questioning at the airport gave a significant boost to the investigation. Mr. Headley was returning to the U.S. from a trip to Denmark in which he was scouting potential targets, authorities alleged. He is also being charged with planning an armed assault on a Danish newspaper that published cartoons of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad. Authorities said little more about the airport interview, including where it happened or why they had become suspicious of Mr. Headley. But court records showed that federal surveillance of Mr. Headley, who is an American, accelerated afterward. Mr. Headley's case is the most potent example of a U.S. born radical. Law enforcement and terrorism specialists said Lashkar's alleged deployment of Mr. Headley underscored the usefulness of recruits with U.S. passports in terror plots. Mr. Headley traveled to India and Pakistan over nearly two years to videotape targets and brief his co-conspirators in the Mumbai attacks, according to the federal charges. Westerners have largely played supporting roles in terror activities, but Mr. Headley's ability to travel freely on a U.S. passport to Pakistan, India and Denmark gave him high value, a U.S. law enforcement official said. "It's exactly the way you'd think al Qaeda would want to use operatives," said Evan Kohlmann, who has testified on Lashkar as an expert witness in U.S. and British courts. More at WSJ
 A CHICAGO man already accused of plotting to kill employees of a Danish newspaper was today charged with taking part in the planning of the 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai, the US Department of Justice (DoJ) said. David Coleman Headley conducted extensive surveillance of targets in Mumbai for more than two years preceding the attack on India's largest city that killed about 170 people, the DoJ said in a statement. Mr Headley, 49, was charged with six counts of conspiracy to bomb public places in India, to murder and maim persons in India and Denmark, to provide material support to foreign terrorist plots, and to provide material support to Pakistani-based terror organization Lashkar-e-Taiba. He was also charged on six counts of aiding and abetting the murder of US citizens in India. Mr Headley is the first American to be charged. In October, Mr Headley and Tahawwur Hussain Rana, 48, were alleged to have been involved in a plot they codenamed the “Mickey Mouse Project” to attack facilities and employees of Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten, a Danish newspaper that offended many Muslims with its Mohammed cartoons.
 By Kenneth Roberts [Part One] Both Sunnis and Shi’ites believe in the use of sacred violence. The right to coerce the infidels and subdue them was given by Allah to Mohammed as owner of the earth. Theologically, mocking Mohammed’s method of controlling the infidels is blasphemy, for the violent method of Mohammed comes directly from Allah.
Allah’s method trumps human logic, even the Western ideal of free speech that is based on mere human philosophy and mere human reasoning, rather than Allah’s Divine Command.
In mere human philosophy, Mohammed’s fitna-prevention method is built on a fallacy of logic called the Appeal to Force in place of logical argument. But this fallacious argument is the main argument of the Koran. Muslims know that the Koranic argument for violence against the infidels takes up 2/3 of the Koran and they further know that the Koranic argument cannot be wrong, for it comes directly from Allah and Allah is not a liar. Mohammed’s method for eliminating fitna is jihad and all Muslims should freely use Mohammed’s method, since Mohammed is their role model. This is what Muslims did in the Danish cartoon riots.
It is also what motivated Dr. Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood on November 5, 2009. Normally, Muslims will not kill infidels for merely thinking non-Islamic thoughts. After all, who knows what another person is thinking, even one’s own spouse? Sacred violence is authorized when open disagreement with Mohammed is expressed in the public domain, as with a cartoon or an anti-Islamic book. It need not be the guilty person who is punished, so we can never be sure of the physical safety of any infidels, since throughout history, jihads have often included mass slaughters and genocides of men, women and children. Mohammed approved of such indiscriminate killing of unbelievers on occasion, if it was convenient for him. During a night-time sneak attack on a town, Mohammed was asked about his customary method of sparing women and children (so that they could be sources of revenue as slaves). According to the Hadith by Abu Muslim 19:4322 , Mohammed responded, “They are of them.” In other words, the women and children are accomplices in the fitna of the defending males. And besides, it was inconvenient to attack and carry lanterns to check everything that moves in the dark. Here Mohammed authorized wholesale slaughter of an entire community. The justification for this was the political charge of fitna. So no infidel is ever innocent of fitna, a capital crime. Such logic was used by Major Nidal Hasan when he committed a wholesale slaughter http://www.faithfreedom.org/islam/islamic-mind-major-nidal-hasan of 13 unarmed American soldiers: …the American army opposes Mohammed’s method…it is guilty of fitna…and the 13 slaughtered soldiers ‘are of them.’
This made Dr. Hasan a hero to the former mullah of his mosque, because he executed the enemies of Mohammed using deceit and surprise, just like Mohammed did. Mohammed frequently executed unarmed prisoners of war. Dr. Hasan is a rational, pious Muslim. His ideas agree with the official scholarly concensus of normative Islam. Mohammed’s brilliant method of ruthless assassination silences fitna by paralyzing the brain with fear. Mohammed’s method may not be judged by any external standard, because his method is itself the standard. Forget the obvious ethical flexibility or opportunism. Mohammed’s method takes a position above human logic, ethical analysis and philosophical discourse. To analyze Mohammed’s ethical inconsistencies is fitna. Today, Islamic governments are seeking new ways to control fitna beyond their borders. Kafir fitna is temptation or luring that tempts Muslims to question or lose their faith. Kafirs commit fitna every time they disagree with Sharia law in the public domain, when they mock Mohammed’s violent method in cartoons or use reason or logic on the Internet to show Mohammed is wrong. Such politically incorrect utterance keeps the Islamic state from insuring all information supports the unity and power of that State and its jihadist army. Information control is normative Islam and is fully acceptable to all pious Muslims, since it prevents fitna, the ultimate crime. Modern Muslims agree that fitna should be removed from human society through censorship of discourse that disagrees with Islam, even in the Human Rights Council of the United Nations. By removing the right to disagree with Islam at the UN, Muslim governments hope to implement global information control. Politically, this will allow Islamic governments to totally ignore all human rights complaints by claiming Muslims have a unique human right: the right of not hearing any criticism. When governments of the Islamic Conference say they wish to remove utterances that criticizes Islam, they actually mean ‘fitna’…public disagreement with Mohammed. Islamic governments know fitna control is needed before discriminatory Sharia law can be fully implemented and jihad can go ahead. They seek to shut down the freedom of UN diplomats to discuss any human rights aspect of Islam. They cast a veil over Islamic discrimination against women and minorities in view of the radical claim that Muslims have a superior, unique human right which infidels do not possess. More at WesternFront
 By Kenneth Roberts Why do cartoons constitute a capital crime in Islam? Why did writing ‘The Satanic Verses’ bring a death sentence and bounty upon Sir Salman Rushdie? Why does a military psychiatrist fire more than 100 rounds into an unarmed crowd he was trained to heal? Why do Muslims express violent anger concerning differences of religious opinion? The one-word answer to these questions is ‘FITNA‘. Fitna is one of the most important concepts in Islam, but it is a totally alien concept to Western philosophy. The concept of fitna totally abnegates our notions of free expression or logical discourse.
The concept of fitna subjugates all thought to the method of Mohammed. Fitna is spotted by the mullahs who also pick the Islamic response to it. In response to the Danish cartoons, they instructed Muslims to riot. Grand Imam Sayyed Tantawi, the paramount authority in Islam, demanded the closing of Jyllands Posten to prevent further fitna. Muslims studiously avoid the word fitna when talking to infidels. What is fitna then? The definition is surprisingly simple: Fitna is any disagreement with Mohammed. More precisely, Fitna is any islamicly-incorrect thought which is communicated to others in the public domain. This definition fits all the confusing facts and makes sense of all the Islamic dualisms. Fitna is a thought crime. Fitna is a dualistic cocktail of blasphemy and treason. As with almost everything in Islam, fitna is very hard to explain, because it is couched in Islamic dualism. Even Muslims have trouble explaining it, but they can identify it when they see it. And when they see it, they react violently. There are two distinctly different classes of fitna: inter-Islamic fitna and infidel fitna. In relation to the evil infidels, fitna means ‘tempting’, ‘enticing’ or ‘luring’ another to disagree with Mohammed. Fitna comes from an old Arabic word that means removing the dross from pure metal. Pure Islam is held in check by fitna, so it must be purged. In modern Islamic usage, fitna is used to describe ideas that cause controversy, testing, fragmentation, scandal, chaos, or discord, disturbing social peace and order within the Muslim community, …such things as openly disagreeing with the head of state of Egypt or Iran or with something found in Sharia law. When a professor at an Arab university quotes original research on the primary sources of Islam, he is immediately accused of fitna and his life is simultaneously threatened. Inter-Islamic fitna is what most Muslims understand when they think of the word ‘fitna’. Muslims cast a veil over ‘kafir fitna’…the politically incorrect free speech of wicked infidels that justifies jihad and brings Allah’s just punishment upon them. Mohammed discovered a brilliant way to criminalize differences of opinion with himself. He called his invention ‘fitna’ and made it the worst crime in his new religion. Any utterance that tests Mohammed’s method is a chargeable offence and a capital crime if it persists. The religious charge of blasphemy veils the serious political charge of treason against Mohammed. Mohammed is Allah’s vice-regent on earth. Not only does Mohammed define the truth, but he has a right to punish those who disagree. Moreover, Mohammed is both the constitution and the Islamic state. By disagreeing with Mohammed, you are calling him wrong, in error or worse yet a liar. That is slander and character assassination, but it is also the crime of treason against the Islamic Nation. The Koran likes to say infidels are accusing Mohammed of being a liar, since that sounds more dramatic and culpable. The Koran commands the punishment of fitna after making it sound reprehensible. Anyone disagreeing with Mohammed in any way has become an enemy of the state who should be treated severely and with violence. Private disagreements with Mohammed are acceptable, as long as they do not reach the eyes or ears of Muslims. However, public disagreement demands public Islamic punishment. ‘Punishment’ euphemistically means the death penalty, normatively by beheading. More at WesternFront
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The face-covering burqa and niqab veils worn by some Muslim women have no place in Denmark, Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen says, adding his government was considering restricting them.
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