150 bodies found in wells at Nigeria

AT least 150 bodies have been recovered from wells following Muslim-Christian clashes in central Nigeria.

The estimated death toll from the clashes already stands at more than 300, a village head and volunteers say.

"So far we have picked 150 bodies from the wells. But 60 more people are still missing,'' Umar Baza, head of Kuru Karama village near the city of Jos, said today.

"We took an inventory of the displaced people from this village, sheltering in three camps, and we realise that 60 people can still not be accounted for,'' he added.

Head of the Muslim volunteer team in the village, Mohammed Shittu, said further searches would be carried out today.

"Now we have 150 bodies in all, taken from the wells as from Thursday. We are still going back there today to comb the bush around the village to search for more bodies,'' he also said.

"From the account of survivors, some people fleeing attacks were ambushed and killed in the bush. That is why we are going there to search for more bodies.

"We believe there are more bodies in the wells but the degree of their decomposition makes it difficult to continue the retrieval operation. We have therefore decided to sand-fill all the wells,'' Baza said.

The state government has given no official death toll for the violence, which broke out last Sunday in Jos, capital of Plateau State and later spread to nearby towns and villages.

Religious leaders and medical workers said they had counted about 300 bodies by Wednesday.

Global rights watchdog Human Rights Watch (HRW) today urged Vice President Goodluck Jonathan to order "an immediate criminal investigation into credible reports of a massacre of at least 150 Muslim residents of a town in central Nigeria''.

HRW said in a statement received in Lagos that witnesses said groups of armed men - believed to be Christians - attacked the largely Muslim population of Kuru Karama on Tuesday morning.

"After surrounding the town, they hunted down and attacked Muslim residents, some of whom had sought refuge in homes and a local mosque, killing many as they tried to flee and burning many others alive,'' the statement said.

The Australian

Andrew Bolt: Mahathir: Jews “had to be periodically massacred”

This Jew-hating, terrorist-excusing conspiracy theorist was actually the elected leader of Malaysia - and spoke at a Muslim gathering where he expected his views to win support:

Malaysia’s former premier Mahathir Mohamad said on Wednesday there was “strong evidence” the US faked the September 11 terror attacks as an excuse to go to war against Muslims.

“There is strong evidence that the attacks were staged. If they can make Avatar, they can make anything,’ Mahathir told the Conference for the Support of Al-Quds (Jerusalem), as quoted by local media.

The former premier also blamed Jews for hindering progress in US foreign policy. Voicing his disappointment that Barack Obama had not yet ended the war in Afghanistan or closed the US terror detention center at Guantanamo, he explained that “there are forces in the United States which prevent the president from doing some things. One of the forces is the Jewish lobby.”

Jews “had always been a problem in European countries. They had to be confined to ghettoes and periodically massacred. But still they remained, they thrived and they held whole governments to ransom,” Mahathir said.

“Even after their massacre by the Nazis of Germany, they survived to continue to be a source of even greater problems for the world.”

Here’s the frightening question: For how many Muslims does Mahathir speak?

And perhaps we should for once ask to what extent this man’s disgraceful bigotry and victimology is driven by Islam rather than seek again to blame ourselves for his vileness, as in this recent effort, reported in The Age:

Malaysia’s relationship with Canberra was at best prickly and diplomats could not understand why Dr Mahathir held such a jaundiced view. Barry Wain, an Australian journalist who has observed Dr Mahathir for 37 years, provides some of the answers to the mystery.

In 1969 Dr Mahathir, a first-term politician and a rising political star, was invited on an all-expenses-paid trip to Australia as a guest of the Foreign Ministry in Canberra. But he lost his seat in an election that year and a few days before he was due to depart the Australians asked him to postpone the trip....

Two years later Dr Mahathir accepted an Australian Government offer to visit Canberra after attending a seminar at his own expense at Monash University, only to find the hospitality in the capital as bleak as the weather. In his book, Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times, Wain maintains Dr Mahathir never forgot how he was treated all those years ago.

So does cold hospitality in Canberra also explain why Mahathir believes Jews “had to be confined to ghettoes and periodically massacred”?

Or has some faith or ideology pushed him to that conclusion?

Andrew Bolt

Nigerians displaced after clashes

Up to 18,000 people are homeless after days of fighting between Christians and Muslims in the Nigerian city of Jos.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said that people have been sheltering in colleges, hospitals and schools since clashes began in the capital of the central Plateau state on Sunday.

More than 460 people in and around Jos are thought to have been killed as of Thursday.

Nigerian authorities relaxed a 24-hour curfew to allow thousands of residents whose houses have not been destroyed, to return home.

The strong presence of troops and police helped restore a measure of calm in Jos on Thursday.

But Andrew Simmons, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Abuja, said: "There has been a fresh outbreak of violence on the outskirts of Jos in a place called Bakuru.

"Six people have been treated for gunshot wounds. And a Red Cross [ICRC] official has confirmed that a woman was attacked by a gang who snatched her baby, twisted the baby's nose and broke it.

"We've had persistent reports saying gangs have been using police uniforms, knocking on door by door, masquerading as security forces and then killing people in their homes. It's a grim situation.

"But in Jos itself, the focus [on Thursday] was on the funerals of the hundreds of people who have been killed."

Earlier, Rob Waudo, from the ICRC in Kano, told Al Jazeera that since the military came in, the situation has been calm.

"[The arrival of soldiers] has allowed us to survey what the needs are. Many people have been able to leave the camps and return home," he said.

"There are so many people that need clothing, food and water. The Red Cross is focusing on those injured and referring some to hospital."

Mosque officials have estimated the number of dead Muslims since Sunday to be about 400.

US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Wednesday said at least 65 Christians had died.

Official government figures were significantly lower at 75 dead, more than 200 injured and 200 arrested.

HRW called for the Nigerian military to show restraint as additional soldiers were ordered onto the streets of Jos.

"Nigeria should ensure that its security forces use restraint and comply with international standards on the use of force in responding to the latest deadly outbreak of inter-communal violence," HRW said.

Charles Dokubo, from the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, told Al Jazeera: "There is more than the religious aspect of it. There are two communities - one that call themselves settlers and one that call themselves indigenous communities.

"The crisis in the north started with the creation a local government."

Dokubo said Muslim settlers wanted to manage the government, which was unacceptable to the indigenous Christian community who regard the former as non-citizens.

"The main cause of the crisis is about administration and the place where people belong," he said.

The fighting erupted on Sunday in a Christian area due to a dispute over the building of a mosque, residents said.

Jos, which is home to 500,000 people, along with other central and northern areas in Nigeria have been plagued by religious violence in recent years.

In November 2008, hundreds of people were killed in Jos in two days of fighting triggered by a rumour that the mainly Muslim All Nigerian Peoples Party had lost a local election to the Christian-dominated People's Democratic Party.

Al Jazeera

Arrests over Malaysia attacks

Police in Malaysia have arrested eight men they said were believed to have been involved in the firebombing of a Christian church earlier this month.

There have been at least 12 attempted attacks on religious institutions since a court verdict on New Year's Eve allowed non-Muslims to use the word "Allah" when referring to God.

The ensuing protests and violence have heightened religious tensions in the Muslim-majority nation.

Bakri Zinin, Malaysia's federal criminal investigation chief said police were investigating whether the eight arrested were also linked to the attacks on 10 other churches, which had been pelted with Molotov cocktails, stones and paint.

"Eight people have been arrested and they are believed to be involved in the arson attack on the [Metro Tabernacle] church. They have been remanded for seven days to facilitate investigations," he told reporters on Wednesday.

"We will investigate whether they are also linked to other cases [but] we believe we have solved this case. So please I advise the public, don't do something that will threaten racial and religious harmony."

The three-storey Metro Tabernacle church in Kuala Lumpur was set ablaze on January 8 in a firebombing that left its ground floor destroyed.

Church leaders said witnesses saw four people ride up to the building on motorbikes, smash the church's windows and throw objects into the building.

Bakri said the first of the eight to be arrested was detained on Tuesday after seeking hospital treatment for burns on his hands and chest.

The group were all aged between 21 and 26, and included three relatives - two siblings and their uncle. The remainder were friends of the family group.

Last month, the High Court ruled in favour of the Catholic Herald newspaper which has used "Allah" as a translation for "God" in its Malay-language section.

Malaysia's government has said the word should be used only by Muslims.

The court's final ruling on the issue was suspended pending an appeal, after the government argued the decision could cause racial conflict.

Malaysia's population is 60 per cent Muslim ethnic Malay, but also includes indigenous tribes as well as the large ethnic Chinese and Indian communities that practice Buddhism, Christianity and Hinduism, among other faiths.

More than half of Malaysia's Catholics are from indigenous groups, most of whom live in the Borneo island states and who mainly speak Malay.

Al Jazeera

Clashes near Nigerian city of Jos

Sporadic violence has countinued around the central Nigerian city of Jos after four days of fighting between groups of Christians and Muslims.

A 24-hour curfew was in place in the city on Wednesday but gunfire could be heard in neighbouring areas in Plateau state.

"The fighting has stopped in Jos, but we can hear gunshots in other communities in the outskirts of the city," Muhammad Tanko Shittu, a senior mosque official organising mass burials, said.

More than 150 citizens have died in the fighting, according to a mosque official, and streets have been left deserted and businesses closed.

"We are expecting more corpses to be brought in from surrounding communities later today," Shittu said.

The government said that only 20 people had been killed in the fighting, with 40 more injured, while leaders of both sides said nearly 300 people have died.

Human Rights Watch (HRW), the international rights watchdog, called for the Nigerian military to show restraint as the government ordered additional soldiers onto the streets of Jos, the state capital, to keep control.

"Nigeria should ensure that its security forces use restraint and comply with international standards on the use of force in responding to the latest deadly outbreak of inter-communal violence," HRW said.

Charles Dokubo, from the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, told Al Jazeera: "There is more than the religious aspect of it. There are two communities - one that call themselves settlers and one that call themselves indigenous communities.

"The crisis in the north started with the creation a local government."

Dokubo said that Muslim settlers were to manage the government, which was unacceptable to the indigenous Christian community who consider them non-citizens.

"The main cause of the crisis is about administration and the place where people belong."

Dokubo said that disputes over jobs may also be contributing to tensions between the two groups, with indigenous peoples' fears that settlers in government would give jobs only to other settlers.

The fighting erupted on Sunday in a Christian area due to a dispute over the building of a mosque, residents said.

Jos, which is home to 500,000 people, along with other central and northern areas in Nigeria have been plagued by religious violence in recent years.

In November 2008, hundreds of people were killed in Jos in two days of fighting triggered by a rumour that the mainly Muslim All Nigerian Peoples Party had lost a local election to the Christian dominated Peoples Democratic Party.

Nigeria has roughly equal numbers of Christians and Muslims, although traditional animist beliefs underpin many people's faiths.

More than 200 ethnic groups generally live peacefully side by side in the West African country, although one million people were killed in a civil war between 1967 and 1970 and there have been outbreaks of religious unrest since then.

Al Jazeera

In the name of Allah, Malaysia's conservatives cling to power

Richard Lloyd Parry

The church attacks reflect deep and long-running tensions in Malaysia.

It seemed to come out of nowhere, it ran its course within a fortnight, and the damage inflicted was mild compared with religious conflicts in other parts of the world.

But this month’s attacks on churches in Malaysia, which petered out last week leaving one gutted by fire and nine others vandalised, is a sinister development, a portent of great changes afoot in what used to be one of South East Asia’s most stable and peaceful democracies.

On the face of it, the attacks were provoked by a simmering and – to many outsiders – absurd controversy about the use of the word Allah. But below that, they suggest deep and long-running tensions in a country which has successfully bottled them up for 40 years.

The row – over whether Christians should have the right to use the word Allah to refer to their own God in Malaysian-language Bibles and liturgy – is just the latest in a series of manifestations of a rising current of conservative Islam.

In other incidents last year, a 32-year old mother was convicted for drinking a can of beer, and Muslim demonstrators outraged Hindu opinion by marching with the head of a dead cow, an animal sacred to Hinduism, to oppose the construction of a proposed temple.

But these in their turn are symptoms of deeper fissures in Malaysian society which are not religious so much as ethnic.

Malaysia’s success since its independence from Britain in 1963 has been to neutralise the rivalry and mutual dislike between its small majority of Malays (who by law are Muslim) and its Chinese and Indian minorities (who are Christian, Buddhist, Hindu and Sikh). Relations between Malays and Chinese, in particular, have been marked over the years by outbreaks of mutual antipathy rooted in racial dislike which in Malaysia’s neighbour Indonesia have intermittently erupted into deadly violence.

In the Chinese racist stereotype, Malays are lazy, stupid, uneducated, unhygienic and feckless. The equivalent Malay view sees Chinese as clannish, patronising, greedy, dishonest and opportunistic. In May 1969, these resentments boiled over in race riots which killed scores, and perhaps hundreds, of people in Malaysia.

The Government’s response was to establish the New Economic Policy, based upon a system of positive discrimination for Malays, who were given favourable access to education, and to business and property subsidies. For years, the resentment among the minorities of such official discrimination was offset by an understanding that it was also a guarantee of long-term racial harmony.

The racial character of Malaysian politics was engraved in the name of its rulers. The Barisan Nasional (National Front) coalition, which has held power since independence, is a coalition of parties based upon ethnic identity – one Indian, one Chinese, and, dominating all of them, the United Malay National Organisation (Umno).

But in the past ten years, the racial texture of Malaysian life and society has altered, and politics is struggling to keep up. Better educated, better off, and increasingly cosmopolitan, young Malaysians of all backgrounds are less prone to identify themselves purely in racial terms.

Opposition parties have been successful campaigning on an inclusive, non-racial platform. After making huge gains in the last general election in 2008, they are now in a position to drive the Barisan Nasional out of power at the next.

The result has been confusion among Umno and its partners. Since the retirement of Mahathir Mohamad, the towering figure in Malaysian politics since the 1970s, the party has lacked a convincing leader.

Umno is not essentially a party of fundamentalist Islam, but as its racial base erodes it has – inconsistently and without much strategic planning – attempted to curry favour with ultra-conservative Muslims in the hope that religion may fill the ideological gap left by Malay nationalism.

A shrewder leader, such as Dr Mahathir, would not have let the Allah row – a ridiculous dispute over a word used without comment by Christians in countries such as Indonesia and Syria – assume the dimensions which it has.

But his successor as Prime Minister, Najib Razak, has stoked it. When a court ruled on December 31 that the ban on the use of Allah by Christians was unconstitutional, he had an opportunity to drop the whole thing.

Instead, his Government appealed against the decision, and the attacks followed. The police have made no arrests. The physical damage which the attacks have caused may have been minimal. But the damage to the cause of racial harmony in Malaysia is impossible to calculate.

Times Online

Dozens die in Nigeria clashes

Troops are patrolling the northern Nigerian city of Jos after clashes between Christians and Muslims left at least 26 people dead and injured around 100 more, officials said.

Violence erupted on Sunday over the rebuilding of homes destroyed in 2008 clashes between the two religious groups, residents said, although reports as to why the latest round of fighting broke out varied.

According to the Associated Press, Muslim youths set fire to a church filled with worshippers, starting a riot that saw mosques and homes burnt.

But the AFP news agency said the unrest was sparked by youths protesting the building of a mosque in a predominantly Christian area.

Police said on Monday that the situation was under control and an evening curfew was in place.

"Security personnel have succeeded in quelling the unrest and restoring calm in the affected area of the city," Mohammed Lerema, Plateau State police spokesman, told AFP.

"We have cordoned the Nassarawa Gwom district as a strategy to prevent the violence from spilling over to other parts of the city," he said.

Jos, capital of Plateau state and home to 500,000 people, along with other central and northern areas in Nigeria have been plagued by religious violence in recent years.

In November 2008, hundreds of people were killed in Jos in two days of fighting triggered by a rumour that the mainly Muslim All Nigerian Peoples Party had lost a local election to the Christian dominated Peoples Democratic Party.

State officials put the death toll at about 200 but other sources gave a toll twice that figure.

Last month, at least 40 people were killed in clashes between security forces and members of an Islamist sect in the northern Bauchi State.

Nigeria has roughly the same number of Christians and Muslims, although traditional animist beliefs underpin many people's faiths.

Al Jazeera

Massachusetts college alters policy banning face coverings

A Massachusetts college has modified a controversial security policy after criticism it infringed on the religious rights of students, a school official said Friday.

The policy originally banned any head covering that obscured the student's face while engaged in student activities.

The Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences e-mailed students about the initial changes this week, saying, "Any head covering that obscures a student's face may not be worn, either on campus or at clinical sites, except when required for medical reasons."

School officials said the policy was intended to ensure that all students would be identifiable "for reasons of safety and security."

But on Thursday, the policy was changed to include an exception "for medical and/or religious reasons."

The original policy had prompted questions and concerns among Muslim students and organizations, particularly because it meant Muslim women at the college could no longer wear the niqab, or face veil.

The college -- with campuses in Boston and Worcester, Massachusetts, as well as Manchester, New Hampshire -- stated that the initial modification was "based on a constructive dialogue with our extended community, and an intensive review of safety and security measures with advisors."

College spokesman Michael Ratty said, "We will achieve our objective of campus security while allowing for a medical and/or religious accommodation. As always, our primary concern is the security and safety of all our students, faculty and staff."

Ratty stressed that Muslims were involved in the original policy decision saying, "Prior to implementation, the college discussed it with several officials within the Muslim community."

Muslim students had mixed reactions to the original ban.

Aisha Bajwa, president of the Muslim Students Association at the college, called the unmodified policy "unjustified and unconstitutional."

Bajwa, who does not wear the niqab, said that having to wear student IDs at all times keeps students safe.

Ibrahim Hooper, communications director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, thinks the policy targeted Muslim students and filed a third-party complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Writing to the commission, the Council invoked Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employers from discriminating based on religion.

Hooper acknowledged that the college's policy focuses on students but said it will inevitably target Muslim employees in the future.

After the complaint, George Humphrey, the vice president for College Relations, e-mailed Hooper, announcing the new policy.

"We have reviewed our ID policy and made an accommodation for religious reasons," the e-mail said. "Thank you for your input on this matter."

Hooper then stated, "We are pleased that the religious rights of all students and staff will now be protected. This is a victory for religious freedom and tolerance."

Ratty said, "The complaint was not the sole reason for the reversal but rather an ongoing discussion this week with our community."

Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum, supported the original policy.

Though Pipes acknowledged the larger cultural debate, he said the college is focusing on security.

"I have documented dozens and dozens of cases about criminality and terrorism that have been abetted by burqas and niqabs," he said. "It is sensible to ban these, and there are a number of these bans in institutions such as banks or jewelry stores."

With increasing concern about terrorist attacks, religious practices will have to be weighed against security, Pipes said.

"In Turkey, the hijab has been banned from government offices, so this is not something that is just an American concern," he added.

CNN

The Faulty Strategy of Muslims

By Khalid Zaheer

I find myself in a state of mind in these troubling times which is different from that of many otherwise likeminded Muslim brothers and sisters. I want to therefore state my mind:

I find many Muslim brothers spending a good part of their time accusing the US, the UK, Israel, and India of inflicting atrocities on Muslims and displaying double standards while dealing with Muslims. It is also quite often mentioned that there is a grand, global conspiracy against Islam and Muslims that is at the heart of whatever is happening in our times.

Although some of these allegations could be partly true, I find the activities of these brothers not only a futile exercise, but also one which is proving to be counter-productive. The reasons for my opinion are many: i) The addressees of these criticisms aren’t even listening to us. ii) Muslims are getting a false impression that there was nothing seriously wrong with them; all their woes owed themselves to the grand conspiracy of the western and some sinister eastern powers. The result is that Muslims are not doing at all what they needed to do the most during these times: to reform themselves morally and spiritually. iii) As a result of the strong criticism against the west, there is an east-west or Islam-kufr divide created which is highly inimical for the task of effectively disseminating the true message of Islam. iv) A false impression is being created that this world is being run not by God but by the US and its allies. Because had we believed that God was running the affairs of this world, instead of living with the negative mindset that has plagued many Muslims struggling to regain the lost glory of Islam, they would have focused on correcting themselves and believed in the Quranic message: “They plotted a plan (against the prophet) and Allah also designed a plan. And Allah is the best planner.” v) As a result of the emotional rhetoric of some Muslims, some others have taken up arms to undertake ‘Jihad’ against ‘Kufr’, thus causing not only hundreds and thousands of innocent lives to be lost but also tarnishing the good name of Islam. By indulging in this completely unnecessary war against the west, we are losing our innocent lives, military strength, and most importantly, the good image of Islam.

What then should we do? i) We should buy peace at all costs; focus our attention on moral, spiritual, and material progress of Muslims; ii) invite people, both Muslims and non-Muslims, to the true religion of God; iii) fight legally and politically –- and not militarily — our cases wherever our interests are being harmed; and iv) undertake a Jihad to remove poverty and ignorance — the two biggest enemies –- from Muslims.

Source: Facebook
H/T: Saiyed Shahbazi

UK: Islam must learn to live as a minority, says Chief Rabbi

The Chief Rabbi has called on Muslims to get used to living as a minority in Britain and to learn to separate religion from power.

Lord Sacks said that neither Muslims nor Christians had yet learnt the lessons inflicted on the Jewish people by the Babylonian exile.

“One of the great advantages of being Jewish is you know how to sing in the minor key,” he said. “We have had 26 centuries of experience ever since the Babylonian exile of living as a minority in the midst of a culture that does not share our views. Christianity and Islam have not had that experience.”

He said that Christianity had learnt toleration but only after 100 years of “knocking the hell out of each other all over Europe”.

He said: “So Christianity went through its experience, Judaism has been through it a long, long time ago and Islam has not yet had that experience.

“I have no doubt that Islam will work its way through to the essential situation that Judaism arrived at and Christianity, namely the substantive separation of religion from power. But there’s no quick way of getting there. It is quite a difficult and painful process within religion.

“Only Muslims can do it. Nobody can tell them from the outside. That would be taken as an affront and I would regard it as morally unacceptable. I do see some wonderful Muslims in this country and elsewhere, in Iraq and even in Iran, going through that process.

"I think some of the Muslim thinkers today are some of the most courageous thinkers I have come across and it is very striking how many of them are women.

It is very interesting. So Islam will get there. But I would hope that one of the ways they would get there is just coming to understand how things work in Britain.”

The Chief Rabbi was delivering the annual lecture to the think-tank Theos in London to an audience of politicians, journalists, academics, businessmen and faith representatives.

He warned that Europe’s loss of a tolerant religious culture made it vulnerable to the advance of fundamentalism.

Tolerant religion was “the only strong enough defence with some of the religiosity that is coming our way with the force of a hurricane,” the Chief Rabbi said.

“Let me be blunt. Either we win or the fundamentalists win and that is the challenge. If the fundamentalists win, I wouldn’t hang around too long.”


(more)


Source: The Times, h/t London Muslim

With thanks to Islam in Europe

Europeans too selfish to have children, says Chief Rabbi

The leader of Britain’s Jewish community claimed the continent’s population is in decline because people care more about shopping than the sacrifice involved in parenthood.

He blamed atheist “neo-Darwinians” for Europe’s low birth rate and said religious people of all denominations are more likely to have large families.

The Chief Rabbi, who entered the House of Lords last week, made his comments in a lecture on religion in the 21st century hosted by Theos, the public theology think-tank, on Wednesday night.

Lord Sacks said that faith had survived so far because it could provide answers to mankind’s eternal search for meaning in life - unlike the market, the state, science or philosophy, which underpin modern liberal democracies.

He claimed religion could continue to play an important role worldwide in the future, by engaging in debate with scientists, by campaigning on issues such as global poverty or the environment, and by discussing the nature of the common good with humanists.

The Chief Rabbi warned that secular Europe is at risk, however, because its moral relativism can easily be defeated by fundamentalists.

And he claimed that its population is also in decline, compared with every other part of the world, because non-believers lack shared values of family and community that religions have.

Lord Sacks said: “Parenthood involves massive sacrifice of money, attention, time and emotional energy.

“Where today in European culture with its consumerism and instant gratification – because you’re worth it – where will you find space for the concept of sacrifice for the sake of generations not yet born?

“Europe, at least the indigenous population of Europe, is dying.”

“That is one of the unsayable truths of our time. We are undergoing the moral equivalent of climate change and no one is talking about it.

“Albert Camus once said, 'The only serious philosophical question is why should I not commit suicide?’.

“I think he was wrong. The only serious philosophical question is, why should I have a child? Our culture is not giving an easy answer to that question.”

He added: “Wherever you turn today - Jewish, Christian or Muslim - the more religious the community, the larger on average are their families.

“The major assault on religion today comes from the neo-Darwinians.’’

Discussing the popular secular idea that there are no absolute moral values, he said: “You cannot defend a civilisation on the basis of moral relativism.

“In a head-to-head contest between a moral relativist and a fundamentalist, who wins? The fundamentalist must win because he is sure he’s right, and you are not sure he’s wrong.”

He said that although the war on terror had been portrayed by Western politicians as a “battle of ideas”, there is little hope that Islamists who believe they owe allegiance to God would be swayed by talk of freedom or democracy.

“The place for religion is in civil society, where it achieves many things essential to liberal democratic freedom. It sanctifies marriage and the family and the obligations of parenthood, and it safeguards the non-relativist moral principles on which Western freedom is based.

“It may not be religion that is dying, it may be liberal democratic Europe that is in danger, demographically and in its ability to defend its own values.”

Lord Sacks, who has been Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth since 1991, described the modern phenomenon of “angry atheists” as the “intellectual equivalent of road rage”.

He said that more respectful dialogue is needed between religious groups and the secular world.

“All peace depends on compromise and that is why peace comes to seem to some religious groups to be a form of betrayal, and that is why peacemakers get assassinated.”

Source: Telegraph

Muslim Veterans Group Says No Reports of Harassment of Islamic Soldiers

A Muslim veteran affairs organization says it has not received reports of harassment from Islamic soldiers, contrary to claims by a relative of the man authorities say is responsible for the worst mass killing on a U.S. military base.

Abdul-Rashid Abdullah, deputy director of the American Muslim Armed Forces and Veterans Affairs Council, told FoxNews.com that the nonprofit group has not received a single report recently of a U.S. soldier being harassed "simply because he was Muslim."

"That kind of report is inconsistent with what we've heard," Abdullah said prior to a press conference in Washington to denounce Thursday's shooting at Fort Hood, Texas, that left 13 dead and 38 wounded. Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, a 39-year-old Army psychiatrist who was reportedly due to be deployed later this month, is accused in the mass shooting.

Abdullah said his organization, which condemned the "unspeakable" attack, serves "several thousand" Muslim soldiers.

Hasan was shot four times during the Thursday attack and remained unconscious early Friday. He reportedly had told relatives in Virginia that he began having second thoughts about his military career after fellow soldiers harassed him for being a Muslim.

Hasan's aunt, Noel Hasan, of Falls Church, Va., told The Washington Post her nephew wanted out of the military following the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks due to harassment about being a Muslim.

"Some people can take it and some people cannot," she told the newspaper. "He had listened to all of that and he wanted out of the military."

Nawar Shora, legal director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, expressed his sympathies to the victims and their relatives on Friday.

"We were all shocked at the tragedy yesterday at Fort Hood and the act of cowardice by the attacker," Shora said. "We were all attacked yesterday. Let's remember that this was an attack on all Americans and it’s a time for all Americans to come together in unity and in faith."

Alejandro Beutel, government liaison for the Muslim Public Affairs Council, said the Muslim-American community is "appalled" by the incident.

"We unequivocally denounce this heinous act against our brave men and women serving in the military to protect our country," Beutel said. "We pray for [the victims'] well-being and for the safety of the entire nation."

Lt. Col. Les Melnyck, a Defense Department spokesman, said that as of August, 3,557 active duty troops of roughly 1.4 million identified themselves as being Muslim. According to the self-reported figures, the largest religious preference identified was Roman Catholic (284,000), followed by "no preference," he said.

"It's self-reported so you don't have to fill in that box," Melnyck said, adding that 1,710 Muslims are currently serving in the Army, by far the most of any service branch.

Source: FoxNews

French Gay Football Team Says Muslim Players Snubbed Them

PARIS — An amateur club of gay football players in Paris said Tuesday its members were victims of homophobia when a team of Muslim players refused to play a match against them.

The Paris Foot Gay team says it received an e-mail Saturday from the Creteil Bebel club canceling a match scheduled for the following day.

"Because of the principles of our team, which is a team of devout Muslims, we can't play against you," the e-mail said, according to Paris Foot Gay. The e-mail continued with: "Our convictions are much more important than a simple football match."

Paris Foot Gay said in a statement that it asked the amateur league to sanction Creteil Bebel.

"This team refused to show up simply so it didn't have to play against homosexuals," the statement said.

Zahir Belgarbi, identified as a spokesman for Creteil Bebel, told France-Info radio that he apologized if "anyone felt upset or hurt" about the decision.

But "as a Muslim, I have the right to decide not to play against homosexuals because I don't agree with their ideas," he said.

Source: FoxNews

Synagogue-dweller is Afghan Jewry's last gasp

KABUL: Zebulon Simentov lives, eats and prays alone — the last known Jew in a country dominated by conservative Muslim culture.

In the late 19th century, Afghanistan's Jews numbered about 40,000, many of them Persian Jews who had fled forced conversion in neighboring Iran.

Beginning with an exodus to Israel after it became a state in 1948, the community has been in decline.

Now Simentov is the caretaker and sole member of Afghanistan's only working synagogue. The last eight or nine Jewish families left after the 1979 Soviet invasion, he said.

Simentov's wife and children moved to Israel years ago, but he stayed even through the Taliban regime.

He was born in the western Afghan city of Herat in 1959 and says Afghanistan is home.

But having survived numerous beatings under the Taliban, he now only wears his yarmulke, or skullcap, in private.

Portly, fond of whiskey and aged about 50, Simentov lives alone in the dilapidated two-story synagogue building and gets by on donations from Jews abroad and sympathetic local Muslims.

Until 2005, Simentov shared the house with one other Jew, but the two feuded and lobbed allegations at each other of having let a sacred Torah scroll go missing and of having spread rumors that resulted in Taliban beatings. When his 80-year-old housemate died, Simentov said he was happy to be rid of him.

Though Simentov has a Muslim friend who visits a few times a week, he spends most of his days in the company of his pet partridge, reading a Hebrew prayer book and watching Afghan TV in a small room whose pink walls are adorned with an Afghan flag and the picture of an orthodox rabbi.

Source: AP

H/T: Infidels Are Cool

Obama wishes Muslims a blessed Ramadan

By Christina Bellantoni

Continuing his administration's outreach efforts to the Islamic world, President Obama has recorded a video greeting to Muslims as they begin their annual holy season of Ramadan. The president used a few Arabic words and described in the video the origin of the holiday and its importance, noting it is a time of festivity but also of devotion and reflection.

The holiday is marked with a month of fasting from dawn to sunset, when Muslims break their fast with a prayer.

"These rituals remind us of the principles we hold in common and of Islam's role in advancing justice, progress, tolerance and the dignity of all human beings," said Mr. Obama in the video.

Earlier this year Mr. Obama offered a similar message of friendship in a Web video to mark Nowruz, the Iranian new year.

That video kicked off a full effort to engage with Muslims, with Mr. Obama delivering major speeches in Ankara and Cairo seeking a new way forward.

Mr. Obama addressed the "new beginning" he has proposed in his Ramadan message, saying it must be "borne out in a sustained effort to listen to each other, to learn from each other, to respect one another, and to seek common ground."

Mr. Obama said the United States has heard from Muslims around the globe in response to his speeches and the outreach done on social networking Web sites, adding that the nation is going after "concrete actions that will make a difference over time."

He said America wants to partner with the Islamic world for expanding educational exchange programs and on science and technology collaboration, adding that the U.S. is working closely to prepare for the global pandemic of the H1N1 virus. Read more here ...

Source: Washington Times

Muslims Have Only Selves to Blame for Negative Image

By: Tawfik Hamid

Many Muslims all over the world believe that the West is distorting the image of Islam and that the Western media is behind this. The Muslim world needs to review this position, as the high frequency of violent and barbaric acts conducted by people belonging to the Muslim faith, makes it inevitable that individuals will associate Islam with violence. Examples of such barbarity have been reported in major news outlets — both western and Arabic — in only the last 4 weeks.

• Spain: A Spanish court has sentenced a Mauritanian Muslim woman to 17 years in prison after she allegedly forced her underage daughter to marry an older man and have sex with him. Mauritanians in Spain protest against “attack on customs.”
• Nigeria: A recent spike in violence in northern Nigeria has drawn attention to a mysterious group of radical Muslims known as the “Nigerian Taliban” or “Boko Haram” — which means “Western education is a sin.” The group aims to overthrow the Nigerian state, impose strict Islamic law, and abolish what it calls Western education.
• Pakistan: Eight Christians have been killed in religious unrest in Pakistan's central Punjab, violence sparked by the rumored desecration of a Quran. Four women, a man, and a child died as Muslim militants set fire to Christian houses in the town of Gojra. Two men died later of gunshot wounds. Read more ...

Source: NewsMax

Refusing Shari'a Courts in Europe is Muslims-friendly

Would it be such a terrible thing if sharia courts existed in the Netherlands? Yes, says Nahed Selim, we have to stop giving in to the Islamic fundamentalists. No, says Maurits Berger, we already have Jewish and Catholic 'courts'.

By Nahed Selim

Sharia law in the Netherlands may not be practised in an actual 'sharia court', but that makes little difference. The point is that Islamic rules about marriage, divorce, custody, parental authority, alimony and inheritance are being implemented according to the sharia, and that these contradict Dutch law.

The clearest example of this is polygamy. Marriages are made and dissolved in mosques in the Netherlands, including polygamous marriages. On September 19, 2008, newspaper De Telegraaf reported that 173 men in Amsterdam are registered as having two legal wives, two men even have three wives. A spokesperson for the city of Rotterdam admitted in NRC Handelsblad last year that polygamous marriages are being registered in that city on an almost weekly basis. Read more ...

Source: NRC Handelsblad

Nahed Selim
Latest recipients of The MASH Award

Land of Uprisings: What do Muslims really want?

By Nonie Darwish

As I watched the Iranian uprising on TV, I could not help but remember the many years of demonstrations by Iranians against the Shah which ended in the 1979 revolution. The Shah regime was accused of being a puppet of the West, corrupt and not Muslim enough. The people of Iran then installed one of the most radical and cruel regimes in modern Middle East history. The Iranian Islamist movement negatively impacted the whole region and empowered radical Muslim groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the Wahhabi Saudi sect.

Now, Iranians are having another uprising. What do they really want? A less Islamist and more modern regime? Wasn’t that what they had before? Do they want a Western style democracy where they can peacefully vote out a corrupt leader? But is that allowed under Islamic Law? It surely is not because under Sharia a Muslim head of state can hold office through a violent seizure of power. So who can tell a Muslim leader who seized office through a coup or an assassination that he is wrong? Such a coup will especially be popular among Islamists if the assassinated leader was friendly with the West.

There are parallels in almost all Muslim countries, especially in Egypt, where the dreaded label ‘America’s puppet’ can get a non-Islamist leader assassinated. The complaint of being a puppet of America can merely describe a Muslim leader who refuses to be the enemy of the West and to engage in jihad. President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and his successor Husni Mubarak until today are called ‘puppets of America’ for that reason. Before them, the revolution leader President Gamal Abdel Nasser ousted the Egyptian King Farouk on the grounds that he was a puppet of the British. The story keeps repeating itself in Muslim countries where many leaders end up with a dilemma. On the one hand, to win respect and fear of the Arab street, they must stand against Western interests and peace with Israel (i.e. Nasser, Assad of Syria and Ahmadinejad). On the other hand, several regimes try to hold the stick from the middle and allow hate speech against America and Israel in their media while in private have mutual respect and cooperation with the West and Israel. Read more ...

Source: FPM

Respecting the Faithful vs. Respecting the FaithUnderstanding the difference is more crucial than ever.

By Raymond Ibrahim

During the pope’s recent Mideast visit, the media reported that he has “deep respect for Islam.” That exact phrase appeared in the Associated Press, AFP, BBC, Jerusalem Post, Washington Times, and Al-Jazeera.

Yet he said no such thing; instead, he mentioned his “deep respect for the Muslim community.” There’s a world of difference between respecting a religious group and respecting their religion, and the pontiff knows this.

As a Christian — indeed, as pope — by evoking his “deep respect” for Muslims, Benedict probably meant that Muslims, who believe in one God, pray, fast, and follow a strict set of moral principles, are, from a religious perspective, worthy of “deep respect,” certainly in comparison to the many godless of the secular West.

The latter also uphold this position. In fact, that is what makes the secular West unique: the right to follow any (or no) religion is guaranteed, is “respected.” Read more ...

Source: Pajamas Media

Muslim Persecution of Christians

Source: Terrorism Awareness Project