Britain's Burka Blues: "I'd Like to Thank Boris Johnson"

.... All the while, it is not the Islamic religion that justifies these suppressions but a culturally-defined patriarchal system that could not be more out of keeping with Western societies, where many women are increasingly asking to be in command of their lives, and where men, however powerful, who abuse women are exposed – and sometimes arrested, tried and imprisoned. Yet we are expected to feel guilty if we dare to question what some Muslim women question: if shariah law is really the most wholesome lifestyle for many women.

The Netherlands is just the latest EU country to have banned the burqa in a major step towards affirming our democratic convictions about human rights and respect for the autonomy and individuality of everyone. Already, some twelve European countries have passed laws for full or partial bans on the burqa, while the UK government still stumbles over even the slightest restriction suggested. [Gatestone Institute] Read more

We need a ‘German Islam,’ says interior ministry

Germany will tighten control over foreign influence of its Muslim community, State Secretary for the Interior Ministry Markus Kerber said Monday, after a week of violent far-right clashes in eastern Germany.

“We have watched foreign forces dictate to German Muslims how to practice their religion for far too long,” Kerber told Tagesspiegel in an interview published Monday. “And because they also have their home here, we will now lend them more support in strengthening their self-confidence.”

“We want to create more discussion formats for German Muslims,” Kerber added. “The minister will also actively encourage German Muslims to conduct a debate on a German Islam.”

According to Kerber, that debate will take place within the so-called Islamkonferenz, which Kerber set up as the interior ministry’s head of policy under Wolfgang Schäuble between 2006-2009 as a “forum for dialogue” on the relationship between Islam and the state.

Kerber responded to Interior Minister Horst Seehofer’s controversial claim earlier this year that Islam “doesn’t belong in Germany” by saying: “If there is to be an Islam that belongs to Germany, German Muslims must define it as ‘German Islam.'” [POLITICO] Read more

Man who stabbed American tourists in Amsterdam names Wilders, cites 'insults' to Islam

A man who stabbed two American tourists at Amsterdam’s central station last week named Dutch, anti-Islam lawmaker Geert Wilders during police questioning and said he was motivated by perceived insults to Islam in the Netherlands, prosecutors said on Monday.

The man, identified by Dutch media as Jawed S., is a 19-year-old Afghan with residency in Germany, who traveled to Amsterdam to carry out an attack because of what he said were repeated insults to God, the Koran and Islam’s Prophet Mohammed, prosecutors said in a statement. [Reuters] Read more

LGBT rights: Malaysia women caned for attempting to have lesbian sex

Two Malaysian women convicted of attempting to have lesbian sex in a car have been caned in a religious court.

The Muslim women, aged 22 and 32, were each caned six times in the Sharia High Court in the state of Terengganu.

According to an official, this is the state's first conviction for same-sex relations and its first public caning.

Human rights activists reacted with outrage. Homosexual activity is illegal under both secular and religious laws.

The caning was witnessed by more than 100 people, according to local news outlet The Star. [BBC] Read more

Trojan Horse reviewed by Andrew Gilligan — the man who helped report the scandal

A new play distorts the truth of how Muslim hardliners took over schools in Birmingham.

.... Trojan Horse does have a stab at balance: a character representing the head teachers targeted by the plotters gets a small amount of stage time, but her removal is shown as justified. Then there’s the difficult-to-avoid matter that, in leaked WhatsApp messages, Razwan Faraz, Alam’s co-plotter and deputy head of one of the schools, spoke of women’s “perpetual role serving men” and called gay people “satanic” and “animals”. They get round this by saying, well, some Tory MPs voted against gay marriage, you know.

Making excuses for some of the most illiberal elements in society turns out to be strangely popular with the liberal classes. A full house of rapt white faces watched the show with me, and it has, perhaps inevitably, won the Amnesty freedom of expression award.

But documentary it is not. This production’s claim to our attention is its assertion to be true. But what it actually shows, once again, is how tricky and dangerous a genre is documentary-drama. It can end up falling between two stools, neither good journalism nor good drama. [The Times (£)] Read more

The inevitability of Fortress Europe

Watching European attempts to come to terms with the problem of migrants from the Third World is to watch a slow-motion train crash. All manner of liberal nostrums about the duty to accept refugees, the right to free movement within the EU and even the notion of a secular indifference to religious distinctions are all being tested to destruction.

There seems only one possible conclusion: a Fortress Europe with distinct echoes from its past as Christendom. This may not be what Europe’s elites would choose but popular pressure seems unlikely to allow anything else.

.... At the end of the book all that Wolfreys has established is that there are frictions between Muslims and non-Muslims at every level of French society. Wolfreys has merely taken one side in that conflict.

As so often happens, anti-Islamic feeling is then denounced as racism but that is only true in the same sense that, say, English anti-popery was often conflated with hostility to the Irish or Spanish. The more important point is that a clash of civilisations really is happening and, as we surely all sense, the present rather silly debates about hijabs, niqabs and burkas are merely the opening skirmishes. [Standpoint] Read more

Islamic education in schools must focus on Islamic way of life: PM

The teaching of Islamic subjects, especially in kindergartens, will emphasise the inculcation of positive values among Muslim students.

Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said that Islamic education in kindergartens and schools is currently focussed on the techniques of performing prayers, instead of the Islamic way of life.

"We want to empower kindergartens, because that is where we want to nurture our children.

"We will ensure that Islamic values will be given focus in the subject, instead of politics.

"(Current) Islamic education is limited to teaching certain prayers, not the Islamic way of life.

"This is what we want to change in our education system… so that it would work to build the characters (of students) according to Islamic values," Dr Mahathir said during a question-and-answer session at the Congress on the Future of the Bumiputera and the Nation 2018 today.

The session was moderated by Economic Affairs Minister Datuk Seri Azmin Ali. Also present was Dr Mahathir's wife Tun Dr Siti Hasmah Mohamad Ali and PKR de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.

Dr Mahathir said as for non-Muslims, the subject of moral education will continue to be taught. [New Straits Times] Read more

Far-right Dutch MP cancels Muhammad cartoon competition

Dutch anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders has cancelled a planned contest inviting people to submit a cartoon of the prophet Muhammad following death threats and large-scale protests in Pakistan.

“To avoid the risk of victims of Islamic violence, I have decided not to let the cartoon contest go ahead,” the far-right opposition politician said in a written statement on Thursday night.

Wilders, who for years has lived under round-the-clock protection because of death threats sparked by his fierce anti-Islam rhetoric, said he does not want others put in danger by the contest he planned for November.

News of the competition sparked angry protests in Pakistan and an alleged death threat against Wilders this week from a 26-year-old man, reportedly a Pakistani, who was arrested on Tuesday in The Hague.

Physical depictions of the prophet are forbidden in Islam and are deeply offensive to Muslims.

“It’s not just about me,” Wilders said in the statement. Opponents of the event “see not only me, but the entire Netherlands as a target”. [The Guardian] Read more

One in five vulnerable Syrian refugees are rejected by NL because of their views

Some of the most vulnerable refugees living in camps in Turkey have been rejected by the Netherlands because they have extremist sympathies or are too conservative, the Volkskrant reported on Wednesday. The Netherlands has agreed to take its ‘fair share’ of refugees under a special scheme worked out with Turkey, but around 20% don’t get final approval, the paper said.

Paul van Musscher, head of the police department charged with monitoring migration and foreign nationals, told the paper that many of them have views which do not dovetail with Dutch values, such as equality between men and women. Last year, 2,100 Syrian nationals came to the Netherlands via the special arrangement with Turkey, but by the end of July this year only 288 have arrived. In total, 15,000 refugees have moved to the EU via the Turkey deal.

.... Around one in five do not get through this vetting procedure, Musscher told the paper. This is because they may have been involved with extremists or because their beliefs will interfere with their integration into the Netherlands. Swimming ‘If you say there is no way my children are going into a mixed school class… then your file is marked and you don’t get in,’ the paper quotes him as saying. [DutchNews.nl] Read more

Iranian activist jailed over hijab protests goes on hunger strike

Human rights activists in Iran have said they are worried about a man on hunger strike who was reportedly jailed for protesting against rules requiring women to wear a hijab.

Farhad Meysami, 48, a doctor and publisher before becoming a civil activist, was arrested in his office in July and taken to Tehran’s notorious Evin prison.

After a wave of hijab protests, Iranian authorities cracked down on activists. Meysami was accused of possessing badges stating: “I am against the compulsory hijab.”

In recent months, a number of women have been arrested for defying hijab rules in public; standing on telecom boxes, taking off their headscarves and waving them on a stick. It has sparked a nationwide debate about the obligatory nature of the rules, drawing in previously silent members of the Iranian parliament. [The Guardian] Read more

Muhammad cartoon contest in Netherlands sparks Pakistan protests

Thousands of Islamists have set off on a protest march in Pakistan to demand Imran Khan’s new government sever diplomatic ties with the Netherlands over a “blasphemous” cartoon competition.

The march, organised by Tehreek-e-Labbaik (TLP), a political party dedicated to the punishment of blasphemy, presents the first major test of Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) administration. Last year, a similar protest by the TLP shut down the capital, Islamabad, for almost a month.

In June, Geert Wilders, the anti-Islam MP who leads the Netherlands’ second largest party and has been found guilty of inciting hatred, invited submissions of cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad, which Islam forbids. The $10,000 (£7,700) competition is due to open in November, with 200 entries so far.

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“We can be martyred or arrested,” said one of the TLP’s leaders, Peer Afzal Qadri, “but we will not return until either the cartoon contest is stopped or the Dutch envoy is expelled.” [The Guardian] Read more

A Visit to Islamic England

Other tourists may remember London for its spectacular sights and history, but I remember it for Islam. When I was visiting the U.K. as a teenager in 2006, I got lost in an East London market. There I saw a group of women wearing head-to-toe black cloaks. I froze, confused and intimidated by the faceless figures.

This summer, I found myself heading back to the U.K. as it was plunging into a debate over Islamic dress

.... My first visit was to Tower Hamlets, an East London borough that is about 38% Muslim, among the highest in the U.K. As I walked down Whitechapel Road, the adhan, or call to prayer, echoed through the neighborhood. Muslims walked in one direction for jumu’ah, Friday prayer, while non-Muslims went the opposite way. Each group kept its distance and avoided eye contact with the other. A sign was posted on a pole: “Alcohol restricted zone.”

Women and girls were dressed in hijabs, niqabs and abayas (robes). Some of the males wore skullcaps and thawbs, Arabic tunics, with their trousers tailored just above the ankles as per Muhammad’s example. The scene could have been lifted out of Riyadh, a testament to the Arabization of Britain’s South Asian Muslims.

.... I grabbed the first booklet that was in English. It was by Zakir Naik, a fundamentalist preacher from India. “The Qur’an says that Hijab has been prescribed for the women,” the booklet explained in one section, “so that they are recognised as modest women and this will also prevent them from being molested.” [The Wall Street Journal ($)] Read more

Polish Lawmaker Backs Burqa Ban, No Saudi Mosques in Europe Until Poland Can Build Cathedral in Saudi Arabia

Polish lawmaker Dominik Tarczynski has waded into the European burqa debate, saying it should be banned partly for security reasons, and partly to make it clear to Islamic radicals that they cannot demand more rights in Europe than Europeans have in Saudi Arabia.

Mr Tarczynski, a member of Poland’s ruling Law and Justice Party, made waves in Britain after clashing with left-liberal journalist Cathy Newman over illegal immigration.

Speaking exclusively to Breitbart London shortly after ex-foreign secretary Boris Johnson’s run-in with the establishment over his criticism of the burqa, the Polish law graduate insisted that Islamic face veils “should be banned in the same way the Christian cross is banned in Saudi Arabia”.

He suggested the relationship between the West and the Islamic world was currently unbalanced, citing a mosque which Saudi Arabia’s theocratic regime wants to construct in the Polish capital of Warsaw as an example. [Breitbart London] Read more

Headscarf has no place in schools

The hijab – the headscarf worn by Muslim women as the minimum form of coverage – should be the subject of a ban in schools under the next legislature, according to federal secretary of state Zuhal Demir.

“The headscarf has no place in schools,” she said.

The hijab, derived from the instruction from the Quran for women (and men) to dress modestly, has been the subject of controversy in Belgium for years, from the ban on the garment at a school in Antwerp to a ban on wearing by communal workers who deal with the public – a ban which was extended to include crucifixes and Stars of David to avoid accusations of religious discrimination.

Supporters of the hijab argue that women have the right to wear the garment if they choose, and legislation is a breach of their religious rights. Opponents use the exact opposite argument – women are forced by their communities, and in particular the men, to cover up in public, and have no say in the matter.

Demir, herself a Muslim of Kurdish origins who dresses in a western style, is an opponent of the hijab in schools. “A school, like a home, should be a place where you feel free. So there’s no place for a headscarf.” [The Brussels Times] Read more

Tories need to promote and elect more Muslims, Ruth Davidson says in swipe at Boris’s burka row

The ex-Foreign Secretary sparked a furious party row after he compared women wearing burkas to bank robbers and letter boxes.

But tonight Ms Davidson, who is seven months pregnant with her first child, will say she will make sure more candidates from diverse backgrounds stand for office.

She will say at an event in Glasgow to mark the Muslim festival of Eid-al-Adha: "If I am to be the next First Minister of Scotland, we need to fill the Holyrood benches with the brightest talent and greatest experience we can find, support, promote and elect from every community in this country.

"That includes the Muslim community.

[TOP RATED COMMENT 29 votes] Another f'kin snowflake handing over the keys

[2ND 24] She has lost the plot, we want the exact opposite!

[3RD 23] Can Davidson name ANY three: Stable, progressive, democratic, Islamic countries? Bit of a trick question really, as there are NONE on this planet. Congratulations must go to Blair; dragging the UK backwards a few centuries certainly took some balls. [The Sun] Read more

Unstunned halal meat back on school menu - for now

The county council has decided to suspend its ban on beef and lamb from animals which are not rendered unconscious before Islamic religious slaughter until its full meeting on October 18.

This will give all Lancashire's county councillors the chance to reconsider the authority's ban on halal meat from unstunned animals.

The county council's cabinet took a decision in July to provide only stunned halal meat, except poultry, to schools.

But the Lancashire Council of Mosques, which has a strict definition of halal meat as coming from only unstunned animals, objected and threatened to ask Muslim families across the county to boycott all school meals.

[TOP RATED COMMENT 31 votes] Why should the minority rule over the majority, its cruel and inhumane. Why do we pander to these people? The decision has been made and should be upheld.

[2ND 23] Lancashire Muslim leaders yet again show themselves to be inward looking and self obsessed. Koran allows Muslims to eat non halal if they are in a non Muslim community. Cruelty is cruelty and religion should not be used as a mask for cruelty.

[3RD 20] The bigger picture is - muslims DO NOT want to fit into the societies they migrate to. They EXPECT their hosts to conform to their ways. Lots of Chinese, Italian & Polish people have made the UK their home. You don't hear them making demands all the time.

You don't hear about 'The Grand Council of Chinese this and that' or 'Italian community leaders' placing demands on the UK to change things to their liking. They quietly fit in, get on with their lives & enjoy the hospitality & freedoms the UK has to offer.

[4TH 18] This is cruel and not part of British culture. When people talk about integration it means sometime giving up parts of your culture and accepting the culture of the country you now live in.

For example, if I was to move to Saudi Arabia where alcohol is not permitted I couldnt expect to go out on the lash and disrespect their culture. Those would be the rules and I would have to abide by them OR move to a country that had different rules.

Its the same with halal meat. Its not part of British culture. So either accept that or move. Its not racist. Its not divisive. Its living within the culture of this country. [Lancashire Telegraph] Read more

Family filmed hacking up animal carcasses in their garden sparks hygiene probe by council

Neighbours alerted environmental health officials after the raw meat was chopped up on a tarpaulin. It is not known if the family — celebrating Eid al-Adha, the Muslim festival of sacrifice — slaughtered the animals at home or were simply butchering them.

Julia McClenaghan, 62, whose flat overlooks the yard in Dagenham, Essex, said: “It seems one of the least hygienic places to prepare meat, and they were using an old rag to wipe their tools.”

A woman living at the property confirmed yesterday they had been butchering for Eid but denied any wrongdoing.

Sun columnist Anila Baig said Muslim families traditionally sacrifice a goat or sheep and divide it into portions for Eid al-Adha.

But she added: “In this day and age, it’s extremely unusual for someone to do this themselves at home. [The Sun] Read more

Germany's Salafist Muslim children being radicalized faster and younger: intelligence report

Germany faces a growing threat from children raised in Salafist families, according to the country’s domestic intelligence service.

A recent report issued by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), warned that these children are “educated from birth with an extremist world view that legitimizes violence against others and degrades those who aren’t part of their group.”

The radicalization of youngsters is happening faster and earlier, according to Hans-Georg Maassen, the head of Germany’s BfV.

Frank Jansen, a journalist with Berlin’s centrist paper Der Tagesspiegel, and an expert on extremism in Germany, notes that most of the Salafist minors in the BfV report are younger than eight-years-old. According to Jansen, the report calls these children ticking time bombs. [FOX News] Read more

Swedish authorities monitor Islamic group's campaign to stop Swedish Muslims voting

The Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir has launched a campaign under the slogan 'Use your voice – but not in the election', arguing that it is "sinful" for Muslims to take part in non-Islamic votes.

Sweden's Civil Contingencies Agency (MSB) is monitoring the campaign and has informed the Swedish Election Authority, as well as producing a handbook for communicators in order to help them deal with campaigns urging non-voting.

"MSB is primarily monitoring foreign influence activities and actors. The Hizb ut-Tahrir propaganda activity was identified in our general monitoring," Mikael Tofvesson, head of MSB's global monitoring and analysis section, told The Local via email.

Kirstine Sinclair, a professor in Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Southern Denmark, told The Local the group has carried out similar activities in other countries. They are "well-known in connection with Danish general elections" for example, she said. [The Local] Read more

Race is on to create 'halal' measles vaccine

An Indonesian pharmaceuticals company has said it is racing to produce a "halal" form of the measles-rubella vaccine amid concerns that conservative Muslim parents might deny their children’s inoculation on the grounds that it contains traces of pork.

The state-owned Bio Farma confirmed its research after the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI), considered to be the Southeast Asian nation’s most authoritative Muslim body, declared the vaccination to be ‘haram’, or religiously forbidden.

MUI quickly clarified that in light of the dangers posed by the diseases, Muslims should continue to use the vaccine until an alternative was found.

However, its initial declaration that the vaccine was ‘unclean’ has provoked fears that conservatives may still shun the injection for religious reasons. [The Telegraph] Read more

Saudi Arabia 'seeks death penalty for woman activist'

Saudi Arabia's public prosecutor has reportedly sought the death penalty for five activists, including the female rights defender Israa al-Ghomgham.

Human Rights Watch said they recently went on trial at a terrorism tribunal on charges including "participating in protests" in the restive Qatif region.

It has been the scene of demonstrations by the minority Shia Muslim community.

Ms Ghomgham is believed to be the first Saudi woman to possibly face the death penalty for rights-related work.

HRW warned that it set "a dangerous precedent for other women activists currently behind bars" in the Gulf kingdom.

At least 13 human rights defenders and women's rights activists have been arrested since mid-May, accused of activities deemed a risk to national security. Some have been released, but others remain detained without charge. [BBC] Read more

Berlin sees rise in Salafists, extreme right and radical left: report

The German capital is home to a growing number of followers of radical Islam and members of the extreme right, according to a new report.

The total number of Salafists in Berlin rose to 950 from 840 the previous year, Der Tagesspiegel reported Wednesday, citing an as-yet-unpublished report by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution Berlin.

The growing numbers in Berlin mirror a nationwide pattern that saw the number of Salafists — who espouse a hard-line interpretation of Islam, and in some cases embrace jihadist ideology — in Germany edge up to 10,800 in 2017 compared to 9,700 the previous year, according to an interior ministry report released last year.

In its report, the ministry describes Germany’s Salafism scene as “the main recruiting source for jihad” despite the fact that “political Salafists usually refrain from using violence.” It also noted that analysis of recent terror attacks in Germany and in Europe shows that “jihadist activities are very often preceded by Salafist radicalization.” [POLITICO] Read more

Iran Sentences 12 Christians to Year in Prison for House Church Worship, Evangelism

An Iranian court has sentenced 12 Christians to one year in prison for holding worship meetings and evangelizing — crimes that Iran considers to be "propaganda activities."

The Iranian Christian news agency Mohabat News reports that a Christian convert known as Payam Kharaman and 11 other Christians who were arrested in Bushehr in April 2015 were sentenced for the crime of promoting what the Iranian authorities call Zionist propaganda that goes against the Islamic Republic's Shia Muslim-controlled system.

Kharaman told the news outlet that he and the others were accused of the crimes because they held house worship meetings, evangelized and invited others to accept Christ as their Savior. Additionally, the Christians were charged with "inclination to the land of Christianity." [The Christian Post] Read more

Woman who complained about noisy mosque jailed for blasphemy

An Indonesian court has sentenced a Buddhist woman to 18 months in prison for blasphemy after she was accused of insulting Islam.

Meiliana, a 44-year-old ethnic Chinese woman, had complained the Muslim call to prayer, which is repeated five times a day, was being played too loudly at the mosque near her house in North Sumatra.

She burst into tears as the presiding judge, Wahyu Prasetyo Wibowo announced her sentence on Tuesday and she was taken from the court in handcuffs.

Prosecutors alleged she had violated the country’s criminal code by committing blasphemy against Islam, the dominant faith in the world’s most populous Muslim nation. [The Independent] Read more

Saudi female activist faces death penalty, rights groups say

Human rights groups warned this week that prominent political activist Israa al-Ghomgham could soon be executed by the Saudi government.

Al-Ghomgham was arrested along with her husband in December 2015 over her support for protests against the authorities in Riyadh. She has spent the past 32 months in detention.

A video shared online over the past few days purported to show al-Ghomgham's body after her execution. However, the footage turned out to be three years old.

For now, "her life is safe," Ali Adubisi, the director of the European-Saudi Organization for Human Rights (ESOHR), wrote on Twitter on Tuesday.

Adubisi said that al-Ghomgham's trial began on August 6, and that she could face execution by beheading on October 28 if found guilty. Some Saudi lawyers have offered to work on her case pro bono, the ESOHR reported. [Deutsche Welle] Read more