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It's no laughing matter. Funnyman ventriloquist Jeff Dunham is fuming after a ringtone advertisement based on his popular comedy skit, "Achmed the Dead Terrorist," was scrubbed from South African TV because it mocks Islam. The ringtone was taken from a puppet routine performed by Dunham, a native Texan, in a TV special on Comedy Central. A 10-minute clip of the comedian's routine that was posted on YouTube has been viewed more than 66 million times since April.

British authorities arrested three Muslims in London on Saturday after fires broke out in the offices of the publishing house Gibson Square and at the home of the publisher, Martin Rynja. Gibson Square had been planning to publish The Jewel of Medina by Sherry Jones, a trashy novel sensationalizing the marriage of the Islamic prophet Muhammad to the child Aisha (Muhammad was in his fifties, and Aisha was nine, when the happy union was consummated).

A television commercial for an "Ahmed the dead terrorist" ringtone mocks Islam and must be withdrawn, the Advertising Standards Authority has ruled. Its ruling followed a complaint by a Moegamat Khan against the GloMobile commercial, flighted on SABC and DSTV. The commercial shows American standup comedian Jeff Durham holding a skeleton puppet with a white cloth around its head, which demands that the audience keeps quiet and says: "Silence! I kill you!" The ASA said Khan had complained that this was offensive to the Islamic religion, and created the impression that all Muslims were terrorists who would kill to get...

In London's historic "Inns of Court", barristers practise law in the shadow of the distinctive medieval Temple Church. But does English law really owe a debt to Muslim law? For some scholars, a historical connection to Islam is a "missing link" that explains why English common law is so different from classical Roman legal systems that hold sway across much of the rest of Europe. It's a controversial idea. Common law has inspired legal systems across the world. What's more, calls for the UK to accommodate Islamic Sharia law have caused public outcry.

A Conservative government would ban sharia courts and impose a tough crackdown on Islamic extremism, the shadow security minister has said.

A GRIEVING family from Sheffield have been told they can't bury their stepfather on a Saturday - because he was not Muslim. Retired steel erector Harold "Charlie" Lemaire, from Woodseats, died last week aged 75 from pneumonia. His stepdaughter Jean Maltby, from Greenhill, wanted the funeral to be held this Saturday so family who live outside the city - including her brother Stephen, now living in Dorset, and relatives from the Isle of Man - could attend. But when her funeral director called City Road Cemetery to arrange a memorial service in the chapel followed by burial, he was told...

LONDON (AP) -Olympic organizers issued detailed design rules for the 2012 London games Wednesday, including a mandate that at least some toilets in the Olympic park do not face the holy Islamic city of Mecca.

Amid growing opposition, a campaign by the world’s Islamic nations to have international bodies outlaw the “defamation” of religion may be facing an uphill battle. The drive by the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), led by members including Pakistan, Iran and Egypt, has sparked concern that the right to freedom of expression is being undermined by a group of countries, including some that enforce blasphemy laws and punish “apostasy.”

A survey in Arab countries ... shows that 62 per cent of Muslims think that non-Muslims living in Muslim countries should not eat or drink in public during Ramadan...as a mark of respect to Islam.

Mohamed Rage, who leads the Omaha Somali-American Community Organization, said 80 workers were thrown out after an altercation late Thursday. He said when they tried to return for their shift Friday, they were fired, along with 70 others. Muslim workers have been asking for accommodations with break times to allow prayer at sunset. The issue led to walkouts this week -- not only from Muslims but from non-Muslims who protested such accommodations as preferential treatment.

GRAND ISLAND — About 50 to 80 Muslims quit at the JBS Swift & Co. meatpacking plant Thursday night. Dan Hoppes, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local No. 22, said the matter stems from the recent debate over break time for the purpose of prayer during the holy month of Ramadan. "There were some Muslim people who wanted to get the rest of the people to back them to moving their (dinner) break to an earlier time, and when that did not happen, the rest of the people went back to work and those people protesting...

to report that there's a nice view to be had of the crescent-topped mosque dome silhouetted against the distant skyline, but not high enough to tell you what it would be like if you were the muezzin who had to go up there five times a day to chant the call to prayer. Of course, the muezzin can't tell you either -- he's no fool -- they're going to broadcast the prayer summons (which will only happen during the day out of respect for the neighbors) by loudspeaker. --Michael Paulson That they're going to broadcast the call to prayer at...

Five-hundred Muslim workers walked off the job Monday at a Grand Island meatpacking plant after they say they were denied time to pray during the Muslim observance of Ramadan. More than 100 workers at a Greeley Swift plant were fired last week because the company said they walked away from work before their shifts ended.

At least 130 Muslim workers at the north Greeley JBS Swift & Co. plant were fired Wednesday afternoon, apparently over a dispute involving breaks during Ramadan. At issue is a request by Muslim workers to be able to take their lunch breaks at sunset to end their fast during Ramadan... expressed their dissatisfaction with negotiations by saying, “No prayer, no work.”

"A nine-year-old girl has the same sexual capacities like a woman of twenty and over". Thus reads a fatwa issued by Skeikh Mohamed Ibn Abderrahmane Al-Maghraoui, according to Moroccan daily 'Aujourd'hui Le Maroc'. This immediately sparked off a hot debate, with most of the public opinion absolutely against this stance which is a permit for paedophilia, many say, among other things. Among the various stances against the fatwa (in the Islamic culture, a decree of religious character issued by Islamic experts which regulates issues of topical character), the daily reported those of extremist MP Abdelbari Zamzami and the president of...

Once again the selfishness of Islam has struck non-Muslims. All members of the Tower Hamlets Council in East London have been asked to follow the strict Islamic rules of Ramadan.

ROTTERDAM, 12/08/08 - Although polygamy is banned in the Netherlands, the marriages of Muslims who have several wives are recognised by Dutch authorities. Registrars in the major cities, in particular, record dozens of bigamous or polygamous marriages per year. These marriages are prohibited and an offence in the Netherlands. However, polygamous marriages that take place in countries where more than one wife is permitted, such as Morocco, are accepted, newspaper NRC Handelsblad reports. If immigrants with several wives settle in the Netherlands, the local authorities register all the marriages. However, the Central Bureau for Statistics (CBS), where all marriages are...

Press Release Labor Day Reinstated as Paid Holiday at Shelbyville, TN, Plant; Tyson Foods Requested Change from Union Springdale, Arkansas – August 8, 2008 - Tyson Foods, Inc. announced today it has reached a new agreement with the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU), an American union, reinstating Labor Day as one of the designated paid holidays under the contract for covered employees in the Shelbyville, Tennessee, plant. Tyson made this request on behalf of its Shelbyville plant employees, some of whom had expressed concern about the new contract provisions relative to paid holidays. In an effort to be...

When The Stiletto was but a little penknife, a family member who was a young child during WWII recounted how easily the locals could pick out American spies: When an Americans eats, (s)he holds the fork in the left hand and the knife in the right hands while cutting food, then puts the knife down and switches the fork to the right hand and eats with the tines facing up. Europeans keep the fork in their left hands - with the tines facing down - and push food onto the fork with a knife that is kept in the right...

Al-Qaeda Draws New Recruits Via Internet Al-Qaeda is using the Internet to recruit vulnerable young people to its terrorist network, according to a programme aired on Saudi Arabian TV late on Tuesday. Umm Osama, the founder of al-Qaeda's first women-only website, al-Khansa, joined several others on the programme to discuss how they renounced jihadist ideology. Among those who sought a response to this question was an imam from the Medina mosque, Saleh Ibn Awad al-Mudamsi, and the father of a young al-Qaeda suspect held in an Iraqi prison. Read More Qaeda Targets U.S. Oil Interests in North Africa U.S....

Police in Toronto, Canada concluded that the 16-year-old-Pakistani girl Aqsa Parvez, was murdered by her father... and her brother, for refusing to wear the hijab or veil as is the custom for women in traditional Muslim households. "Instead of getting angry at the father and brother who are accused of planning the murder by luring the runaway teenager back to her home, leaders of the conservative and orthodox Muslim community made excuses." we found few other Muslim leaders willing to slam the father, mother, sister and brother, who either joined hands in killing the young girl, or sat passively as...

Muslims outraged at police advert featuring cute puppy sitting in policeman's hat By Daily Mail Reporter Last updated at 12:15 PM on 01st July 2008A postcard featuring a cute puppy sitting in a policeman's hat advertising a Scottish police force's new telephone number has sparked outrage from Muslims. Tayside Police's new non-emergency phone number has prompted complaints from members of the Islamic community. The choice of image on the Tayside Police cards - a black dog sitting in a police officer's hat - has now been raised with Chief Constable John Vine. Tayside Police caused uproar in the Muslim community...

Aired on LBC TV (Lebanon) - June 19, 2008 - 00:03:08 : Dr. Ahmad Al-Mub'i, a Saudi Marriage Officiant: It Is Allowed to Marry a Girl at the Age of One, If Sex Is postponed. The Prophet Muhammad, Whose Model We Follow, Married 'Aisha When She Was Six and Had Sex with Her When She Was Nine : (excerpts) Dr. Ahmad Al-Mu'bi: Marriage is actually two things: First we are talking about the marriage contract itself. This is one thing, while consummating the marriage – having sex with the wife for the first time – is another thing. There is...

U.S. company: Blackwater Flight 61 crash lawsuit governed by Islamic law   To defend itself against a lawsuit by the widows of three American soldiers who died on one of its planes in Afghanistan, a sister company of the private military firm Blackwater has asked a federal court to decide the case using the Islamic law known as Shari’a.    The lawsuit “is governed by the law of Afghanistan,” Presidential Airways argued in a Florida federal court. “Afghan law is largely religion-based and evidences a strong concern for ensuring moral responsibility, and deterring violations of obligations within its borders.”.......(News Observer)

When I came to this country, I took off my hijab. It wasn't an easy decision. I worried at night that God would punish me for it. That's what I had been taught would happen, and it filled me with fear. I was 27, coming from my home country of Iraq to study in California. I hoped that by taking off the hijab I had been wearing for eight years, I would be able to maintain a low profile. In Baghdad, you keep a low profile to stay alive. But in the United States, I merely wanted not to be...

One of Turkey’s most successful fashion designers has been taken to court accused of exploiting Islam for personal profit. Mustafa Karaduman has been dubbed “Allah’s tailor” for his success at mass-marketing the ankle length coats and headscarves worn by conservative urban women who choose to cover up in style. His fashion empire, which encourages women to dress according to the Islamic beliefs, produced £25 million in sales across the Muslim world last year. But his commercial prowess has angered two Turkish theologians who claim he is profiting from Islamic belief having named his company after one of the Koran’s core...

Breibart has a story about a bride who lied about her virginity and her husband who wanted the marriage annulled when he found out she was not. The big deal? They were both Muslims and that particular religion sets great store by women's virginity before marriage. In fact, it sets great store by virginity, period. Men who die during jihad are promised 72 virgins in the afterlife. Apparently, in the Muslim afterlife the 72 virgins have their virginity restored so that the supply of virgins never runs dry. The French are now in an uproar and demanding to have the...

Brigitte Bardot fined for racism From correspondents in Paris June 03, 2008 11:19pm Article from: Agence France-Presse FRANCE'S 1960s screen icon Brigitte Bardot has received a 15,000 euros ($24,440) fine today for inciting hatred against Muslims. In December 2006, the film star-turned-animal rights activist wrote a letter to France's then interior minister, current President Nicolas Sarkozy, arguing that Muslims should stun animals before slaughtering them during the Aid al-Kabir holiday. She outraged anti-racist groups by saying: "I've had enough of being led by the nose by this whole population which is destroying us, (and) destroying our country by imposing their...

A court in French-Flanders annulled a marriage since the bride turned out not to be a virgin... The judges came to the conclusion that the bridegroom was deceived concerning an 'essential characteristic' of the bride, who had assured him before the wedding that she was still virgin. Both bride and groom are young French Muslims... The fraud was revealed when on the wedding night the groom could not show blood spots on the sheets to the feasting family. The groom's father brought the bride back to her parents.

Seeking a balance between outreach and enforcement, Miami is launching a nearly $1 million crime-fighting initiative in Overtown that will mix police patrols, video cameras -- and suit-and-tie wearing Muslims. The stepped-up policing seeks to deter would-be lawbreakers without making Overtown residents feel ''invaded,'' in the words of Miami Commissioner Michelle Spence-Jones. Which is where the Muslims come in. Along with budgeting hundreds of thousands of dollars for increased police patrols and the installation of surveillance cameras, Miami is spending $150,000 on a ''Peacemakers'' pilot program run by a nonprofit with ties to the Nation of Islam.

MG: Are you under any illusions as to what will will happen to you, if the Iranian regime discovers your identity? Will they accuse you of blasphemy and hang you from that giant crane? Rotten Gods: I wish. I mean I wish Iran was a democratic country and I was free to express my opinion without fear of terror, sudden death, or death penalty in public. In blasphemy cases, sharia law strictly orders to hang, behead, or throw convicted from height e.g. mountain.

Denmark, long the liberal, open society that welcomed immigrants, has done an about face. After being the symbolic envy of Universalists, of Socialists, of cultural liberalism, Denmark today has the strictest immigration policy in Europe. The Muslim population in Denmark, constituting a mere 4% of the total, refuses to integrate, consumes 40% of the welfare, and constitutes a majority of the country’s convicted rapists. The Danes now acknowledge that their core values of personal liberty, free speech, equality for women and tolerance of other ethnic groups are incompatible with Islam as they know it. Muslim leaders openly advocate introducing Islamic...

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - A Dutch political cartoonist was arrested this week on suspicion of insulting people because of their race or religion through his work, authorities said Friday. The cartoonist, who works under the pseudonym Gregorius Nekschot, was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of violating hate speech laws and held overnight before being released, a spokeswoman for his publisher Uitgeverij Xtra said. "He was arrested with a great show of force, by around 10 policemen," the spokeswoman said.

Scotland's first Muslim Police Association is being created in an attempt to encourage more Muslims to join and stay in the force. Strathclyde Police hopes the group will also help tackle Islamophobia and improve understanding of Islam. Pc Amar Shakoor, who was Scotland's first Muslim officer, said negativity had recently been directed towards the Muslim community. He said the association hoped to put Islam in a more positive light. "We want to highlight some of the positive things Islam can provide to the communities and not just the police services," he said. According to Pc Shakoor, since the 9/11 World...

Six translations of Qur'an 4:34: "Men are superior to women on account of the qualities with which God has gifted the one above the other, and on account of the outlay they make from their substance for them. Virtuous women are obedient, careful, during the husband's absence, because God has of them been careful. But chide those for whose refractoriness you have cause to fear; remove them into beds apart, and scourge them: but if they are obedient to you, then seek not occasion against them: verily, God is High, Great!" (Rodwell's version of the Koran, Quran, 4:34) "Men have...

A Baltimore couple has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the Islamic investment bank that owns the Church's Chicken fast-food chain, alleging their franchise failed because the bank's strict adherence to the religious code of Shari'ah prohibited the couple from selling pork. Marcus and Denise Beasley, who are black, claimed they were treated differently by the bank, now known as Atlanta-based Arcapita Inc., than non-black franchisees who were allowed to continue serving breakfast dishes containing pork after the chain was acquired by the bank in December 2004. The couple did not benefit from the grandfather policy allowing the sale...

Nojoud Muhammed Nasser YT Photo by Hamed Thabet SANA’A, April 9 - An eight-year-old girl decided last week to go the Sana’a West Court to prosecute her father, who forced her to marry a 30-year-old man. Nojoud Muhammed Nasser arrived at court by herself on Wednesday, April 2, looking for a judge to handle her case against her father, Muhammed Nasser, who forced her two months ago to marry Faez Ali Thamer, a man 22 years her senior. The child also asked for a divorce, accusing her husband of sexual and domestic abuse. According to Yemeni law, Nojoud cannot prosecute,...

"When it comes to avoiding a ban for speeding, the courts hear every excuse in the book. But yesterday one motorist offered what must be a unique reason why he should keep his licence. Mohammed Anwar said a ban would make it difficult to commute between his two wives and fulfil his matrimonial duties. His lawyer told a Scottish court the Muslim restaurant owner has one wife in Motherwell and another in Glasgow - he is allowed up to four under his religion - and sleeps with them on alternate nights. He also needed his driving licence to run his...

Following threats to our staff of a very serious nature, and some ill informed reports from certain corners of the British media that could directly lead to the harm of some of our staff, Liveleak.com has been left with no other choice but to remove Fitna from our servers. This is a sad day for freedom of speech on the net but we have to place the safety and well being of our staff above all else. We would like to thank the thousands of people, from all backgrounds and religions, who gave us their support. They realised LiveLeak.com is...

THE HAGUE, 28/03/08 - While the cabinet is losing sleep over MP Geert Wilders' unpublished Koran film, a second film is due out on 20 April. Ehsan Jami plans to launch a cartoon film featuring the Prophet Mohammed as a paedophile. Jami, born in Iran, announced that his film, The Life of Mohammed, is due for release on 20 April. On TV programme Netwerk, the young politician (22) showed a screen-shot in which the Prophet, with a visible erection, takes a child to a mosque to have sex. On the mosque is a swastika. The fragment is a reference to...

... In some sense, the outrage about according a degree of official status to Shariah in a Western country should come as no surprise. No legal system has ever had worse press. To many, the word “Shariah” conjures horrors of hands cut off, adulterers stoned and women oppressed. By contrast, who today remembers that the much-loved English common law called for execution as punishment for hundreds of crimes, including theft of any object worth five shillings or more? How many know that until the 18th century, the laws of most European countries authorized torture as an official component of the...

American Muslims Believe They Found A Way To Establish Shariah Law in the USA. Quote: And while our attention is diverted by our clueless leaders and the apologists and appeasers of Islamism, this is what’s happening behind our backs. http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/featu..._system/0013143 Issa Smith writes in the American Muslim that Native American courts can be used as a precedent for Islamic courts in the US. Although the Muslim community in North America is vastly different from the Indian community, I feel that in developing a plan for the implementation of Muslim family law, we can in some ways imitate the paradigm of...

The recent criticism of hate speech on campus is entirely appropriate. But we ought to make one exception to this rule: the “religious right,” a retrograde coterie of unattractive common folk who seek to impose their irrational beliefs on the rest of us. These fundamentalists lie awake at night, plotting the imposition of the truths they have received by revelation from God. God has decreed the necessity of prohibiting abortion and gay marriage, lest the land be scourged by His wrath, so the unquestioning hordes of Jesus-freaks flood the polls on election day. The few who are at Yale (here...

KHARTOUM, Sudan (AP) -- Sudan has enacted a ban on Danish imports in reaction to the reprinting of a cartoon that satirizes Islam's Prophet Muhammad, the Sudanese state-run news agency said Tuesday. Seventeen Danish newspapers reprinted the cartoon — showing Prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb-shaped turban — in a gesture of free speech on Feb. 13, a day after three men were arrested in an alleged plot to kill the drawing's creator. The reprinting prompted protests in Muslim countries and among Muslims in Denmark, though so far the reaction has been low-key in comparison to the 2006 riots that followed...

AMMAN (Reuters) - Vowing "Revenge against Crusaders who attack the symbol of Islam," dozens of Jordanian Islamists burned the Danish flag on Monday to protest the reprinting of cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammad in Danish newspapers. The Islamic Action Front, Jordan's main licensed opposition party and the political offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, demanded the government expel the Danish envoy until his government offered an official apology. "Oh government, expel the Danish ambassador: Oh Dane... listen the Prophet is the symbol of our Islam. We will die for his sake and eradicate anyone who humiliates him," chanted angry protesters in...

Harvard University has moved to make Muslim women more comfortable in the gym by instituting women-only access times six hours a week to accommodate religious customs that make it difficult for some students to work out in the presence of men. Men have not been allowed to enter the Quadrangle Recreational Athletic Center during certain times since Jan. 28, after members of the Harvard Islamic Society and the Harvard Women's Center petitioned the university for a more comfortable environment for women. Harvard Islamic Society's Islamic Knowledge Committee officer Ola Aljawhary, a junior, said the women-only hours are being tested on...

MUSLIM university students want lectures to be rescheduled to fit in with prayer timetables and separate male and female eating and recreational areas established on Australian campuses. International Muslim students, predominantly from Saudi Arabia, have asked universities in Melbourne to change class times so they can attend congregational prayers. They also want a female-only area for Muslim students to eat and relax. But at least one institution has rejected their demands, arguing that the university is secular and it does not want to set a precedent for requests granted in the name of religious beliefs. La Trobe University International chief...

February 24, 2008Universal Islamic 'Blasphemy' Law ? By Andrew G. Bostom Almost two weeks ago, "three men with a Muslim background" were arrested by Danish police on anti-terrorism charges, suspected of having plotted to murder Kurt Westergaard, a cartoonist for Jyllands-Posten. Westergaard is one of the 12 cartoonists who on September 30, 2005 published cartoons of the Muslim prophet Muhammad to protest the tacit enforcement in Danish society of Islam's taboo on depictions of Muhammad, no matter how banal, or inoffensive, through intimidation -- a clear violation of Western freedom of expression. Upon learning of the arrests, Westergaard (noted for...

Barack Obama and Israel American Thinker ^ | Jan. 16, 2008 | Ed Lasky Posted on 02/22/2008 12:19:24 AM EST by TheThinker The ascent of Barack Obama from state senator in Illinois to a leading contender for the Presidential nomination in the span of just a few years is remarkable. Especially in light of a noticeably unremarkable record -- a near-blank slate of few accomplishments and numerous missed votes. However, in one area of foreign policy that concerns millions of Americans, he does have a record and it is a particularly troubling one. For all supporters of the America-Israel relationship...

Saudi Arabia's national carrier Saudi Arabian Airlines (SAA) said that women will not be hired as flight attendants... SAA said that hiring women as flight attendants was inconsistent with Saudi society.