Free Republic

Rep. Keith Ellison, Minnesota Democrat, said Tuesday that Republicans don’t have a mandate after a midterm election cycle in which they took back control of the Senate and picked up about a dozen seats in the House — pointing to low voter turnout and successful ballot initiatives on raising the minimum wage as evidence of a nuanced electorate. Appearing on CNN’s “New Day,” Mr. Ellison was responding to comments from Sen. Mike Lee, Utah Republican, that the American people have spoken and President Obama can listen to them on issues like immigration. “Well, you know, we had a 72-year low...

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Saturday that the Americas were discovered by Muslims in the 12th century, nearly three centuries before Christopher Columbus set foot there. "Contacts between Latin America and Islam date back to the 12th century. Muslims discovered America in 1178, not Christopher Columbus," the conservative president said in a televised speech during an Istanbul summit of Muslim leaders from Latin America. "Muslim sailors arrived in America from 1178. Columbus mentioned the existence of a mosque on a hill on the Cuban coast," Erdogan said.

(WASHINGTON, D.C.) -- The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, plans to mobilize Muslim voters this weekend through a get-out-the-vote (GOTV) call campaign directed at 145,000 households in states with high concentrations of American Muslims. [IMPORTANT NOTE: Because of recent efforts to suppress minority voting nationwide, it is important to report attempts to block any qualified voter from casting a ballot. Report any denial of voting rights to civilrights@cair.com ] The calls will urge Muslim voters to go to the polls on November 4 and will be recorded by regional Muslim leaders...

REVERE, Mass. (WHDH) - Some parents in Revere were angry when they learned students were being taught about Islam and the Muslim religion. "No religion should be taught at school. In their paper it says Allah is their only God. That's insulting to me as a Christian who believes in just Jesus only," said Anthony Giannino. A section of the textbook describing the beliefs of Muslims says, "I bear witness that there is no God but Allah." Giannino immediately pulled his son out of the classroom. "We don't believe in Allah. I don't believe in my son learning about this...

A few days ago President Obama, in an interview he gave France's Canal+ TV Channel, said that the American people need to be better educated about Islam, since US could and should be regarded as a Muslim country. He said that the number of Muslims residing in the US makes it "one of the biggest Muslim nations". In reality the US has one of the smallest percentages of Muslims of any Western country. The number of Muslims in the US is approximately 4.5 million, 1.5% of the population, one of the smallest minorities in the US. Since there are approximately...

Two months after American bombs and missiles began pounding fighters of the so-called Islamic State, President Barack Obama’s undeclared war in Iraq and Syria finally has a name: Operation Inherent Resolve. The Wall Street Journal had reported on Oct. 3 that the name had been considered and rejected, with one unnamed military officer saying “it is just kind of bleh.” The long search for a name had sparked a flurry of jokes on Twitter, where one leading tongue-in-cheek suggestion was that it be called “Operation Hey Wasn’t That My Humvee” – a reference to U.S. airstrikes hitting Islamic State fighters...

"Public Schools Introduce Islam" In Mississippi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYDTL4N8y4k

President Barack Obama has issued a statement on the occasion of Eid al-Adha, which commemorates the Muslim belief that Abraham was willing to sacrifice to God his son Ishmael (rather than Isaac, as related in the Old Testament). “Michelle and I would like to extend our best wishes to Muslims in the United States and around the world who are celebrating Eid al-Adha, and to congratulate those performing the Hajj [pilgrimage to Mecca] this year,” he said. “As our Muslim neighbors and friends gather for Eid celebrations, Muslim Americans are among the millions of pilgrims joining one of the world’s...

A recent announcement from the Islamic Society of Baltimore (ISB) / Masjid Al-Rahmah advised that it will be receiving a grant from the Nonprofit Security Grant Program administered through the Maryland Emergency Management Agency (MEMA): ISB will be receiving $74,675.00 which will go towards upgrading, enhancing and adding to our security infrastructure. Over the next several months you will see contractors on-site conducting these security enhancements. The Nonprofit Security Grant Program (NSGP) is nationwide and overseen by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Part of DHS’s Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI), it has been in effect since 2005. To...

What if Iraq is not a country of people with common cultures and interests and generally accepted borders, but rather an amalgam of warring groups cobbled together by British and American diplomats? What if only a strongman like Hussein — however evil and ill suited for government by Western standards — can keep peace and stability in an artificial country like Iraq?

Approximately 2.5 million immigrants from “predominantly Muslim countries" reside inside the U.S. right now, a new report from the Center for Immigration Studies found. The four-page report, which details which countries and world regions from which immigrants in the U.S.—both legal and illegal—came to this country, found that since 2000 nearly a million more immigrants from such Muslim countries came to the U.S. In 2000, there were 1,518,755 immigrants from Muslim countries in the U.S. In 2010, That number stood at 2,184,664, and in 2013 it stands at 2,480,407. Between 2010 and 2013, there was actually a greater increase in...

Turkey has lifted a ban on the Islamic-style headscarf in schools, allowing girls from the fifth grade and up to cover their hair in a further easing of generations-old restrictions on the public expression of faith. The government, whose roots are in political Islam, has already lifted a ban on religious garb for university students and female civil servants, scrapping curbs stemming from the founding of Turkey's secular republic in 1923 on the ashes of Islamic Ottoman Empire. "Our female students have yearned" for the end of the ban, Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said late on Monday after a...

Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday that to counter the ideology of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and its claim of a "religious foundation" for its actions, part of the strategy of the international coalition he is attempting to assemble must be to "begin to put real Islam out there." Kerry, in Paris for talks with various world leaders to build that coalition, further said that all of the Arab leaders he had spoken with earlier concurred about their focus on "real Islam and how important the Friday sermons are." The secretary of state recently...

In his prime-time speech to the nation on the eve of the 13th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, President Obama vowed to “degrade and destroy” the Islamic State insurgency in Iraq and Syria with airstrikes and 475 U.S. boots on the ground – but he also made a particular point of declaring that the Islamic State terrorists “are not Islamic.” “Now let’s make two things clear: ISIL is not Islamic,” Obama said, speaking from the state floor of the White House residence. “No religion condones the killing of innocents, and the vast majority of ISIL’s victims have been...

A new policy put in place by Cal State University could cost InterVarsity and other Christian groups up to $460,000 to meet on campus because they cannot change their leadership requirements to include any student. "No campus shall recognize any fraternity, sorority, living group, honor society, or other student organization unless its membership and leadership are open to all currently enrolled students at that campus," the policy states. The rule requires leadership positions to be open to any student, regardless of whether they hold the same beliefs as the Club. The policy went into effect in 2012 but up until...

The "I" word -- Islam -- shall not be used other than respectfully, as in "the religion of peace."Do the Islamic State (IS) and its terrorist cohorts practice an "extremist" version of Islam? Does Obama know enough about Islam to decide? [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRSSn_yRrT4] Video linkSecretary Kerry (consistently with Obama's position), said “The real face of Islam is a peaceful religion based on ‎the dignity of all human beings:” “America’s faith communities, including American Muslims, are sources of strength for all of us. They’re an ‎essential part of our national fabric, and we are committed to deepening our partnerships with them. We’re ‎making these efforts to...

Do not eat or drink in front of Muslims, and learn more about their religion. That’s the directive that has gone out to active duty military personnel at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, a Department of Defense medical and graduate school in Bethesda, Md. The brigade commander sent an email to military personnel at the facility last month – just before the start of Ramadan – advising them to show respect to Muslim colleagues.

Bill Donohue comments on President Obama’s remarks last night at the White House honoring Eid-al-Fitr, marking the end of Ramadan: Last night the president said that Eid “reminds us of the many achievements and contributions of Muslim Americans to building the very fabric of our nation and strengthening the core of our democracy.” He would have done us a service had he enumerated them. “That is why we stand with people of all faiths,” he continued, “here at home and around the world, to protect and advance their rights to prosper, and we welcome their commitment to giving back to...

....U.S. officials said Wednesday that not only are Sunni radicals with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant “worse than al Qaeda,” but that the group has a message for the president: “We’re coming for you, Barack Obama.” Brett McGurk, the deputy assistant secretary of state, told lawmakers at a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing that ISIL may have “changed its name,” but that it’s still al Qaeda.

The last Christian families still present in Mosul are leaving the city and are heading towards Iraqi Kurdistan. The exodus was caused by the proclamation on Thursday by the self-proclaimed Islamic Caliphate that Christians must pay a special tax or be killed. Islamists have for the past two days been marking the doors of homes belonging to Christians and Shia Muslims living in the city. “For the first time in the history of Iraq, Mosul is now empty of Christians,” said Chaldean Patriarch Louis Sako in an interview with the AFP news agency. The Patriarch said as late as last...