Free Republic

A nationalist organization has criticized a proposal to construct more mosques in Russia to accommodate an influx of immigrants arriving from Muslim countries in search of employment."This approach is not totally correct," Aleksander Belov, chairman of the Russkiye national movement, told reporters on Tuesday. "It is necessary to decide once and for all whether Russia will turn into an Islamic state or it will remain a secular state, where foreign immigrants arrive, find jobs and leave after their work is finished.""If immigrants…want to build a mosque in my yard, this approach is certainly wrong," he addedIn an effort to “to...

BOBIGNY, France (Reuters) -- French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy defended his tough crime policies on Monday after a fourth night of riots in a Paris suburb in which tear gas was fired into a mosque. Sarkozy, addressing police officers, vowed to find how tear gas had been fired into the Muslim place of worship, an incident which had helped fuel the disturbances. Youths hurled rocks and set fire to cars in the northeastern Clichy-sous-Bois suburb of the French capital, where many immigrants and poor families live in high-rise housing estates notorious for youth violence. ...snip French television said six police...

A Muslim cleric in Århus demands that daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten apologises for publishing cartoons featuring the prophet Mohammed Daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten is facing accusations that it deliberately provoked and insulted Muslims by publishing twelve cartoons featuring the prophet Mohammed. The newspaper urged cartoonists to send in drawings of the prophet, after an author complained that nobody dared to illustrate his book on Mohammed. The author claimed that illustrators feared that extremist Muslims would find it sacrilegious to break the Islamic ban on depicting Mohammed. Twelve illustrators heeded the newspaper's call, and sent in cartoons of the prophet, which were published...

British prison officers who wore a St. George's Cross tie-pin have been ticked off by the jails watchdog over concerns about the symbol's racist connotations. The pins showing the English flag -- which has often raised hackles due to its connection with the Crusades of the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries -- could be "misconstrued," Chief Inspector of Prisons Anne Owers said in a section on race in a report on a jail in the northern English city of Wakefield. The banner of St. George, the red cross of a martyr on a white background, was adopted for the uniform...

A poll at CNN asks, “Is it time for England to change its national flag?” Why in the world would such a thing even be considered? To avoid offending ... you know who: Race fears spark St. George ban. Chris Doyle, director of the Council for the Advancement of Arab-British Understanding, said Tuesday the red cross was an insensitive reminder of the Crusades. “A lot of Muslims and Arabs view the Crusades as a bloody episode in our history,” he told CNN. “They see those campaigns as Christendom launching a brutal holy war against Islam. “Muslim or Arab prisoners could take...

Toy pigs must go at council Oct 1, 2005 (photo mine -YD) Novelty pig calendars and toys have been banned by bosses at Dudley Council in case Muslim staff are offended. Workers in the council's benefits department have been told to remove or cover up all pig products including toys, porcelain, calendars and even a tissue box featuring Winnie the Pooh and Piglet. It comes after a Muslim worker said they were offended by pig-shaped stress relievers delivered to the authority. Muslims are forbidden from eating pork in the Koran and staff were asked to remove the items. The...

NOVELTY pig calendars and toys have been banned from a council office — in case they offend Muslim staff. Workers in the benefits department at Dudley Council, West Midlands, were told to remove or cover up all pig-related items, including toys, porcelain figures, calendars and even a tissue box featuring Winnie the Pooh and Piglet. Bosses acted after a Muslim complained about pig-shaped stress relievers delivered to the council in the run-up to the Islamic festival of Ramadan. Muslims are barred from eating pork in the Koran and consider pigs unclean. Councillor Mahbubur Rahman, a practising Muslim, backed the ban....

THE Bush Administration has intervened in the debate about Turkey’s entry into the EU, warning Brussels of disastrous consequences if Ankara’s membership bid is turned down. Eric Edelman, the Pentagon’s new number three and until recently the US Ambassador to Ankara, said that refusing Turkey’s entry would not just destabilise a strategic region on Europe’s border but also set back efforts to encourage democratic reform across the Muslim world. “In light of everything else that is going on in the wake of 9/11, in Afghanistan, in Iraq and following the bombings in Madrid and London, to say ‘no’ to a...

By Sibel Utku Bila - Agence France-Presse ANKARA - Turkey hinted yesterday that it may shun the start of EU membership talks next week as political tensions rose over the country's place in Europe, leading Britain to warn of a «huge betrayal» if the door was slammed shut on Ankara. Raising the risk of a political showdown, the European Parliament issued a stern warning to Ankara to recognize Cyprus and acknowledge that the Ottomans committed «genocide» against Armenians during World War I, two highly sensitive issues that have already strained ties. The Parliament did, however, endorse the start of talks...

ABOUT 70 young Muslim men have left Britain to join the insurgents who are fighting coalition troops in Iraq, senior security sources have revealed. At least three have been killed in combat, including one whose role in an Iraq suicide bombing in February was disclosed by police only last week. The growing problem of militants from Britain travelling to Iraq has been highlighted by Eliza Manningham-Buller, director-general of MI5, in recent briefings to Tony Blair. The MI5 boss warned the prime minister that would-be suicide bombers and other fighters who want to kill British and American troops were using “a...

Oriana Fallaci is 75 years old. The renowned Italian journalist lives in hiding because of death threats she received after the publication in 2001 of her book The Rage and the Pride. She is dying of cancer. And now she is going to go on trial for “defaming Islam.”

WHEN the editor of one of America’s leading gay magazines visited the world’s gay capital a fortnight ago, he assumed that he would be safe. But as Chris Crain, editor of the Washington Blade, was walking hand in hand with his boyfriend near one of the gay districts in Amsterdam, two men standing on a street corner spat at his face. He stopped to ask why, was called a “fag” and suddenly the two youths turned into seven. Surrounded, Mr Crain was kicked to the ground by the gang and ended up in hospital with a broken nose and badly...

As students bought lunch and coffee at London's School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) campus, the Islamic call to prayer, "Allahu Akbar," blasted repeatedly through several speakers situated around the student union. "If you want to work for Islam, you must give your heart, if you want to get to heaven, do what the prophet said, peace be upon him," bellowed a melody. SOAS, scene to a growing number of anti-Semitic incidents in recent months, has issued a threat to one of its Jewish students to cease his protests against anti-Semitism at the university. Gavin Gross, an American, has...

~~snip~~It is those voters, overwhelmingly Muslim, who should concern us at least as much as Mr. Galloway. Across the country, city after city with a large Muslim minority showed an above average swing against Mr. Blair and Labor. It seems pretty clear that the great majority of Britain's 2.5 million Muslims obeyed the instructions of their imams or community leaders and voted en bloc for whichever antiwar party seemed to have the best chance of defeating the Blair government. The Muslim defection from their traditional allegiance to Labor cost Mr. Blair up to half of the seats he lost and...

MORE than a year after the Madrid train bombings that left 191 people dead, and hundreds more injured, Europe is struggling to come to grips with the spectre of Islamic terrorism. The strong words and lofty promises made by European leaders in the emotion-charged days after the Madrid tragedy now seem increasingly hollow as the continent struggles to adopt a unified approach to dealing with the terrorist threat. The problem is being fuelled by sharp differences among the 25 member nations of the European Union about the gravity of the threat posed by Islamic terrorism – a division that creates...

Europe's pioneer for much of the last century in social experiments, it seems the Netherlands may now be pointing to the next cultural revolution: the bourgeois exodus. Escaping the stress of clogged roads, street violence and loss of faith in the country's once celebrated way of life, the Dutch are quitting their homeland in droves. More and more Dutch people are leaving the Netherlands to live abroad. In 1999, nearly 30,000 native Dutch moved elsewhere. By 2004 the figure had shot up to almost 50,000. Dutch people emigrating around the world is nothing new, but this time it's highly skilled...

Religion should not play the same role in British politics that it does in America, Tony Blair has said. Mr Blair said he did not want a system where politicians went out "beating their chests about our faith". The prime minister was speaking to a Christian group already addressed by the Tory and Lib Dem leaders. He said he wanted churches and faith groups to play a bigger role in national life and paid tribute to their work in social action. 'Don't do God' Mr Blair was speaking to church leaders, other faith representatives and community activists in London about...

Europe's Muslim Street Foreign Policy, March 2003 Omer Taspinar, Visiting Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies Islam may still be a faraway religion for millions of Americans. But for Europeans it is local politics. The 15 million Muslims of the European Union (EU)—up to three times as many as live in the United States—are becoming a more powerful political force than the fabled Arab street. Europe’s Muslims hail from different countries and display diverse religious tendencies, but the common denominator that links them to the Muslim world is their sympathy for Palestine and Palestinians. And unlike most of their Arab brethren, growing...

Only a few years ago, mass-murder attacks on the West in the name of Islam, like those of September 11, would have seemed like a thriller writer’s fantasy. Nor would anyone have imagined that a bombing by Islamists could swing a general election in a European country, that a Dutch movie-maker might be shot dead on the street for a film about the abuse of women in Islam, or that one might find oneself watching, on television, the beheading of Western hostages by men crying out Allahu Akhbar! over their savage deeds.... At present, it is not clear whether the...