Islamism & Islamophobia Abroad - News & Analysis

[wig]

and this is what happened in maldives when a swiss couple got married in a plush resort. worth reading in full

The couple chose an idyllic resort in the Maldives as the perfect place to renew their marriage vows and pledge everlasting love.

But their happiness has turned to humiliation after the wedding video was posted on YouTube and subtitles disclosed that their "Islamic blessing", which was conducted by a hotel employee in the native Dhivehi language, was in fact a stream of insults.

"You are swine. The children that you bear from this marriage will all be ******** swine. Your marriage is not a valid one," he intoned as the couple held up their hands in prayer, blissfully unaware of what was being said.

Dismissing them as pork-eating "infidels", the employee went on: "You are not the kind of people who can have a valid marriage. One of you is an infidel. The other too is an infidel and, we have reason to believe, an atheist who does not even believe in an infidel religion
The ceremony took place at the Vilu Reef Beach and Spa Resort, which charges £820 for the privilege. The hotel's website claims that the sunset ceremony is the perfect way "to mark a milestone in your amazing journey together".

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... adise.html

[tejas]

ROP is the only legal religion in Maldives. People can be jailed for practicing any other religion. To me, to be called a kafir is the best compliment in the world. Let Somalis, Pukistanis and other people of the Ummah ferquent Maldives as tourists. All infidels should boycott it.

[RajeshA]

ROP is the only legal religion in Maldives. People can be jailed for practicing any other religion. To me, to be called a kafir is the best compliment in the world. Let Somalis, Pukistanis and other people of the Ummah ferquent Maldives as tourists. All infidels should boycott it.

Well the pork-eating kafirs from China who occupy Muslim lands in East Turkestan, do not boycott it, why should we?

We have already lost Myanmar to China due to ideological reasons, let's not lose other strategic places, because of ideological blinkers!

Consider Maldives' policies the bark of a small dog.

[Nandu]

x-posted from TSP thread.

"Hip Muslim Moms" disbanded because one of the co-founders was wife of the Paki who wanted to bomb DC metro.

http://gawker.com/5675028/alleged-metro ... muslim-mom
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02600.html

[harbans]

Sickening, cheap and sad. What sort of human being/ group can say and do that to a trusting couple on possibly one of their happiest days in life..there is nothing to Maldives than a shore of white sand beaches, slums housing fisherman. Maldives has changed last 10 years. It's 100% Islamic, many of it's citizens service merchant shipping in India as crew and so it's present wealth.

[darshhan]

Good overview article on trends across Europe : Anti-Muslim feelings propel right wing

Alarm over the anti-immigrant wave intensified recently as authorities warned "dark-skinned" residents in the southern city of Malmo that one or more snipers are targeting immigrants, killing one and wounding eight in 15 separate shootings this year

It seems that Resistance against islamism has started in Europe.May the resistance win.

[KLNMurthy]

Good overview article on trends across Europe : Anti-Muslim feelings propel right wing

Alarm over the anti-immigrant wave intensified recently as authorities warned "dark-skinned" residents in the southern city of Malmo that one or more snipers are targeting immigrants, killing one and wounding eight in 15 separate shootings this year

It seems that Resistance against islamism has started in Europe.May the resistance win.

Be careful what you wish for. Most of these resisters hate Yindoos and Yinduism even more.

[Hari Seldon]

Be careful what you wish for. Most of these resisters hate Yindoos and Yinduism even more.

Good point, KLNMurthy garu. But consider what the alternative may be - a Europe that has fallen to Islam. Consider what straight talker sri muammar gaddafi said on the matter:

We have 50 million Muslims in Europe. There are signs that Allah will grant Islam victory in Europe—without swords, without guns, without conquest—will turn it into a Muslim continent within a few decades.
(10 April 2006), quoted in Steven Stalinsky (2006-09-06) "Terrorists Promise More Attacks Like 9/11" New York Sun

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Muammar_al-Gaddafi

I know, sounds all warm, fuzzy and cuddly only. However, this needn't be an either-or alone.

There is, it seems a third option - a situation where neither the momeen nor the resisters win - a perpetual stalemate with civil war, mutual recriminations, ancient hatreds flared up, ethnic zones carved out, no-go areas pockmarked all over the map....... In short, oirope may actually get what oirope, specifically UQ, had carefully planned and acted to achieve in the Indian subcontinent. Consider what the briturds have already done to the place - carved it up into a civil-war ethnic conflict zone, gotten a million + killed in the partition and so on. Thank heavens for Sri VB Patel and the chronicling by sri VP Menon on how we, narrowly, managed to avoid the fate the briturds had planned for us.

So, its entirely possible oirope with UQ in the lead, may actually get a small taste of precisely such medicine. Some may say it is Karma coming calling only.

Some may also say that one side benefit will be that all the moral sanctimonious sermonizing the oiro high-brows sitting on human-rights councils and award-tribunals do will be toned down back to reality only.

Time will tell. I could well be off by a few years here and there but I see no way in which a conflict can be avoided on Oirostan. Just as there is no way a massive economic contraction and dislocation can be avoided in the rich world either.

[tejas]

Namaste Hari. I couldn't agree more with your thoughts. The disease the Brits were more than happy to spread in India has finally blown back into their faces. I only wish the leftwingers in Umrikah could also get a taste of this Kool Aid. It nauseates me when Atlantacist rags like the NYT put out articles portraying ROPers in India as victims of Hindu fundamentalists ( an oxymoron if there ever was one).
The fact that NaMo can't get a visa to Umrikah while Musharraf or former persident for life Zia can is sickening.

Peace out!

[shiv]

. I only wish the leftwingers in Umrikah could also get a taste of this Kool Aid. It nauseates me when Atlantacist rags like the NYT put out articles portraying ROPers in India as victims of Hindu fundamentalists ( an oxymoron if there ever was one).
The fact that NaMo can't get a visa to Umrikah while Musharraf or former persident for life Zia can is sickening.

What does Modi lose by not getting a US visa? Surely that is not a place he needs to visit. What would he want to do? Visit Disney World?

[brihaspati]

No, Maldives are not a small dog barking - they have continuously sent out students to Paki madrassahs for the last two decades and these have come back to infiltrate the politics and system increasingly. It was sort of ideological blinkers - rightly - that made GOI not intervene in the process because of its policies that virtually has always amounted to protection and nurture of Islamism on the subcontinent.

Maldives is a good transit point for movement of men and material for Jihad. If some essentially radical Islamist leaning leader from Maldives comes to India and appears sincere about collaborating against "terror" - that can make a GOI pretend that Maldives is "okay" - but reality is that so far India has not been able to check even the D-companys transits along the west coast. The fault need not be that of the navy or coastal security systems - the fault could be much deeper inland. But without such insulation, Maldives remains a good base - traditional Islamist stopover between Sindh coast and SL.

Track the internal happenings in Maldives - it has been steadily turning paki brand of Islamist. in fact PRC's rumoured naval facility in Maldives could very well have been negotiated through the Paki connection and the Islamist connection. Maldives will be a future deception base to provide networking and support for planned Jihadi or Paki activities on India. It will pretend to be a "peaceful Islamist" oh-so-weak and non-trouble-liking "tiny" enclave. But it is a wonderful, base for the Islamists, and good listening post for surveillance on India.

Yes, yes, GOI can do surveillance a million times, can make the islands vanish beneath the waves - etc, etc, but the thing is ultimately GOI has to decide to do so. It is almost surely unlikely that GOI will take any such step that can severely damage the existence of any piece of land that has substantial Islamists on it. They are the ultimate "scheduled" "castes" meant for utmost protection.

[RajeshA]

brihaspati garu,

I agree completely with you on Maldives.

It is an extremely valuable piece of real estate, whose patron is going to be PRC now.

[KLNMurthy]

Be careful what you wish for. Most of these resisters hate Yindoos and Yinduism even more.

Good point, KLNMurthy garu. But consider what the alternative may be - a Europe that has fallen to Islam. Consider what straight talker sri muammar gaddafi said on the matter:

We have 50 million Muslims in Europe. There are signs that Allah will grant Islam victory in Europe—without swords, without guns, without conquest—will turn it into a Muslim continent within a few decades.
(10 April 2006), quoted in Steven Stalinsky (2006-09-06) "Terrorists Promise More Attacks Like 9/11" New York Sun

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Muammar_al-Gaddafi

I know, sounds all warm, fuzzy and cuddly only. However, this needn't be an either-or alone.

There is, it seems a third option - a situation where neither the momeen nor the resisters win - a perpetual stalemate with civil war, mutual recriminations, ancient hatreds flared up, ethnic zones carved out, no-go areas pockmarked all over the map....... In short, oirope may actually get what oirope, specifically UQ, had carefully planned and acted to achieve in the Indian subcontinent. Consider what the briturds have already done to the place - carved it up into a civil-war ethnic conflict zone, gotten a million + killed in the partition and so on. Thank heavens for Sri VB Patel and the chronicling by sri VP Menon on how we, narrowly, managed to avoid the fate the briturds had planned for us.

So, its entirely possible oirope with UQ in the lead, may actually get a small taste of precisely such medicine. Some may say it is Karma coming calling only.

Some may also say that one side benefit will be that all the moral sanctimonious sermonizing the oiro high-brows sitting on human-rights councils and award-tribunals do will be toned down back to reality only.

Time will tell. I could well be off by a few years here and there but I see no way in which a conflict can be avoided on Oirostan. Just as there is no way a massive economic contraction and dislocation can be avoided in the rich world either.

The dynamics of right-wing politics in euroamerica and the intra-semitic religion conflicts can be complicated. We Indics have no option but to strengthen ourselves to the point of invulnerability and maintain eternal vigilance, with the ultimate offensive goal of actually eclipsing semitic religions with Indism 2.0 or 3.0.

To take an example of these complicated dynamics, consider the Indian-american right-wing republican Dinesh D'Souza. This guy is a virulent Obama-hater, also hates Hinduism and everything Indic. He has also said in the past that evangelical christians should team with muslims to put down Hindus (more or less). While he stands out as an extreme case, a case like this illustrates the difficulty of choosing sides.

In our history we have done our bit (as with Vijayanagar) in trying to play the game of managing these dynamics, and we are still doing it. The concern here is whether we are buying time to become independently invincible or whether these manipulations are a substitute for the real effort to acquire that power.

[tejas]

Shiv garu, the point is not that NaMo couldn't visit Disney world ( he was actually to talk at a Gujarati shindig). The point was ROP apologists combined to paint him as a genocidal tyrant because some ROPers finally got a taste of their own medicine in Gujarati riots. To deny the CM of India's most industrialized state a visa is a slap in the face. Meanwhile to firmly confirm its dhimmi status the GOI continues to allow war criminals like Henry Kissinger to visit India.

[vera_k]

^^

All this consternation is not due to US actions but due to Indian weakness. The fact that India has to deal with illegitimate states (according to our worldview) like Pakistan is solely due to a lack of advantage over these states. The US faces similar restrictions in dealing with illegitimate states, although it wins one every now and then. Today the Islamic world far outclasses anything the US can bring to bear, hence all the kowtowing to various Islamic strongmen.

[A_Gupta]

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/20 ... nce-again/

The Liberal State and Religion

[wig]

Woman tried to murder Labour MP over Iraq
London: A female student was found guilty at a London court on Tuesday of trying to murder a Labour MP in revenge for his having voted for the Iraq war. Roshonara Choudhry, 21, knifed former Treasury Minister Stephen Timms twice in the stomach during a regular monthly advice surgery at an east London community centre in May. The assault was a "punishment" and "to get revenge for the people of Iraq", prosecutor William Boyce told the Old Bailey. — Reuters

source:
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2010/20101103/world.htm

[Sumeet]

It seems that Resistance against islamism has started in Europe.May the resistance win.

Be careful what you wish for. Most of these resisters hate Yindoos and Yinduism even more.

Let them get a closer taste of radical & political Islam there eyes will (hopefully) open.

[shiv]

China is the flavor of the month

One thing you've got to admire is the way the Chinese have handled Islam. They have simply crushed it.
http://www.asiasentinel.com/index.php?o ... Itemid=206

Wang Zhen, the man who did more than any other in history to bind Xinjiang to China. In 1944, with support from the Soviet Union, the Uighurs proclaimed the second East Turkistan Republic in three districts of northern Xinjiang. It lasted five years, until Wang's Communist army conquered the region. From October 1949, as Communist Party chief and military commander of the region, for each Chinese soldier killed, Wang ordered the execution of five men in the village where the killing took place. I love it. I love the Chinese way

In 1954, Wang set up the Production and Engineering Corps, in Chinese Bingtuan or military group'. They were demobilized soldiers who became militia farmers, similar to the Jews who migrated to Palestine before and after the establishment of Israel. They now number more than 2.5 million and produce much of the region's cotton, tomato, fruit and other farm crops. They have also developed mining and mine-related industry and have a dozen listed companies. The corps has its own education system, including two universities, a newspaper and television stations.

By 1964, thanks to Wang's policies, the Han percentage of Xinjiang's population had quadrupled from six percent, or 300,000, in 1949 to 32.7 percent in 1964. In 1949, the Uighur proportion was 75 percent.

Wang's brutality was too much even for Mao Zedong, who fired him from his post in Xinjiang in 1956. But Wang remained a senior figure in the Communist party and army and an advocate of military force in Beijing in May 1989. He remains a hero among the Han in Xinjiang. his ashes were scattered over the Tianshan Mountains north of Urumqi after his death in March 1993.

The Chinese way was "Are you a Muslim? Take that, Blam! Blam!" This method is, after all, how the "West" was won in the US from Red Indians. And China did the same thing. No wonder China is now challenging the US. No?

I tell ya we Indians know nothing about making this world ours as we sit in our dhotis worshipping yon hill and vale.

[shiv]

Islam and Muslims in China
http://chinese-school.netfirms.com/Muslims.html

Dhimmitude or Taqiya?

Under China's current leadership, in fact, Islam appears to be undergoing a modest revival. Religious leaders report more worshipers now than before the Cultural Revolution, and a reawakening of interest in religion among the young.

According to a publication on mosques in China(1998 edition), there are now 32,749 mosques in the entire People's Republic of China, with 23,000 in the province of Xinjiang. There has been an increased upsurge in Islamic expression in China, and many nationwide Islamic associations have been organized to coordinate inter-ethnic activities among Muslims. Islamic literature can be found quite easily and there are currently some eight different translations of the Qur'an in the Chinese language as well as translations in Uygur and the other Turkic languages.

Muslims have also gained a measure of toleration from other religious practices. In areas where Muslims are a majority, the breeding of pigs by non-Muslims is forbidden in deference to Islamic beliefs. Muslim communities are allowed separate cemeteries; Muslim couples may have their marriage consecrated by an imam; and Muslim workers are permitted holidays during major religious festivals. The Muslims of China have also been given almost unrestricted allowance to make the Hajj to Mecca. China's Muslims have also been active in the country's internal politics. As always, the Muslims have refused to be silenced. Islam is very much alive for China's Muslims who have managed to practice their faith, sometimes against great odds, since the seventh century.

[shiv]

http://www.harunyahya.com/e_turkestan01.php
COMMUNIST CHINA'S POLICY OF OPPRESSION IN
EAST TURKESTAN

Whenever he holds the upper hand, he goes about the earth corrupting it, destroying (peoples') crops and animals.
God does not love corruption.
(Qur'an, 2:205)

China entered the twentieth century as the remains of an empire fragmented and crushed under pressure from especially Britain, France, Germany, Japan and Russia. After imperial rule had been overthrown, no powerful central authority was established for decades. When the Communist Party came to power in 1949, China soon turned into a state of fear. That process cost the lives of tens of millions of people because of the repressive and totalitarian methods the communists used to enforce their bloody ideology. The Chinese Communist Party resorted to violence to remain in power, and implemented one of the most savage and ruthless form of communism ever, enforcing one single way of living and thinking for the entire Chinese people. Throughout that period, those who refused to abide by the rules of their communist leaders were ruthlessly exterminated.

It is commonly assumed that the savage implementation of communism has come to an end. People no longer receive food in return for vouchers, no longer are required to wear uniforms, nor suffer torture because they are unable to learn Mao's "Little Red Book" by heart. Yet communism, adapted by the regime to the new world order, is still alive and well in all its ruthlessness.

In the eyes of the Communist Party, people are of value only as long as they can produce, and are allowed to think only within boundaries set by the Communist Party. They can freely express only thoughts in harmony with the party. The labor camps that exist through China, the system that humiliates and exploits millions of people in those camps, the mass executions in full public view, the torture methods widely employed in the prisons and the sale of the internal organs of those condemned to death, all reveal the ugly face of the communist administration. Despite all this, however, for the last 20 years a number of media outlets have been spreading the propaganda that China is rapidly preceding down a liberal and democratic path. One important point is often ignored: The fact that China has moved to capitalist practices in the economic field and has opened its gates to foreign investors in a number of areas, does not mean that there has also been a change in the country's political structure and ideology. On the contrary, the inhuman practices still common demonstrate that nothing has changed in the mentality of the ruling Communist Party. This will be clarified with a great many examples in subsequent chapters of this book.

A major area of communist savagery is East Turkestan, home to the Muslim Uighur Turks. Located at the westernmost point of China, East Turkestan has been under occupation for the last two centuries or so, and for the last 50 years in particular has suffered great oppression from the despotic regime of the communist Chinese administration. As a result of Chinese propaganda, East Turkestan is known to the world as "Xinjiang," or "Sinkiang" meaning "new borders" in Chinese, and most people are very unaware of the human drama going on there. Yet East Turkestan, the majority of whose population are Muslims of Uighur origin, is the scene of violence and oppression by the communist Chinese administration, the like of which is found in no other region of China. Torture, executions, labor camps and religious oppression have long been features of daily life in East Turkestan.

[shiv]

Yo! Pakistani lurkers. Look at what your Chinese bilathels are doing in East Turkestan?

Mind you I'm lovin' it!

Image caption:The communists slaughtered thousands of innocent people during their take-over in China.


Image caption:Oppression, slaughter and torture are integral parts of the communist regime. Scenes of this savagery against the Muslims of East Turkestan are also frequently witnessed in China itself.


Yeh dil maange mooore!


You Pakis want more nukes? Ash the Chinese .. Man! Those Chinese really know how to live.

[shiv]

PAKISTANEEEES!

Here are your Muslim brothers in China being feted and celebrated!
http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detay ... ink=180201

Image caption:The killings of ethnic Turkic Uighurs at the hands of Chinese forces have caused outrage in many countries, including Turkey, where a large group of protestors condemned the killings at a demonstration held in front of the Chinese Embassy in Ankara yesterday.

[wig]

longish article but good reading

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... -list.html

Radical website publishes MP 'death list'
A website which influenced a young Muslim to stab an MP has posted dozens more MPs’ names on a 'death list’ with an exhortation to Muslims to follow her example
Revolutionmuslim.com was named by Roshonara Choudhry in her police interviews as one of the sites which radicalised her. Choudhry was sentenced to life imprisonment on Wednesday for attempting to murder the former Labour minister Stephen Timms
Revolutionmuslim.com includes a number of YouTube videos of Awlaki, which can still be accessed, despite the provider promising to take them down. It also includes a video by Abdullah Azzam, the al-Qaeda spiritual leader, another figure cited as an influence by Choudhry in her police interviews.

The website claims a number of authors. It appears to be strongly influenced by supporters of the British Muslim extremist Anjem Choudary, formerly a senior figure in the now banned Al-Muhajiroun and Islam4UK groups. It carries a number of press releases and video clips from Choudary and also includes a video of Abu Izzadeen, another British extremist linked to Choudary, emerging from prison.

Islam4UK earned notoreity when it proposed to demonstrate against the ceremonies held in Wootton Basset, Wiltshire, to honour service personnel killed in Afghanistan, though the demonstrations never took place. Revolutionmuslim recently publicised a flag-burning ceremony to be attended by Choudary – which also apparently never happened – outside the US embassy in London on the ninth anniversary of September 11.

[arun]

Woman tried to murder Labour MP over Iraq
London: A female student was found guilty at a London court on Tuesday of trying to murder a Labour MP in revenge for his having voted for the Iraq war. Roshonara Choudhry, 21, knifed former Treasury Minister Stephen Timms twice in the stomach during a regular monthly advice surgery at an east London community centre in May. The assault was a "punishment" and "to get revenge for the people of Iraq", prosecutor William Boyce told the Old Bailey. — Reuters

source:
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2010/20101103/world.htm

Transcript of the UK Police interview indicates that Roshonara Choudhry derived inspiration from Islam for this act of attempted murder :

Roshonara Choudhry: Police interview extracts

Conducted on 14 May 2010, about four hours after her arrest for stabbing Stephen Timms, in Forest Gate police station

Vikram Dodd, crime correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 3 November 2010 22.49 GMT …………..

Q How did you feel about what you was about to do?

A I was a bit nervous about what I was gonna do but I felt like it had to be done and it's the right thing to do.

Q Having done it, how do you feel now?

A I feel like I did my best to fulfil my duty to the other Muslims.

Guardian

[brihaspati]

shiv ji,
you might check up on the first pic! It is a famous one and corresponds to chiang's regime. Lets see how many "China-supporters" know about this. However, the communists did even worse when they came to power. This kind of torture and killing is one thing which could also be the one constant in an otherwise non-existing culture or "state" - hence all regimes who come to power in China does the same thing as far as tackling dissent goes!

[wig]

the german newsmagazine spiegel has a report on An Islamist Uprising in Tajikistan, do read it in full

International observers consider Tajikistan to be a failed state in the midst of a national crisis. A growing mood of protest there is benefitting the Islamic opposition. Hundreds of new mosques have opened since the beginning of the year, and more women are seen wearing veils on the streets of Dushanbe.
war Ahmadov had predicted came more quickly than expected. President Rakhmon sent his best units to the area, where they have been combing the mountains around Gharm since Sept. 22.


The campaign has already been underway for more than a month, but the military is not reporting any successes. The Islamists are using Afghan tactics to fight the military: with mines and surprise attacks. Some 34 Tajik soldiers died on Oct. 6 and 7 alone, including high-ranking fighters with an elite unit of the Ministry of State Security and the National Guard. There is a growing sense of consternation in Dushanbe, which has severed all communications with the eastern part of the country.

Farangis Najibullah, a radio reporter and expert on Central Asia, expresses what many are now thinking: That the Rasht Valley could become a "hotbed of Islamic resistance," which would destabilize the entire region.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/wor ... 26,00.html

[Brad Goodman]

Wife of convicted terrorist on trial in Germany

The wife of a German convert to Islam who was convicted of plotting a thwarted attack on U.S. targets in Germany is standing trial on charges of supporting a terrorist organization.

Filiz Gelowicz, 28, went on trial Friday on accusations of supporting the Islamic Jihad Union by helping provide euro3,000 ($4,225) to fund terrorist training in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region between 2009 and 2010. She faces up to five years in prison.

One of two co-defendants also went on trial for allegedly supporting the same terrorist organization. The other is in Turkish custody awaiting extradition.

Gelowicz's husband, Fritz Gelowicz, was convicted in March of plotting with three other members of the Islamic Jihad Union to attack U.S. soldiers and civilians.

[wig]

Captive Converts? Egypt Gripped By Rising Muslim-Christian Tensions a story carried by the newsmagazine Time

Around 200 men flooded out of the al-Qa'id Ibrahim mosque into the midday sunlight following the Friday afternoon prayers in Alexandria. They held up banners before the hundreds of black-clad riot police who were there to greet them, and immediately began to chant. "Shenouda is the enemy of God," they yelled, referring to Pope Shenouda III, the head of the Coptic Church, Egypt's largest religious minority. "Shenouda is an infidel ... State security, where is your Islam? Why did you leave the criminals alone?"

Much of the rage expressed by the members of the hard-line Salafi sect of Islam stems from one woman. Not much is known about Camilia Shehata, a priest's wife from Upper Egypt, whose story (or lack thereof) has gripped the Middle East's most populous nation since the summer, sparking waves of angry protests and emotional editorials. Shehata disappeared from her home for several days in July after having reportedly converted to Islam — some say in an effort to get a divorce, which is not permitted by the Coptic Church. At first, the Christians protested — accusing Muslims of kidnapping a Christian and forcing her to convert. When she re-emerged, it was the Muslims' turn. Many now believe Shehata was forcibly returned to her home and the Coptic Church by state authorities, only to become sequestered against her will within the confines of a monastery.


"We do not know anything except that she was married to a priest and she ran away from that marriage. Everything else is just rumors, and that is the problem," says Amr Khafagy, the editor in chief of the independent al-Shorouq newspaper, which has run four stories and an editorial about Shehata. "The government never said the absolute truth and the church never said the absolute truth. And the media blew these rumors out of proportion."

It's not the first time a Christian has converted to Islam, but conversion has long been a sensitive issue in a state where Copts worry about rising Muslim religiosity and Muslims increasingly see Copts as existing outside the law. It is also one of the first times the state has interfered in an individual's conversion, claims Rafiq Habib, a Coptic intellectual. If they hadn't, he says, this never would have gotten so out of hand. "From the public perspective, it was a sign that the role of the church and the position of the Copts has changed in the last years — that they have become allies of the state and allies of the President."

Wafaa Constantine, who was also the wife of a priest, reportedly converted to Islam in 2004 and wound up in a monastery as well. Neither woman has appeared in public since their returns to the church, and the Salafi protests of late have invoked both names. "Today we hold a standoff to free our sister hostages from the church," explained one of the protesters, Atef Wael. "Whenever a sister converts to Islam, they keep her in the church and they torture her to make her appear before the media saying that she is a Christian, not a Muslim." Other protesters outside the mosque on Friday and in recent weeks have displayed pictures of women they allege are Shehata, Constantine and others held captive by the church. Some sobbed as they chanted slogans comparing their struggle to the Crusades.


The recent string of protests is just the latest episode of sectarian strife that has gripped Egypt this year. In September, Muslims protested angrily after the No. 2 official in the Coptic Church, Bishop Bishoy, remarked that "Muslims are only guests" in Egypt, and disputed the validity of certain verses of the Koran that dispute the divine nature of Jesus Christ. In January, the shooting of six Copts and a Muslim in the town of Nag Hammadi sparked sectarian rioting, and the trial of suspects has since been repeatedly adjourned.

Local and international human-rights groups, along with many Copts and Muslims, have complained in recent years of a deepening sectarian rift, which they attribute to rising conservatism on both sides, government discrimination and competition for resources. "I was raised in a neighborhood where my neighbors were Copts. I grew up with them; we never had those problems in the past," says Salah Yusuf Hafez, a Muslim mechanic in Imbaba, a predominantly Muslim slum of Cairo. "What's happening now — it has to be in someone's interests. Someone stands to benefit."

Last week, however, it became apparent — even to Muslim authorities and opposition groups — that the clamor over the converts may have gone too far. The Islamic State of Iraq, an al-Qaeda linked group that took responsibility for the attack last week on a Baghdad church, issued a statement that the attack had been carried out in retaliation for the captive converts in Egypt. It declared all Christians "legitimate targets" because a deadline it set to release the women had expired.

Egypt responded by beefing up security around churches. And Islamic groups running the gambit from the banned opposition Muslim Brotherhood to the sheik of al-Azhar, Egypt's highest religious authority, along with Pope Shenouda III, came out with strong condemnatory statements and calls for Egyptian unity.

"I don't think that there is a real danger here in Egypt," says Habib, because al-Qaeda has little to no following in the country. "The only risk is that someone hears the declaration from al-Qaeda and decides to take action by themselves and tries to burn a church."

The problem is that's not out of the question. Egypt is prone to rare but violent attacks on Copts and tourists, and analysts warn that the anger over the missing converts shows that Egypt's sectarian rift continues to demand serious attention.

For Habib, that would mean a church willing to take conciliatory steps like allowing the women to clarify their own stories publicly, and a regime willing to offer Christians more equal rights while staying out of issues like conversion, which he says should be a personal affair. Until then, he says, the fuse will only get shorter: "Both sides have become very sensitive now. For any action now, the reaction will be very large."

In Alexandria on Friday, demonstrators implored state security to heed their religious identity in a battle of Muslims vs. Christians. And after about an hour of protest outside the mosque, the Salafis declared that their fight was far from over. "We don't want strife or demonstrations," one man called through a bullhorn. "But we will not stop the demonstrations until they are released."

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/ ... 77,00.html

[wig]

Awlaqi calls for killing Americans ‘without hesitation’

Sanaa: US-Yemeni radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaqi has called for the killing of Americans "without hesitation," in a video message posted on jihadist websites, US monitoring group SITE said on Monday. "Do not consult anyone in killing Americans," Awlaqi said in the 23-minute video, according to SITE. "Killing the devil does not need any fatwa (religious edict)," he added. "It's either us or you," Awlaqi said, addressing Americans in the video, which first surfaced on October 23 when one minute of footage was posted on jihadist forums

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2010/20101109/world.htm

[darshhan]

Another Paki found guilty of assisting Al qaeda.

http://counterterrorismblog.org/2010/11 ... nals_a.php

The FBI's arrest of Farooque Ahmed of Ashburn, Va., for allegedly assisting al Qaeda in planning multiple bombings around the nation's capital paints a sobering picture of the threat we still face from jihadists.

The FBI charged the 34-year-old computer engineer, husband, father of one and naturalized U.S. citizen with "providing material support to terrorists and collecting information for a terrorist attack." Emphasizing the gravity of the case, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia Neil H. MacBride remarked that Mr. Ahmed was "accused of casing rail stations with the goal of killing as many Metro riders as possible through simultaneous bomb attacks."

Throughout the summer and fall, U.S. authorities witnessed a significant rise in jihadist activity, using increasingly sophisticated operational strategies. According to open-source reports, between 2001 and 2008, U.S. agencies stopped one or two terror attempts a year. However, from 2009 until today, the government has been uncovering one or two cases a month, a troubling growth in jihadi activities.

The deep concern of citizens and law enforcement personnel is understandable, but the concern is not merely that a man from Ashburn purportedly is engaged in terrorist activities, but rather that there is jihadi activity in the United States at all. The information available on jihadi operations around the United States suggests that authorities are witnessing a coordinated terrorist strategy that focuses on our urban centers.

The FBI's indictment states that Mr. Ahmed agreed to conduct surveillance and take photographs of the Arlington Cemetery Metrorail station and a hotel in Washington for the purpose of gathering information about security and the sites' busiest periods. Mr. Ahmed allegedly also participated in surveillance, recording images of the Arlington Cemetery Metro station on July 7.

The following month, Mr. Ahmed is said to have participated in surveillance of the Courthouse, Pentagon City and Crystal City Metrorail stations just outside Washington. These descriptions of Mr. Ahmed's tasks correspond to calls by al Qaeda leaders to conduct strikes in U.S. cities and to similar actions the group and its affiliates have undertaken in many parts of the world.

"During a meeting at a hotel in Herndon, Virginia, on Sept. 28," the indictment reads, "[Ahmed] suggested that rolling suitcases be used instead of backpacks, and he said that he wanted to kill as many military personnel as possible."

The plan closely resembles past attacks, such as the train bombings of Madrid in 2004 and London in 2005. More important, the plot is consistent with the standing orders of al Qaeda and other jihadists to attack U.S. military personnel.

[wig]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/wor ... 38,00.html

For the few with money in the Gaza Strip, a new water park provided relief from monotony and widespread misery. Hamas, though, has now burned it down -- and sent a message that even the elite must conform to the Islamists' restrictive rules.

[Sumeet]

First lady’s handshake with conservative Muslim raises Indonesian eyebrows

Indonesia's pious information minister, Tifatul Sembiring,

[chetak]

The european legislative virus is spreading to the US.

http://public.dawn.com/2010/11/10/crick ... e-run.html

Oklahoma and Sharia law

[wig]

Christian woman sentenced to death in Pakistan 'for blasphemy'

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... phemy.html

[Eric Demopheles]

New York Times' heart bleeds for Muslims in America:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/06/us/06muslims.html

American Muslims Ask, Will We Ever Belong?
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
Published: September 5, 2010

America is the land of all kinds of freedoms:

“We worry: Will we ever be really completely accepted in American society?” said Dr. Ferhan Asghar, an orthopedic spine surgeon in Cincinnati and the father of two young girls. “In no other country could we have such freedoms — that’s why so many Muslims choose to make this country their own. But we do wonder whether it will get to the point where people don’t want Muslims here anymore.”

GW Bush was a good president:

Mr. Patel explained, “After Sept. 11, we had a Republican president who had the confidence and trust of red America, who went to a mosque and said, ‘Islam means peace,’ and who said ‘Muslims are our neighbors and friends,’ and who distinguished between terrorism and Islam.”

etc, etc.

[Eric Demopheles]

Ashura seems to be a festival commemorating the martyrdom of Imam Hussein. It appears that some people get a bit too carried away in the celebration and unaccustomed people find it disturbing.

Jihad watch on Ashura in London:

http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/11/like- ... itain.html

Atlas Shrugs blog entries in previous years on Ashura:

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atla ... -ny-n.html

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atla ... rabia.html

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atla ... toons.html

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atla ... f_pea.html

[arun]

Pope calls for religious freedom in Muslim states

The call by the head of the Christian Catholic Church is not completely unjustified going by the violent persecution being meted out to Non Muslims in Muslim majority countries of which a current example:

Fear of jihad driving Christians from Iraq

[arjunm]

French Tv secretly video taped process of disturbing trend of Islamization of London, focus on Pakistanis and Bangladeshis-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdRfT76s7UQ

[Sumeet]

World's largest pilgrimage underway as hajj begins

Just check comments !!! Moderate Muslims by remaining quiet are surely not doing themselves any favor. World is slowly loosing any kind of respect & empathy for Muslims.