UK Closes School When Little Boy Says Muslims are Terrorists

This whole witch hunt was triggered by Muslims using religious schools to promote Islamic Supremacism while forcing out non-Muslims. So it predictably turned into inspectors visiting  Jewish and Christian religious schools and interrogating small children about their views on homosexuality.

And shutting down entire schools because Muslims are offended. (via Vlad Tepes)

Pupils at a Christian school have been branded bigots after a young boy gave the wrong answer when asked what a Muslim was.

Durham Free has been told to close after inspectors branded it an educational failure and said some children displayed ‘discriminatory views’ toward people of other faiths. The boy’s answer to the Muslim question apparently included a reference to terrorism.

But teachers said the verdict was grossly unfair and based on a throwaway and ignorant comment made by a single pupil. They said the school’s Christian ethos made it an easy target for officials who wanted to show they were promoting the Government’s diversity agenda.

A second Christian school in the area has been put into special measures. Inspectors also concluded its children were intolerant after allegedly asking ten-year-old pupils what lesbians ‘did’.

The team based this view on speaking to the boy of around 12 who was asked about Muslims during a group discussion.

Credit to Daniel Greenfield

British army aims to recruit more Muslims after worries over low numbers

The British army is exploring ways to recruit more Muslims as the latest figures reveal they make up less than 1% of the total. Resistance is partly down to the UK’s involvement in conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The army is also concerned that black, Asian and other ethnic minorities are not sufficiently represented and a recruitment drive is planned for this year, with 10 events each month across the UK aimed at these groups.

There are 480 Muslims in the army out of an overall strength of 88,500 – 0.54%, an increase from 300 in 2008. Muslims comprise about 4.4% of the UK population according to the 2011 census.

The army has been trying to engage with communities in places such as Bradford and Burnley, where Muslims account for about 25% and 10% of the population respectively.

About 9,110 members of the army are drawn from the black, Asian and minority ethnic population. Although this amounts to about 10%, many have joined from Commonwealth countries rather than from the UK.

General Sir Nicholas Carter, chief of the general staff, said: “Our recruitment from the black, Asian and minority ethnic communities has been improving over the years, but it is nowhere near where it needs to be. We have to do more.”

One of the most senior Muslims in the army, Imam Asim Hafiz, Islamic adviser to the chief of staff, said diversity was one of the UK’s strengths and this enhanced the military’s cultural understanding and helped them when deployed. “In my view, the values of the armed forces are fully compatible with the values of Islam as well as other faiths,” he said.

Kashmiri separatist urges Muslim families to produce more kids

Separatist leader, Dr Muhammad Qasim Faktoo, who is serving life-term in jail, asked Muslims in Jammu and Kashmir to marry more than once and produce more children to “prevent a change in the state’s Muslim-majority status”.

The statement comes in the backdrop of West Pakistani Refugees living in J&K whose permanent citizenship is being strongly opposed by separatists.

BJP and some PDP leaders want the issue of refugees be resolved on humanitarian basis. Dr Qasim, husband of Duktharan e Millat chairperson Asiya Andrabi, asked doctors  to desist from  performing unnecessary birth control surgeries without any excuse valid under Shariah.

“In J&K, Muslims are fighting for right to self-determination keeping in mind their majority in  the state and therefore expecting a favorable result of independence from forcible control of India. If the Muslim-majority status is changed into a minority, all these expectations are bound to crash,” he said in a statement issued from jail on Saturday.

Dr Qasim said the Indian rulers have been working on this plan right from 1947. “Earlier, it was done in a silent way. Now it is being done in proactive and outrageous manner. The settlement of refugees in J&K is a move towards these goals. Surprisingly, Kashmiri Muslims are themselves playing a part in their own destruction as the girls are being married late. This implies they will have less children-bearing capability,” he said.

He said the the excuse given for late marriages is that youth should become economically stable and then they fall prey to birth control slogans.

Dr Qasim said that seven per cent girls in the state are facing Polycystic Ovarian syndrome. “They are thus unable to bear children after the age of 23-24 years. Almost 10 per cent boys suffer from depleted sperm count and mortality. There has been a considerable  increase  in these  numbers during  the past 25 years which  makes  it clear that the food  being imported  here from India and the mental stress caused by the presence of troops  is affecting  the fertility of Kashmiri Muslims,” he said.

The anti-Islamic far-right is spreading in Europe—and going mainstream

In recent months, a street movement called Pegida—Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the Occident—has emerged from nowhere in Germany, seeking to “protect Judeo-Christian culture” and halt to what it calls the spread of Islam. Though it denies being xenophobic or racist, its leader quit after being pictured dressed as Hitler. Pegida’s rallies have attracted tens of thousands of people in Germany.

And now the group is spreading abroad. Pegida held its first march in Vienna and is to hold its first British rally in the city of Newcastle on Feb. 28, with more planned in the UK. Britain already has anti-Islamic groups such as the English Defence League, a small but vocal force. Only this weekend, the EDL attracted as many as 1,000 people to a march against the building of a mosque.

Time will tell how popular Pegida will be outside of Germany—only a few hundred people showed up in Vienna—but its rising profile is a small part of the growing shift into the mainstream of far-right groups that would have once been shunned.

1

Britain is also coping with the rise of the anti-immigration UK Independence Party, whose leader has blamed immigrants for his being late to his own campaign events. In France, the Front National is a more organized and established version of much the same sentiment. In 2002, the Front National’s overtly-racist leader at the time, Jean-Marie Le Pen, shocked many by getting to the run-off in the presidential election, and the whole of the French establishment united against him. His daughter, Marine Le Pen, now runs the Front National, which was the most popular party in the last nationwide elections held in France and has become so prominent that she was invited to speak at the Oxford University student union last week (link in French)—her speech was delayed by three hours due to protests. She even gets to write editorials in the New York Times now.

Even Britain’s Prince Charles, who rarely speaks on political matters, is worried about the radicalization of Muslim youths within his future kingdom. The growing acceptance of far-right subject matter as part of political discourse in Europe may just be a sign of our more polarized times—similar things are happening on the far-left in Greece and Spain, for example.

But it could also mean that Europe will have to come to accept voices like Pegida in the mainstream for the foreseeable future. If nothing else, it is a test of the region’s tolerance for dissent. As Germany’s vice-chancellor Sigmar Gabriel suggests:

    Whether you like it or not, people have a democratic right to be right-wing or nationalist. People also have a right to spread stupid ideas, such as the notion that Germany is being Islamicized.

Part 2 of Beautifying Islam: What is the true nature of Islam?

The Qur'an and the six canonical Hadith collections primarily formed the twin pillars of the sources from which the scholars of Islam developed the principles of Sharia and the commandments of the Islamic laws. These try to give prescriptions and proscriptions for all human conducts imaginable.
But is it not possible that God wanted humans to use their brains and rational faculties, and that He did not provide step-by-step instructions for all the questions in life simply to be obeyed by humans without reflection or questioning? Although in Islam, there exists an important concept called ijtihad -- independent reasoning in legal matters -- the literalist, textual fundamentalist scholars declared this principle to be inoperable whenever there are clear-cut, decisive textual statements in the sacred texts on the issue in question. There is also a debate as to whether the gates of ijtihad were closed after the 10th century CE. While most traditional Islamic scholars and jurists still consider ijtihad to be the exclusive domain and prerogative of the preeminent religious scholars (mujtahid), and not for the general public, other scholars do not.
In the early days of Islam, right after the passing away of the Prophet Muhammad, Muslims splintered into many sects and factions. There were endless debates on the issues of religious doctrine, theology, and religious law, due to divergent interpretations of the Qur'an and the Hadiths. During that period, a group of theologians called the Mutazila, who based their theology on reason and rational thinking in conjunction with the sacred texts, waged an intellectual battle with the traditionalists, who gave absolute primacy to strict literal interpretations of the revealed texts: the Quran and the Hadith. Unfortunately for the future of the Islamic tradition, the literal traditionalists won the struggle, and went on to establish among the Sunni Muslims the four legal schools of Sharia, which became the dominant form of Islam from then onwards.
This mainstream, legalistic, text-bound, literalist Islam -- now the dominant strain and controlled by the traditional Muslim scholars -- is a mixture of both humanistic ethical values, combined with supremacist ethos, as it developed throughout the centuries. Due to its literalist tradition, it does not have the flexibility or the ability to overcome interpretations of the scriptures that are inimical to pluralistic and humanistic values.
Many equate this literalist, legalistic, text-bound Islam to be the "true" Islam. But just because it is the dominant form of Islam does not mean that it is the "true" Islam. A careful study of the history of Islam indicates that this view is utterly unwarranted. Religious traditions have changed and evolved over time, based on the understandings, interpretations, and practices of their adherents. Therefore, it is the duty of us Muslims, using reason and common sense, to reinterpret the scriptures to bring about an Islam that affirms and promotes universally accepted human rights and values.
Classical Islamic law is a synthesis and deduction of rulings from the Quran and Hadith by the medieval scholars from when Muslims were powerful. Beheadings and enslavement at that time were widespread among many societies, not unique to the practice of Islam. Muslims believe that in the Quran we have a document from God that provides ethical guidance and moral lessons from the Prophet and his followers in the language many at the time understood. They allude to the practices and conduct suitable for the time and place in which the Prophet lived and was trying to influence people.
There were many actions of the Prophet recorded in the "authentic" Hadith, such as holding slaves, carrying out beheadings and so on, which are not easy to accept according to the present day norms, to say the least. But for the textual literalists, there is no question that whatever the Prophet did, as recorded in the approved texts, must be accepted and emulated without any question or hesitation. And in order to strengthen their text-based legal methodology, the textual literalists elevated the status of the so called "authentic" Hadith to the status of the divine scripture, almost equivalent to the status of the Qur'an, believed by almost all Muslims to be the literal word of Allah relayed to the Prophet.
For the rest of us, however, first, we need to realize that the "approved" texts were recorded by early methods and at least after a century or two after the passing of the Prophet in an age of violent sectarian conflicts. Therefore, it might be wise to take with a big grain of salt, the accuracy of these so called "approved" texts. Second, if the actions of the Prophet were so important as exact examples, then, why didn't he or his God make sure that authoritative, unambiguous, contemporary recordings of the actions were written down for posterity to follow? Either the Prophet or his God, or both, did not have foresight, or more than likely, these actions were not meant to be exactly copied and emulated, especially in different times, different places, and under vastly different circumstances.
While it is true that there are eternal principles in the Qur'an and the Hadith, such as peace, justice, and mercy, which are universal values, and therefore, incumbent on everyone to believe and practice at all times and at all places, it is also true that it is a betrayal of the true spirit of Islam to assume that God wanted Muslims to follow the Prophet blindly, slavishly, without thinking and reflecting. Is it possible, therefore, that the close-minded, literalist and text-bound tradition is a betrayal of the true spirit of Islam?
The pitfalls of the literalist methodology can be illustrated by looking at any textual document. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, for example, affirms freedom of speech. But we know that, to "shout fire in a crowded theater" (when there is no fire), for example, endangering public safety, does not fall under the protection of the First Amendment. Any text by its very nature is finite and limited, and therefore cannot be comprehensive. Therefore, to be a strict literalist is to live in constant conflict with common sense and with practical reason. According to the literalist classical scholars of Islam, "justice" is achieved only by being obedient to God and reason by itself is not to be trusted to decide what is just and unjust.
For these literalist, text-bound scholars, there are no objective standards of right or wrong by using reason alone. In the mind of the literalists, the killing of innocents, for example, is wrong not because we learn from experience or reason, but because that is what God says in the Qur'an and the Hadith. According to them, God could just as well have said, for example, in the scripture that the killing of innocents is right, and therefore that makes it right.
The god of these scholars is not therefore a merciful and rational God but a god of power whose motto is: "Might is right!" In order to preserve the absolute omnipotence of God, these scholars sacrifice rationality as an essential attribute of God.
As Prof. Robert Reilly writes in the article, "The Formidable Philosophical Obstacles to Islamic Constitutionalism":

"There is a realm within which man is legitimately semi-autonomous and sovereign. Through his reason, he is called upon [to] figure out how to rule it and himself ... God [in the Judeo-Christian tradition] speaks to man with equal force through his reason, as He does through revelation. Reason, therefore, is morally legitimate as a source of law. What is reasonable is morally good."

If we Muslims want to stand up and challenge the literalism of the text-bound scholars and the militants who are beheading, enslaving and persecuting people around the world alike, we need to develop an interpretative methodology that balances revelation with reason as in other rational, religious traditions.
The militants are idealistic and impatient, and part of an ideology that has essentially become frozen in time, while the other Muslims are more careful, patient and circumspect, and dwell in a tolerant society without resorting to violence.
That is why many of these literalists believe that peace, justice and mercy (all interpreted according to the classical Sharia) can be achieved only under the sovereignty or hegemony of Islamic rule. And that is also why the OIC (Organization of Islamic Conference, since renamed the Organization of Islamic Cooperation), in 1990 came up with its own version of a human rights declaration, the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam -- based on Sharia law -- to supersede the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, approved by the UN in 1948.
So the vital question is: Can't we Muslims also learn from all of human history and all of nature -- the arts and the sciences -- which are also created and originated from God, as in "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God," as stated in the U.S. Declaration of Independence?
There are signs and hints in the natural world that provide guidance from the Creator on a continuing basis, even after all the textual revelations. Although God has stopped sending His messages (revelations) through human messengers, He is still providing messages, in the form of natural phenomena in the world He created, so that human beings can experiment and learn, and benefit -- using reason and reflection.
Slavery and beheadings may have been suitable at some time in human history. But just because it is in the scriptural texts, it does not mean that we need to follow them to the letter so literally, for eternity -- unless we happen to agree with the literalists, and reject using reason and thinking to learn from the natural sciences and the experiences of human history.
A religion that prescribes killing or criminalizing apostates; condones institutionalized slavery, stoning, beheading, flogging, and amputations; which restricts and criminalizes freedom of speech and freedom of religion; commands the stoning of adulterers; develops a theory of constant state of war with non-believers; discriminates and demeans women and people of other religions is not only "The Religion of the Bigots" but it is also the Religion of the Bullies.
Classical Islamic law, developed over the history of Islam, is definitely not peaceful or benign, and therefore not suitable for this age; neither are its violent and grotesque progeny such as Islamism and jihadism.
If we Muslims believe that "true" Islam, which is genuinely aligned with the will of the Creator, must be fundamentally peaceful, comprehensively merciful and objectively just, then it is our duty to cleanse the traditional, literalist, classical Islam and purify it to make an Islam that is worthy to be called a beautiful religion.
Credit to Ahmed Vanya , based in San Jose, California, is a fellow at the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

Part 1 of Beautifying Islam: What is the true nature of Islam?

Many people are understandably asking: What is the true nature of Islam? Is it that although there are many peaceful Muslims, Islam itself is not peaceful?
Classical Islamic law, developed over the history of Islam, is definitely not peaceful or benign, and therefore not suitable for this age; neither are its violent and grotesque progeny, such as Islamism and jihadism.
If Islam is a religion that stands for justice and peaceful coexistence, then this policy of jihad cannot be justified as sanctioned by a just and merciful creator.
Religious traditions have changed and evolved over time, therefore it is the duty of us Muslims, using reason and common sense, to reinterpret the scriptures to bring about an Islam that affirms and promotes universally accepted human rights and values. It is our duty to cleanse the traditional, literalist, classical Islam and purify it to make it an Islam that is worthy to be called a beautiful religion.

Looking at a year of beheadings by ISIS, child grooming abuses in the UK, the hanging judges of Iran, slaughtering and enslaving of Christians in Egypt and Africa, and various murders justified in the name of Islam throughout the world, many people are understandably asking: What is the true nature of Islam? Is it that although there are many peaceful Muslims, Islam itself is not peaceful?
If, for us Muslims, Islam is a religion of peace, justice, and mercy, how come the militants, who claim to be staunch Muslims -- who are ready to die for Islam and who claim to have established a state in the name of Islam in Iraq and Syria by sacrificing blood and lives -- are beheading journalists and aid workers, and enslaving religious minorities, all by citing Islamic Sharia Law?
The Taliban (literally "students") in Afghanistan have persecuted religious minorities and inflicted human right abuses against women -- and men who disagreed with them or who have fallen afoul of their laws. Boko Haram has also carried out human rights abuses in the name of Islam and Islamic law. In Malaysia, where "moderate" Islam is practiced, Christians cannot call God "Allah." In Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, and supposedly an ally of the U.S., the policies and practices carried out by the state, and the Wahhabi religious scholars in the name of Islam, are woefully anti-humanitarian. Many Muslims from around the world perform the religiously required pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina; a number of them are on the dole of the petrodollars provided by the Saudis, but do not show much concern for the human rights abuses carried out in the name of Islam by the Saudi establishment.
Many devout Muslims, like monks in monasteries, are busily trapped in performing rites and rituals, and ceding ever more ground to extremists, without adequately reflecting on the history of Islam, the nature of God and the nature of revelation from God.
We Muslims commonly believe that God sent prophets and messengers to every corner of the world since the beginning of creation to guide humanity, but that most, if not all, of the messages got corrupted and adulterated, one way or another, except the message of Islam. But it seems natural that most people, Muslims or not, also see their own religion as the only true religion. But there are religious traditions, both in Islam, such as many Sufi sects, and in other religions, that affirm the transcendental unity at the core of almost all religious traditions, and that are inclusive and universalistic in nature.
Also, Muslims learn from the Qur'an that hubris, or arrogance, is the greatest sin committed by the Satan, and that it was arrogance that led him to disobey God. God asked him to bow to Adam, the first human, but Satan refused out of arrogance.
The current question seems to be: Did Muslims go astray very early on, when they conquered many lands and developed a massive doctrine and theology of intolerance (it took about 300 years to solidify Sharia after the passing of the Prophet Muhammad), due to pride and quest for power -- the very arrogance that is prohibited? Although many conversions to Islam did not occur by the sword, the first four caliphs (the so-called "Rightly Guided") and their successors did in fact send out armies to conquer the world. If Islam is a religion that stands for justice and peaceful coexistence, then this policy of jihad -- and the idea that peace and justice can be achieved only under Islamic sovereignty -- with Muslim rulers subjugating non-Muslims, cannot be justified as sanctioned by a just and merciful Creator.
The Islamic tradition is not monolithic; there are countless variants. Many of the Islamic Sufi traditions, for instance, that are often relentlessly condemned by the extremists, who likely see them as a threat to their own power -- are notable for their pluralistic and humanistic nature, even though, historically, some orders may have been more martial than spiritual.
There have been many individual Muslims throughout history who are truly freedom-loving and who respect the rights of all human beings. Also, historically, a number of Muslim kings, sultans and emperors in Andalusia, Spain -- and in the Ottoman Empire in Turkey, as well as in Mughal India -- who treated their non-Muslim subjects kindly, albeit not with full equality. The Ottoman Sultans established a system of "millet" whereby people of other religious communities were allowed to live in the Empire in peace, although as second-class "protected" citizens, had to pay a head tax called jizya, but were otherwise freely allowed to follow their own personal laws and religions (Canon law for Christians and halakha for the Jews), without attempting to convert them by compulsion.
Maimonides, the early medieval Jewish scholar, for example, makes it clear that even in the "golden age" of Islamic rule in Spain, it could be a bit nightmarish for the non-Muslims; but if the rulers were reasonably kind and tolerant, and if the intolerant religious leaders were not in control, non-Muslims could live restrained but reasonably comfortable lives, as dhimmis (protected people), under Islamic suzerainty.
When Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, died in the year 632 CE, the Qur'an had not been compiled as a book. The messages said to have been revealed from God, or Allah, to Muhammad during a period of 23 years, during his prophetic career, were either orally passed down or written on animal bones, leather and scraps of parchment, without systematic collection or any adequate background or context.
The Prophet Muhammad himself did not provide any authoritative narration or explanation for the Qur'anic verses while he was alive. He also did not provide a method for selecting his successor, nor did he authorize his companions to record the Hadith (his actions and sayings) while he was alive. Later, therefore, subsequent generations would have to sift through mountains of dubious material, in an age of primitive record keeping -- and during a period of discord, partisanship and violence, even among those who were close to the Prophet.
To be continued in part 2 ........
Credit to Ahmed Vanya , based in San Jose, California, is a fellow at the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

Introduction: "Beautifying Islam" What can Muslims do to reclaim their Beautiful Religion?

Nigeria: Presidential Elections Amid Specter of Boko Haram

If Boko Haram successfully purges the moderate Muslim elites in the northern states, Nigeria may well split into two separate nation-states, as did the Sudan. There would be a Muslim country in the north under Sharia law -- if Boko Haram stopped there, a call that is doubtful. And there would be another country in the south, governed by the existing Federal Constitution.

Nigeria's former dictator and perennial coup plotter, Mohammadou Buhari[1], may well defeat incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan in the country's upcoming presidential elections, scheduled for February 14 . Buhari, a northerner and a Muslim, has vowed to end Boko Haram's reign of terror in the northeast of the country. Boko Haram has been responsible for the deaths of at least 10,000 Nigerians in 2014, mostly Christian and Muslim civilians, as well as many Nigerian soldiers and police.[2]
According to Boko Haram documents, the terrorist group wants to purge the ruling political and religious elites in Nigeria's 12 northern states, which are already governed by Islamic Sharia law.[3]
Boko Haram apparently considers the governing Muslim leaders of those states corrupt and "insufficiently" Islamic, for, they say, having introduced watered-down Sharia codes.[4] If Boko Haram successfully purges the moderate Muslim elites in the northern states, Nigeria may well split into two separate nation-states, as did the Sudan. There would be a Muslim country in the north under Sharia law -- if Boko Haram stopped there, a call that is doubtful. And there would be another country in the south, governed by the existing Federal Constitution
Nigeria's southern states are largely populated by Christians from the Ibo tribe, except for some Yoruba tribal areas in the country's southwest. The Yoruba are also largely Muslim but less prone to militancy than northern-based Islamic tribes.[5] The Hausa people in northern Nigeria are almost entirely adherents of Islam. The Boko Haram terrorists are almost all Hausa, except for some Fulani tribal members.

An election victory by Buhari would be more the result of voter dissatisfaction with the perceived lack of leadership by Jonathan. His administration is seen by some as embarrassingly incompetent in the face of Boko Haram's ability to lay siege to at least a quarter of Nigeria's territory. This image is punctuated by the failure of Nigeria's security forces to rescue any of the nearly 300 girls kidnapped more than nine months ago by the Boko Haram in the northeastern town of Chibok.[6] The Nigerian army's feckless operational performance against Boko Haram's militants -- and in some instances a total unwillingness to fight -- along with its poor human rights record have poisoned and slowed military-to-military ties with the American advisors sent to train anti-terrorist units.
Jonathan's own chances for victory may hinge on the possibility, in the Muslim north, of low voter turnout, due to the widespread dislocation of citizens caused by fear of Boko Haram's violence.[7]
In the event of a Jonathan victory, there may substantial post-election violence in the northern states, as there has been in previous presidential elections.[8]
Buhari, although a Muslim, realizes that there can be no accommodation with the Boko Haram terrorists. Boko Haram has attempted to assassinate Buhari several times in the past year. A victory by Buhari, despite his own dubious human rights record, would pit a moderate Muslim against the radical recruits of Boko Haram. Furthermore, a Buhari electoral win may renew enthusiasm for on-the-ground bilateral U.S.-Nigerian military cooperation against the Boko Haram. Joint anti-Boko Haram planning and training was largely discontinued last year because of endemic corruption among Nigerian bureaucrats and the army's human rights abuses, such as indiscriminate arrests, torture of detainees, and extra-judicial executions.[9]

Meanwhile, officials in the national capital of Abuja claim that the Americans failed to deliver heavy weapons and attack helicopters needed effectively to combat Boko Haram forces.
Boko Haram already controls a landmass the size of Denmark, and last week almost captured Maiduguri, the capital city of Borno State. Maiduguri, a city of approximately two million people, is now completely cut off from the outside. Borno, Nigeria's northeastern-most state, borders on the neighboring Muslim majority countries of Chad, Niger, and Cameroon. Boko Haram fighters have already spilled across the border into Cameroon.
If the Boko Haram ultimately succeeds in capturing Maiduguri, it will have gone a long way to securing a West African Caliphate.
The strategic danger by Boko Haram is the possibility of the establishment of an extremist Muslim corridor cutting all the way across sub-Saharan Africa, from Nigeria in the West to Somalia in the east.

Credit to Dr. Lawrence A. Franklin served on active duty with the U.S. Army and as a Colonel in the Air Force Reserve, where he served as a Military Attaché to Israel.

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/5168/nigeria-elections-boko-haram

Germany's Pegida anti-Islam movement unravelling

Germany's Pegida anti-Islam movement looked to be unravelling on Wednesday after five of its leaders resigned a week after its founder quit, and a weekly demonstration scheduled for next Monday was abruptly cancelled.

The resignations included Kathrin Oertel, who emerged as the new face of Pegida after its founder, Lutz Bachmann, was forced to quit over a photo of him posing as Adolf Hitler.

The movement, which has brought up to 25,000 people onto the streets under the banner of Patriotic Europeans against the Islamisation of the West, or Pegida, claims it is trying to defend Germany from "Islamisation" at the hands of Muslim immigrants.

The apparent crisis in its leadership came as senior member of Germany's rapidly rising Eurosceptic party, Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD), called for a ban on immigration from the Middle East.

A statement on Pegida's Facebook page claimed Ms Oertel had resigned because of "massive hostility, threats and career disadvantages.

"She has sacrificed herself for the cause," the statement read, "but even the strongest of women has to take time out when at night photographers and other strange figures are sneaking around outside her house." But it quickly emerged that four other members of Pegida's executive board had also resigned, and German press reports claimed the real reason was Mr Bachmann's recent behaviour and racist statements.
Mr Bachmann officially stepped down after the publication of the Hitler photograph and a series of Facebook posts in which he described immigrants as "filth", "trash" and "brutes".

But a report in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper claimed he remains influential behind the scenes. The newspaper quoted one of those who quit, Bernd-Volker Lincke, as saying Mr Bachmann was the real reason for the resignations.
In a statement, Pegida vowed the movement would continue. It said next Monday's Dresden rally had been cancelled for "organisational and legal reasons", but that weekly protests would resume the week after.
Pegida appeared to be on the verge of collapse even as a leading member of the Eurosceptic AfD described it as a "people's movement", and called for a ban on immigration from the Middle East.
"We should not encourage immigration of people who are completely foreign to our cultural tradition, indeed we should avoid it," Alexander Gauland told Tagesspiegel newspaper.
"There are cultural traditions that make it very difficult to integrate here. I don't want any further immigration from this cultural tradition. This cultural tradition belongs in the Middle East," he said.
If immigration from the Middle East was allowed to continue, he warned, "parallel societies" could develop in Germany "which we won't be able to cope with in the end".

The backdrop to Mr Gauland's remarks is a rift within the AfD over how to respond to Pegida. The party has emerged as a threat to Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats on an anti-Euro message and opposition to German financial assistance for Greece and other ailing southern European economies.
Mr Gauland, a party vice-chairman and deputy spokesman, has emerged as leader of a faction within the AfD which wants to make immigration a more central issue in the wake of Pegida's success.
But the AfD leader, Berndt Lucke, is deeply opposed to any contact with Pegida, which he sees as potentially toxic.
A counter-protest movement has seen crowds of up to 100,000 march against Pegida.
Credit to Justin Huggler

Egyptian poet goes on trial accused of contempt of Islam

A prominent Egyptian poet could face up to three years in jail over a Facebook post in which she criticized the slaughter of animals at a Muslim festival, a case which rights activists say shows how the government is muzzling free speech.
Fatima Naoot described the Prophet Abraham's dream - in which, according to Islamic belief, God tells him to sacrifice his son as a test of his faith - as a "nightmare". Before Abraham can carry out the deed, God provided a sheep instead as a sacrifice.
In her post, the poet criticized the sacrifice of animals at Eid al-Adha, also called the Feast of the Sacrifice, a festival that honors Abraham's willingness to obey God.
"Millions of innocent creatures will be driven to the most horrible massacre committed by humans for ten-and-a-half centuries," she said. "A massacre which is repeated every year because of the nightmare of a righteous man about his good son."
The poet - whose trial began on Wednesday - has been charged with contempt of Islam, spreading sectarian strife and disturbing public peace, judicial sources and Naoot said.
She denies the charges. If convicted she could face jail terms ranging from six months to three years, the sources said.
"I will not be defeated even if I'm imprisoned," Naoot, who did not appear in court, told Reuters on Wednesday. "The loser will be the cultural movement."
Rights groups say a crackdown launched by the government of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, following the toppling of Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood in 2013, has muzzled freedom of expression.
They also say those seen as offending Islam have been targeted by the state and jailed on charges ranging from blasphemy to contempt of religion - but say this has been happening since the 2011 overthrow of autocrat Hosni Mubarak, not just since Mursi was deposed following mass protests.
The country's courts convicted 27 of 42 defendants accused of contempt for religion in 2011-2013, according to the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.
The government denies any accusations of hindering freedom of speech or belief. It says it is committed to democracy and does not interfere in judicial matters.
Egypt's constitution states that "freedom of belief is absolute".

CRITICISM
Gamal Eid, the director of the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information, said Naoot's case should not have made it to court. "This shows that the state is turning a blind eye to the advocates of religious extremism," he added.
Three Al Jazeera journalists - Canadian-Egyptian Mohamed Fahmy, Egyptian Baher Mohamed and Australian Peter Greste - were jailed last June for spreading lies to help a "terrorist organization", a reference to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.
That case has drawn criticism from local and international human rights groups and western governments which accused Egypt of restricting the freedom of speech and prompted the United Nations to question its judicial independence.
Egypt's High Court ordered a retrial of the men earlier this month.
Naoot is a supporter of Sisi, according to her Facebook posts and television interviews. She attended a meeting he held last month with writers, according to local media reports.
She denied her comments were intended to insult religion.
"I am respectful of all religions," she wrote in an article published on Tuesday on an Egyptian news website.
A lawyer filed a lawsuit against the poet in December following her Facebook post and prosecutors agreed to take up the case.

The hearing on Wednesday dealt with procedural matters and the judge set a date of Feb. 25 for a second hearing.
Credit to By Mahmoud Mourad

Rock concert, rallies overwhelm Germany's anti-Islam group

Germany's anti-Islam PEGIDA movement was overwhelmed by opponents of the far-right group at a rock concert for tolerance in Dresden on Monday and enormously popular counter-demonstrations in cities across the country.

More than 22,000 cheered German rock stars at an anti-PEGIDA rally in Dresden, where the movement that argues the country is being overrun by Muslims and refugees began in October. In Frankfurt 70 PEGIDA backers were outnumbered by 15,000.
"It's great that you're all here with us to send a signal tonight," said Herbert Groenemeyer, one of Germany's best-selling rock artists at the hastily organized free concert under the motto "Open and colorful -- Dresden is for everyone."
"It's horrible and sad what's been happening in some people's minds lately -- creating an atmosphere of hysteria where one religious group is being targeted as the scapegoat. It's absurd, mean, unjust, undemocratic and completely unacceptable."
PEGIDA, already reeling after its leader Lutz Bachmann quit for posing for a picture looking like Hitler and calling refugees "scumbags", normally holds its rallies on Mondays but switched to Sunday to make way for the parade of rock stars.
"There are 4 million Muslims in Germany and they are just as much a part of our 'economic miracle' as all the other religions in Germany," said Groenemeyer to the crowd, which braved heavy rain and chilly January temperatures for three hours.
In Munich, more than 2,300 anti-PEGIDA demonstrators outnumbered the 800 who took part in the PEGIDA rally there while, in Berlin, 500 supporters of the local BAERGIDA group were met by more than 1,000 counter-demonstrators.
Earlier on Monday, on the eve of Tuesday's 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germans had an everlasting responsibility to fight all forms of anti-Semitism and racism.

In what appeared to be an indirect reference to PEGIDA, Merkel told a memorial for the victims of Auschwitz: "We've got to fight anti-Semitism and all racism from the outset."
"We've got to constantly be on guard to protect our freedom, democracy and rule of law," she said. "We've got to expose those who promote prejudices and conjure up bogeymen, the old ones as well as the new."
Merkel said it was a disgrace that some Jews or those expressing support for Israel had been threatened or attacked in Germany, which was responsible for the Holocaust, and that protecting the growing Jewish community was a national duty.
 

German Footballer Reverts to Islam

Germany's young footballer Danny Blum has announced his reversion to Islam, describing it as a religion of hope and strength.

"Islam gives me hope and strength. Prayer calms my soul," Blum told Bild newspaper on Monday, January 26.

"I was short-tempered, erratic and did not know where I belong," he added.

Blum joined 1. FC Nürnberg in Bavaria last July. The team plays in the he Second Division of professional football in Germany, the Bundesliga.

Shortly after joining the team, he injured his knee and was forced eventually to take six months off.

A few weeks ago, he took the decision to revert to Islam, joining the world’s fastest growing religion.

"Living in the lap of luxury. Every weekend make alarm. No responsibility for anything. And what actually comes after retirement?” the questions came to Blum as he sat at home.

Talking with his friends about religion, he landed in Islam.

"I have visited a mosque and I immediately risen the heart. I felt this is something for me and wanted to know more," Blum told Bild.

Ever since, he prays five times a day and eat halal food. Informing his parents with his decision, the 24-year-old player said they were scare at first.

"They are devout Christians. But soon they said that I have to go that route if I believe that it is right," he said.

“Islam is a peaceful religion. My faith says: never force anyone to do what he does not want. If you think, it has to come voluntarily from the heart!"

Germany is believed to be home to nearly 4 million Muslims, including 220,000 in Berlin alone. Turks make up an estimated two thirds of the Muslim minority.

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