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Friday
Sep102010

English Defence League leader refused entry into US?

DateFriday, September 10, 2010

Nick Lowles reports: "I've picked up a rumour this morning that EDL leader 'Tommy Robinson' has been refused entry into the United States where he was due to attend an anti-Islam rally at Ground Zero in New York. Robinson was travelling with a number of other EDL leaders when he was turned away at the Immigration desk for apparent entry form irregularities. He was taken into custody and almost immediately put on a plane back to London. His fellow EDL members were allowed to go through."

Hope Not Hate, 10 September 2010

Though Pamela Geller will no doubt be disappointed that a notorious far-right organiser of violent confrontations with Muslim communities in England won't be able to make it, she can at least take consolation in the fact that there will still be a contingent of racist Islamophobic thugs from the UK attending her anti-Muslim hate-fest tomorrow.

AuthorBob Pitt | in , , ,
Friday
Sep102010

Netherlands: Labour party to launch offensive against 'Wilders cabinet'

DateFriday, September 10, 2010

The Labour party (PvdA) has accepted it will be in opposition and is planning a major offensive against the expected right-wing government, the Telegraaf reports on Friday, quoting an internal party document.

According to the secret plan, entitled "opposition strategy", Labour is to go all out on countering what it calls the "Wilders cabinet".

The right-wing Liberals, Christian Democrats and anti-Islam PVV expect to resume their coalition negotiations next week.

"It will be up to us to expose the tensions within this coalition and cause the cabinet problems," the Telegraaf quotes the document as saying.

The right-wing cabinet will have just 76 of the 150 seats in parliament and a number of CDA MPs are opposed to any alliance with Geert Wilders' PVV.

The document, which was discussed by MPs at a secret meeting last week, also outlines how the PvdA will mobilise voters against the right-wing cabinet.

"The right-wing policy of destruction will lead to a lot of opposition in society at large," the document says. "We will not be in opposition in The Hague alone, but in a close alliance with social movements, environmentalists, the elderly and youth organisations. We will actively look for those alliances."

Dutch News, 10 September 2010

See also "Wilders 'can say what he likes' at Ground Zero", Dutch News, 10 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt |
Friday
Sep102010

NSW Opposition won't support veil ban Bill

DateFriday, September 10, 2010

The NSW Opposition says it will not support a Bill seeking to ban the wearing of burqas and other face veils in public, delivering a final blow to the hopes of its author, the conservative MP Fred Nile.

The Christian Democratic Party MP introduced the Bill in June, even though the same Bill was voted down by the NSW Upper House in May.

Two weeks ago NSW Premier Kristina Keneally announced that Labor MPs would not support the proposed legislation, giving it little chance of success. "Such a ban has no place in multicultural NSW," she said.

Opposition Leader Barry O'Farrell said today that the Coalition had also decided it would not back the burqa ban Bill. "We decided last week, the Liberal-National parties, that there shouldn't be discrimination," Mr O'Farrell told Macquarie Radio.

Herald Sun, 10 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt | in , ,
Friday
Sep102010

US Catholic bishops denounce 'outright bigotry' against Muslims

DateFriday, September 10, 2010

Several U.S. bishops attended an interfaith dialogue earlier this week in Washington D.C. and voiced their opposition to recent events in the country that have displayed anti-Muslim sentiments.

Numerous religious leaders from Jewish, Christian and Muslim faiths attended a Sept. 7 meeting in D.C., titled "Beyond Park 51," which was hosted by the Islamic Society of North America.

In a statement on Thursday, Archbishop Wilton Gregory, Bishop William Murphy and Bishop Howard Hubbard said they voiced their "solidarity" with the leaders who gathered to "denounce categorically derision, misinformation and outright bigotry being directed against America's Muslim community."

The three prelates are chairmen of USCCB's Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development and Committee on International Justice and Peace, respectively.

CNA, 9 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt | in ,
Friday
Sep102010

Donald Trump's Park51 offer rejected as 'cheap attempt to get publicity' 

DateFriday, September 10, 2010

Donald Trump offered Thursday to buy out a major investor in the real estate partnership that controls the site near ground zero where a Muslim group wants to build a 13-story Islamic center and mosque.

The offer, though, fell flat nearly instantly.

"This is just a cheap attempt to get publicity and get in the limelight," said Wolodymyr Starosolsky, a lawyer for the investor, Hisham Elzanaty.

In a letter released Thursday by Trump's publicist, the real estate investor told Elzanaty that he would buy his stake in the lower Manhattan building for 25 percent more than whatever he paid.

"I am making this offer as a resident of New York and citizen of the United States, not because I think the location is a spectacular one (because it is not), but because it will end a very serious, inflammatory, and highly divisive situation that is destined, in my opinion, to only get worse," the letter said.

Trump also attached a condition to his offer: He said that as part of the deal, the backers of the project would need to promise that any new mosque they constructed would be at least five blocks farther away from the World Trade Center site.

Huffington Post, 9 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt | in
Thursday
Sep092010

Jones calls off Qur'an burning

DateThursday, September 9, 2010

A Florida pastor Thursday called off his controversial plan to burn copies of the Quran on the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack.

The Rev. Terry Jones of the Gainesville, Florida-based Dove World Outreach Center, standing with a Florida Muslim leader, also said the imam who planned a mosque and Islamic center near ground zero in New York has agreed to move it to another location. But the imam who appeared with him said that Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf in New York agreed to speak with Jones about possibly moving the center.

A spokesman from Soho Properties told CNN producer Vivienne Foley that "the Muslim community center called Park51 in lower Manhattan is not being moved."

CNN, 9 September 2010

Update:  See "Quran burning on again? Florida pastor says maybe", MSNBC, 9 September 2010

And "Fla. pastor, imam at odds over Quran-burning deal", Washington Post, 10 September 2010

Also "No deal made to halt Quran burning, Muslim leader says", CNN, 10 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt | in ,
Thursday
Sep092010

Sarrazin resigns from Bundesbank board

DateThursday, September 9, 2010

A board member of Germany's central bank dramatically resigned on Thursday after causing weeks of uproar with inflammatory comments on immigrants and Jews.

"The Bundesbank board and its member Thilo Sarrazin are aware of their responsibilities to the institution of the Bundesbank," the bank said in a surprise statement posted on its website.

"Given the public debate, the parties concerned are going, of mutual accord, to end their cooperation at the end of the month."

The Frankfurt-based Bundesbank had previously wanted the German president to fire him, as it was unable to do so itself, and Sarrazin had been refusing to go quietly.

But on Thursday the bank said it had "withdrawn its request" and that the 65-year-old had asked President Christian Wulff to relieve him of his duties. It even thanked Sarrazin "for the work he has done".

AFP, 9 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt | in ,
Thursday
Sep092010

Celebrate Eid by rejecting Islamophobia

DateThursday, September 9, 2010

Statement from One Society Many Cultures condemning the Qur'an burning provocation.

AuthorBob Pitt | in , ,
Thursday
Sep092010

Date set for Wilders court case

DateThursday, September 9, 2010

The court case against MP Geert Wilders, who faces discrimination and inciting hatred charges, will begin on October 4 in Amsterdam district court. The court says it needs five days to hear evidence in the case. The court will pass sentence on November 2.

The MP faces five charges of religious insult and anti-Muslim incitement. In January, the public prosecution department extended the prosecution case to include inciting hatred of Muslims, Moroccans and non-Western immigrants.

Dutch News, 9 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt | in , ,
Thursday
Sep092010

Opponents of the Murfreesboro mosque say it's not about religion. Their Muslim neighbors aren't buying it

DateThursday, September 9, 2010

Stephen George provides a useful summary of the origins and evolution of the campaign against the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro, which recently culminated in an arson attack, and exposes the spurious arguments used by leaders of the campaign.

Nashville Scene, 9 September 2010

AuthorBob Pitt | in , ,
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