June 29, 2010
By ROBERT WRIGHT
It would be an understatement to say that Faisal Shahzad, the would-be Times Square bomber, pleaded guilty last week. “I’m going to plead guilty a hundred times over,” Shahzad told the judge. Why so emphatic? Because Shahzad is proud of himself. “I consider myself a Mujahid, a Muslim soldier,” he said.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_xBlo_xB1M&feature=player_embedded
Saudi Arabia’s king is due to travel to Washington to meet Barack Obama, the US president, to discuss Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking, the nuclear standoff with Iran, and economic co-operation.
The meeting on Tuesday is also likely to focus on US policy in Afghanistan, following the sacking of the US military commander there and mutual national security efforts.
(Reuters) – Muslim states said on Wednesday that what they call “islamophobia” is sweeping the West and its media and demanded that the United Nations take tougher action against it.
World
ACTION ALERT
(AMP 6/22/2010) – For the past several years, Turkey has consistently thrown its support behind Palestine by publicly denouncing Israel’s illegal occupation, by trying to break the siege on Gaza, and simply by speaking out about Israel’s illegal, unjust and inhumane treatment of the occupied Palestinians.
After Israel’s deadly attack on the Freedom Flotilla on May 31, in which nine unarmed Turkish civilians were killed, Turkish officials roundly criticized Israel for its actions, which occurred illegally in international waters, and demanded an apology.
Continue reading ‘Support Turkey by buying Turkish products – Attend 47th Annual ISNA Convention’
June 28, 2010 / News
By Thomas Tracy
The Brooklyn Paper
If they build it, they will bomb.
Angry Sheepshead Bay residents came out in a show of force on Sunday to protest a planned mosque and Muslim community center in their neighborhood.
Continue reading ‘‘What kind of America’? Hate-filled rally to stop mosque’
By TRAVIS LOL
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A Tennessee Republican candidate for Congress says plans to build a mosque in a Nashville suburb pose a threat to her state’s moral and political foundation.
In a Thursday evening statement, 6th District candidate Lou Ann Zelenik said she stands with those who oppose building what she calls “an Islamic training center.” She says the center is not part of a religious movement, but a political one “designed to fracture the moral and political foundation of Middle Tennessee.”
Israel’s Supreme Court has ordered the immediate release of 35 ultra-Orthodox Jewish fathers jailed for disobeying a court order on school integration.
The ruling on came after the intervention of leading Jewish rabbis, who managed to reach a compromise over mixing Jewish children of Ashkenazi – European – descent with others whose families have roots in the Middle East, known as Sephardis, at a girls’ school in a West Bank settlement.
By Ambassador Afif Safieh
June 27, 2010
In coordination with the Palestine Center, The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs is pleased to host Ambassador Afif Safieh, who served as PLO ambassador to the United States from October 2005 to May 2008, for a reception and signing of his new book, The Peace Process: From Breakthrough to Breakdown. This will be a wonderful opportunity for friends and supporters to catch up with the popular diplomat and his wife, Christ’l, who now reside in London.
Continue reading ‘Peace Process: From Breakthrough to Breakdown’
The leaders of the world’s eight richest nations have called for Israel’s blockade on the Gaza Strip to be relaxed in order to allow more aid to reach the civilian population of the beleagured coastal territory.
G8 leaders meeting in Canada issued a wide ranging statement on Saturday, addressing global security concerns ranging from Israel’s blockade on the Gaza Strip to the situation in Afghanistan and concerns over Iran’s nuclear programme.
By CHARLIE SAVAGE
Published: June 25, 2010
WASHINGTON — Stymied by political opposition and focused on competing priorities, the Obama administration has sidelined efforts to close the Guantánamo prison, making it unlikely that President Obama will fulfill his promise to close it before his term ends in 2013.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has led a protest against alleged abuses by the police in the Egyptian city of Alexandria.
At least 4,000 people greeted ElBaradei, who has become a prominent pro-democracy campaigner, as he arrived to offer condolences to the family of Khaled Mohammed Saeed, an Egyptian youth who human rights groups say was beaten to death by police.
Friday June 25, 2010
by Saed Bannoura – IMEMC & Agencies
Israeli interrogators tortured a Palestinian child who was detained and sent to a detention center close to a settlement near Hebron. The child said that the interrogators used electricity in torturing him by attaching wires to his testicles.
Human Rights Commissioner in the Palestinian Territories, based in Gaza, Kiert Jorneg, stated that Israeli interrogators used wires and a battery when torturing the child by wiring his testis.
Continue reading ‘Child Tortured, His Genitals Electrified By Israeli Interrogators’
Written by Admin Friday, 11 June 2010
By Kristin Szremski
American Muslims for Palestine
While pro-Palestinian activists and supporters of Israel lined opposite sides of South LaSalle Street outside the Northern Trust Building in Chicago on 9 June, James Owens, the outgoing CEO and Chairman of Caterpillar Inc., told a room full of shareholders the company was not responsible for the way Israel uses the bulldozers the company manufactures in the United States.Owens made his remarks at the end of the annual shareholders meeting, which had been disrupted 14 times by individual protestors who stood up one by one and loudly proclaimed that the Israeli military uses Caterpillar’s D9 bulldozer to raze farmland, uproot olive groves and demolish homes, sometimes crushing people inside. As each activist stood, as many as five plain-clothed security personnel descended upon the speaker and physically escorted him or her from the room.
Continue reading ‘Activists disrupt Caterpillar shareholder meeting’
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Mara Gay Contributor
AOL News
(June 23) — While a controversial ad campaign targeting Muslims is getting a cold shoulder in Detroit, its ads may soon be appearing on the side of Motown buses anyway.
A conservative legal group has asked a federal judge to force a Michigan bus company to run ads that offer support to Muslims who want to leave their religion, saying the ads are protected under the First Amendment.
“Fatwa on your head?” one of the slogans reads. “Is your family or community threatening you? Leaving Islam? Got questions? Get answers!”
Thomas More Law Center / AP
A controversial ad campaign in Detroit targeting Muslims is being defended by a conservative legal group. The Freedom Defense Initiative wants a federal judge to force a Michigan bus company to run the ads.
Continue reading ‘Legal Battle Brews Over Ban on ‘Anti-Islam’ Bus Ads’
Frankie MartinIbn Khaldun Chair Research Fellow at American University
What I Learned About America from Visiting 100 Mosques
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/frankie-martin/what-i-learned-about-amer_b_619534.html
By Omar Sacirbey
Religion News Service
(RNS) Liberty University is expected to release a report this month on whether Ergun Caner, president of the school’s Baptist Theological Seminary, fabricated or exaggerated his life story as a former Muslim extremist rescued by Jesus.
Caner is no ordinary ex-Muslim. His story has made him a favorite in conservative Christian circles, and many credit the charismatic preacher with helping boost enrollment at the school founded by the late Jerry Falwell.
Continue reading ‘Critics Say Caner Isn’t Only Self-Styled Ex-Muslim’
By Stephen Glain
Published: Monday 21 June 2010
A geopolitical war is on for the soul of Jewish America, and it is asymmetrical. For decades, conservative groups, led by the American-Israel Political Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, have insisted that they alone spoke for a monolith known as the American Jewish community. For the first time, that claim is being seriously challenged. In the two years since its launch, J Street has created an air pocket where liberal Jews can express themselves in the otherwise stultified debate about Israel and America’s support of it. At stake, according to friends of J Street, is whether Israel can survive as a Jewish state in co-existence with its neighbors, or hunkered down and segregated in a ghetto of its own making.
