Thanks to Abu Elvis, Archonix, Barry Rubin, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, no2liberals, TB, VH, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Details are below the fold.
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A Pistol-Packin’ Looby Loo: the Left’s Worst Nightmare
Frank Sinatra would have got the joke. In the words of the great political philosopher, they all laughed at Christopher Columbus when he said the world was round.
They’re all laughing, too, at John McCain for choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate. The usual suspects took one look at this pistol-packin’ momma and reacted like John McEnroe to a disputed line call: you cannot be serious!
Certainly, the pick came, as the Americans say, out of left field. But Sarah Palin is centre stage now, and suddenly it’s game on. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Barack Obama — Magna Cum Saudi?
Election ‘08: Does Barack Obama owe his meteoric rise to an Israeli-hating adviser to a Saudi billionaire? Why did a race-baiting mentor to the Black Panthers favor this yet unknown community organizer?
| — Hat tip: no2liberals | [Return to headlines] |
McCain-Palin Ticket Chills Arabs, Muslims
AMMAN — With the U.S. presidential elections just two months away, many Arabs and Muslims are increasingly worried that a victory for another conservative Republican administration will exacerbate the tensions and turbulence that have followed the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
The events and speeches at the Republican Party convention in Minnesota, which endorsed the candidacy of Arizona Senator John McCain and his running mate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, were given special attention in the Arab media, as commentators voiced fears that a McCain administration would pursue, perhaps more belligerently, the path of the current government.
As a rule, Arab governments in the region prefer to refrain from showing their preferences in U.S. elections, but the media, including the state-controlled TV and press, have made no secret of their desire to see a new leadership in Washington that is run by Democratic presidential candidate Illinois Senator Barack Obama.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Obama’s Training Program Described as ‘Big Brother’
Critic says plan would herd ‘American youth into government-funded re-education camps’
The tax-funded Chicago organization cited as a probable model for programs to integrate youth into the social and political world under an Obama tenure in the White House is the epitome of “Big Brother” that shovels impressionable youth through a course of brainwashing, according to critics.
The organization is called Public Allies and Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama was a founding member of the board of directors in 1992. He later resigned and his wife became executive director of the group.
According to an editorial in Investor’s Business Daily, Obama plans to use the non-profit, which is funded partly by the federal government and is featured on Obama’s campaign website, as the model for a national service corps, called the “Universal Voluntary Public Service.”
WND reported earlier when Obama asserted in a Colorado Springs speech that the U.S. needs a “civilian national security force” that would be as powerful, strong and well-funded as the half-trillion dollar Army, Marines, Navy and Air Force…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
France: Prosecutor Denies Trial Postponement Due to Ramadan
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, SEPTEMBER 5 — The Prosecutor General of the Court of Appeal in Rennes, in northern France, Leonard Bernard de La Gatinais, denied today postponing a trial due to the Ramadan, affirming that his decision was taken “considering different elements”. Among the other reasons which justified the postponement is a pending case at the Court of Cassation regarding one of the investigating officers, another one about drugs still awaiting trial, and a problem concerning the impartiality of the jury. “Considering these facts I decided not to oppose to the request for postponement, with the objective to find at the beginning of next year an environment of serenity in this affair,” the judge explained. “In no way the Ramadan was considered by me as a reason not to oppose to the postponement; it would be absolutely against all the republican principles of secularity,” he underlined. Frank Berton, lawyer of one of the defendants, said he was “astonished” by this “turning point” of the proxy, “since until now it had announced in writing that it opposes to any postponement founded on the different reasons”. Various defending counsels of the civil parties denounced yesterday the postponement of the trial due to the Ramadan, considering that fact “aberrant”. The order for postponement of the trial, dated September 2, says only that the trial is postponed “for better administration of justice”, without specifying other reasons. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
France: Trial Postponed Over Ramadan, Seculars Protest
(by Tullio Giannotti) (ANSAmed) — PARIS, SEPTEMBER 5 — Another storm has hit the French justice, “secular and republican”, claimed in official declaration. After the notorious case of the marriage of two Muslims which was annulled because the bride turned out not to be virgin, there is strong suspicion that a trial for various cases of robbery has been postponed because one of the defendants observes the Ramadan. The case has caused scandal and provoked a true revolt in the secular world and the prosecutor general of Rennes has been even forced to call a news conference to “deny” that the festivity of Ramadan, in the sense of observation of a fast that could undermine the strength of one of the defendants, was the main reason behind the postponement of the trial. The decision was taken for several reasons but the new postponement in the trial of seven persons accused of committing various robberies in Saint-Malo in 2001 was not the condition of presumed weakness of the Muslim observing the Ramadan. Leonard Bernard de la Gatinais, the prosecutor general of the court in Rennes, said that the decision for the postponement was in no way related to the Ramadan as such a move “would be absolutely against all the republican principles of secularity”. However, the civil defence lawyers, still furious for the postponement in January under the pass-partout formulation of “better administration of justice”, have said they were “astonished by this turnabout”. They protest because all other motives in the request for postponement were rejected, while that of Ramadan was finally accepted, according to them. They have called the decision “aberrant”. The defendant’s lawyers, in their postponement request, noted “the diet and cultural obligations” of their Muslim client imposed by the Ramadan. At the time of the hearing “he would have spent already 14 days fasting”, they specified in the request, therefore “he would not be fully capable of defending himself, of being attentive and of expressing his thoughts”. Yann Choucq, one of the defence lawyers, referred to article 1 of the constitution and the principle of “non discrimination and respect for beliefs”, saying that “Ramadan, from physiological point of view, puts a person into a state of physical weakness”. “On the other hand, I do not understand this media clamour. Postponements are usually made for Jewish or other religious festivities and there are no hearings on Easter or Passover. Does this mean that some religions are more respectable than others?,” the lawyer said. Apart from the rejoicing defence, there is general revolt, also recalling the ruling of the court in Lille which in May annulled the marriage of two Muslims because the bride was not virgin which meant that there had been “a flaw in the essential qualities” promised to the bridegroom. The case caused a scandal then and is still a scandal even today: “In a secular republic such as ours the legal schedule cannot be based on a religious calendar”, Helene Franco, secretary general of the magistrates’ trade union, said. “Religion has absolutely nothing to do with justice,” said Fadela Amara, undersecretary in charge of urban policies, who is Algerian origin and is former president of a popular association for defence of immigrant women. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Irish Media Now More Eurosceptic, Warns EC Report
Ireland’s media have become more Eurosceptic and more tabloid in their reporting in the years between the second Nice Treaty referendum and the Lisbon campaign, the European Commission has warned.
In a private briefing document circulated by the commission in Brussels, it warned that Ireland’s “changing media landscape” between 2002 and 2008 has implications for public opinion about the European Union.
RTÉ’s [Radio Telefís Éireann] broadcasting dominance has been hit by satellite broadcasters who increased their audience by nearly 10 percentage points since the 2002 Nice referendum, while “news content on the main commercial national station TV3 is of quite low quality. […]
“Since 2002 we have seen an increase in UK titles with “Irishised” editorial. Forty-one per cent of all Irish people read one or more of the following; the Irish Sun , Irish News of the World , Sunday Times , People , Irish Mirror , Sunday Mirror , Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday . These have proven to be significant opinion formers which in general have been more Euro-hostile,” it said.
The Rupert Murdoch-led media group News International has increased its hold over the tabloid and Sunday paper market, the document explained.
“Editorial is highly critical of the European Union and even more so of the Lisbon Treaty. What has changed is that these papers were previously printed in the UK, but now they are printed in Ireland. Also more of its editorial content is produced by Irish journalists on Irish issues — but subject to the London editorial line,” it went on. The Irish Sun , which has 309,000 mostly young male readers, has “taken a campaigning Europhobic stance in line” with its sister title in the United Kingdom.
However, the influence of the upmarket Sunday Times is particularly noted by the commission because it is read “by 363,000 middle-class, well-educated readers, who would traditionally have been European supporters. “Not only has the editorial been largely critical of Europe, it is rumoured that it has been refusing contributions from staff that are pro-Europe,” the commission’s paper said. […]
“Apart from official websites, the internet has largely been a space left to anti-European feeling. Given the ability to reach an audience at a much lower cost, and given the simplicity of the No campaign messages, it has proven to be easily malleable during the campaign and pre-campaign period.” […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Labour’s 3,600 New Ways of Making You a Criminal
Ever tried selling a grey squirrel, impersonating a traffic warden, importing Polish potatoes or disturbing a pack of eggs without permission? If you do, you will be breaking the law. These are among the 3,605 new criminal offences created by the Labour Government since it won power in 1997 — almost one for every day it has been in office.
Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Chris Huhne has described the plethora of new laws as ‘legislative diarrhoea’.
The new offences are made up of 1,238 which were brought in as primary legislation — meaning they were debated in Parliament — and 2,367 by secondary legislation, such as orders in council and statutory instruments.
Under Tony Blair, Labour introduced 160 new offences in its first year, but in 2003, 493 offences were created. Offences brought in during the past five years include:
* Sell types of flora and fauna not native to the UK, such as the grey squirrel, ruddy duck or Japanese knotweed
* Disturb a pack of eggs when instructed not to by an authorised officer
* Offer for sale a game bird killed on a Sunday or Christmas Day
It has slowed slightly in the past two years with 288 new offences in 2007 and 148 so far this year.
Mr Huhne said: ‘In what conceivable way can the introduction of a new criminal offence every day help tackle crime when most crimes that people care about have been illegal for years. This legislative diarrhoea is not about making us safer, because it does not help enforce the laws that we have one jot. It is about the Government’s posturing on punishments.’
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has proved the most prolific law creators, introducing some 852 new offences. Meanwhile the Home Office has been responsible for 455 new offences. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Mulhouse Adopts Islam
It will be the largest mosque in Mulhouse [near German/Swiss border] and the choice of where to build it is not insignificant. Managed by the Muslim Association of Alsace, An-Nour will be built on rue Illzach, behind the Kinepolis (a multi-theater movie house).
The future great mosque of Mulhouse will be identifiable at the entrance to the city, and this new visibility can be interpreted as a strong political act on the part of the municipality: that of social recognition offered to a religion that has now been registered for long-term duration in the city.
“There will be a school with ten classrooms for the teaching of Arabic and Islam and academic support. We will also have a multi-purpose conference room that will be used to introduce the religion. Classes of Alsatian students are already forming for the purpose of learning about religions. There will also be a library, a multimedia area and three shops, including a halal butcher shop and a small market, operated by the Association.”
The city is planning, during its next city council meeting on September 15, to allocate a subsidy of 235,000 euro, for the preparation of the terrain. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Police Reported for Pepper Spraying Epileptic
A woman who was doused with pepper spray while suffering an epileptic seizure has reported police from Växjö in south central Sweden to Ombudsmen of Justice (JO) for their handling of the incident.
On August 1st, the woman was on her way home from an evening out with friends when she suffered a seizure, reports the Smålands Posten newspaper.
An ambulance quickly arrived on the scene, but emergency workers were unable to calm the woman.
“They called the police for help by I tried to explain to them that she has epilepsy. She has proof from her doctor that she is sick and can easily become aggressive when she suffers an attack,” one of the woman’s friends told the paper.
Four police arrived and began questioning the woman’s friends as to whether she had taken any drugs and how much alcohol she’d consumed.
Meanwhile the woman suffered a new onslaught of cramps, causing her to drift out of consciousness.
Police first wanted to arrest the woman, but her friends protested.
Finally, police and emergency personnel managed to get the woman into the ambulance and take her to the hospital.
On the way to the hospital, the woman regained consciousness and began to lash out at the police riding with her in the ambulance.
“I panicked when it was dark in the ambulance and two people were holding my arms and legs,” the woman told the newspaper.
It was then that police pulled out a can of pepper spray and showered the woman with the potent irritant.
Apparently their aim was not very precise, however.
“They evidently got spray on themselves too because we were forced to stop and air out the ambulance,” explained the woman.
It took several days for the woman’s eyes to stop itching, and she was left with several bruises from the rough treatment she received from police.
Her case was taken up by the local epilepsy association (Epilepsiföreningen), who filed a complaint with the ombudsman on her behalf.
The group feels that police should be better informed about the disease and ought to have known better than to spray someone suffering an epileptic seizure with pepper spray.
“I’m so ashamed and think it’s my fault when I have an attack,” said the woman.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Anti-Terrorism Laws Used to Spy on Noisy Children
Councils are using anti-terrorism laws to spy on residents and tackle barking dogs and noisy children.
An investigation by The Sunday Telegraph found that three quarters of local authorities have used the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) 2000 over the past year.
The Act gives councils the right to place residents and businesses under surveillance, trace telephone and email accounts and even send staff on undercover missions.
The findings alarmed civil liberties campaigners. Shami Chakrabarti, the director of Liberty, said: “Councils do a grave disservice to professional policing by using serious surveillance against litterbugs instead of terrorists.”
The RIPA was introduced to help fight terrorism and crime. But a series of extensions, first authorised by David Blunkett in 2003, mean that Britain’s 474 councils can use the law to tackle minor misdemeanours.
Councils are using the Act to tackle dog fouling, the unauthorised sale of pizzas and the abuse of the blue badge scheme for disabled drivers…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
“Russian Action Could Spur Macedonian Extremists”
Macedonia’s deputy PM says Russia’s intervention in Georgia could encourage extremists in Macedonia. This could happen if Macedonia’s EU and NATO integration process are not soon unblocked, Ivica Bocevski warned.
At a seminar in Brussels, Bocevski said that there were two ways that the crisis in Georgia could reflect on the Western Balkans—either towards broadening the pro-European idea or spreading independence. The minister warned that further delays in Macedonia’s accession to the EU and NATO could act as a fillip to “marginal forces”.
“We need to open talks (on EU membership), we have to see that process beginning and we have to see that process unfolding,” he stressed. […] We can imagine the entire European periphery as big chess board… if there aren’t enough figures on it, then whoever is playing against us can easily fill our place,” the minister cautioned. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Algeria: Terrorists Must Surrender or be Killed
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, SEPTEMBER 2 — “The terrorists must surrender or be killed”, Algerian Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia stated at the end of the opening ceremony of the autumn session of the Senate, as reported by APS. “We will fight to the end”, Ouyahia said, launching a warning also to the journalists: “the press’ best interest, and this is not a threat, is to return to reason and not supply a stage for people who do not spare anyone, military, policemen, officers, journalists, not even the small children”. The Interior Minister Yazid Zerhouni repeated once more that the latest attacks carried out in Algeria are favouring “foreign interests”. “Each time we evoke ways to defend better our interests, we register this kind of reaction”, he added. “The fanatics are in a blind alley. They do not have a national political or economic vision or an alternative policy in favour of the Algerian citizens”, Zerhouni concluded. In the month of August, some 130 people, including over 30 members of the armed Islamic groups, died in five suicide attacks, ambushes and clashes between the army and the extremist groups. Responsibility for all the attacks was claimed by Al Qaeda for Islamic Maghreb (former Salafi Group For Preaching and Combat). (ANSAmed).
2008-09-02 17:49
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Islamic State? Not Yet
Popular support seems thin after more than a year of Hamas rule
GAZA CITY — Mahmoud Zahar doesn’t believe in evolution. And he has not evolved.
For Gaza, this could be a problem.
The fierce co-founder of the Palestinian militant group Hamas, a surgeon by training, spent 20 minutes after a recent interview with CBC News insisting that evolution is false.
After all, said Zahar, a donkey can eat shrubbery and survive, but a human cannot.
“So, a donkey is more evolved than a human? No,” scoffs Zahar, seemingly satisfied that he has demonstrated the absurdity of Charles Darwin’s theory. Allah, not evolution, made man, he says, and Allah has made Gaza Islamic.
“We are already an Islamic society,” Zahar declares. “We are controlled by Islam in every quarter, every inch of our life.”…
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Hamas Clashes With Islamic Jihad
(IsraelNN.com) Hamas forces broke up a Saturday rally by Islamic Jihad supporters who rallied with the Fatah-aligned union of teachers. They have charged Hamas with placing its own backers into positions in educating and in the civil administration.
Security forces prevented photographers from approaching the protest, which Islamic Jihad member Nafid Azam said was peaceful. He charged that Hamas forces attacked several teachers and Hamas responded that the demonstration was illegal because it was held without a permit.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Israel: Waiting for Something
by Barry Rubin
If I had to nominate the funniest cartoon I’ve ever seen, it was a very simple one showing a driver in a car at a “T” junction. He was staring desperately at three signs that read: No Left Turn; No Right Turn; No U-Turn.
The Middle East isn’t quite like that, but the current moment—though surely temporarily—seems somewhat akin to that drawing.
It isn’t as if there weren’t lots of action, but that the action is merely like the above-mentioned driver revving his engine and honking his horn. I wouldn’t go so far as to invoke William Shakespeare’s line from “Macbeth”: “Full of sound, and fury, signifying nothing.” But the current moment’s antics surely don’t signify progress.
The Israel-Palestinian Authority (PA) and Israel-Syria peace negotiations are going nowhere; the French plan to charm Syria into moderation is going nowhere; the Western attempt to lightly press (not push) Iran into abandoning its nuclear campaign is…well, you get the picture.
And then we await upcoming changes in Israeli politics (who will be prime minister and when will be elections), in American politics (who will be the next president in January), in Palestinian politics (how long will PA head Mahmoud Abbas’s term last, a year or less?), in Egyptian politics (when will Egyptian President Husni Mubarak name a successor or die), and in Iranian politics (who will be elected president next June).
| — Hat tip: Barry Rubin | [Return to headlines] |
The Gaza Prison Camp
by Nonie Darwish
“Gaza conditions at ‘40-year low’“ the BBC headlined last week. Rarely a week goes by without a politician or organization deploring the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip. But I do not hear anyone describe its root cause: 60 years of Arab policy aimed at maintaining Palestinians as stateless refugees in order to pressure Israel.
I lived in Gaza as a child in the 1950s when Egypt conducted guerrilla-style operations against Israel from Gaza, then under Egyptian control. My father commanded these operations, carried out by “fedayeen,” (which means, “self sacrifice”). This became the frontline of Arab Jihad against Israel. My father was killed by Israel in a targeted assassination in 1956.
Today the Gaza Strip, now under the control of Hamas, has become the Gaza prison camp for 1.5 million Palestinians and continues to serve as the launching pad for attacks against Israeli citizens.
This is the legacy of the Arab world’s Palestinian refugee policy, started 60 years ago, when the Arab League implemented special laws regarding Palestinians that all Arab countries had to abide by. Arab countries could not absorb Palestinians. Even if a Palestinian married a citizen of an Arab country, that Palestinian could not become a citizen of his or her spouse’s country. A Palestinian can be born, live and die in an Arab country, but never gain its citizenship. Even now I receive e-mails from Palestinians telling me they cannot have a Syrian passport, for example, and must remain Palestinian even though they have never set foot in the West Bank or Gaza. Forcing the Palestinian identity on them is designed to perpetuate the Palestinian refugee status. Palestinians have been used and abused by Arab nations, and by Palestinian terrorists, for the purpose of destroying Israel…
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Chained Child Freed, Ready for Treatment
The Ministry of Social affairs has ordered its rehabilitation center in Najran to follow up on the case of a 6-year-old girl who was found chained to a tree inside her family’s house earlier this week, said Muhammad Al-Asmi, Director of Public Relations Department in the Ministry.
[…] When a committee from the Najran Rehabilitation Center visited the family’s house, they found Maryam helplessly trapped on a dirty mat which reeked of urine and chained to a tree from her ankle.
The committee immediately broke her chain and gave her the freedom to walk that she had lost for years. She was physically and emotionally challenged, the committee which included the director of the center, social counselor, pediatrician, and a nurse reported.
When the chain fell off her little ankle, Maryam stormed into the ambulance vehicle and hopped in with a new hope in her eyes. Her grandmother, who raised her and look after her because of her mother’s sickness, tried to force Maryam out of the vehicle, but the child clung to the seat in fear.
According to a medical report the family provided, Maryam suffers from epilepsy and mental disorder. But her case, however, deteriorated after she was attacked by dogs while she was playing with other children a couple of years ago, her grandmother said.
Ever since, Maryam was chained for developing an “aggressive attitude towards her family and other kids,” her father said.”We want to protect others from her,” he justified the reason for chaining the child. […]
The father was asked to personally report to the rehabilitation center on Saturday, but it was unclear if the father and the grandmother will go before a judge for chaining the child.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Divorce Case of 2 Minor Girls Put Off Indefinitely
The Shariah Court here has indefinitely adjourned the case of two minors, Sheikha and Abeer, seeking divorce from their septuagenarian husbands.. The judge made the decision on Tuesday after the husbands did not show up.. Sheikha’s father had married her off to Abeer’s father in exchange for marriage to Abeer.
The judge, however ordered a police case against the two men. The mothers of Sheikha and Abeer, from Afeef and Al-Ula respectively, had moved the court on the grounds that the marriage contracts were signed without the brides’ consent and also because exchange marriage (Al-Shighaar) is impermissible in Islam.
The mothers had also appealed to the Governorate to intervene. Sheikha had tried to commit suicide by drinking Clorox but she was rescued and transferred from King Faisal Hospital in Taif to the Comprehensive Rehabilitation Center in the same city, where Abeer had been admitted earlier.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Does Saliva Break the Fast in Ramadan?
Q- Does saliva break the fast in Ramadan or not, since I get a lot of saliva, especially when I read the Qur’an and (when this occurs) in the mosque it causes inconvenience?
A- The fasting person swallowing his saliva does not invalidate his fast, even if there is a lot and it occurs in the mosque or any other place…
— The Permanent Committee
Fataawa Ramadan — Volume 2, Page 541, Fatwa No.518
Fataawa al-Lajnah ad-Daa.imah lil-Buhooth al-Ilmiyyah wal-Iftaa. — Fatwa No.9584
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Gulf: Islands Dispute; GCC Slams Tehran for Abu Musa Offices
(ANSAmed) — DUBAI, SEPTEMBER 3 — The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) has condemned Iran for its plans to build two new administrative offices on the island of Abu Musa, occupied by Tehran since 1971 but claimed by UAE. The condemnation, issued following unheeded appeals and ignored criticism, appears in the final document of the meeting of Foreign ministers of the GCC member states — Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, UAE, Oman — which took place last night in Jeddah. The bloc of the six oil-rich countries, at loggerheads with the big Persian neighbour for weeks, demanded that Iran “suspends the construction of such illegal centres” and reaffirmed “the territorial integrity of UAE and its sovereignty over the islands, including territorial waters and airspace”. Abu Musa, situated at the same distance from Iran and UAE, is part of a small archipelago of three islands, including also Greater Tunb and Lesser Tunb, a total less than 25 kilometres of semi desert land. However, it lies at the entrance of the Strait of Hormuz, where almost 40% of global crude flow passes which Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad has threatened to block unless the West stops tightening sanctions on Iran over its nuclear policy. In the meantime, Tehran has called the ambassador of UAE and delivered to him a formal note of protest in which it complains of maltreatment and searching of Iranian citizens at airports in UAE. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Islam: New Fatwa Centre Opens in the Emirates
(ANSAmed) — DUBAI, AUGUST 29 — A new fatwa centre to serve as a reference point for those enquiring about Islamic decrees and interpretation is now open in Dubai under the federal General Authority for Islamic Affairs. All the main Gulf dailes report today the news of the Fatwa Centre which was inagurated yesterday by Interior Minister Lieutenant General Shaikh Saif Bin Zayed Al Nahyan. The centre, the first of its kind in the Muslim world, will offer phone services in Arabic, Urdu and English. “Preachers and muftis are of the highest qualifications and posses the highest level of knowledge and discretion. These traits make them capable of being an official authority to issue fatwas, preach and guide to further cement social bonds and relations among people and embody the sublime values of justice, equality and rightness”, the Interior Minister Shaikh Saif Bin Zayed al Nahyan said. The director of the authority, Hamdan Musallam Al Mazroui, said the new centre was part of a move to develop methods of issuing fatwas, regulate them, and curb extremist fatwas. A phone service (8002422), which is already operational, received 24,000 calls in July alone on the eight lines it serves. The centre currently employs 48, and has 14 telephone lines that people can call on a toll-free number. Muslims can also send queries through the centrés website — www.awqaf.ae — which publishes new fatwas daily. For generations, muslims have taken such questions to local imams at their mosques, or perhaps discussed over over a cup of black tea or a plate of dates. Now this kind of service can be offered by the centre but many are the questions related to the daily behaviour: for examples, can a male medical student practise CPR on a female student? Or can a Muslim make up for not fasting during the previous Ramadan by fasting extra days during Shaaban, the month prior to the holy month? Officials said the centre should be able to put paid to confusion Muslims might have about any issue. “This centre will put an end to individual fatwas issued here and there, which can cause doubt and trouble among people,” said the authority’s general manager, Mohammed Mattar al Kaabi. In the Sunni tradition, any Islamic scholar who is learned enough can issue a fatwa, meaning that they have sometimes been contradictory. Muslims — as the National online reports — are also free to follow different schools of jurisprudence, which can also mean different rulings on similar issues. Many Sunni countries have an official mufti or fatwa centre, but none has proclaimed in such clear terms that there will be no other authority in the country in such matters outside the fatwa centre. The move is the latest by the UAE Government — which places a great deal of emphasis on following what it refers to as the “moderate, middle way” of Islam — to standardise all religious matters. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Abkhazia, Kosovo to Recognize Each Other?
Abkhazian officials say they will recognize Kosovo independence if Priština recognizes the Georgian province in return. Foreign Minister Sergei Shamba, however, doubts that Kosovo, “which depends on the U.S. and NATO, will recognize the independence of Abkhazia.”
Abkhazia President Sergei Bagapsh told a group of Russian and foreign journalists yesterday that “the process of recognition, just like every conflict, is universal on its own and it cannot be measured by the same benchmarks.”
“We said when the Kosovo process began that, regardless of how it ended, whether it was recognized or not, we would not give up on our path to independence,” Bagapsh said, adding that the Kosovo decision had sped up the process in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and heightened the awareness of what was being sought.
He pointed to double standards, stating that the main question was “why some can do everything and others can do nothing,” adding that “Kosovo is the heart of Serbia,” that they “ripped out without a decision from the UN Security Council or Council members.” […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Who Says Religion and Politics Don’t Mix?
Forum 18, so far as I know the only organization that pays attention to religious persecution in the former Soviet territory, including Russia, reports from the newly “liberated” Abkhazia (in the same way as numerous countries were “liberated” after the Second World War by the benign Soviet Union).
Two monasteries of Georgian Orthodox monks and nuns in the Upper KodoriGorge, captured by Abkhaz forces from Georgian forces in mid-August, arebeing pressured by the Abkhaz Orthodox Church to change their jurisdiction.”They must submit to the authority of our Church or leave Abkhazia,” thehead of the Abkhaz Orthodox Church, Fr Vissarion Aplia, who visited themonks and nuns within days of the fighting, told Forum 18 News Service.Asked who had given him the right to pressure members of a differentreligious jurisdiction to submit to his authority, Fr Aplia responded angrily: “It’s not your business. It’s our territory.” Abkhaz DeputyForeign Minister Maxim Gvinjia backs the right of the Abkhaz Church toenforce its will on the monks and nuns. “Of course we won’t defend theirrights, given the context of current developments,” he told Forum 18.”Abkhazia is a Christian Orthodox country and the Abkhaz Orthodox Church is the main church.” Since the expulsion of a Georgian Orthodox priest inApril, the two monasteries are the only remaining Georgian Orthodoxinstitutions left in Abkhazia.
It is a mistake to think that freedom of speech and of religion and human rights in general are issues that can be separated from political and economic relations between countries. Eventually, I trust, we shall learn this lesson and realize that it is true not just in individual cases but in all of them.
| — Hat tip: Archonix | [Return to headlines] |
Islam Encourages Muslims to Take Up Sports as a Form of Jihad
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 6 (Bernama) — Muslims are encouraged to take up sports as they are a form of ‘jihad,’ provided they do not go against Islamic teachings.
National Sports Council (NSC) Islamic Affairs Unit head Mohammad Hasnol Bakar said ‘jihad’ in Arabic may have been translated as holy war but what it actually meant was to do something wholeheartedly.
“Sports are a form of jihad for Muslims provided the intentions are good and are not against Islamic teachings,” he told Bernama here today.
Present-day ‘jihad’ may not be as challenging as a holy war but important nonetheless as it was about sacrifices to achieve prosperity for the benefit of Muslims.
Muhammad Hasnol said history had it that Prophet Muhammad had used sports as a medium to propagate Islam.
“Prophet Muhammad had been challenged by a Quraish tribesman named Rukanah Abu Yazid who said he would embrace Islam if he was defeated in three rounds of wrestling.
“He accepted the challenge and defeated the wrestler. This showed that early day Muslims had physical strength derived from sporting activities. This is consistent with a popular Arab saying; “A Healthy Mind Comes From a Healthy Body,” he said.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
China Imposes Ramadan Security Crackdown in Muslim Northwest
Authorities in China’s Muslim-populated far northwest are seeking to prevent mass prayers and the distribution of religious material as part of a security crackdown for Ramadan, government notices said.
A series of attacks on police in Xinjiang around last month’s Beijing Olympic Games left more than 20 officers and security guards dead, and at least as many attackers killed or arrested, in the biggest unrest there in years.
As the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan began, local governments this week issued orders to clamp down on security in the region and stop its ethnic Muslim Uighur population from using the holy month to foment further unrest.
“Faced with recent violent and disruptive activities by religious extremists, separatists and terrorists, we must… step up ideological education of religious leaders and followers,” a notice posted on Xinjiang’s Zhaosu county website said.
The county government prohibited government officials, Communist Party members, teachers and students from observing Ramadan, while warning that “any person caught forcing another to observe Ramadan” would be punished. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Police Officers Killed in China Were Ethnic Uighurs
Two police officers who were killed and five who were wounded in an ambush in western China on Aug. 27 were ethnic Uighurs searching for a woman who they thought might have been involved in an earlier attack, said a police officer in the village where the ambush took place.
The attackers were also Uighurs, a Muslim Turkic group common throughout the western region of Xinjiang. Brandishing knives, the attackers set upon a group of unarmed police officers as they were walking through a cornfield in the village of Qizilboy, said the police officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he did not have permission to talk to reporters.
The violence against the police suggested that some of the violence in Xinjiang could be aimed at Uighurs seen by other Uighurs as collaborators with the ethnic Han Chinese, who make up the leadership of the Communist Party and govern the region. […]
Two days after the attack, police officers shot and killed six suspects and arrested three near the Silk Road oasis town of Kashgar, also in western Xinjiang, according to a report Saturday by the official Xinhua news agency. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
South Korea Denies Speculations on North Korea Kim’s Health
SEOUL (AFP) — South Korea’s spy agency Sunday denied a media report that the health of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il might be worsening.
Speculation has recently grown again since Kim, 66, has not been seen in public for more than three weeks. His last outing was August 14, when he reportedly inspected a military unit in North Korea.
A little-known Seoul economics daily, Asia Economy, cited an unnamed government source as saying Saturday that five Chinese doctors had been in the communist state for more than a week — possibly to treat Kim.
But a spokesman for South Korea’s National Intelligence Service told AFP on Sunday that the agency has no information to indicate Kim’s health has declined.
“There is no confirmed fact in the report,” the spokesman said, referring to the Asia Economy article.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Islam Group Urges Forest Fire Jihad
AUSTRALIA has been singled out as a target for “forest jihad” by a group of Islamic extremists urging Muslims to deliberately light bushfires as a weapon of terror.
US intelligence channels earlier this year identified a website calling on Muslims in Australia, the US, Europe and Russia to “start forest fires”, claiming “scholars have justified chopping down and burning the infidels’ forests when they do the same to our lands”.
The website, posted by a group called the Al-Ikhlas Islamic Network, argues in Arabic that lighting fires is an effective form of terrorism justified in Islamic law under the “eye for an eye” doctrine.
The posting — which instructs jihadis to remember “forest jihad” in summer months — says fires cause economic damage and pollution, tie up security agencies and can take months to extinguish so that “this terror will haunt them for an extended period of time”.
“Imagine if, after all the losses caused by such an event, a jihadist organisation were to claim responsibility for the forest fires,” the website says. “You can hardly begin to imagine the level of fear that would take hold of people in the United States, in Europe, in Russia and in Australia.”
With the nation heading into another hot, dry summer, Australian intelligence agencies are treating the possibility that bushfires could be used as a weapon of terrorism as a serious concern.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Cracks Down on Illegals; Not Everyone is Happy
The Italian government, which scaled back a crackdown on illegal immigration and other security measures after critics alleged they were too heavy-handed, now faces accusations that its security efforts aren’t even working after brutal attacks on four tourists. Silvio Berlusconi’s Rightist government, elected in April on a platform of making the country safer, encountered roadblocks as it tried to implement its security program, including declaring a state of emergency on illegal immigration, assigning soldiers to patrol sensitive areas, and having traffic police carry guns. During the summer, the measures drew accusations of heavy-handedness and xenophobia from human rights groups, the European Union, and the Catholic Church. Others also voiced concern about possible resurgent fascism in Italy.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Stop to Hiring Immigrants, Government Changes Plan
(by Paola Del Vecchio) (ANSAmed) — MADRID, SEPTEMBER 5 — The announcement of the Spanish Labour and Immigration Minister, Celestino Corbacho, that the country was planning to suspend the hiring of immigrants in their countries of origin in order to deal with the unemployment crisis has caused a wave of protests in Spain on the part of trade unions, employers’ organisations, immigrant associations and numerous parties, among them the major oppositional People’s Party, which forced the government to make a step back today. At the usual news conference following the council of ministers meeting, Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega corrected the announcement, leaving the door open to contract signed in the countries of origin and affirming that the government ‘‘has not changed its policy in the field of immigration’’. ‘‘Contracts abroad will be signed in accordance with the necessities of the labour market,’’ she said. Yesterday Corbacho, justifying the decision with the economic crisis, said that the hiring of immigrants abroad ‘‘will come close to zero’’ in 2009, so that the jobs available could be taken by unemployed residents of Spain. The objective, according to the minister, would be to reduce the number of contract jobs destined for the annual contingent of foreign workers, retaining the temporary jobs and reducing the list of jobs difficult to occupy. Under these three chapters last year a total 234,457 foreign workers legally entered Spain. ‘‘The priority is to help Spanish citizens who need a job’’, PSOE spokesman, Antonio Alonso, said in a statement. ‘‘If there are jobs that can be occupieded by Spanish citizens, then the latter should have precedence.’’ On the other hand, sources from the Labour Ministry said that the list of jobs difficult to occupy includes ones such as taxi driver, chambermaid and carpenter. ‘‘Who could swear that in Spain there is not even one carpenter ready to work in any province?,’’ they said. However, the initiative has provoked criticism on the part of most of the parties in Parliament, beginning with PP which, despite the fact that in past it blocked the contracts in the countries of origin and opposed to the amnesty launched by PSOE during the term of the previous parliament, accused Corbacho of ‘‘closing the road of illegal immigration, leaving open only the door for illegal immigration’’, in the words of spokesman Esteban Gonzalez Pons. The left-wing party Izquierda Unida defined the measure ‘‘populist and xenophobe’’ and, through the secretary general Gaspar Llamazares, requested that Corbacho reports the matter to the Parliament. The Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) called the government initiative ‘‘non solid and unjust’’. It is ‘‘limiting’’ according to Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (‘Republican Left of Catalonia’) and ‘‘demagogic’’ for the nationalists of Coalicion Canaria; while Convergencia y Union has called for ‘‘realism’’. The reaction of trade unions was harsh. According to UGT, the government launches ‘‘an irresponsible message’’, while for Comisiones Obreras the minister ‘‘should instead announce that he is planning to curb illegal immigration’’. According to the confederation of Spanish employers (CEOE), the government proposal is ‘‘hardly realistic’’. Although agreeing that, in times of crisis, local unemployed have priority, industrialists claimed that it would be ‘‘difficult’’ to give up contracts abroad. The example of the fruit and vegetable speaks for itself. Local workers cannot occupy the thousands of jobs available during the harvest of strawberries and citrus fruit. Agricultural entrepreneurs in the province of Huelva, according to sources from the sector, have called to seasonal employment of 5,500 immigrants, of who 2,500 Moroccans and 3,000 coming from East European countries. The rest of the job offer, which amounts to a total 25,000 workers, is occupied by workers in the area. However, despite the ‘census’ of foreign workers registered with the Andalusian Employment Service, of the 22,000 included in the lists only 2,034 gave a positive response to the seasonal job offer in the fields. The president of the Freshuelva consortium, Jose Manuel Romero, in an interview with El Pais said that of 560 unemployed persons contacted by the consortium only 260 answered to the appeal. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
“Liberals Didn’t Free Auschwitz”
(IsraelNN.com) Conservative American talk show host Dennis Prager told Jewish Republican leaders, “They’d still be gassing Jews” if liberals and peace activists had their way. “The left does not understand that Auschwitz was not liberated by peace activists,” he said at a reception for Republican governors at the Republican national convention.
Prager also told the politicians, “Gandhi said to the Jews, ‘Do not resist Hitler.’ Gandhi did a lot of great work in India. You know why? Because when you advocate peaceful resistance against the British, it works. Peaceful resistance against evil does not work.”
Several Jews objected to Prager’s analogy to the Holocaust, but he said if anyone was offended, “That’s fine with me, so what? Auschwitz was liberated by military people, not by poets and not by peace activists. If one is no longer allowed to say that, we are in a very scary period.”
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Defending Identity by Natan Sharansky
Reviewed by David Pryce-Jones
A few rare individuals bring alive the drama of the times in which they live, and one such is Natan Sharansky. Born in the Soviet Union, he was programmed to be another cog in a system designed to eliminate every identity, whether political or religious or nationalist, that could challenge Communism. He might well have settled to be a Homo Sovieticus if he had not rebelled early on, becoming active in the movement of human-rights activists and dissidents whose best-known representative was the physicist Andrei Sakharov.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
“Time to Stop Jihadist Islam in Europe”
Knesset Member Aryeh Eldad held a press conference on Wednesday announcing a first-of-its-kind summit in Jerusalem for the establishment of a defensive coalition of European legislators. “I believe that it’s time to look reality in the eye, not to lower our eyes, not to be afraid of the reality,” declared Eldad. “As a physician, I can tell you that a patient who denies his disease is doomed.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Environmental Rules ‘Could Cause Plane Crashes’
Environmental rules demanding planes burn less fuel could cause a devastating plane crash by allowing vital fuel pipes to freeze up, an aviation expert has warned.
David Reynolds, head of safety at the pilots’ union Balpa, has called on regulators to “revisit” some of the requirements aimed at cutting CO2 emissions after it was disclosed that a crash landing at Heathrow earlier this year was caused by ice freezing up supply lines to the plane’s engines.
“These rules need to be looked at again. Fuel flow is an import factor in the safe running of an aircraft engine. With reduced burn, that means that less fuel is circulating, which makes it easier for water to separate and turn into ice.
“In this case this was combined with very low temperatures and perhaps fuel which may have had a bit more water than usual — even though it complied with international standards. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Is Google Turning Into Big Brother?
The Debut of Chrome, Google’s New Browser, May Have Been Quiet for a Reason
While we’re transfixed by the presidential election, in the world of high tech another duel between two well-funded, take-no-quarter candidates has just emerged … and in the long run the impact on our daily lives may be nearly as great — and perhaps even sinister.
Is Chrome, Google’s new browser, part of an ambitious effort by Google to own all of the world’s data?
As you probably heard, on Monday — that is, on a national holiday, when business announcements are almost never made — Google rolled out Chrome, its new Web browser.
Why the odd timing? Hard to say. Google surely knows that just about anything it does these days is going to cause a news frenzy — and especially when it’s announcing its first thrust into a huge new market.
So, perhaps it hoped to temper this coverage to a degree, and drag it out for several days. Or perhaps Google was unsure about the product itself, and didn’t want to overhype it — and then face a potential backlash. Or, maybe Google just didn’t think Chrome was that important, saw a window between the two political conventions and rushed it out.
Google’s official explanation is that the Labor Day release of Chrome was an accident, and the Terms of Use attached to that product were simply a cut-and-paste from other Google products. We will leave it to the reader to decide if these are viable explanations from a multi-billion company regarding one of its biggest new products in years — and, if true, what it says about Google’s competence in handling some of your most sensitive information.
Well, now that Chrome is out and being field-tested by reviewers, I think we can rule out the second and the third scenarios. That leaves the first. But why would a company that knows it has a solid and newsworthy product on its hands intentionally dampen media coverage of it?
The answer, I think, was that it was a long-term strategic decision to make Chrome look almost like an afterthought. And I think that decision was made at the highest levels of Google, perhaps by CEO Eric Schmidt.
Why? Because Google’s ambitions are bigger than most of us have ever imagined, and the company is now rich enough, and powerful enough, to execute them — even if it means the short-term sacrifice of a major new revenue source.
One more thing: If Google pulls off this strategy, it will be the most valuable company on the planet. It will also be the scariest … and we should start worrying about that right now.
First, a little background. Google sits at the confluence of two historic Silicon Valley philosophical streams…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
5 comments:
The antidote:
Anon Google
Excellent new videos up at the People's Cube.
American Contrarian.
The world has gone to crap.
The siyuation in UKistan:
http://tinyurl.com/6s9nzd
The elite’s war by immigrant proxy
David Hamilton
According to the Mail on Sunday, which obtained the official statistics of 37 police forces under the Freedom of Information Act, there is an offence involving a knife every 24 minutes of the day in England.
Impressive article on 911 at
http://www.theconservativevoice.com
http://tinyurl.com/5fb68k
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