Category Archives: Anti-Muslim violence

Police probe mosque blaze amid fears ‘firebomb attack’ is Woolwich revenge

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Bravanese Centre fire

Counter-terrorism police are investigating a blaze that destroyed a mosque today amid fears that it was firebombed in revenge for the Woolwich murder of Drummer Lee Rigby. Fire crews reported seeing the letters EDL scrawled on the building’s side as they battled the blaze in Muswell Hill.

Scotland Yard said it was treating the fire at the Somali community centre as suspicious and the Counter Terrorism Command was leading the inquiry. Fire crews were called to the Somali Bravanese Welfare Association in Coppetts Road at 3.15am and took nearly an hour and a half to get the blaze under control. The two-storey building, housing the Al-Rahma Islamic Centre and listed as a mosque, was completely destroyed.

A prominent member of the far-Right protest group English Defence League said: “Just because EDL is written on the wall, you can’t point the finger at us. It could have been anyone. The Government is not doing anything so people are taking things into their own hands. I don’t condemn this.”

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Breivik admirers to stand trial on race hate charges

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Breivik 2083Two terror suspects are to go on trial accused of waging a campaign of hate against Muslims in Devon.

Tobias Ruth, 18, and John Roddy, 20, allegedly daubed mosques and cultural centres with racist graffiti. The pair are also said to have sent threatening letters to Islamic organisations located around Torbay and Brixham.

Roddy is accused of possessing terrorist literature including an Al Qaida manual and a document entitled A European Declaration of Independence. He and Ruth were arrested at their homes in Torquay last January 3.

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Texas man apologizes, pleads guilty to phoning in bomb threat to Murfreesboro mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Alan CorreaA Texas man who threatened to blow up the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro apologized to the imam and mosque leaders on Monday, then pleaded guilty to a federal charge.

“I’ve been around with all types of people, and have all types of friends,” Javier Alan Correa read Monday in federal court in Nashville. “I also understand not all Muslims are terrorists. I was just ignorant at that time, plus I had been drinking alcohol so I wasn’t thinking very clearly which is why I made a very poor choice in calling. Sir, after making that phone call I felt really bad and guilty. I really felt awful and I knew what I did was wrong. I’m sorry for that.”

U.S. District Court Judge Aleta A. Trauger then sentenced Correa, 25, of Corpus Christi, Texas, to eight months of home detention and five years of federal probation, according to the terms of his plea agreement.

The charge came from a profanity-laced telephone call he made Sept. 5, 2011, to the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro punctuated with, “On Sept. 11, 2011, there’s going to be a bomb in the building.” Correa told the judge that he had been drinking that night and had watched a CNN program called “Unwelcome: The Muslims Next Door.” He said the show had enraged him and had prompted him to phone in the threat.

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CAIR seeks hate crime probe of Texas mosque vandalism

Posted on by Bob Pitt

McKinney Islamic Association paintball attackThe Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-DFW), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, tonight called on state and national law enforcement authorities to investigate a paintball attack on a mosque in that state as a possible hate crime.

Officials with the McKinney Islamic Association in Mckinney, Texas, told CAIR that up to two dozen paintballs were fired at the mosque sometime between 11 p.m. on Saturday and 5 a.m. on Sunday. A vehicle owned by a member of the mosque’s congregation was also hit by a paintball after he left the facility. Worshippers have reportedly been verbally harassed recently by young people who gather near the mosque. Local police told mosque officials that they will recommend stepped up patrols in the area.

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Huntingdon mosque attack: Man charged

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A 45-year-old man has been charged with racial or religiously aggravated criminal damage over an attack on a mosque in Cambridgeshire.

The man was arrested on Thursday at the Islamic Education and Prayer Centre on Coneygear Road, Huntingdon.

Police in Huntingdon said they were working with the mosque and the local community to provide reassurance following the attack.

The man is due before Huntingdon Magistrates’ Court on Monday.

BBC News, 2 June 2013

Anti-Muslim hate crimes soar since Woolwich attack

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Lee Rigby’s family say he would not want people to use his name as an excuse to attacks others. But figures show that violence against Muslim targets has increased fivefold since his murder.

Channel 4 News has obtained figures from the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), which emerged as Drummer Lee Rigby’s family appealed for calm following his killing on 22 May.

136 complaints of anti-Muslim incidents were reported online to police in the week following the killing – that included violence and internet material. The number is five times the number recorded in the preceding week, although the numbers hit a peak the day after the murder.

Channel 4 News, 31 May 2013

Man arrested following attack on Huntingdon mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Huntingdon Islamic Centre

A mosque window was smashed during a disturbance in Huntingdon on Thursday (May 30).

Police said they were called to the Huntingdon Islamic Education and Prayer Centre in Coneygear Road to reports of the property being damaged. A 45-year-old man was arrested nearby on suspicion of causing criminal damage.

A police spokesman said: “It is being treated as an isolated incident and officers will be carrying out reassurance patrols as a precaution.”

There have been at least 10 attacks on mosques across the UK since the murder of soldier Lee Rigby last week.

Hunts Post, 31 May 2013

Mohammed Saleem stabbing: new leads

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Mohammed SaleemA TV appeal to find the killer of a man murdered on his way home from a mosque has prompted new leads.

Mohammed Saleem, 82, was stabbed after leaving the Green Lane Mosque in Small Heath, Birmingham, on 29 April. West Midlands Police said it had “several new leads” after a reconstruction and appeal on Thursday’s BBC1 Crimewatch show. It has appealed for an anonymous man who rang with information about the attack to call back.

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Lee Rigby death no excuse for attacks, says family

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Killed soldier Lee Rigby would not have wanted his death used to excuse reprisal attacks, his family have said.

Drummer Rigby’s family called for calm as the Queen met army personnel during a visit to the barracks near to where he was killed on 22 May. In a statement his family said his friends’ different cultures and religions “made no difference to Lee”.

The family’s plea came amid reports of a rise in anti-Muslim incidents since the soldier’s murder last week.

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