The English Defence League will be holding a march in Peterborough next Saturday. Peterborough Trades Council have organised a counter-protest. Details here.
Update: See “Anti-fascists demonstrate against EDL in Peterborough”, Islamophobia Watch, 29 March 2014
Hundreds of people marched in the streets of Montreal Friday evening to mark the International day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and denounce the Parti Québécois’s proposed secular charter.
While the protest stopped outside PQ Premier Pauline Marois’s offices downtown, many were critical of Quebec’s other political parties for not taking a stronger stand against the charter. They say no government should decide what women get to wear. “We cannot let the other parties off the hook, when they say hijab is okay, but niqab is not,” said Delores Chew of the South Asian Women’s Association.
Though the march was taking place in the context of an election campaign, protesters say the issue is bigger than party politics.
“People assume that there is a legitimate debate to be had about how we – presumably white people – are going to decide how immigrant people are going to integrate or participate in society. That’s profoundly racist. It’s as simple as that,” said protest organizer Joël Pedneault.
A group of Muslims from New Jersey is appealing a federal judge’s ruling that determined that the New York City Police Department’s surveillance of Muslims did not violate their civil rights.
Attorneys from the groups Muslim Advocates and the Center for Constitutional Rights filed a notice of appeal on Friday in federal court in Newark, challenging the dismissal of a 2012 lawsuit brought by Muslim individuals and organisations who said the NYPD programs constituted unconstitutional surveillance based on religion, national origin and race. The suit had accused the department of spying on ordinary people at mosques, restaurants and schools in New Jersey since 2002.
Hilary Aked reports on the latest developments in the campaign against the Henry Jackson Society front organisation, the misnamed Student Rights.
Right-wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders led supporters in chants against Moroccans at an election victory party on Wednesday night – and now faces calls for prosecution for discrimination.
Wilders’ eurosceptic, anti-Islam Freedom Party made huge gains in municipal elections on Wednesday and polls suggest it will become the largest Dutch party in the Brussels assembly in European elections in May. His anti-Moroccan policies dominated campaigning for the elections.
On Wednesday night in The Hague, he asked a crowd of supporters: “Do you want more or fewer Moroccans in this city?”. They chanted “Fewer! Fewer! Fewer!” Wilders smiled and responded “I’ll take care of that.”
The incident was denounced by politicians and immigrant groups.
A Muslim family from Long Island slapped the owners of the Empire State Building Tuesday with a scathing $5 million lawsuit that claims they were booted from the building’s observation deck for praying. Fahad and Amina Tirmizi of Farmingville said their civil rights were violated when they were “assaulted, battered and forcibly removed” from the famed observatory last July.
The suit, filed against Malkin Properties, security company Andrews International Inc. and others, claims that Fahad, 32, and his 30-year-old wife were unfairly targeted because they were Muslim and wearing traditional Muslim attire. “We weren’t doing anything wrong,” Fahad said. “We just wanted to enjoy the view like everyone else.”
The couple and their two children were on the 86th-floor outside deck when they walked over to a quiet spot to recite evening prayers, the suit says. Although Amina briefly prayed without incident, a security guard quickly confronted Fahad and “menacingly poked” him and loudly told him he was not allowed to pray on the deck. Another guard joined the fray and told all the family members that they had to leave, and “forcibly escorted” them down to the lobby and out of the of the building, the suit says.
On Saturday the Coordination contre le Racisme et l’Islamophobie organised a demonstration against Islamophobia in Lyon, to mark the tenth anniversary of the introduction of the hijab ban in French state schools.
The CRI points out that the law was the first in a series of legal restrictions on, and judicial and administrative rulings against Muslims, including the 2011 ban on the niqab, a 2013 court decision upholding the sacking of a childcare assistant who wore a headscarf to work, the adoption this year by the Senate of a bill that would extend the hijab ban to childcare workers who work at their own homes, and the prevention of hijab-wearing mothers from joining their children on school trips.
The demonstrators called for the cancellation of all Islamophobic laws.
Earlier this month, FIFA lifted its ban on headscarves, allowing female Muslim players to wear hijabs while playing soccer. But that didn’t stop high school soccer referees in Aurora, Colo. from prohibiting Samah Aidah to play with her head covered.
Last week in response, the Overland High School girls soccer team took an inspiring stand in support of their teammate and her freedom of religious expression by donning headscarves representative of Aidah’s hijab. With more than 40,000 retweets and favorites so far, teammate Divine Davis’ photo of the team in headscarves is making a loud statement about equality.
UN anti-racism day – Assemble 11 am
Procession from Nelson Mandela statue, Parliament Square to Trafalgar Square rally
Speakers at the event will include: Diane Abbott MP, Natalie Bennett (Green Party Leader), Christine Blower (NUT General Secretary), Jerry Dammers, Bruce Kent (VP Pax Christi), Jean Lambert MEP, Max Levitas (Cable Street Veteran), Gloria Mills (UNISON National Secretary Equalities), Claude Moraes MEP, Farooq Murad (Secretary General – Muslim Council of Britain), Mohammad Taj (TUC President), Tommy Tomescu (Alliance Against Romanians and Bulgarians Discrimination), Ava Vidal (Comedian), Maurice Wren (Chief Executive – Refugee Council)
Organised by 
and 
