A lawyer for New York City on Monday denied that the NYPD has a surveillance program to spy on Muslims.
Responding to an ACLU lawsuit claiming religious discrimination that seeks to force police to turn over surveillance records, city lawyer Peter Farrell claimed “there is no Muslim surveillance program. … I 100 percent disagree that there was ever a Muslim surveillance program.”
A federal judge has awarded back pay and other costs to a Muslim man who said he was fired from his security-guard job two years ago for refusing to shave his close-cropped beard.
Abdulkadir Omar, 23, who worked for American Patriot Security in 2009 and 2010, was awarded over $66,000 in back wages, attorney fees and court costs. U.S. District Judge Robert Lasnik ordered a default judgment against American Patriot on Sept. 27 after the company declined to mount a defense.
A major crowd control operation involving mounted police and almost 100 uniformed personnel was mobilised to deal with a demonstration by rival political groups in Dundee on Saturday.
The protest by the far right Scottish Defence League and counter demonstration by the Unite Against Fascism (UAF) alliance passed without any arrests thanks to strict segregation outside the City Churches.
The two groups – the SDL heavily outnumbered – confronted each other and traded chants but were kept apart by barriers and four mounted officers.
The SDL members, who were bussed into Dundee from as far as Sunderland, shouted their loathing for what they called militant Islam, but their message was drowned out by the UAF, who condemned their racial intolerance.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=V-bHEF6goF4
Fox & Friends Saturday criticized President Obama for offering to personally pay for a “museum of Muslim culture” during the government shutdown, a claim that originated from a satire website.
On October 5, the co-hosts of Fox & Friends Saturday discussed the closure of the World War II Memorial, which resulted from the Republican-led shutdown. During the discussion, co-host Anna Kooiman claimed that while the memorial is closed, “President Obama has offered to pay out of his own pocket for the museum of Muslim culture.”
LE RAINCY, France — A pink and orange all-women’s gym has become an unlikely focus of a very French row over Muslim integration, secularism and what some view as blatant populism in the run-up to France’s municipal elections.
The gym, which opened last month in the up-market Paris suburb of Le Raincy, is owned by a French Muslim couple who say their religion and appearance – she wears a headscarf and he a long beard – are the reason the mayor wants to shut them down.
The squabble has erupted five months before conservative mayor Eric Raoult, who says safety is his only concern, seeks re-election in nationwide municipal polls in which the anti-immigrant National Front is expected to gain ground.
“‘I don’t want any veiled women in my town,’ he told us,” said gym manager Nadia El Gendouli, who sports a piercing in her nose and plunging neckline. “‘You’re a fundamentalist!’ he told me.”
At the town hall on Thursday, Raoult denied the allegation that he did not want women wearing Muslim veils in Le Raincy. “These are fundamentalists, they lie!” he shouted. “They consider because they’re Muslims they’re victims and they consider they have more rights,” he said.
Plans to turn an abandoned pub into an Islamic community centre have sparked a fierce debate.
The South West London Ismaili Community has purchased the old Worcester Park Tavern which closed in August 2012. The group is launching a public consultation on proposals to turn the former public house into a centre for activities, a library and an area for meditation and spiritual practices.
Many of those commenting on our online story hope that the scheme will rejuvenate the building which has been left abandoned and blighted by squatters.
Others have voiced their opposition to it, with one reader commenting: “I’m sorry but I grew up in the area and don’t want to see this. I don’t live in the Middle East, I live near Worcester Park. This will just drive the area down and drive away residents that have lived in the area all their lives.”
But Nikki R hit back: “The ignorance that comes out when people read the word ‘Islamic’ is breathtaking. If and when the centre is open, politely request to visit. They’d make you welcome and you may learn more about people than what the Daily Mail chooses to tell you.”
A Muslim woman is accusing the popular TGI Friday’s casual dining chain of tricking her into eating a food that her religion forbids: pork.
The chain, which has nearly 1,000 locations worldwide and which recently undertook a brand face-lift with a menu upgrade and restaurant renovation, says in a Facebook post that it is investigating her claim, noting, “we don’t tolerate discrimination in any form.”
For a project that has been framed by its authors as an important step toward equality of the sexes, the Charter of Quebec Values is managing to upset a lot of women.
On Wednesday, it was the turn of the organization representing provincial women’s centres to issue a stark warning about the damage the charter proposals are causing before they even become law. The group, R des centres des femmes du Québec, said that the debate over the charter, which would ban such religious symbols as the Muslim hijab and Jewish kippa from the public service, is provoking violence against Muslim women.
At a meeting last week, the organization representing 97 centres across the province heard of dozens of recent incidents in which Muslim women wearing headscarves were targeted. “Women are being shoved, insults, denigrated,” the group said in a statement. “Some have even been spit on in the face. The impacts of the debate over the charter are undeniable.”
A federal judge ruled against enforcing a zoning change brought upon by a central New Jersey township this week, which restricted a mosque from extending its boundaries into a residential territory.
Al Falah Center had fought for years to gain approval for a new mosque in the Jersey township of Bridgewater. On Monday, the township could not validate reasoning as to why the mosque could not be built, leading a judge to grant permission for the expansion of the mosque.