Racist thugs attack Muslim boy

Posted on by Bob Pitt

BasildonA 12-year-old Muslim boy was left with cuts and bruises after he was attacked by two racist men outside his home.

Ubaid Khan, was playing football in Somercotes, Laindon, when he was set upon by the two thugs last Monday evening. The assault happened in the same week three Asian men were attacked as they walked to church, in Whitmore Way.

Brother Sarfraz Sarwar of the Basildon Islamic Centre, said members of the Muslim community are now being advised not to go out alone after dark, in the wake of the attacks.

Ubaid’s dad, Khubaid Khan, 40, said: “My son was attacked by two men, who gave him a good smacking. He was playing football when the ball went out of the game and he ran to get it. These two men started shouting abuse at him, then they attacked him, leaving him with a cut lip and swollen face. For two men to do this to a young boy is unthinkable. He has been left very shaken and now he does not want to play out anymore.”

The assault comes after three Asian men were physically attacked in Basildon while on their way to a church celebration late on Saturday night. The men – all Christians – were confronted by a yob asking if they belonged to Isis or a terrorist group, before being slapped and punched.

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Burbank man protests outside Islamic Center in West Richland

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Michael Harmon protestsA Burbank man protested Monday evening outside a West Richland mosque, holding a sign that read “death to Islam” on one side and “Islam is evil” on the other.

Michael Harmon, 28, of Burbank, also had a sign reading “Terrorists” on the side of his car, with a blue arrow pointing toward the Islamic Center of Tri-Cities on Bombing Range Road. Harmon said he served as a specialist in the Army and was in Afghanistan.

“You’ve got the Taliban, al-Qaida, ISIS – they all follow the Quran,” Harmon told the Herald, referring to the Islamic State group by one of its acronyms. “The Quran itself is evil. It states there in black and white they want to kill us.”

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Activists protest ‘massive spike’ in racist attacks in Melbourne

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Batman Station anti-racist posters

Muslim activists say they are seeing a “massive spike in racist attacks”, prompting a rally this morning to stand against Islamophobia.

About 30 people gathered at Batman train station in Coburg, speaking to commuters about a sickening racial attack on an Upfield train last Thursday.

A Muslim woman, 26, was racially abused by an offender who then slammed her head into the wall of the carriage as it approached Batman station. Campaigner Yasemin Shamsili said the attack was a “consequence of a hysterical political campaign” which had vilified Muslims. “(This) will no doubt give more confidence to racists to come out of the woodwork,” she said. “We have already seen a massive spike in racist attacks.”

Another community activist, Vashti Kenway, said: “It is vital for Muslims and non-Muslims to fight for a genuinely multiracial Australia”. She claimed “racist scaremongering” had created “a perception of terror that is not based on reality”. “People in Australia at very little risk from terrorism,” she said.

A mass rally will be held on October 19 at the State Library.

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Moazzam Begg released after terror charges dropped

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Former Guantanamo Bay detainee Moazzam Begg has walked free from Belmarsh prison after seven terrorism-related charges against him were dropped.

The charges – which were connected to the conflict in Syria – were dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service after “new material” emerged.

Leaving prison, Mr Begg, 46, said he had “wanted his day in court” and claimed his detention was “unlawful”.

The Muslim Council of Britain called for an “urgent investigation”.

Mr Begg, from Birmingham, was arrested with three others in February.

Speaking from outside prison after his release, he said: “Not once but twice in my case this government has been involved either in directly detaining me or indirectly detaining me and on both occasions it’s been unlawful.”

Mr Begg also said handling of his case “shows a knee jerk reaction”, adding: “It shows little has changed since the beginning of the early days in the war on terror. There isn’t an appetite, there isn’t a desire to try to really understand what’s taking place.”

BBC News, 1 October 2014

Update:  See “Moazzam Begg was in contact with MI5 about his Syria visits, papers show”, Guardian, 2 October 2014

Muslim woman thrown off moving train in Australia

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A 26-year-old Muslim woman suffered injuries after being racially abused, assaulted and thrown off a moving train in Australia’s Melbourne last week, in an alarming Islamophobic attack.

Detective Senior Constable Michael Potter was quoted by 9News on Monday saying the attack had a “massive effect” on the victim, calling it “totally unacceptable.”

The victim had her head bashed into the wall of the train a number times by an unknown woman who was shouting abuse before being pushed off the train, a Victorian police spokesperson told the Daily Mail.

Prominent Australian Muslims say their community is being unfairly targeted by law enforcement and threatened by right-wing groups, as the government’s tough new policies aimed at combating ‘radicals’ threaten to create a backlash.

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Police investigate ‘disgusting’ hate mail and threats against Muslim businesses in Sydney suburb

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Five threatening letters delivered to Muslim businesses and ­groups in Lakemba are being investigated by police, with more incidents believed to be going unreported. Campsie crime manager detective Inspector Paul ­Albury said the material was offensive and would be to anybody in the community.

“It’s degrading, disgusting and derogatory to people and their religion,” he said. “The reality is the groups targeted have no direct link with any conflict or with anybody that has been ­arrested. They are normal, everyday people going about their day-to-day business and they’re subjected to a level of hate which is quite stunning.”

The letters, believed to contain threats against mosques and the Islamic community, are an alarming response to recent terror raids across Sydney. It is a criminal offence to send offensive material through the mail.

The Grand Mufti of Australia, Dr Ibrahim Abu Mohammad, and leaders of a number of Australian Muslim community organisations released a statement in response to an increase in incidents of abuse and discrimination against Muslim Australians in the past month. They called on anyone who may have suffered a hate or bias motivated crime to contact police or ­report it using a special Facebook page set up to register incidences.

The letters are the latest sign of rising tension in the south-west Sydney suburb following the terror raids in September. Earlier this month, a scuffle broke out between young people and Lakemba shopkeepers and rocks were reportedly thrown at businesses along Railway St.

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New South Wales: ugly incidents shock Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Female Muslim medical students have been verbally abused and have had patients refuse to be treated by them in a fortnight where the spectre of ignorance has raised its ugly head in the Hunter.

Two female students were walking back to their car at Maitland hospital last Wednesday when they were verbally abused by a car-load of men because they were wearing the religious head dress, known as a hijab. A nurse who witnessed the incident assisted the terrified women to flee the tirade of obscenity.

“I’ve always met lovely people since I have been in Australia; but what happened to us was a horrible experience,” one of the students said. She said several of her Muslim female friends had reported some patients had refused to be treated by them. “We are taught in medicine not to take offence, but ultimately we are human and it does hurt; you do feel it,” she said.

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Reza Aslan slams Bill Maher for ‘facile arguments’ about Muslim violence

Posted on by Bob Pitt

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_anVKcrSAls

Religious scholar Reza Aslan took some serious issue on CNN Monday night with Bill Maher‘s commentary about Islamic violence and oppression. Maher ended his show last Friday by going after liberals for being silent about the violence and oppression that goes on in Muslim nations. Aslan said on CNN that Maher’s arguments are just very unsophisticated.

He said these “facile arguments” might sound good, but not all Muslim nations are the same. Aslan explained that female mutilation is an African problem, not a Muslim one, and there are Muslim-majority nations where women are treated better and there are even female leaders.

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Arkansas firing range becomes first to exclude Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

In an act that will no doubt result in lawsuits, The Gun Cave Indoor Shooting Range in Hot Springs, Arkansas, has declared itself a “Muslim free zone” due to concerns over domestic Islamic terrorism. The ban was announced yesterday by range owner Jan Morgan in an article posted to her web site where she cites ten points justifying her position.

Among the points cited are prior attacks in the United States that the federal government refuses to classify as terrorism, including the Fort Hood attack, the Boston Marathon bombing, and the last week’s Oklahoma City beheading. Morgan has also received death threats in the past for her writing about Islam.

Another incident that weighed heavily in Morgan’s decision was an incident at her firing range several weeks ago, which she relayed to Bearing Arms this morning.

Morgan claims that two Muslim men who spoke only broken English came to her range and requested to rent semi-automatic firearms and ammunition. One of them could not produce any identification showing that he was in the country legally, and the other had a California driver’s license. Neither had any apparent firearms training. She allowed them to rent one firearm, and stood behind them the entire time they were on the range, her hand on or near her holstered Glock 19. All other patrons voluntarily vacated the firing line while they were shooting.

She brings up a very valid point that gun stores and ranges have both a legal and moral obligation to ensure the safety of their patrons. Because of this, they may refuse service to anyone they deem to be under the influence, mentally unstable, or otherwise a potential threat to themselves, or others. FFLs are afforded a great deal of latitude in this regard, as the federal government would rather err on the side of caution.

While FFls and range operators have a great deal of latitude in their business dealings, it is doubtful that a blanket ban based upon religion is remotely viable on First Amendment grounds. This is no more legally viable than a ban on Baptists or Catholics.

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James Foley photo removed from anti-Islamic bus ads in New York

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A photo of American journalist James Foley shortly before his beheading by the Islamic state militant group is being removed from anti-Islam advertisements appearing on Monday on 100 New York City buses and two subway stations.

In response to a complaint from the Foley family, the advertisement is being altered to include an unidentifiable severed head held by the masked militant seen wielding a knife in the video of Foley’s beheading, said David Yerushalmi, lawyer for Pamela Geller, whose group is sponsoring the ads.

“The use of Mr. Foley’s photo in your advertisement will cause profound distress to the Foley family,” family lawyer J. Patrick Rowan said in a letter to Geller.

Geller writes a blog criticizing Islam. Her group, American Freedom Defense Initiative, paid for a six-ad series scheduled to run for a month on the city’s mass transit system.

The ads, including one showing Foley in the video of his beheading released in August, suggest that Islam is inherently violent and extremist, and call for the end of American aid to Islamic countries.

“Having lived in and reported from communities in which nearly everyone was of Muslim faith, he had great respect for the religion and those who practiced it,” the Foley family lawyer wrote, referring to the journalist.

“The advertisement you are preparing to run seems to convey the message that ordinary practitioners of Islam are a dangerous threat. This message is entirely inconsistent with Mr. Foley’s reporting and his beliefs.”

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