Religion

On a flight from Malaga, Spain to  Manchester, England, passengers were concerned about two "Asian or Middle Eastern looking men acting suspiciously".On the instigation of the passengers, the flight attendants were alerted, who in turn alerted the crew, who got the airport security to remove  the men from the flight.The actions was described as "mutiny" by some news media. The suspicious behavior turned to be that the Asian men were in their twenties and talking Arabic, and wearing leather jackets although the weather was hot. They were questioned for several hours, and found to be harmless, and caught a flight back later in the day. 

A recent poll in the US show a disturbing trend.In a USA Today / Gallup poll shows that almost 40% of Americans acknowledge having prejudice against Muslims. A similar percentage, 39%, favor subjecting Muslims to stricter security measures including carrying a special ID. 41% favored Muslims undergoing more intensive security checks at airports. Most respondants said that they don't personally know a Muslim. While this is not unexpected in the USA, where the right wing media has been demonizing Muslims even before September 11, the fact that Canada has similar negative views of Muslims is saddening.

This is a web site that collects media articles hostile to Muslims. Although they can use better wording than "Western Imperialism" on their About us page,  the collection is valuable, and categorized by country and topic.Even notorious Islamophobes like Daniel Pipes and Oriana Fallaci have their own category, not a surprise given the volume and vitriol of their writing.Visit Islamophobia Watch and judge for yourself. 

A new scarecrow term that has emerged recently, specially in right wing media and the Bush administration's rhetoric. The term is the caliphate.

In this article, I mention some facts on the caliphate, and what the above rhetoric is.

As the saying goes : Even a broken clock tells the correct time twice a day ...Little Green Footballs is a political blog that often has an Islamophobic tone. It often gets anonymous tips of important news.It broke the word on Dan Rather's flop with G. W. Bush's army service letter.It also broke the news on photoshopped pictures from Beirut freelance photographer Adnan Hajj. See the CBC coverage as well.

The Yesha Rabbinical Council, commenting on the Qana massacre, has said that during the time of war, there are "no innocents".

Yesha Rabbinical Council: During time of war, enemy has no innocentsThe Yesha Rabbinical Council announced in response to an IDF attack in Kfar Qanna that "according to Jewish law, during a time of battle and war, there is no such term as 'innocents' of the enemy." All of the discussions on Christian morality are weakening the spirit of the army and the nation and are costing us in the blood of our soldiers and civilians," the statement said. (Efrat Weiss)(07.30.06, 17:37)

Two recent polls do not give a comforting picture.The first shows that 18% of Canadians are uneasy in the presence of Muslims, compared to 5% saying the same for Jews, and 31% for born-again Christians.The second says that one quarter of Canadians see Muslims negatively, compared to 10% only for Jews and Christians.

On Sunday, a man reportedly shot and killed one person at a Seattle Jewish center, and wounded six more, while reportedly shouting: "I am an American Muslim and I am angry at Israel".His name is Naveed Haq, and is of Pakistani ancestry.What is emerging though is that Naveed had converted to Christianity and underwent baptism in December 2005. Moreover he was rarely at the mosque, despite his father being a founder.

Hindu extremists have rioted in Mumbai. The reason: a statue of the late wife of a political leader was found vandalized. The party is called Shiv Sena, and is (unsurprisingly) right-wing, and the statue belonged to Bal Thackeray, the party's leader.The riots torched at least one bus and forced several shops to close. The sad part is that a former speaker of the Parliament, Manohar Joshi of the Shiv Sena party, has declared this act as vandalism against Hindus and Hindusim.

Seven black people have been arrested in a poor area in Miami, Florida yesterday. The plot allegedly invovled bombing the Sears tower in Chicago, as well as FBI offices in Miami and elsewhere. An FBI agent posing as an Al-Qaeda operative gave them money, supplies and weapons. You can read the full indictment.

Are they Muslims?

The accused are mostly of Haitian descent. Although reports initially said they are Muslims, it later became obvious that this is not the case. They are members of something called the "Seas of David". Most of the suspects have non-Muslim nicknames which are more Biblical, e.g. Levi, although others were said to have names like "Brother Sunni". The one called "Brother Levi" is also called Brother Levi-El", the -El suffix being a Moorish Science Temple mark from Noble Drew Ali.