Tag Archives: Islam

German establishment rounds on anti-immigration party over Islam

Vote for German AfD

BERLIN (Reuters) – German politicians from across the spectrum criticized the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) on Monday after the party declared Islam incompatible with the constitution.

The AfD, which has surged onto the political scene since its launch three years ago, backed a manifesto pledge at a congress on Sunday to ban on minarets and the burqa, the full face and body-covering gown worn by some Muslim women.

With concerns about Europe’s migrant crisis fuelling the AfD’s rise, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrats led criticism of the party.

“What the AfD has decided on is an attack on almost all religions,” Armin Laschet, deputy chairman of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), told ARD television.

“They have identified Islam as a foreign body in Germany,” he said. “That is divisive, and startling to a Christian Democratic party for which faith has meaning.”

Greens parliamentary party leader Katrin Goering-Eckardt described the AfD manifesto as “reactionary” and accused the party of dividing society with Islamophobia.

Opinion polls give the AfD support of up to 14 percent, presenting a serious challenge to Merkel’s conservatives and other established parties ahead of a 2017 federal election. They rule out any coalition with the AfD.

The AfD has no lawmakers in the federal parliament in Berlin but has members in half of Germany’s 16 regional state assemblies.

Merkel has said freedom of religion for all is guaranteed by Germany’s constitution and that Islam is a part of Germany.

Germany is home to nearly 4 million Muslims, about 5 percent of the total population. Community leaders have called on politicians to ensure that no religious community be disadvantaged and that Islam not be defined as a “foe”.

Many of the longer established Muslim community came from Turkey to find work. Last year, more than a million, mostly Muslim migrants, arrived in Germany. Most had fled conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Alexander Gauland, who leads the AfD in the eastern state of Brandenburg, said Muslims could still practise their faith in Germany.

“A Muslim in Germany can follow his religion without minarets. The AfD has nothing against places of worship,” Gauland told Deutschlandfunk radio, insisting his party did not want existing minarets torn down but rather no new ones built.

Aiman Mazyek, head of Germany’s Central Council of Muslims who has likened the AfD’s attitude towards his community to that of Hitler’s Nazis towards Jews, told the Osnabruecker Zeitung the AfD manifesto was “an Islamophobic program” that “is of no help to solve problems, but rather just divides our country.”

(Writing by Paul Carrel; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Bosnia eyes closure of radical Islamic centers over links to Syria militants

GRACANICA, Bosnia (Reuters) – Dozens of breakaway Muslim community groups in Bosnia face shutdown by police for rejecting the authority of the moderate national Islamic organization and radicalizing young men who have left to join Islamist insurgents in Syria, officials said.

Most of Bosnia’s Muslims, known also as Bosniaks, are moderates well integrated in its widely secular society, which also comprises Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats.

But during and after Bosnia’s 1990s ethnic war, some came under the sway of foreign Islamist “mujahideen” who slipped in to fight in support of Bosnian Muslims against nationalist Serbs and Croats, fostering more radical forms of Islam.

Echoing the experience of other European countries with Muslim communities, more than 150 Bosnians have gone to fight alongside Islamist militants such as Islamic State in Syria and Iraq over the past few years, police say. More than 50 have returned to Bosnia and about 30 were killed in combat.

Bosnian Security Minister Dragan Mektic said this week that police would soon shut down Muslim community groups that refuse affiliation with the state-recognized Islamic Community organization based in the capital Sarajevo.

“It is correct and true that criminals who have made fascist and violent threats against us from the Middle East have been members of these illegal community groups,” an editorial on the Islamic Community’s website said on Friday.

It was referring to death threats sent via the Internet this week to Bosnia’s top Islamic cleric, Grand Mufti Husein Kavazovic, by a Bosnian believed to be fighting in Syria.

The man who made the threats came from a village adjacent to a breakaway Muslim community, one of 64 in Bosnia, in the northeastern village of Gracanica, according to Bosnian media.

“NO SUPPORT FOR CALIPHATE”

Fikret Duric, the Gracanica community leader, acknowledged that it had adopted a fundamentalist form of Islam but denied any connection with radicalized men going to join Islamic State or other Islamist insurgents in Syria and Iraq.

“They accuse us of organizing departures to foreign wars, which I absolutely deny,” said Duric, 39, sporting a long beard and traditional Islamic robe. “We don’t support the so-called (Islamic State) caliphate and will not help it in any way.”

The official Islamic Community organization has agreed to negotiations with dissident local groups that face having their centers of worship and study sealed by police in coming days.

But it defended the crackdown as vital to restoring order and unity among its faithful – who make up almost half of Bosnia’s population – and allow it to vouch for all its members.

“We live in a world where radical Muslims take actions with undesirable consequences, and the Islamic Community has decided to take stock of what we have in Bosnia, start a dialogue with them and call on them to come under our roof,” senior Islamic Community official Razim Colic told Reuters.

But Duric said tensions had been raised by repeated police harassment of his community. He said some members had been forcibly removed by police from their mosque after they stayed on for Koranic studies following prayers.

Dissident Muslims want mosques to be open 24 hours, one of their disputes with the mainstream Islamic Community.

“Going back under the Islamic Community roof would mean returning to where we started, but I fear that this time the problem may be bigger because our believers have got used to the freedom they have here,” Duric said.

(Additonal reporting by Aleksandar Vasovic in Belgrade; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Four Egyptian Christians reportedly punished for mocking Islam

An Egyptian judge punished four Coptic Christian teenagers who were accused of insulting Islam by making fun of prayers in a video last year, the AFP news agency reported Thursday.

A lawyer for the teens told the news agency the quartet was mocking beheadings perpetrated by Islamic State extremists, and did not mean to insult the country’s most-worshipped religion.

However, they became the latest four people punished for blasphemy under Egyptian law.

Three of the teenagers received five-year jail sentences, according to the AFP report, while a 15-year-old was ordered to a serve an indefinite amount of time in a juvenile detention facility.

Their lawyer told AFP he is planning to appeal.

Egypt ranks 23rd on the World Watch List published by Open Doors USA, a group that monitors Christian persecution in countries around the world. The roughly 10 million Christians among Egypt’s 87.3 million residents face persecution from Islamic extremists and must cope with “relatively restrictive legislation related to religious affairs,” according to the organization.

AFP reported it’s also illegal to insult Christianity and Judaism in Egypt.

The Islamic State beheaded 21 Egyptian Christians last February, according to Open Doors USA.

Professor who said Christians, Muslims worship same God to leave school

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A professor at an evangelical university near Chicago who got in trouble after saying Muslims and Christians worship the same God will leave the school, according to a joint statement released by Wheaton College on Saturday night.

Larycia Hawkins, a tenured political science professor, had been scheduled for a disciplinary hearing in five days to determine whether she would be allowed to remain at Wheaton.

A joint statement said Hawkins and the college had “found a mutual place of resolution and reconciliation” and that the two sides “will part ways” after reaching a confidential agreement.

The controversy began on Dec. 10, when Hawkins wrote on Facebook that she would don the hijab head scarf during the period of advent before Christmas as a sign of solidarity with Muslims.

“We worship the same God,” she said in her post.

The post drew criticism amid a broader debate regarding the role and treatment of Muslims in the United States following the November mass shooting in San Bernardino, California, which U.S. authorities have said was inspired by the militant group Islamic State.

The college placed Hawkins on administrative leave as a result. Last month, the school’s provost recommended Hawkins be fired.

The school previously said Hawkins was disciplined not because she chose to wear a hijab but because her “theological statements seem inconsistent with Wheaton’s doctrinal convictions”.

Both sides struck a conciliatory tone in the statement, which also said neither Hawkins nor school officials would offer any further comment until a scheduled news conference on Wednesday morning.

“I appreciate and have great respect for the Christian liberal arts and the ways that Wheaton College exudes that in its mission, programs, and in the caliber of its employees and students,” Hawkins said in the statement.

The college president, Phillip Ryken, said the school “sincerely appreciates Dr. Hawkins’ contributions to this institution over the last nine years.”

Many members of the faculty had expressed support for Hawkins. Bill Struthers, a Wheaton psychology professor, posted a photo on Facebook on Saturday night of himself holding a handwritten sign reading, “I support Larycia.”

Wheaton, founded in 1860 and located in the Illinois town of the same name, has approximately 2,400 undergraduate students and 480 graduate students.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Stephen Powell)

Maryland couple files lawsuit alleging school indoctrinated daughter with Islam

A Christian couple in Maryland has lodged a federal lawsuit against their teenage daughter’s school district and other school officials, charging the school indoctrinated her with Islam and gave her failing grades when she wouldn’t complete assignments that violated her beliefs.

John Kevin Wood and Melissa Wood filed the civil rights in U.S. District Court last week, claiming the teachings at Charles County Public Schools promoted Islam over other religions.

The lawsuit alleges the couple’s then-16-year-old daughter was “instructed and indoctrinated in Islam” in 2014-15 during her 11th-grade world history class at La Plata High School. The Woods claim the course spent one day teaching Christianity and roughly two weeks teaching Islam.

The lawsuit claims the school violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by “implementing a curriculum that impermissibly endorses and advances the Islamic religion.”

One assignment allegedly required students to profess the Shahada, according to the lawsuit.

The statement is a key component of the Islamic religion, though translated into English it reads “There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.” Making such a statement would have violated their daughter’s Christian beliefs, the Woods allege in court documents.

The Thomas More Law Center, which is working with the Woods on the lawsuit, released worksheets purported to be school assignments. None of them specifically prompt students to write the Shahada, though they do contain a fill-in-the-blank sentence where students can write “Allah” and “messenger.” If they do, they will complete the English translation of the Shahada.

“Defendants forced Wood’s daughter to disparage her Christian faith by reciting the Shahada, and acknowledging Mohammed as her spiritual leader,” Richard Thompson, the president and chief counsel of the Thomas More Law Center, said in a statement. “Her World History class spent one day on Christianity and two weeks immersed in Islam. Such discriminatory treatment of Christianity is an unconstitutional promotion of one religion over another.”

The Woods also allege the class taught their daughter most Muslims have stronger faiths than average Christians, while another argument focused on a semantic difference in the teachings.

The lawsuit claims that the Woods’ daughter was taught that the “Qur’an is the word of Allah as revealed to Muhammad in the same way that Jews and Christians believe the Torah and the Gospels were revealed to Moses and the New Testament writers.” The use of “is” and “believe” in that sentence, the Woods argue, represents Islam as fact and the other religions as beliefs.

The lawsuit claims that John Kevin Wood called the school’s vice principal and tried to get an alternate assignment for his daughter, though the request was denied and he was ultimately banned from school grounds after he said that he would contact lawyers and the media.

The Woods claim their daughter didn’t complete the assignments and was given zeroes “because she refused to violate her beliefs and derogate her faith,” according to the lawsuit. The parents argue their daughter was punished “because she would not act contrary to her Christian faith.”

Thompson, of the Thomas More Law Center, warned similar lessons are being taught elsewhere.

“Parents must be ever vigilant to the Islamic indoctrination of their children under the guise of teaching history and multiculturalism,” Thompson said in a statement. “This is happening in public schools across the country. And they must take action to stop it.”

The lawsuit asks the court to declare the school violated the Woods’ civil rights and injunctions that prevent the school from endorsing or favoring Islam and banning John Kevin Wood from school property, according to the Thomas More Law Center. Defendants include the school district, its board of education and La Plata High School’s principal and vice principal.

The lawsuit identifies John Kevin Wood as a former Marine who fought in Desert Storm and later served as a firefighter who responded to the Pentagon following the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

Differences in Islam play role in refugee crisis, says UK ex-foreign minister

LONDON (Reuters) – Civil wars crippling many Muslim states and fueling a global refugee crisis are driven in part by major struggles within Islam that cannot be ignored, former British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said on Wednesday.

This “implosion” in about two dozen Muslim-majority countries has forced people from their homes in “unheard-of” numbers, Miliband, now head of the New York-based humanitarian group International Rescue Committee, said in a speech.

Miliband spoke at the international affairs think-tank Chatham House in London, where he will take part in a major conference on Thursday that aims to raise billions of dollars from donors to respond to the Syrian crisis.

“More people are fleeing conflict, they’re fleeing conflict significantly in Muslim-majority countries, so the implosion in the Islamic world, in Afghanistan, in the Middle East, is driving it,” he said.

Venturing into what he called “tricky territory”, he added it would be dishonest not to report that his organization’s work was increasingly focused on crises in Muslim-majority countries.

“It seems to me there are big questions, big debates happening within Islam about the reconciliation of Islam to modernity, to democracy, of different segments within the Islamic tradition,” he said.

“To pretend that that’s not part of the story wouldn’t be right,” he added, without elaborating.

In several war-torn countries, militant Sunni literalists such as the Taliban and Islamic State are battling other Muslims who want the faith more adapted to the modern world or belong to a minority sect such as Shi’ism.

Miliband added his analysis did not apply to the whole of the Muslim world, citing Indonesia, the most populous Muslim-majority country, and Bangladesh as two examples of countries that did not fit into the narrative.

“It’s not right to pretend that all Muslim-majority countries are undergoing this implosion,” he said. “But I think if you look at the story in South Asia over the last 30 years and the story in the Middle East over the last 20 years, then that’s part of the story.”

Miliband said the Syrian crisis was a long-term issue, with large numbers of refugees likely to be living in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and other countries for many years, and this called for a change in the scale and nature of the response.

Refugees were increasingly living in urban areas, he said, where the fact they are not separate from the general population creates new demands very different from those of refugee camps.

Dozens of heads of state and government are due to attend the London pledging conference.

The United Nations estimates that $7.73 billion is needed to meet Syrian humanitarian needs this year, with an additional $1.2 billion required by countries in the region.

(Reporting by Estelle Shirbon; Editing by Tom Heneghan)

Saudi Arabian Mass Execution Spurs International Outrage

A recent mass execution in Saudi Arabia has spurred international backlash, drawing condemnations from human rights advocates and United States officials while reportedly driving a wedge in diplomatic relations between the kingdom and other Islamic nations.

The state-run Saudi Press Agency reported that the country had killed 47 people that had been convicted of “terrorist crimes” on Saturday. Among them, according to the report, was Nimr al-Nimr, who the U.S. State Department characterized as an important leader in the Islamic community. His reported execution drew immediate rebuke from Amnesty International, one of the most vocal critics of the death penalty and Saudi Arabia’s seemingly unrelenting use of it.

“Saudi Arabia’s authorities have indicated that the executions were carried out to fight terror and safeguard security.” Philip Luther, the director of Amnesty’s Middle East and North Africa program, said in a statement. “However, the killing of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr in particular suggests they are also using the death penalty in the name of counter-terror to settle scores and crush dissidents.”

Most of Saudi Arabia aligns with Sunni Islam, a branch that has different teachings than Shia Islam, creating some religious tension. Nimr was a leader in the Shiite minority, Amnesty said.

The group indicated Nimr had criticized Saudi Arabia’s government and was originally arrested for political protests in a traditionally Shiite region in 2011. Amnesty called his trial “political and grossly unfair,” and Luther said executing Nimr and 46 others when there were doubts about the fairness of the country’s criminal proceedings “a monstrous and irreversible injustice.”

It’s not the first time Amnesty has criticized Saudi Arabia’s executions. The group has previously said Saudi Arabia killed at least 151 people in the first 11 months of 2015, its highest such total in 20 years, and Amnesty isn’t alone in speaking out against the country’s use of the death penalty.

“We have previously expressed our concerns about the legal process in Saudi Arabia and have frequently raised these concerns at high levels of the Saudi Government,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said in a statement released Saturday. “We reaffirm our calls on the Government of Saudi Arabia to respect and protect human rights, and to ensure fair and transparent judicial proceedings in all cases.”

Kirby said the United States was “particularly concerned” about the death of Nimr.

In the statement, Kirby said the religious leader’s execution “risks exacerbating sectarian tensions at a time when they urgently need to be reduced. In this context, we reiterate the need for leaders throughout the region to redouble efforts aimed at de-escalating regional tensions.”

But those calls appeared to be falling on deaf ears.

CNN reported a group of protesters in Iran, which predominantly follows Shia Islam, waged an attack against the Saudi Arabian embassy following the execution. That attack led to Saudi Arabia and three other Muslim nations taking diplomatic actions against Iran, CNN reported.

On Monday, Kirby told a news briefing that the State Department condemned the attack on the embassy and encouraged the countries continue to seek diplomatic solutions to the conflicts.

“We continue to believe that diplomatic engagement and direct conversations are essential to work through differences,” Kirby told reporters. “Increased friction runs counter to the interests of all those in the international community who support moderation, peace and stability.”

Brunei Bans Public Christmas Celebrations

If you’re planning to celebrate Christmas in Brunei, you could get a five-year prison sentence and a hefty fine.

According to multiple published reports, the predominantly Islamic nation has banned public celebrations of the holiday amid fears that it could damage the faith of the Muslims who live there.

The Brunei Times published a statement from Brunei’s Ministry of Religious Affairs saying that non-Muslims are free to celebrate Christmas privately “among their community,” but they can’t disclose their celebrations or display them to Muslims. Doing so can be viewed as an illegal “propagation of religions other than Islam.”

It’s also illegal for a Muslim to imitate customs of other religions, according to the statement. A Muslim who wears a Santa hat or a Santa suit could be arrested.

British newspaper The Independent reported anyone who violates Brunei’s Christmas laws could be handed a five-year prison sentence and/or a fine of $20,000.

Brunei, on the island of Borneo, introduced the restrictions last year after Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah implemented the controversial, religiously inspired Sharia penal law system. Violating certain laws can prompt punishments like stoning, whipping and dismemberment, drawing widespread criticism.

About 430,000 people live in Brunei, according to data released by the CIA. Islam is the nation’s official religion. About 79 percent of Brunei’s residents are Muslim and 9 percent are Christian.

This month, local religious leaders have warned Muslims in Brunei not to celebrate Christmas.

According to The Borneo Bulletin, imams said “doing anything that amounts to respecting their religion” – referring to Christianity – violates Islamic beliefs. The imams cautioned against doing things like putting up holiday decorations, singing Christmas carols or even lighting candles “as it could affect our Islamic faith.”

The statement from Brunei’s Ministry of Religious Affairs said that enforcement officials visited multiple businesses last year that “publicly displayed Christmas decorations.” It did not say if anyone was punished.

The nation wasn’t alone in imposing restrictions on Christmas celebrations.

According to a report in New Vision, a Uganda newspaper, the government in Somalia banned celebrating Christmas and the New Year in the nation’s capital. Officials gave reasons similar to Brunei’s decision, saying the celebrations could damage Islamic faith – despite the fact that the country is 99 percent Muslim.

New Vision reported Somali religious officials are worried that Christmas celebrations might incite the Al-Shabaab terrorist group to perform deadly attacks.

Some people who live in countries where Christmas celebrations have been restricted are sharing photos of their Christmas trees on social media using the hashtag #MyTreedom.

A Facebook page devoted to the cause had more than 27,000 likes as of Wednesday afternoon, and was displaying images purported to be from countries like Iraq, Nigeria and Syria.

Muslims Shield Christians During Terrorist Attack in Kenya

Muslim passengers helped shield non-Muslim passengers, some of them Christians, during a terrorist attack on a bus in Northern Kenya on Monday, according to multiple published reports.

Daily Nation, a Kenyan newspaper, reported a bus traveling from the Kenyan capital of Nairobi to Mandera was attacked at about 7 a.m. local time by gunmen believed to be tied to Al-Shabaab.

The Associated Press reported 60 passengers were on the bus when the gunmen stopped it in Papa City, and that some of the Muslim passengers helped some of the non-Muslim passengers put on Islamic apparel, such as head scarves, to help mask their identities from the terrorists.

The bus passengers might have been recalling a similar attack that took place last November.

Al-Jazeera reported that Al-Shabaab militants stopped a bus near Mandera, singled out 28 non-Muslims aboard, and killed them. The BBC also reported that Al-Shabaab militants singled out Christians when they shot and killed about 150 people at Kenya’s Garissa University in April.

The quick-thinking passengers ensured that a similar scene wouldn’t take place this time.

A local government official told Daily Nation that the militants reportedly asked the passengers to exit the bus and separate themselves into two groups: Muslims and non-Muslims. The official told the newspaper the gunmen “were trying to identify who were Christians and who were not.”

But the passengers refused to divide themselves. Mandera Governor Ali Roba told Daily Nation that the passengers insisted the gunmen “should kill them together or leave them alone.”

According to the Associated Press, the gunmen ordered everyone back on the bus after a Muslim passenger told them that the bus had a police escort that was due to arrive on the scene shortly.

Two people were killed and three were injured in the attacks, Roba wrote on his Twitter page. The governor said the militants also attacked a truck.

Virginia School District Closes Over Backlash from Islamic Homework Assignment

Schools in one Virginia county were closed Friday after a controversial homework assignment, in which students were reportedly asked to copy the Islamic statement of faith, drew backlash.

In a statement posted on the Augusta County Public Schools website, the district announced that schools would be closed Friday after “parental objections to the World Geography curriculum and ensuing related media coverage” spurred a bombardment of phone calls and emails.

The district said those messages “significantly increased in volume” Thursday and they were concerned about their “tone and content.” The district made the decision to close the schools “out of an abundance of caution,” though said there was “no specific threat of harm to students.”

The district didn’t offer details about what specific assignment prompted the backlash, but multiple media outlets reported that students at Riverheads High School were asked to practice drawing calligraphy by copying down the shahada, which is the Islamic statement of faith.

CNN published a copy of the assignment, which notes calligraphy’s importance in Islam. It shows the shahada written in Arabic calligraphy and instructs students to copy it into a box. “This should give you an idea of the artistic complexity of calligraphy,” the assignment reads.

One of the most common objections to the assignment is that the shahada, when translated into English, reads “There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.”

The News-Leader, a Virginia newspaper, reported that more than 100 people “met in fury” over the assignment, and some parents had called for the teacher who gave it to be fired. But the state Department of Education and the district’s superintendent both reviewed the assignment and determined it wasn’t a violation of students’ rights, and deemed it in line with state standards.

As of Friday afternoon, 2,500 members had joined a Facebook group to support the teacher. Still, some parents weren’t happy about the message the students were asked to copy.

“I will not have my children sit under a woman who indoctrinates them with the Islam religion when I am a Christian, and I’m going to stand behind Christ,” Kimberly Herndon told Virginia television station WHSV. The news station identified her as a parent of a Riverheads student.

The News-Leader reported that the teacher didn’t come up with the assignment, but rather pulled it out of a workbook about world religions. The newspaper also reported that students had learned about other religions in the teacher’s class, including Christianity and Judaism.

In its website posting, Augusta County Public Schools said “no lesson was designed to promote a viewpoint or change any student’s religious belief.” School officials said that their students will keep learning about world religions, which is required by state education officials, but a new, non-religious calligraphy sample will be used in future homework assignments about Islam.

Before making the decision to close, the district said it increased police presence at its schools.