From Ex Patica
The state secondary schools in Antwerp and Hoboken (also part of Antwerp) are in the midst of heated discussion regarding a decision taken by the school administration to ban all religious symbols from the next school year.
The principal of the state secondary school in Antwerp, Karin Heremans, explains that the decision to ban religious symbols stemmed from a growing pressure on Muslim girls to wear veils, even if they don't want to. The idea behind the ban is to take away the growing peer pressure.
"We have noticed that certain students have started feeling less comfortable over the past few years," says school principal Karin Heremans. "We have the impression that some students are under social pressure to conform and wear religious symbols."
The decision to ban religious symbols from the public schools has drawn criticism from the immigrant community. The public schools have many students of different ethnic backgrounds. "This is an emotional decision but the students are at the centre of the discussion. It is a decision that is in the interest of the students."
When Karin Heremans addressed the students in the courtyard to explain the measure her words were met with booing. The police were massively present in the neighbourhood, but no incidents were reported.
During a protest action in the school the Antwerp imam Nordine Taouil, also chairman of the Muslim Executive, called on muslim parents to keep their children at home and not send them to school as long as there is a ban on headscarves. "I'm calling on all parents, muslim parents, not to send their children to school from the first of September until our rights are guaranteed," said the imam.
The Flemish conservative nationalist N-VA party (the big winners of the recent regional elections), thinks the imam has gone too far. The N-VA labels the imam's call to keep children at home "irresponsible".
"Mr Taouil talks about rights, but there are other rights too. Like the right of children to get an education," says Flemish MP Kris Van Dijck. "Calling on parents not to send their children to school threatens their future."
As it is, many students of foreign origin (children who do not speak Dutch at home especially) are somewhat behind at school.
And from Al Arabyia
About a hundred people gathered in Antwerp Sunday to protest a ban on veils imposed over the weekend at the only remaining high school in Belgium that permitted them, according to press reports over the weekend.
The protesters held placards bearing slogans like "Freedom for all, except us" and "Democracy not discrimination," according to a local TV station
It is expected affect about 50 percent of the school’s female students according to Nordin al-Taweel, former president of the Muslim Executive of Belgium, the official national organization of Muslim Belgians, told the London-based daily Asharq al-Awsat.
"We notice that the equality and freedom of our students is suffering," the school administrations said in a statement. "It is possible that students feel obliged due to social pressure to wear political and religious symbols. Therefore we will not allow it anymore."
Taweel said that out of 148 elementary and middle schools, only 23 allowed the veil, and that the high schools were the only remaining that permitted students to wear it.
About 100 Muslims, including several students, gathered at Antwerp’s Sint-Jansplein to protest the ban, according to local press reports, following a call by Taweel to stage a demonstration. He also urged parents to boycott the school by not sending their children.
"We feel that the identity of the Muslim woman is targeted," he told the paper. "Women bring up generations. If they are lost, all Muslims will be lost, too."
According to the far right Vlaams Belang party, Taweel is paving the way for founding an Islamic school, a step the party considers unacceptable.
He denied those allegations in several media statements.
His detractors accuse him of appearing moderate to the public while behind the scenes he portrays fundamentalist views.
I would like to see a similar ban in UK schools and institutions.

From The Daily Mail
Two Muslim pupils and their teacher were told to remove their facial veils before they could make an official visit to a Catholic school.
The party were from an Islamic school in Great Harwood and were visiting St Mary's School in nearby Blackburn, Lancashire for its annual open day.
A spokesman for St Mary's said the request was made because the veils were against school policy.
The two pupils agreed to the removal but their teacher refused.
She was taken to an office at St Mary's and told she would not be allowed on the premises.
Abdul Quereshi from the Lancashire Council of Mosques spoke out against the ban.
'I thought St Mary's had a good reputation and am very disappointed,' he said.  'The information I have is that this was the action of one individual and now this will once again will become a big issue. The wearing of the veil is to protect the nature of the Muslim family and avoid the temptation facing Muslim males.'
Well done that individual. I don't think there are going to be any Muslim males to be tempted by schoolgirls at a Catholic school.
I can't find out which St Mary's school in Blackburn this is; there are several. Most are primary schools so any boys around would be under the age of 12 anyway.
Update - the mail has updated their report. The school was a Sixth form college (16-18) and the girls were probably aged 15. If they were intending to apply there for their A-levels then they had to understand from the outset, no veil!

I think of the Sony Walkman as, if not quite the dernier cri in portable music, a rather newfangled, snazzy little gizmo. I don't use mine anymore, as I have an iPod, but then so does the Pope. Face it, I'm a fuddy-duddy. And like many fuddy-duddies before me, I only realise it by comparison with the youth of today.

The BBC invited 13-year-old Scott Campbell to swap his iPod for a Walkman for a week, with barely comprehensible results:

My dad had told me it was the iPod of its day.

He had told me it was big, but I hadn't realised he meant THAT big. It was the size of a small book.

[...]

From a practical point of view, the Walkman is rather cumbersome, and it is certainly not pocket-sized, unless you have large pockets. It comes with a handy belt clip screwed on to the back, yet the weight of the unit is enough to haul down a low-slung pair of combats.

I can see your predicament - better brace yourself.

When I wore it walking down the street or going into shops, I got strange looks, a mixture of surprise and curiosity, that made me a little embarrassed.

It took me three days to figure out that there was another side to the tape. That was not the only naive mistake that I made; I mistook the metal/normal switch on the Walkman for a genre-specific equaliser, but later I discovered that it was in fact used to switch between two different types of cassette.

The devil take me if I know what is meant by "genre-specific equaliser".

Another notable feature that the iPod has and the Walkman doesn't is "shuffle", where the player selects random tracks to play. Its a function that, on the face of it, the Walkman lacks. But I managed to create an impromptu shuffle feature simply by holding down "rewind" and releasing it randomly - effective, if a little laboured.

I told my dad about my clever idea. His words of warning brought home the difference between the portable music players of today, which don't have moving parts, and the mechanical playback of old. In his words, "Walkmans eat tapes". So my clumsy clicking could have ended up ruining my favourite tape, leaving me music-less for the rest of the day.

That's too, too awful.

You can almost imagine the excitement about the Walkman coming out 30 years ago, as it was the newest piece of technology at the time.

Now I feel like Professor Higgins with his phonograph.

After the Walkman, but before the Mini-disc player, came the Discman. What was the point of that? If you didn't hold it absolutely still and sprit-level horizontal, it would leap about right in the middle of your favourite Abba song, or possibly skip from one Abba song to another: dancing queen....I have a dream...take a chance....you can dance....cross the stream....my my.....why why...aha......aha-ah-ah...my friend...ahahaaa.. You could lose all meaning.

The Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report expands on an article in the Jerusalem Post which explores the role of the Muslim Brotherhood at Al Jazeera. According to the JP article:

The meteoric rise of the network and its increasing popularity have led many political and media commentators in the Arab world to wonder exactly who or what was behind what appears to be its main purpose: encouraging opposition and promoting incitement against Arab regimes, exposing the corruption of their leaders and their entourage, while holding to an extreme Arab nationalist attitude against the US and Israel and extolling the values of conservative - and sometimes extremist - Islam. It did not take long for one name to emerge: the Muslim Brotherhood. This hypotheisis is supported by a number of facts. The director-general of the network, Wadah Khanfar, was a member of the organization in Jordan, where he was arrested. Today he is one of the closest advisers of the emir. Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi is also a member of the inner circle of the emir and is known to work closely with Khanfar. Both support Hamas. Arab researchers have succeeded in uncovering a number of other Brothers working for the network, but it is surmised that there are many more. The general consensus is that Qaradawi is the visible tip of the iceberg. In an article published in 2003 in the London-based Arabic daily Asharq al-Awsat, Maamun Fendi, a well-known Egyptian liberal thinker today living in the US, wrote that some 50 percent of the network’s personnel belong to the Muslim Brotherhood. He added that their influence in Qatar was rising both in the network and among government circles. According to him, the Brotherhood had intended to hold its world summit in Qatar in 2003 but had to scuttle its plan when it became known. These summits are usually held in a European capital far from Arab countries, in conditions of the utmost discretion, if not secrecy. Fendi believes that Qatar, by embracing the Brotherhood, an extremist Islamic organization quite popular in the Arab world, while hosting American bases, has found the perfect formula against retaliation by Arab leaders and attacks by all other Arab and Islamic extremists including al-Qaida.

According to a report in a Mideast business publication, Wadah Khanfar was born and educated in Jordan where, consistent with a Muslim Brotherhood background, he was educated as an engineer. The same report indicates that he also was a student activist, organizing a student union an activity also consistent with a Muslim Brotherhood background. In a TV interview, Khanfar stated that started his career as a journalist as an analyst on African affairs, mainly on Al Jazeera, while living in South Africa where is was doing graduate study in international politics and African studies at the time. He also described himself in the interview as “a researcher and consultant in Middle Eastern economics and political affairs.” In 1997, Khanfar became the Al Jazeera correspondent in South Africa. However, while living in South Africa, Khanfar was also was the Director of Human Resource Development for the International Islamic Federation of Student Organizations (IIFSO), an organization closely tied to the global Muslim Brotherhood. A memo purporting to be a 1998 briefing document prepared for the South African President Thabo Mbeki has long been posted on the Internet and describes the IIFSO as working closely with Hamas:

According to information HAMAS members in South Africa does not recognise the MUSLIM YOUTH MOVEMENT (MYM) as the official organ representing the Muslim youth in South Africa. HAMAS is of the opinion that the MYM have lost their control of the youths representation. Based upon this situation HAMAS, with the help of the INTERNATIONAL ISLAMIC FEDERATION OF STUDENT ORGANIZATIONS (IIFSO) are busy to establish institutions for the Muslim youth in South Africa to take over the role of the MYM. These youth centres are implemented in Pretoria and Cape Town.

The memo also identifies an individual called Wahdan Abu Ahmed KHUNFUR who it says was a Trustee of the Al Aqsa Foundation in South Africa as well as a Hamas contact. The Al Aqsa Foundation is one of the organizations comprising the Union of Good, the worldwide coalition of charities collecting money for Hamas and directed by global Muslim Brotherhood leader Youssef Qaradawi. The memo appears to be genuine, containing substantial detail and matching the time that Khanfar was known to be living in South Africa, but cannot be verified as genuine or that these are the same individuals. It should be noted, however, that a Jordanian newspaper reported recently that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas gave Qatari officials a file demonstrating Khanfar’s Hamas/Brotherhood connections.

In 2003, Khanfar became head of the Al Jazeera Baghdad bureau and shortly thereafter station General Manager. A recent report in Nation Magazine attributes the support by the Al Jazeera television station for Islamic movements to Khanfar’s influence. According to the report, Al Jazeera coverage changed when Khanfar took over in March 2003:

“How things are covered, the prominence of things, what words are used–sometimes you do see that very clear Islamist subtext, depending on the issue,” says Alberto Fernandez, the director for press and public diplomacy in the Bureau of Near East Affairs at the State Department. “We see the unconditional support of Islamic movements, no matter where they are: Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan,” says a Jordanian official who did not wish to be identified because of what he characterized as the deteriorating relations between his country and Qatar. Dozens of hours of viewing Al Jazeera for this article confirm the charge. Whether it’s reporting the Hamas perspective from the occupied territories without mention of the Palestinian Authority’s version of events, or the fawning depiction elsewhere of Islamist parties and militias as the grassroots reflection of Arab sentiment, Al Jazeera has moved away from its ideologically diverse origins to a more populist/Islamist approach. After the March 2003 US invasion of Iraq, Al Jazeera replaced its longtime secular bureau chief in Baghdad, Faisal Yasiri, with Wadah Khanfar, who had reported from Afghanistan after the American invasion in 2001 and then Kurdish-controlled territory as the war with Iraq was launched in 2003. Shortly thereafter, the secular head of Al Jazeera, Mohammed Jassem Ali, was ousted and replaced by Khanfar, whom nine current and former employees of the station interviewed for this article characterize as an Islamist. It was around this time that Jazeera’s Iraq bureau “became a platform for [Sunni] extremists,” says Shaker Hamid, a secular Jazeera correspondent in Baghdad from 1997 to 2000, who left to work at another Arab satellite station after getting what he says was a better offer. “I can’t say that Jazeera’s rhetoric is completely against Shiites,” Hamid says. “The Americans introduced this, but the media should not make it worse, and Jazeera did.”

The report goes on to say that the trend toward Islamism at the station is continuing:

Former employees of Jazeera interviewed for this article say the newsroom is becoming more religiously conservative. “Everyone is complaining about the new trend now–that the liberals, the secular types, the Arab nationalists are getting downsized and the Islamic position is dominating the newsroom,” says Hamid, the former Baghdad correspondent. Mirazi, the former Washington bureau chief, told Al Hayat: “From the first day of the Wadah Khanfar era, there was a dramatic change–especially because of him selecting assistants who are hard-line Islamists.”

Joe Kaufman, Chairman of Americans Against Hate is one courageous guy.  I had the privilege of standing beside him during an Anti-Terror Coalition press conference  organized to protest Muslim Day on the west steps of the Florida State Capitol building in Tallahasse in March.  At the time the frivolous case brought against him by the Muslim American Society (MAS) in Texas, an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation trial, was still unresolved. His  defense, although costly, was an important First Amendment matter that finally was dismissed by the Texas court, last week. 

Intrepid Dr. Paul Williams discusses the MAS-Kaufman case in this article, "Allah in Agony," on his blog, The Last Crusade.  Williams rightly calls Kaufman "one of the heroes in the fight against Radical islam."  Others who have been similarly sued by Radical Islamics that Williams cites are Rachel Ehrenfeld,  our colleague Bruce "Beowulf" Tefft, Mark Steyn, and Williams himself. To that group I would add Andy Whitehead, who forced CAIR to drop its lawsuit against him, as well as those in the American for Peace and Tolerance organization, Dr. Charles Jacobs, Prof. Dennis Hale, Sheik Ahmed Mansour and others, who caused the Islamic Society of Boston (ISB) to withdraw their defamation case in 2007.  The connection between Kaufman's Texas case brought by the MAS and the ISB matter is made clear by the fact that  one of the founders of the MAS, Jamal Badawi is  also a trustee of the ISB Cultural Center formally opened last weekend in the Roxbury section of Boston.

Here is the account by Williams of this important victory for Kaufman and for all those rightly made anxious by those pushing the Stealth Jihad:

There is great elation deep in the bowels of the Last Crusade bunker this afternoon. Corks are popping in celebration of Joe Kaufman’s victory over the forces of Islamic hatred and intolerance. The lawsuit that was initiated against him by seven Muslim groups, including the Muslim American Society (MAS), was kicked out of court by the Texas Court of Appeals.

Mr. Kaufman is one of the heroes in the fight against radical Islam and the proliferation of terrorist groups and organizations throughout the country.

His legal problems arose when he led a small protest against Muslim Family Day at the Six Flags Over Texas amusement part. The event was sponsored by the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), a group with ties to such terrorists groups as Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood of Pakistan.

At the protest, Mr. Kaufman and ten other protestors carried signs which read “Americans against Hate,” “ICNA – Bugs Bunny’s Terrorist Friends,” and “No Jihad in Our Backyard.” This activity proved to be highly unsettling for many Muslims in attendance. And Mr. Kaufman was slapped with a restraining order.

Upon returning to his office in Florida, Mr. Kaufman wrote an article about the ICNA event (which was closed to Jews and Christians) for Front Page Magazine, an on-line news publication.

The article resulted in the lawsuit from MAS and the other Muslim groups.

The case ended up in Texas Appellate Court, after the presiding judge refused to rule on whether or not Kaufman was a “media defendant” and to determine if the case should go to trial.

In their appearance before Appellate Court, members of MAS and other Islamic groups that initiated the suit admitted under that neither Kaufman nor his group had ever threatened them in any way, shape or form. The Appellate, therefore, decided that the restraining order should be lifted.

The Court also ruled that Mr. Kaufman is a “media defendant” and deserves all the rights provided to print journalists and moved to dismiss the case, on the grounds that the article written by Kaufman was not about the plaintiffs.

Despite the favorable ruling, the lawsuit took a financial toll on Mr. Kaufman.

A lesser man would be acquiesced to the Islamic demands by issuing an apology.

But Mr. Kaufman is not a journalist with weak knees and a rubber spine.

Other journalists in recent years have been sued for writing and speaking about Islamic terrorists. The list includes Mark Steyn, Rachel Ehrenfeld, Bruce Tefft, and, last but not least, Paul L. Williams.

What about the Muslim American Society (MAS), the group that initiated the suit against Mr. Kaufman? Is it a peaceful Islamic organization that fosters peace on earth and good well toward men?

We think not.

A visitor to a MAS website will be treated to the following quotes from the Koran and the Hadith:

• “The Holy Prophet (and through him the Muslims) has been reassured that he should not mind the enmity, the evil designs and the machinations of the Jews …”

 “In view of the degenerate moral condition of the Jews and the Christians, the Believers have been warned not to make them their friends and confidants.”

 “If you gain victory over the men of Jews, kill them.”

 “The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say, ‘O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him.’”

 “May Allah destroy the Jews, because they used the graves of their prophets as places of worship.”

 “A Muslim must always worship Allah and wage jihad until death in order to reach his ultimate goal … Regularly make the intention to go on jihad with the ambition to die as a martyr.

In May 2005, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross reported in The Weekly Standard that MAS is a U.S. front group for the Muslim Brotherhood — a claim supported by a September 19, 2004 Chicago Tribune story. “The message that all countries should be ruled by Islamic law,” Gartenstein-Ross writes, “is echoed throughout MAS’s membership curriculum. For example, MAS requires all its adjunct members to read Fathi Yakun’s book To Be a Muslim. In that volume, Yakun spells out his expansive agenda: ‘Until the nations of the world have functionally Islamic governments, every individual who is careless or lazy in working for Islam is sinful.’”

MAS’s ties to the Muslim Brotherhood were confirmed on August 14, 2007 at the terror-support trial of the Holy Land Foundation. FBI agent Lara Burns testified that a phonebook found at the home of Ismail Elbarrasse — un-indicted co-conspirator and former assistant to HAMAS leader Musa Abu Marzook — listed the names and numbers of the Muslim Brotherhood leadership in the United States. On the first page of the phonebook under the title ‘Members of the Board of Directors’ were fifteen names. Among those names are Ahmad Elkadi, Jamal Badawi, and Omar Soubani: the founding incorporators of the Muslim American Society (MAS).”

Joe Kaufman’s victory and his courage under fire merits celebration.

But it should not serve to give true believers the assurance that the last Crusade can and will be won.

When Mr. Kaufman went to Texas to protest ICNA’s Muslim Family Day, we called Christian groups throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth area to support Mr. Kaufman in his protest of Muslim Family Day. Only ten out of the thousands who had been summoned showed up to carry placards and to decry the parks exclusion of non-Muslims. The rest believed that the ICNA event which was taking place in their backyard was of no spiritual or patriotic importance.

Today’s New York Post had this disquieting revelation  by columnist Jacob Gershman:  Columbia University has  granted tenure to notorious Israel and gay bashing, Professor Joseph Massad.  Massad was a central figure in the David project documentary, “Columbia Unbecoming”  that roiled the Morningside Heights campus in 2005 and 2006.  The film portrayed allegations by Columbia students about anti-Semitism and anti-Israel statements  by  faculty in the Middle East Arts Language and Culture (MEALAC) program .  In the film a former IDF soldier and Columbia Student relates how he was rebuked by Massad and questioned,  “ how many Palestinians did he kill.?”  

Massad’s appointment  is not the first Columbia  University  tenure controversy.  Last year  we had another event, the  tenure  of Nadia Abu el Haj of  the anthropology faculty at Barnard College.  Abu El Haj had published a controversial book denying the ancient Jewish heritage and provenance of  Israel.  That was preceded by the appointment in 2005 of Rashid Khalidi to the Edward Said Chair of Middle East History endowed with significant Saudi money.  Khalidi  was a colleague of President Obama in his days as a junior Illinois Senator, when they were both on the faculty at the University of Chicago.

Massad, as the Gershman New York Post column points out, has bizarre views on Israel and gays:

Columbia's process for reviewing tenure candidates is as rigorous as any Ivy League school's. Ordinarily, an academic of Massad's caliber would be bounced from Morningside Heights. And in fact, the system did work -- it denied Massad tenure two years ago.

But now the school's academic standards have succumbed to ideological tensions and campus politics -- in what appears to be a remarkable manipulation of the tenure process and a breach of fiduciary trust.

First, a little background on Massad.

A Christian secularist of Palestinian-Arab descent, Massad has dedicated his academic career primarily to encouraging the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state. Criticism of Israel is far from unusual in his field, but Massad goes much further, taking arguments to bizarre ends. "The ultimate achievement of Israel," he writes, is "the transformation of the Jew into the anti-Semite, and the Palestinian into the Jew." In a book, he rails against the "Zionist theft of Palestinian Arab food (e.g., hummus, falafel)."

In a recent work, "Desiring Arabs," Massad claimed to expose yet another plot against the Muslim world -- the "Gay International." He describes how a vast conspiracy of gay activists descended on Arab countries and endangered the lives of "practitioners of same-sex contact" by transforming them into "subjects who identify as 'homosexual' and 'gay.' "

So, if Massad’s tenure was side tracked two years ago, how did he gain a tenure appointment, now? Gershman reveals how:

But faculty members opted instead to lionize Massad as a supposed martyr of academic freedom. A crucial ally for him was Dean of Arts and Sciences Nicholas Dirks, whose wife taught a class with Massad.

In 2007, months after Massad completed his latest book, a committee rejected his tenure application. Tenure candidates rarely get a second shot at Columbia, but Dirks intervened and pushed for a second committee, sources say.

Oddly, the professor who led the first review of Massad refused to serve again. Even odder, the administration justified the do-over by claiming that Massad had switched his field of specialty from political science to cultural studies.

After the second committee approved Massad, President Lee Bollinger and Provost Alan Brinkley took extraordinary measures to protect the secrecy of Massad's tenure case and guard against an outcry from Jewish alumni and donors.

The last step in the process was the trustees. The administration refused to share with the trustees any list of who was on the two tenure committees. The board was also kept in the dark as to why Massad failed the first review. Bollinger and Brinkley also refused to discuss in detail why Massad was permitted another shot.

Massad's tenure appointment puts the nail in the coffin about what passes for academic leadership and governance at Columbia.

For those fellow alumni who had thought that vocal opposition and supporting evidence of Massad's lack of qualifications would prevent this turn of events, they were naively wrong.

Bollinger and Brinkley have connived with the cabal of left radical academics on the College and University tenure and promotion committee to reward Massad’s Gobbelian anti-Israel, anti-Gay and anti-Semitic screed.  Surely, Obama's former University of Chicago colleague Rashid Khalidi, Director of the Middle East Institute at Columbia's School of International Public Affairs must be overjoyed at the prospect of  tenure for Massad.

Like the tenure appointment of Nadia Abu el-Haj in the anthropology at Barnard, the Massad tenure appointment is all about rewarding Meta fiction and degradation of the merest scholarly standards at Columbia .

Massad at Columbia's MEALAC faculty, Abu El-Haj over at Barnard and the late Edward Said are Christian dhimmis supporting cultural Jihad and the myth of Orientalism. (See Ibn Warriq’s critical analysis of Said and Orientalism in his book, “ Defending the West. “)  Is this the equivalent of a Stockholm syndrome?  After all these Christian Arabs are supporting the Jihadi killers of their own threatened minority in the Middle East.  I suspect they are misguided Arab nationalists like the late Orthodox Christian George Habash, who co-founded the Marxist  terrorist group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.  They have adopted the Islamic Jihad creed and are consumed with  hatred towards Jews who had the chutzpah to reclaim the ancient Jewish homeland.

Good thing the recession has diminished Columbia's endowment. Now fellow alum who gave freely of their largess can claim that their purses are closed for economic self preservation reasons.  Jewish alumni in particular, ought to have turned away in disgust back in 2005 with the Khalidi appointment.  Last year’s Abu El-Haj appointment at Barnard College and now this Massad tenure appointment at Columbia are mounting evidence that President Bollinger and Provost Brinkley have abetted the cultural jihad on campus. They have kept trustees in the dark about the shenanigans employed in the Massad tenure announcement this month and besmirched both the university’s and their professional reputations.  Bollinger as you may recall was a First Amendment legal scholar.

Columbia has clearly become a post-modernist academic institution par excellence. Massad's tortuous tenure track is just the latest evidence of the devolution of academic freedom and scholarship on Morningside Heights.  Pity!

There are as many as 85 sharia courts operating in Britain, according to a new report.
Academic Denis MacEoin, the report's author, said the existence of the courts practising Islamic law could lead to different legal standards being applied to Muslim and non-Muslim citizens.
He said many of the courts operate out of mosques and their rulings are closed off to non-Muslims.
In previous reports it was claimed there were only five sharia courts in the UK, working in London, Manchester, Bradford, Birmingham and Nuneaton.
He said: "This is not a matter of eating halal meat or seeking God's blessing on one's marriage. It is a challenge to what we believe to be the rights and freedoms of the individual, to our concept of a legal system based on what parliament enacts, and to the right of all of us to live in a society as free as possible from ethnic-religious division or communal claims to superiority and a special status that puts them in some respects above the law to which we are all bound."
His report, published by the think-tank Civitas, includes a list of previous sharia judgements which he believes give an indication of the type of ruling being handed down by the courts working in the UK.
Among the examples quoted are laws banning a Muslim woman from marrying a non-Muslim unless he converts to Islam and the removal of a wife's property rights in the event of divorce.
The report states: "Among the rulings ... we find some that advise illegal actions and others that transgress human rights standards as they are applied by British courts."
This is a poster advertising one such court. It was in the window of the islamic shop in Queens Road, Walthamstow, almost opposite the Masjid-e-Umer, the centre of at least one terrorist plot.  With many English County Courts now closed (and my colleagues redundant) the fees increased and the backlogs ditto, even before you look at the language difficulties and accessability  you can see the attraction of a free court at your neighbourhood Mosque. I wonder how these are financed?

CAIR issued a news release launching a new initiative in its 2010 Strategic plan: distribution of 100,000 Qurans to  US state and local officials.  In the news release CAIR said  it was prompted to conduct Da’wa (preaching) by President Obama’s Cairo  speech:

"In the multi-year initiative, American Muslims will sponsor Qurans for distribution to governors, state attorneys general, educators, law enforcement officials, state and national legislators, local elected and public officials, media professionals and other local or national leaders who shape public opinion or determine policy," the statement said.
According to the press release from CAIR, the "Share the Quran" educational campaign "was prompted by President Obama's recent address to Muslims worldwide in which he quoted from that holy text."

CAIR  Chairman and North Carolina Democratic State senator, Larry Shaw  noted:

"Through this ground-breaking outreach initiative, we hope not only to educate policy-makers and opinion leaders about Islam, but also to provide an opportunity for American Muslims to reach out to their fellow citizens of other faiths."
The "Share the Quran" initiative, according to the CAIR statement, is part of the celebration of the council's 15th anniversary.

In an interpretation of a verse from the Quran used by Obama in his Cairo speech , WorldNetDaily noted:

During his speech "to the Muslim world" from Cairo on June 4, Obama referred to the Quran as "holy" four times and quoted several verses from the Islamic text. He also used Muslim terminology, such as the Quranic obligation of "zakat" or charity.
As the Holy Quran tells us, 'Be conscious of God and speak always the truth,'" Obama said. "That is what I will try to do – to speak the truth as best I can, humbled by the task before us, and firm in my belief that the interests we share as human beings are far more powerful than the forces that drive us apart."
Obama was reading from chapter 9 verse 119 of the Quran, which scholars pointed out to WND carries two interpretations: the primary exegesis, or tafsir, which deals with speaking the truth, and a second, underlying tafsir urging Muslims to follow Muhammad in waging jihad against nonbelievers.  [This is based on context].

In an NER article, “ Is CAIR’s 2010 Plan a Fiasco?” we noted prior efforts to spread Da’wa (preaching among Americans:

CAIR trumpeted one element of the “hearts and minds” campaign, the delivery of more than 40,000 press kits to newspaper editors, radio and TV stations and electronic media outlets in a blitz distribution in late 2007. Note this report from PRWeek:

WASHINGTON: The Council on American-Islamic Relations' (CAIR) has launched a campaign called "Beyond Stereotypes," featuring a new publication called American Muslims: A Journalist's Guide to Understanding Islam and Muslims, which intends to educate the media and disabuse journalists of misinformation about the religion.

The guide and the campaign were developed by the nonprofit advocacy group's national office. The campaign's aim is to provide the Islamic perspective on such issues as democracy, women's rights, and "interfaith relations."

CAIR plans to distribute the publication to as many as 40,000 editors, reporters, and producers at major media outlets across the country, as part of the broader initiative to educate the media about Islam.

As regards  the particular version of the Quran, perhaps, CAIR might distribute one of the  translations of the ‘holy work’ such as the Pickthall version.  A worthy project  to counter the CAIR Da’wa project might be to enlist a benefactor to send a kit to all these state and local leaders composed of critical works such as Andrew Bostom’s,  “ The Legacy of Jihad,”  Robert Spencer’s,  a “Politically Incorrect Guide to  Islam (and the Crusades)”, Ibn Warriq’s What the Koran Really Says: Language, Text, and Commentary;   or the Center of the Study of Political Islam series, starting with  A Simple Koran.

But we seriously doubt that a benefactor will come forward to do this. Sic Gloria “Stealth Jihad.”

This coming week, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) will hold its annual convention in Washington, DC.  The Obama Administration has done a literal two step.  As reported by IPTNews,” FBI Replaces Brotherhood-Tainted Liaison with Brotherhood-Tainted Liaison”,  the   Department of Justice (DOJ) and FBI have simply exchanged one Muslim Brotherhood Front, CAIR, for another, the ISNA. This is in furtherance of outreach to the American Muslim community following the President’s Cairo U. speech. In a controversial move the Department of Justice (DOJ) has announced that it will send representatives to  attend the ISNA convention.  IPT News  report noted  that there is serious dissension in the DOJ and FBI over this ISNA issue. There is good reason for these internal DOJ and FBI concerns given the recent convictions in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial.  The federal prosecutors had named CAIR, ISNA and several other Muslim Brotherhood front groups as unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation trial. This trial resulted in May convictions  of five officials of the Muslim charity on charges of funneling over $12 million in funds to Hamas, a designated foreign terrorist organization. Two of the HLF officials fled the US in 2004 for Syria when the indictment in the original trial was handed down, as we have posted.  The ISNA has  admitted ties  to Hamas.

The Investigative Project alerted us to an Indianapolis NBC affiliate WTHR investigation of the ISNA, which has its national headquarters in that area.  The report, “Images in Conflict,” was done back in 2004 but is still relevant. You can watch the WTHR report on YouTube, here and here.

In the transcript of the WTHR investigation of ISNA were these revelations:

On Holy Land Foundation and Hamas connections

Tucked away on the farmland of rural Plainfield, Indiana, are headquarters to one of the largest Islamic organizations in the country – the Islamic Society of North America.

Its charismatic leader, Dr. Sayyid Syeed, promotes ISNA as a mainstream organization of American Muslims. He preaches family values, unity and acceptance of all religions.

"Here we are Muslims, young and old, men and women," he said in a Friday prayer service earlier this year. "We respect Christianity. We respect Judaism…. America should be proud of this community."

It's talk that is worlds away from the beliefs of Islamic extremists.

But although ISNA is a well-respected Islamic organization that's received accolades from Indiana's late Governor and even grant money from the federal government, some charge it is a supporter of extreme ideology.

Steven Emerson, author of the bestselling "American Jihad: The terrorists Living Among Us," dedicated an entire section of his book to ISNA as a supporter of militant Islamic groups.

Emerson says ISNA's popular annual conventions, attended by thousands of Muslims, serve as gathering places for some Islamic extremists to raise money and share ideas.

"I think ISNA has been an umbrella, also a promoter of groups that have been involved in terrorism," Emerson told Eyewitness News. "I am not going to accuse ISNA of being directly involved in terrorism. I will say ISNA has sponsored extremists, racists, people who call for Jihad against the United States."

In fact, we found about a dozen charities, organizations or individuals under federal scrutiny for possible ties to terrorism that are linked in some way to ISNA – ties sources tell us have also placed ISNA under the federal microscope.

ISNA has provided convention booth space and helped raise money for a number of Islamic charities later linked to terrorism by the federal government – groups like the Holy Land Foundation.

ISNA has also supported Hamas leader Mousa Marzook, who was deported from the U.S. in 1997 and is on the State Department's designated terrorist list. Marzook thanked ISNA in an open letter of appreciation for support of his legal defense fund.

"It doesn't hurt it you give a few words of support or if you give a few words of sympathy," Syeed said. "The issue is, do I get involved in some major campaign? Then it would be a problem."

Emerson said ISNA took Marzook on "as their poster child."

"Go ask ISNA whether Hamas and Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad are terrorist groups," he said.

When we asked, Syeed said: "That's not us."

But does he condemn the groups?

"We will condemn anywhere there is hate, whether they are Muslim, Christian, Jew or whatever."

On convicted felon Sami Al Arian, Triple I-T and Saudi funding

Recently indicted University of South Florida professor Sami Al Arian is one controversial figure ISNA supported. In a federal indictment, Al Arian is accused of heading the U.S. front for the terrorist group Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The  DOJ links him to the death of 100 civilians overseas, including two Americans. When Al Arian was arrested, ISNA issued a statement critical of the government.

Syeed downplayed the action.

"Sometime we might have said that so-and-so should not be targeted just because he's a Muslim," he said. "But once you know there's a definite case in court, ultimately it will be the court that will decide. No one else will decide."

Before coming to ISNA, Syeed was a long-time employee of the International Institute of Islamic Thought, an Islamic think tank in Virginia known as Triple I-T. Federal authorities executed a search warrant there last year. The reason - major donations made, while Syeed was there, to an organization founded by Sami Al Arian.

"It was a surprise for me, a shock for me," Syeed said.

He said he no longer has any ties to Triple I-T. But according to the group's website, Syeed is still on the advisory board of its journal. Triple I-T leaders say they have no ties to terrorism, and no charges have been filed.

Some of ISNA's own members have raised concerns on another issue: large donations from Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia follows an extreme version of Islam known as Wahhabism, and questions continue to swirl around Saudi connections to terrorism, including the attack on 9-11.

Thus, in light of the Holy Land Foundation and Al-Arian  convictions, ties to the extremist Triple I-T and Hamas, you can understand why there is dissension in the Justice Department FBI ‘substitution’ of the ISNA for CAIR at the behest of the Obama White House.

Read this AP analysis of the narrowly passed House version of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (“The Waxman Markey Act”) "Winners and Losers emerge in the Climate Bill" and then look at your monthly electrical bill and visualize a possible five-fold increase.  Your utility costs will increase each year until 2050 when we may get an 80 percent reduction in carbon dioxide levels for less than a 0.05 degree Celsius drop in average temperatures at a cost of over $7.4 trillion according to a Heritage Foundation Study cited by Investors Business Daily.  Further,  an internal Environmental Protection Agency  (EPA) report, surfaced by the Competitive Enterprise Institute indicated that:  "Given the downward trend in temperatures since 1998 (which some think will continue until at least 2030), there is no particular reason to rush into decisions based on a scientific hypothesis that does not appear to explain most of the available data." The Heritage Foundation Study notes that  human activity generates  less than 3.4% of  carbon dioxide which in turn accounts for less than 3.6 % of all greenhouse gases, the bugaboo of global warming.  Moreover, there will not be a net gain in employment from the greening of America, quite the reverse, millions of jobs will be diminished.

I'm a transplant from the Northeast to the Gulf Coast.  The one thing I learned as a transplanted New Englander was that electricity is darn expensive in these parts.  Part of it is the climate. Its warmer most of the year.  But the other factor is in the Southeastern US most of the power is generated by coal-fired plants-a scapegoat of the Waxman-Markey Act promoted by the Obama Administration.  The crowning set piece of this Act is the Cap and Trade, some call it Cap and Tax, proposal directed at allegedly putting a cap on carbon dioxide generation by fossil fuels like coal and oil, although natural gas is given a reprieve because of its alleged cleanliness. Gasoline would be taxed at the refinery and passed on to the consumers. Neither would natural gas escape the additoonal taxes.  Western states get heavy subsidies for solar, geo thermal and wind resources, while the Northeast gets incentives for biomass. Nuclear power, the cleanest of all energy sources, gets some support, but nowhere near that  going to the renewable energy advocates.  Further, lumber companies get paid not to cut trees down because trees absorb carbon dioxide and transform it into oxygen. The Act also gives foreign aid to reforest tropical forests.  Tropical forests like those in Brazil, currently being cleared for agricultural production of sugar ethanol with its flex fuel mandates.

The Act penalizes refining of oil here, virtually assuring that we are forced to purchase refined products from questionable offshore locations.  The Act amounts to a huge inter-regional wealth transfer tax for not a lot of benefit. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) studies of the Act indicate that the cost impact will be less than $175 per person per year (CBO), while the EPA alleges its analysis says less than $80.00.  Congressman Ed Markey of Massachusetts, co-sponsor of this Act, along with Hollywood Congressman, Henry Waxman, blithely trumpets that it will cost less than a postage stamp a day. Where have I heard that before?

Think of the Ethanol subsidy program that supplies 10% of a gallon of gas with each fill up at the pump resulting in less combustion and lower mileage.  The  American Petroleum Institute  estimates that the confiscatory effects of this new climate change proposal is worse, perhaps as much as $3,300 a year per household by 2020.  It will transform what's left of our automobile industry, increasingly under government direct control, by mandating production of smaller fuel efficient vehicles and it will result in sticker shock when you open those monthly utility bills.  All this because of the specter of global warming and climate change based largely on consensus science and interpretation of speculative computer simulations. How much of this is based on real science, meaning the consequence of natural weather cycles, and how much is sheer statistical speculation is hard for an educated layperson to tease out from the welter of alleged facts.

I only need remind you of the consequences of panic in 1979 with the infamous Three Mile Island (TMI) nuclear plant incident conflated by the, "China Syndrome"  film starring Jane Fonda that threw everyone into a panic about the dangers of a possible reactor meltdown and radiation death.  Didn't happen here.  It may have at Chernobyl in 1986 because of lousy Russian nuclear engineering and plant safety.  So we panicked, and shot ourselves in the foot.  We could have avoided passage of the House Waxman-Markey Act by a razor thin margin of less than seven, 219 to 212.  If we hadn't panicked then we would have nuclear energy plants today, which would have given us a bulwark for energy independence and aided in achieving a cleaner environment.  Not to be. If the TMI panic had not occurred we could have avoided this looming transformational disaster, the untoward consequences of this Act. The Obama Administration with willing assistance of the Democratic super majorities in the House and Senate are on a fast track to gain its adoption.  We hope that ‘blue dog’ Democrats in the Senate will follow the lead of their colleagues in the House who joined Republicans to narrow the margin of the victory sought by House Democratic managers of the Waxman-Markey Act and strangle this L’Enfant terrible legislation in its cradle.  If the Senate Democratic Majority succumbs to the siren-like calls of consensus scientists and computer simulations using questionable data, this country could witness the throttling of its economic productivity. Further, it could imperil our national security by further ramping up imports of foreign oil and natural gas. We have more than two hundred years of coal reserves in this country, some of which could be converted to clean fuel for power plants and into petroleum products for our vehicles.  But, not with this legislation.  Waxman-Markey, is an expensive failure aborning in a vain attempt to deal with the phantom of climate change.

Press release - (Dallas, TX) The lawsuit and restraining order that were filed against the Chairman of Americans Against Hate (AAH) Joe Kaufman by seven Dallas-area Muslim organizations, in October 2007, were thrown out this past week by the State of Texas Court of Appeals, Second District of Texas Fort Worth.

The seven plaintiffs included the Muslim American Society (MAS), which the U.S. government has called a front for the extremist Muslim Brotherhood, and three Islamic centers owned by the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), an organization that was named a co-conspirator in the 2007/2008 Holy Land Foundation (HLF) Hamas financing trial.

The groups claimed in the lawsuit that Kaufman had written an article for FrontPage Magazine that libeled them, yet not one of the groups was actually named in the article. It was about the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) and its connection to the financing of terrorism overseas. Kaufman, in October 2007, had flown to Texas to lead a demonstration outside an ICNA-sponsored event to expose this information to the public.

Regarding the restraining order or temporary injunction, the groups admitted under oath that neither Kaufman nor his group had ever threatened them in any way, shape or form. Indeed, with respect to this case, it was Kaufman and his organization that received a threat, before Kaufmans arrival in Texas.

The case was placed in the Appellate, after the presiding judge refused to rule on whether or not Kaufman was a "media defendant"and refused to rule on the case ("summary judgment") prior to it going to trial.

The Appellate dealt with both issues, stating that Kaufman was a media defendant and deserved all the rights provided to print journalists. And the Appellate moved to dismiss the case, on the grounds that the article written by Kaufman was not about and did not mention any of the plaintiffs or appellees. The Appellate basically agreed with everything that Kaufman and his attorneys were arguing and shot down the arguments from the losing side.

One of the more embarrassing arguments from the other side was that Joe Kaufman ran FrontPage Magazine. FrontPage, in reality, is run by the David Horowitz Freedom Center, and Kaufman is a columnist for it. Both Kaufman and David Horowitz wrote and filed affidavits attesting to this. The plaintiffs worked hard to have these affidavits thrown out.

From the start of the case, Kaufman has called the lawsuit entirely frivolous and stated that it was only brought to harm Kaufman financially and to stop him from writing about the terrorism ties of the plaintiff's friends. In the end, the case was an important victory for Freedom of Speech.
 

The Mail on Sunday misses the point completely that Islam is not a race and Muslims can be, and are white, sometimes several generations so, even in England.
What is the point is that Anjem Choudary is roving ready to do instant conversions. An adult baptism would take weeks, if not months of study, prayer and preparation. In my church confirmation will not be considered before the end of year 7, slightly older than this boy.  A man I used to work with converted to islam a few years ago so that he could marry his wife and colleagues told me that the preparation for that also took months.
This is the shocking picture of a young, white schoolboy being converted to Islam by a cleric linked to a radical Muslim hate preacher.
The bewildered 11-year-old, who gives his name as Sean was filmed repeating Arabic chants and swearing allegiance to Allah.
The boy is prompted throughout by controversial cleric Anjem Choudary, a follower of exiled hate-preacher Omar Bakri Mohammed.
Choudary defended the young boy's 'reversion' to Islam but admitted his parents were not with him and were not consulted.
He said: 'The child was genuinely interested in Islam.  The boy told us he wanted to become a Muslim and, of course, some people are intellectually more mature than they are physically. I don't see there is any harm in this.
'He was with his friends, but I didn't see if his parents were there,' he added.
A message on Choudary's website offers advice for those who become Muslim at his Islamic Roadshow.
'Conversion packs are already provided to those who revert to Islam in the Islamic Roadshows,' it says.  'They include a booklet on 'Everything a Muslim must know' and a free DVD with a brief guide on how to pray in Islam.'
 

Some churches do a great deal to reach young people searching for God and spiritual development. But there is much more work needs to be done. And look at the strange staring eyes of the chap to the right - he looks like he is seeing raisins.

I hate to monger fear, but if Foreign Secretary David Miliband gets really cross, who knows what he may do?  

John Tierney writes:

Marc Bekoff, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Colorado, says he’s convinced that animals feel emotional pain for their mistakes and missed opportunities. In “Wild Justice,” a new book he wrote with the philosopher Jessica Pierce, Dr. Bekoff reports on thousands of hours of observation of coyotes in the wild as well as free-running domesticated dogs.

When a coyote recoiled after being bitten too hard while playing, the offending coyote would promptly bow to acknowledge the mistake, Dr. Bekoff said. If a coyote was shunned for playing unfairly, he would slouch around with his ears slightly back, head cocked and tail down, tentatively approaching and then withdrawing from the other animals. Dr. Bekoff said the apologetic coyotes reminded him of the unpopular animals skulking at the perimeter of a dog park.

“These animals are not as emotionally sophisticated as humans, but they have to know what’s right and wrong because it’s the only way their social groups can work,” he said. “Regret is essential, especially in the wild. Humans are very forgiving to their pets, but if a coyote in the wild gets a reputation as a cheater, he’s ignored or ostracized, and he ends up leaving the group.” Once the coyote is on his own, Dr. Bekoff discovered, the coyote’s risk of dying young rises fourfold.

If our pets realize what soft touches we are, perhaps their regret is mostly just performance art to sucker us. But I like to think that some of the ruefulness is real, and that researchers will one day compile a list of the Top 10 Pet Regrets. (You can make nominations at TierneyLab, at nytimes.com/tierneylab.) At the very least, I’d like to see researchers tackle a few of the great unanswered questions:

When you’re playing fetch with a dog, how much regret does he suffer when he gives you back the ball? As much as when he ends the game by hanging on to the ball?

Do animal vandals feel any moral qualms? After seeing rugs, suitcases and furniture destroyed by my pets, I’m not convinced that evolution has endowed animals with any reliable sense of property rights. But I’m heartened by Eugene Linden’s stories of contrite vandals in his book on animal behavior, “The Parrot’s Lament.”

He tells of a young tiger that, after tearing up all the newly planted trees at a California animal park, covered his eyes with his paws when the zookeeper arrived. And there were the female chimpanzees at the Tulsa Zoo that took advantage of a renovation project to steal the painters’ supplies, don gloves and paint their babies solid white. When confronted by their furious keeper, the mothers scurried away, then returned with peace offerings and paint-free babies.

How awkward is the King Kong Syndrome? Both male and female gorillas have become so fond of their human keepers that they’ve made sexual overtures — one even took to dragging his keeper by her hair. After the inevitable rebuff, do they regret ruining a beautiful friendship?

Do pet cats ever regret anything?

I bet the ayatollahs are quivering in their socks after a "rebuke" from the schoolboy. After all he has been so formidably decisive in the matter of the 5 British hostages kidnapped in Iraq, 2 of whom have now been found to have been dead for 18 months.
Nine employees of the British embassy in Tehran have been detained by the authorities in a worrying escalation of tensions between Iran and Britain.
David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, has issued a sharp rebuke to Iran after the arrests, which are part of a campaign by the clerical regime in Iran against what it has portrayed as foreign interference in its politics.
The employees were arrested on suspicion of playing a role in the demonstrations that followed Iran's disputed presidential election. Those demonstrations, which saw calls for a re-run amid allegations of widespread vote rigging, have now largely fizzled out after a crackdown by regime.
Mr Miliband dismissed the allegations of British involvement in the demonstrations as preposterous. He called for the detainees to be released immediately, saying: "This is harassment and intimidation of a kind that is quite unacceptable. We want to see [them] released unharmed. These are hard-working diplomatic staff and the idea that the British Embassy is somehow behind the demonstrations and protests that have been taking place in Tehran in recent weeks is wholly without foundation."
The embassy employees were rounded up on Saturday and a number were released yesterday. A relative of one of those detained said the staff member had disappeared: "He went out yesterday morning and I have been unable to reach him since his mobile phone is switched off. Since then I have had no news of his whereabouts."
Mr Miliband said Britain had made a strong protest to the Iranian authorities and had raised the issue with his European Union counterparts gathering in Corfu.Last week both countries threw out mid-ranking diplomats in a tit-for-tat round of expulsions, but British officials are wary of being drawn into a protracted dispute with Iran which could serve to distract attention from the domestic pressure to overturn the result of the election.

From Jacob Laksin's review of Bruce Bawer's Surrender:

[T]he term “moderate Muslim” has come to denote “someone who might not stone an adulteress to death himself, but who would defend to the death another Muslim’s right to do so.”

These are hard times for us fearmongers. The market is saturated, and fear, once a cash cow, is now a dog.

I never set out to be a fearmonger. Once I made a good living hawking puns up and down the Old Kent Road. But I was too generous with my wares - one day a gent asked me for a double entendre and I gave him one. I over-specialised too, in puns about knickers - but the bottom dropped out of the market.

So here I am, mongering fear on the internet. My stock is coming up to its sell-by date, and everything must go. For today only, I have a special offer:

BOGOF: Buy One, Get One Free!!!

Let me mong you some fear, and I'll throw in some loathing for nothing. I can't say fairer than that. Come on down, the price is right. What? Two quid? Do me a favour, I've got a cat to feed.....

Bugger. I've been undercut. You can get loathing for nothing at the mosque down the road.

This is in The Mail on Sunday
During the raid, the Indian intelligence services intercepted mobile phone calls between Kasab, his terrorist comrades and a mysterious handler hundreds of miles away, who issued commands to shoot civilians without mercy. These shocking tapes reveal the sinister mind control used to turn young men into killing machines  -  and the casual, off-hand brutality of the men who masterminded the massacre
'Do you want them to keep the hostages or kill them?' asks Brother Wasi of someone else in the control room.
The person replies with a casual grunt, barely audible through the background babble of the news channels playing on a nearby television.
At the other end of the line, 500 miles away, Akasha, a 25-year-old Pakistani, is squatting on the floor inside a besieged building in the centre of Mumbai with a murdered rabbi's mobile phone in one hand and a Kalashnikov in the other.
He knows with complete certainty that this will be his last night on Earth. For his mission to be a success, he must be killed.
The two women hostages are on a bed nearby, trussed up and blindfolded. Another gunman, Umer, is dozing.
Now Wasi comes back on the phone. His manner is warm and paternal - the kind of calm, commanding voice you instinctively trust.
Wasi: 'Listen up...'
Akasha: 'Yes sir.'
Akasha speaks in a gentle, dopey murmur. He sounds exhausted.
Wasi: 'Just shoot them now. Get rid of them. Because you could come under fire at any time and you'll only end up leaving them behind.'
Akasha: 'Everything's quiet here for now.'
Wasi: 'Shoot them in the back of the head.'
Akasha: 'Sure. Just as soon as we come under fire.'
Wasi: 'No. Don't wait any longer. You never know when you might come under attack.'
Akasha: 'Insh'Allah' (God willing).
Wasi: 'I'll stay on the line.'
There's silence for 15 seconds. No gunshots.
Akasha: 'Hello?'
Wasi: 'Do it. Do it. I'm listening. Do it.'
Akasha: 'What, shoot them?'
Wasi: 'Yes, do it. Sit them up and shoot them in the back of the head.'
Akasha: 'Umer is asleep. He hasn't been feeling too well.'
Wasi consults his associates in the control room, then comes back on the line.
Wasi: 'I'll call you back in half an hour. You can do it then.'
Akasha and Umer had been under siege for nearly 24 hours on the upper floors of Nariman House, a Jewish study centre run by the orthodox Chabad-Lubavitch organisation in New York. The bodies of rabbi Gavriel Holzberg, who ran the centre, and his pregnant wife Rivka lay downstairs, next to those of two visiting Israeli rabbis. The hostages whose fate was being so casually discussed over the phone were an Israeli and a Mexican.
No one knows the true identity of the man known as Wasi - the puppetmaster. He is heard deferring to more senior figures in the control room, but it was he who cajoled, reassured and inspired the young gunmen forward minute by minute until they were killed. He is presumed to be a senior officer of Lashkar-e-Taiba ('Army Of The Righteous'), a militant group now considered to be a global threat on a par with Al-Qaeda.
When Wasi calls Akasha back at 9.20pm, his chief concern is ricochets. He reminds his neighbours in the control room that Ali, Soheb and Fahadullah - half the members of a six-man squad who've seized two hotels - have already been hit by their own bullets while executing hostages. He has a tip for Akasha.
Wasi: 'Stand the women up in a doorway so that when the bullet goes through their heads it then goes outside, instead of ricocheting back into your room.'
Akasha: 'OK.'
Wasi: 'Do one of them now, in the name of God. You've tied them up, right?'
Akasha: 'Yeah. I'll untie their feet.'
Wasi: 'Just stand them up. If they're tied up, leave them tied up.'
Akasha then raises another objection. He doesn't want to kill the two women in the room where he and Umer are sitting.
Wasi: 'It'll only take two shots. Do it in the room where you are now.'
Akasha: 'All right, yes.'
Wasi: 'Do it. Shoot them and shove them over to one side of the room.'
Akasha shuffles off somewhere but leaves the line open. Wasi holds the line for a full seven minutes. He calls Akasha's name a few times, then hangs up. In the next call, ten minutes later, Akasha seems more upbeat.
Akasha: 'Please don't be angry. I've rejigged things a bit and now...'
Wasi: 'Have you done the job yet or not?'
Akasha: 'We were just waiting for you to call back, so we could do it while you're on the phone.'
Wasi: 'Do it, in God's name.'
Akasha: 'Just a sec... hold the line...'
Akasha places the phone in his pocket. There is a lot of rustling (presumably Akasha crawling over to the hostages) followed by silence. Then a loud burst of gunfire. And then silence. More rustling, then Akasha is back. His voice has changed markedly. It's now a deep, eerie rasp.
Wasi: 'That was one of them, right?'
Akasha: 'Both.'
We have all had conversations like this over the phone but about the milkman, or tonight's dinner not how to kill and be killed.
The gunmen at the Taj, young Pakistanis from villages in the Punjab, had never set foot in a modern hotel before, let alone the vast suites on the upper floors of the Taj. By 1.04am on the Thursday, police had recorded their very first intercept...
Ali: 'There are so many lights, so many buttons... and lots of computers with 22in and 30in screens.'
Wasi: 'Computers? Haven't you burned them yet?'
Ali: 'We're just doing it. You'll be able to see the fire sometime soon.'
Wasi: 'We'd be able to see the fire if there were any flames. Where are the flames?
Ali: 'The entrance to this room is fantastic. The mirrors are really grand. The doors are massive too.'
Wasi urges him to throw grenades at the police and prepare a bucket of water and towels to use against tear gas. But the gunman keeps talking about the hotel.
Ali: 'It's fabulous. The windows are huge, but it feels very safe. There's a double kitchen at the front, a bathroom and a small shop. And mirrors everywhere.'
About 20 minutes later Wasi is concerned the gunmen have still not taken proper control of the hotel. He calls to ask what they have done and speaks to Ali.
Wasi: 'We told you to find an axe, did you not find one?'
Ali: 'No, we couldn't find an axe.'
Wasi: My brother, there will be an axe hanging next to each fire extinguisher in the hotel. On every floor in every corridor. Now you must start the fire. Nothing will happen until you start the fire. When people see the flames, it will cause fear outside.'
Ali: 'OK, we'll start the fire. The other brothers are nearly here now.'
Wasi: 'Throw grenades my brother. There's no harm in throwing a few grenades.'
Thirty minutes later the gunmen confirm that they have got the hotel under control.
Ali: 'They're massive rooms. Some of them are amazing. We burned some and cleared a few more.'
Wasi: 'Did you start a fire in the ones you cleared out?'
Ali: 'No, they're right next to each other. We'll set the fire on our way out. We don't want the fire to spread too quickly in case we can't get out.'
Wasi: 'No, burn everything as you go along. The bigger the fire, the more pressure you will bring to bear. We're watching it on TV. If you start the fire it will put pressure on the security forces. They won't come up.'
Ali: 'Listen. We don't even walk around our own houses as freely as we do here. We own the third, fourth and fifth floors, thanks be to God.'
(Later)Wasi had been trying to persuade Akasha to run outside and be shot dead.
Wasi: 'A stronghold can only last for as long as you can handle it. And now we're crossing that limit. What do you think?'
Akasha: 'Please God.'
Wasi: 'It's Friday today, so it's a good day to finish it.' Once the helicopter lands on the roof, Akasha and Umer suddenly find themselves under fire.
Wasi: 'Put the phone in your pocket and fire back.'
Two hours later, at 8.47am on Friday, Wasi finally gets the news he's been waiting for.
Akasha: 'I've been shot.'
Wasi: 'Sorry?'
Akasha: 'Pray for me.'
Wasi: 'Oh God. Where have you been hit?'
Akasha: 'My arm. And one in my leg.'
Wasi: 'May God protect you. Did you hit any of theirs?'
Akasha: 'Yeah, we shot a commando. Pray that God will accept my martyrdom.'
Wasi: 'Praise God, praise God.'
Akasha: 'Bye.'
There's a lot more. These boys sound like robots. Exceedingly dim, lacking in initiative, but deadly robots. I would be interested to know whether any drugs were found in their bloodstream during the post mortems.
Dan Reed's 'Dispatches Special' on the terror attacks in Mumbai is on Channel 4, Tuesday at 9pm

One might almost think they were vying with each other who can make the most distasteful boast.
First from Canada.com
Muslim fighters are being told they may be justified in cannibalizing U.S. soldiers, it emerged Friday. The chilling message is contained in a recent jihadist Internet entry that quotes from the work of a prominent jihadist ideologue, Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi.
In one section of his work, Maqdisi discusses the idea of having to do something that is otherwise forbidden, including eating food "sacrificed for an idol," according to the Washington-based SITE Intelligence Group, which translates jihadist "chat" sites. Maqdisi adds some scholars believe this has evolved to mean that Muslims, faced with hunger, are allowed to kill an enemy and "cannibalize him."
In a bid to instil fear into U.S. soldiers, the entry says Americans should be told that Muslim fighters "smack their lips to eat the flesh of . . . the eaters of hamburgers and Pepsi."
But some jihadist respondents made light of the entry, which appeared on the al-Fallujah forum June 12. "If we are forced to eat Americans, we will make them (into) kabsa," said one posting, referring to a family of rice dishes served mainly in Saudi Arabia. This contributor said the kabsa would have "the taste of gunpowder," and added that the "limbs of apostates" could be turned into appetizers.
Another jihadist said the "slaughter" of Americans must be carried out in accordance with Shariah law, and posted a picture of the beheading of Nick Berg,
Then the Sunday Herald, a Scottish paper has a report on activities in North and the Horn of Africa.
ELEVEN DAYS ago, scarcely noticed by the international media, guerrillas in Algeria aligned to the terror group al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) detonated two huge roadside bombs against a convoy of vehicles 125 miles south-east of the capital, Algiers.
The convoy, travelling near Bordj Bou Arreridj in the Kabylia range of the Atlas Mountains, comprised paramilitary police vehicles escorting Chinese workers to a site where they were building a new highway.
After disabling the convoy with two improvised explosive devices (IEDs), the Islamic militants raked the disabled vehicles with small-arms fire. By the end of the ambush, 18 policemen and one Chinese worker lay dead. Another six gendarmes and two Chinese were wounded.
As well as causing dismay within the Algerian government, Western governments and intelligence agencies took extra-special note of the Bordj Bou Arreridj attack for many reasons.the group may have been joined by top operatives returning from training with Islamist groups in Iraq or Pakistan, where roadside bomb-making has become a deadly art form.
Second, it coincides with deadly AQIM strikes elsewhere in Africa. Al-Jazeera TV said it had received a recorded statement from the north African wing of the international terror outfit saying it was responsible for the slaying on June 23 of 39-year-old American Christopher Leggett in Nouakchott, the capital of Mauritania.
AQIM said in the video statement that Leggett was assassinated for allegedly trying to convert Muslims to Christianity. "Two knights of the Islamic Maghreb succeeded to kill the infidel American Christopher Leggett for his Christianising activities," said AQIM. "The organisation in Mauritania carried out the attack at a time when savage US bombs are mowing down our Muslim brothers in Pakistan and Afghanistan."
But gruesome events some 4500 miles to the east, right across Africa from Mauritania, last Thursday raised the alarm in Washington about al-Qaeda penetration of Africa to such an extent that the Obama administration said it was sending arms and ammunition to the beleaguered government of Somalia to counter al-Qaeda-aligned insurgents who are bringing a grotesque form of sharia law to the outskirts of the capital, Mogadishu.
Al Shabaab, which the Washington official estimates has some 200 foreign jihadists in its ranks, stepped up attacks in early May and now controls most of south Somalia and most of the suburbs of Mogadishu.
Western nations and their allies in Africa fear the al Shabaab insurgents could destabilise the entire East Africa and Horn of Africa region, exploiting widespread discontent with pervasive poverty and corrupt governments and providing safe havens for hardline Islamists from the Middle East and Asia. "We remain concerned about the prospects of an al Shabaab victory," said the official.
Security and defence bosses in Kenya, to the south of Somalia, are openly frantic that Somalia could become East Africa's Afghanistan, attracting extremists from its neighbours to be trained in terrorism in order to return to their own countries to set up al-Qaeda-style networks. According to intelligence sources, a Kenyan Islamist group, Al-Muhajurin, is already fighting in Somalia alongside al Shabaab. Believed to be about 180-strong, some of Al-Muhajurin's fighters are battle-hardened from action in Afghanistan.
Al Shabaab has threatened to annex Kenyan territory. A Kenyan Ministry of Internal Security official said that while Kenya does not feel physically threatened "in the conventional sense," it does fear massive destabilisation and a threat to its already shaky tourist industry - not least because al-Qaeda has released video statements saying its dream is to create a Taliban-type super-state running all the way south to Mozambique.
Already the bloody conflict in Somalia has created in Kenya the world's largest refugee camp. Dadaab, just 50 miles from the Somali border, is home to more than 280,000 refugees in an area meant to hold just 90,000. Some 3500 people escape across Somalia's border with Kenya every week,President Obama has raised the stakes by sending weaponry to Somalia's government. If that does not stabilise the situation, it is unclear what his Plan B is - if he has one.
AN al Shabaab spokesman, commenting on the possibility of foreign troop intervention, said: "Our dogs and cats will enjoy eating the dead bodies of your boys if you try to respond to the calls of these stooges the Somalia government. Somali young Mujahideen will fight any troops deployed here until our last holy fighter passes away."
Meanwhile, as the West, Kenya and Ethiopia worry about al-Qaeda-inspired events in Somalia, a close eye remains focused on Algeria's AQIM. Its leader, Abu Musab Abdul-Wadud, is believed to have 1000 fighters and his declared ambition is to carry out actions in Spain, France and Britain. Paris is already investigating reported cells of the group in France.
Intelligence agencies are waiting anxiously to see if the Bordj Bou Arreridj attack was just an anomaly - or the beginning of a deadly new trend.

"Omission Statement?"

Today's post will deviate from the Mission Statement that Jack Silverman kindly drew up for this website. So will fear will remain unmongered and Islam unblamed, indeed unmentioned, except just now. Last but not least, I will neglect to ignore complex geographical factors and instead ignore simple ones.

Today's beef is with "multiple intelligences". This term is thrice annoying. "Multiple" annoys Hugh intensely and me mildly. "Intelligences", as an abstract plural like "competences" and "hegemonic masculinities", annoys me intensely, and should cause multiple intense annoyances on a global basis. And "multiple intelligences" as a whole  ("holistically", as the multiply intelligent would have it) is nonsense - or bollocks, if you want a plural.

I have beefed about this before:

Time and time again we are told that IQ tests can’t tell you everything - as if anyone thought that they could. We all know someone with a high IQ who can’t boil an egg or drive a car. [...] Nobody likes to say that some people are thick, so, like many abstract words – competencies, sexualities, subjectivities – intelligence is made multiple and unthreatening. [...] If life were fair, the mathematically gifted would be tone deaf; the nifty movers would stumble over their words; and the fluent talkers would stumble over their feet. But since life is not fair, some mathematicians can write and sing like an angel, and some dunces are clumsy and ugly. Some can neither write a book nor drive a car, and some can do both – and whip up a soufflé when they get home.

In a recent piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Christopher J. Ferguson comprehensively smashes Howard Gardner's  well-intentioned but misguided attempt to look harder for the exellence. Read it all - it's one smithereen after another.

Of course, nothing is ever cut and dried when it comes to the social sciences. Gardner and the psychologist Lynn Waterhouse engaged in a lively debate in the journal Educational Psychologist in 2006. While the exchange was informative, empirical evidence to support multiple intelligences was largely absent. As Waterhouse put it, the theory is "persisting without adequate evidence" — and was likely to continue to do so, she added, because of the "good news stories" it provides. By contrast, a wealth of evidence supports the existence of "g," which, contrary to the claims (or wishes) of some people, remains a strong predictor of academic performance, job performance — particularly in highly technical careers or those requiring decision making — and other markers of "success."

[...]

The remaining intelligences have nothing to do with intelligence or cognitive skills per se, but rather represent personal interests (for example, musical represents an affinity for music; naturalistic, an affinity for biology or geology) or personality traits (interpersonal or intrapersonal skills, which correspond best to the related concept of emotional intelligence). And even those interest areas may be enhanced by "g." Only bodily-kinesthetic — the ability to manipulate one's own body with dexterity — may truly represent a separate cognitive ability, probably stemming from cerebellar activity involved in fine motor control. It may be better represented as a neurophysiological trait than as intelligence. Even for related activities — dancing, for instance — having at least a modicum of "g" is still going to be necessary to learn, say, complex dance choreography.

Finally, as Waterhouse noted in her exchange with Gardner, the theory of multiple intelligences has little value for clinical testing of intelligence or the prediction of future performance. "G" alone is highly predictive of both academic and work success. The other intelligences, or whatever they are, add very little.

Part of the confusion that has allowed the theory to survive long past the stage of empirical disrepute is the irascible debate regarding what intelligence is in the first place. Intelligence is among the most stable of psychological constructs. It is as possible to define it both operationally and conceptually as it is for almost any other psychological variable, although that might not be saying much. At worst, intelligence is like pornography: I may not be able to define it to the satisfaction of all, but I sure know it when I see it (or, in the case of intelligence, when I come across its absence). At the optimistic extreme, a reasonable definition of intelligence is not hard to come by. Intelligence: an innate cognitive ability that powers learning. Perfect? No. But that's basically it.

Aren't there plenty of Ph.D.'s who can't fix their cars? Sure, but the majority of them could learn if they were so inclined. An individual with low "g" is going to struggle at both book learning and auto repair (although perhaps car mechanics would prove more manageable than literary theory or quantum physics). In other words, individuals high in "g" are going to be able to learn a wider range of activities with greater ease than individuals low in "g". The "g" that assisted our hominid forebears in learning the skills of hunting, gathering, and toolmaking is the same "g" that gives gifted/talented students an advantage in calculus. Of course, one person can't learn everything, so some folks pick, say, European history over Math Without Numbers (or whatever the rage is in mathematics these days). The theory of multiple intelligences fundamentally conflates intelligence and motivation. It's a fatal flaw. Motivation is certainly important, and it works alongside intelligence to produce results. However, having the raw biological machinery of intelligence is simply irreplaceable.

Perhaps in a naïve effort to deny that inconvenient truth, the debate about intelligence has become largely political, at times even facetious. Intelligence certainly is not the only predictor of success in work or in school, college, or scholarship, but it's as strong as any. Unfortunately, it's also largely genetic. Social justice, treating people the same, bringing out their best abilities are all worthy ideals. Yet we must be cautious when ideals conflict with reality. The world in which we live has no obligation to be politically correct. And it is not politically correct to say that one person is, well, simply more talented than another.

That's me done for the day. I'm off out now to monger some fear, and rustle up a dash of loathing, ignoring ....whatever it is. Incidentally, if this site must have a mission, perhaps it is to help you find your G-Spot.

I don't have many thoughts on the London Underground, other than "Is this Cockfosters? If so, what's it doing in Shepherd's Bush?" That will all change soon, as an initiave is "rolled out" on the Piccadilly Line. From the BBC:

Transport for London has commissioned Turner Prize-winning artist Jeremy Deller to compile a list of bon mots to be used by Tube drivers.

Among the quotes on offer will be Gandhi's, "there is more to life than increasing its speed".

Deller hopes they will make commuters' journeys a bit more thought provoking.

Cezanne's, "we live in a rainbow of chaos" and Jean-Paul Sartre's, "hell is other people" will also be recited by Tube drivers.

Perhaps the trains will join in, as they struggle up London's subterranean slopes: "I think I am, I think I am." The Times has some suggestions:

Through me lies the way to the Ninth Circle Line: through me the way to eternal grief: Abandon all hope, you who enter the Underground: Dante.”

“Escalator work is taking place at Bank ...

Facilis descensus Averno: but to make your way out again to the upper air, that's the sweat: Virgil.”

“This train will not stop at Archway ...

Hell is other people: Jean-Paul Sartre.”

“This is the Mornington Crescent train ...

There is more to life than increasing its speed: Mahatma Gandhi.”

“Ickenham, Hillingdon, UXBRIDGE ...

To travel hopefully is better than to arrive: Robert Louis Stevenson.”

“Move right down the train ...

Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing can ever be made: Kant”

Incidentally, just days after I complained that I hadn’t seen any Poems on the Underground lately, low and behold there was Wordsworth Upon Westminster Bridge:

Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth like a garment wear

The beauty of the morning: silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.

Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!

The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

It was evening, and I was heading for Embankment, which is not quite Westminster, but I enjoyed his company.

The Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center (ISBCC) officially opened yesterday to kumbaya fanfare with lots of balloons, women swathed in Hijabs and ‘peace offerings’ by Imams to protesters. The muezzin ‘s call of “Alluhu Akbar”  (Allah is Great)  from the top of the 185 foot tall Minaret signaled the call to noon Prayers  and  the supremacy of Islam over the interfaith representatives at the gathering in the courtyard  below.  We posted on the official Dhimmitude evinced by Massachusetts Governor Patrick , who sent a welcoming video, because of  his attendance at a funeral for a soldier killed in Iraq, and  Boston Mayor Thomas Menino and several city council members who showed up for the occasion.  Others who attended included the Dean of Harvard Divinity School, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), the first Muslim elected to Congress, and local Christian and Jewish clergy.  Protesters organized by Americans for Peace and Tolerance led by Dr. Charles Jacobs, Professor Dennis Hale and Egyptian Islamic reformist Sheik  Ahmed Mansour were there too with posters that read “Prayers, Yes!  Extremism, No.”  Rabbi Jon Hausman of Congregation Ahava Torah of Stoughton, Massachusetts and Tom Trento of the Florida Security Council  were there among the protesters.

As if on cue, Imam Abdullah Faaruuq of the Mosque confronted Jacobs.   In the midst of a New England Cable News (NECN) TV interview with Jacobs Imam Faaruuq walked up  and gave Jacobs a rose and welcomed him in a gesture of ‘peace.’ Other Imams laid on more roses, and from there it degenerated into squabbles between Imams and protesters.  The ‘peace gesture’  by the Imams, members of the Boston chapter of the Muslim American Society (MAS), was captured on this NECN video news clip .  For those of us old enough to recall, it was reminiscent of the picture of anti-war protesters at the Pentagon in 1967 putting flowers down the gun barrels of helmeted GIs guarding the entrance. The difference is Islam means ‘submission,’ not peace, when it comes to infidels like Jacobs and the other protesters at the ISBCC official opening.

This ‘peace gesture’ by the ISBCC Imams was in contra distinction to what they did in 2005 when the ISBCC predecessor, the Islamic Society of Boston (ISB) filed a defamation case in Suffolk County court. The ISB had sued a group of defendants that included Jacobs and other officers of the David Project, Professor Hale, the Boston Herald American and the Fox News TV channel WFXT.   The defendants in the ISB matter produced evidence identifying Saudi and Gulf emirate terror financiers of the $15.6 million Mosque and Cultural Center built on property adjacent to the Roxbury Community College.  The ISB trustees and Imams, according to the evidence produced by the defendants, had close connections with Muslim Brotherhood incitement to hate against Christians and Jews.  The defendants had also brought action against the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) with allegations that the land for the ISBCC had been conveyed i n a ‘sweetheart deal.’   According to the NECN report, the ISB dropped their original defamation lawsuit in 2007, when the defendants’ case in pursuit of the BRA land conveyance matter was dismissed.  The Boston Phoenix has a definitive report on the controversy in an article, “Menino’s Mosque.”  

A Boston Globe news article  “Dissent Greets Mosque Opening,” reported on yesterday’s ISBCC inaugural.

A handful of protesters stood on the other side of Malcolm X Boulevard holding signs reading “Prayer, Yes. Extremism, No!’’ A group of Muslims marched from an interfaith breakfast over to the protest carrying white roses, which they gave to the protesters as a sign of peace. A brief argument ensued between Charles Jacobs, the leading critic of the mosque, and supporters of the mosque, and along the sidewalk a few mosque advocates carried on parallel debates with demonstrators. Eventually, the groups retreated to opposite sides of the street.

Bilal Kaleem, the executive director of the Muslim American Society’s local chapter, pointed out that the celebrants vastly outnumbered the protesters, “and that speaks volumes about America.’’ Kaleem elliptically acknowledged that the mosque’s backers - some of whom have been accused of saying hateful things - have made mistakes. “There have been shortcomings on our part,’’ he said.

Despite the controversy, a number of dignitaries were present, including Mayor Thomas M. Menino and some city councilors and state lawmakers.

Although many speakers focused on the mosque’s triumph over controversy, others cited different reasons to celebrate. Imam Taalib Mahdee, of the Mosque of the Quran in Roxbury, noted that local Muslim institutions have not previously been highly visible in African-American parts of the city and said, “Finally we have you over in the ’hood.’’

On the WBUR website,  were  these comments :

Jacobs played an audiotape of a man he says was a recent speaker at the mosque describing Christians in previous comments as “filth’’ and denying the Holocaust. The critics also contend that the bulk of the mosque’s financing came from Saudi donors, which is problematic, they said, because Saudi Arabia is associated with a conservative strain of Islam.

“We are concerned about the radicalization of the Boston Muslim community, which has historically been quite moderate,’’ Hale said. Jacobs accused the local civic, religious, and media establishment of allowing itself to be blinded by political correctness and what he calls “Islamophobiaphobia.’’

Kaleem reacts wearily to the assertions, which he says are motivated by animus. He says no donors will have any say in the programs or books at the mosque and says that the mosque received nothing more generous from the city than have many other religious organizations. As for offensive comments by individuals associated with the mosque, Kaleem says, “People say wrong things, and they shouldn’t, and we should learn from it and educate ourselves and move on.’’

Kaleem called it “racist’’ to object to donors from Saudi Arabia.

Among the contingent of interfaith representatives at the ISBCC was Rabbi Sanford Seltzer, Associate Dean for Rabbinic Community Relations of the Rabbinical School at  Hebrew College. Seltzer remarked in the NECN news story, that until he sees “chapter and verse about these allegations, he remains unconvinced.”  Seltzer may be another victim of what Jacobs called “Islamophobiaphobia.”  Sic gloria transit ‘stealth Jihad’ in America.

Its only one stop away. And you can see Westminster Bridge which you can't from Westminster because you are on Westminster bridge there.
I was asked about that poem in my Civil Service entrance interview, after I had passed the entrance exam.
I was told that the first question would be something straightforward to put me at ease.
I was told wrong. The first question was " I see from our records that you have previously applied to the Factory Inspectorate. Tell me why you wanted to be a Factory Inspector?"
Tell him why I wanted a job I didn't get because it didn't actually exist.
These days 'elf 'n' safety is a dirty word. All right its three words which makes it a dirty phrase. But this was just after the first Health and Safety at Work Act had come in in 1975 which replaced or extended the provisions of the many Factory Acts and Offices Shops and Railway Premises Acts enacted since the mid 19th century.
Working conditions interested me and that interest was not academic. I grew up amongst factory workers, some of whom were missing fingers that had caught in machinery, or were coughing to death from a working lifetime spent among dust and asbestos. Having done a law degree I applied thinking the Inspectorate had a legal department to handle any prosecutions that might be necessary.
They didn't. The inspectors mounted their own cases and those inspectors needed engineering and technical degrees to understand what machinery was safe and what wasn't. End of application.
The second question was "You will have walked by Westminster Bridge to get here. What do you think Wordsworth would say were he here today?"
So far as I can recall I said that while many of the buildings had changed, he would not necessarily disapprove of every piece of modern architecture that has replaced what he knew. And the River has not changed, and neither has the effect of sunlight on water, effect on the human spirit . . .
Whatever else I said had the desired effect because I was accepted into HM Civil Service, and offered a post in the very department which was my first choice.
Civil Service recruitment has changed many times since then.
Call me a cynic but I believe the process now goes something like "And how does this candidate define her ethnic origin? ", her being a deliberate effort at the positive discrimination which does not exist. Then when the answer is Angmassalik the application is carried with peals of merry laughter to the top of the pile as "We are under-represented by members of the west Greenlandic ice shelf community".

Iran has called Britain the most evil of foreign powers.

Are they stupid or what? Britain, as any fule kno, is not foreign.

(H/t The Now Show)

Fairfax County, Virginia has been the locus of a battle by concerned local citizens against Saudi-sponsored and funded Wahhabi and Muslim Brotherhood extremism.  Whether it is the swirl of controversy surrounding the Dar Al-Hiijah  Mosque in Falls Church , or the International  Institute of Islamic Thought in Herndon funded by Muslim Brotherhood funds  or the  Saudi Embassy sponsored and funded , Islamic Saudi Academy, the area has assumed the label of  Wahhabi Alley.  My colleagues in Fairfax Count were heavily involved in last year’s protests  of the ISA’s hate texts at the Alexandria campus. The hate texts were identified by studies of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, and were the subject of northern Virginia Congressman Frank Wolf’s insistent inquiries of our State Department, see here.  Lead by Jim Lafferty, my colleagues have aggressively taken on the expansion of the ISA’s Pope Head campus recently   unanimously approved by Fairfax County Planning Commission.  Now they are combating outright Dhimmitude by County officials in sending email invitations to citizens to attend a taqiyya fest justifying their decision on the ISA expansion and promoting Islam.

Jim Lafferty, a leader in the ISA protests has led the formation a new coalition, Virginians Against Sharia Task Force or VAST.  VAST is now combating Fairfax County bureaucrats on aiding and abetting Sharia and pushing propaganda on behalf of the ISA.

Witness this OneNewsNow report:”County caves to Islamic school's requests.”

The Virginia Anti-Shariah Task Force (VAST) is upset that Fairfax County sent e-mail invitations to county residents, inviting them to a free dinner and symposium called "Understanding Islam Conference: A Symposium to Promote Peace, Harmony, Understanding and Cultural Diversity" held on June 20 by an Islamic group.
 
The event was aimed ostensibly at helping promote the school's plans to expand its Fairfax campus to accommodate 200 additional students. VAST chairman James Lafferty says the county should not have helped to promote the event.
 
"The academy is sponsored by the Saudi government, and it is a very radical form of Islam," he contends. "It is anti-Semitic, anti-Christian, anti-American -- all those things."
 
And yet Lafferty says the county has consistently given the school everything it wants.
 
"We've opposed that at public hearings and in every way we can -- and each time the county government has sided with them," he points out. "And this was the first example that we've seen where the county government actually did a mailing to support this dinner that was nothing more than a propaganda session for radical Islam."
 
The county board of supervisors will vote July 13 on final approval of the Islamic school expansion.

As my colleagues in Fairfax County know from experience, public officials are easily intimidated by Saudi money and allegations that any criticism of Islamic hate of Christians and Jews is tantamount to ‘racism’.

These Fairfax County officials are no different from Massachusetts Governor Patrick and Boston Mayor Menino on display at yesterday’s inaugural of the Islamic Society of Boston Mosque and Cultural Center funded by Saudi and Gulf Emirate money and associated with Muslim Brotherhood front, the Muslim American Society.   It is all about what Dr. Charles Jacobs of Americans for Peace and Tolerance called Islamophobiaphobia.  It looks like Saudi money talks and state and local bureaucrats in the US walk.