Muslim braves Europe's secular zealots

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by martijn.
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

A Muslim braves Europe’s secular zealots

TORONTO As a young Canadian Muslim who has called for reform in Islam, I’ve been traveling throughout North America and Europe over the past year. Last week, I toured France and Spain. God help me.
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I didn’t expect a warm reception from fellow Muslims. But now, I’m also not sure that liberal Muslims like me fit comfortably in a secular European crowd. I say this even after the murder of Theo van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker, who the police say was shot and stabbed by a Muslim extremist. Van Gogh had exercised his right to criticize Islam – a right that I, as a modern Muslim, defend unequivocally.

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Muslim braves Europe’s secular zealots

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

A Muslim braves Europe’s secular zealots

TORONTO As a young Canadian Muslim who has called for reform in Islam, I’ve been traveling throughout North America and Europe over the past year. Last week, I toured France and Spain. God help me.
.
I didn’t expect a warm reception from fellow Muslims. But now, I’m also not sure that liberal Muslims like me fit comfortably in a secular European crowd. I say this even after the murder of Theo van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker, who the police say was shot and stabbed by a Muslim extremist. Van Gogh had exercised his right to criticize Islam – a right that I, as a modern Muslim, defend unequivocally.

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Study: Ramadan practices changing

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Internal Debates.

CULTURE DIGEST: Target stores reject Salvation Army kettles; Spiritual collegians have better emotional health; More teens having plastic surgery; Study: Ramadan practices changing – (BP)

“The new Ramadan has changed our customs beyond recognition,” he wrote. “What has become of neighbors exchanging plates before iftar? What has become of the people in a neighborhood coming together for talk and discussion after taraweeh prayers? Couldn’t we bring back some of these customs in place of an hour or two of satellite TV? Wouldn’t we all be richer if we did?”

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Islam and the West: Essays dispense with hidden mythologies

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Important Publications.

The Daily Star – Book Reviews – Islam and the West: Essays dispense with hidden mythologies

The stated aim of “Shaping the Current Islamic Reformation” is to steer a middle course between the two extremes of academia and the media. According to its jacket, it seeks to “go beyond the media presentation of the impact of a politicised notion of Islam in the region and to consider the reality that lies behind current issues in the region and the role that an embedded Islam has played or may play.” Admittedly a book should never be judged by either its cover or its jacket, but editor B. A. Roberson’s introductory essay goes on to reaffirm that the book’s objective is to attempt to offer a more balanced view of the region than traditionally presented in the Western media “from news to film which very often trades on the incompatibility of Islamic or Muslim culture and ideas with modernity.
(more…)

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Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Misc. News.

The Muslim News
The supposed neutrality of the prison service in France towards the ethnic and religious backgrounds of prisoners is widely blamed by Muslim inmates as a prime cause of racist and discriminatory treatment, according to new research.

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The Events of September 11 and the Arab Media: The New Antisemitic Myth

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: International Terrorism.

Special Report – No. 9

Since the release of MEMRI’s study – and regardless of the information accumulated about the identities of the perpetrators – officials, journalists, and religious leaders throughout the Arab and Muslim world have continued to claim that the perpetrators of the attacks (of 9/11) were not Arabs or Muslims. The claim that American and or Jewish/Israeli elements carried out the attacks has become an accepted, albeit false, and common myth in the Arab world, to the point that U.S. President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Colin Powell have been accused of masterminding the attacks.

This updated report, which is based on research compiled over the past five months, reveals another trend that has emerged in the Arab media whereby Arab writers have begun to base their fictitious allegations on the widely discredited “research” of Western sources such as former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and Holocaust denier Roger Garaudy. The apparent intent of the Arab writers is to add credibility to their false allegations by relying on Western sources whose claims they erroneously believe will be readily accepted by a Western audience.

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Islamists shift focus to Europe as jihad enters third phase

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Religious and Political Radicalization.

Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Simon Tisdall: World briefing

According to the French academic Gilles Kepel Bin Laden’s holy war, as originally conceived, is failing. Far from vanquishing the west, it has created a crisis in the heart of Islam, setting Muslim against Muslim.

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Germans fear Islamic unrest

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Murder on theo Van Gogh and related issues.

ISLAMIC preachers in Germany have been told that they may be ordered to deliver their sermons in German rather than in Arabic in an attempt to halt racist diatribes.

The move reflects Berlin�s fears that a spark of ethnic and religious unrest could leap from the Netherlands to Germany, a country with more than three million Muslims.

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Gun moslima's eigen sexualiteit – Naema Tahir

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by martijn.
Categories: Internal Debates.

Liberales.be – Gun moslima’s eigen sexualiteit – Naema Tahir

�Moslims doen niet aan seks�, sprak een van mijn opvoeders, �wij krijgen onze kinderen van Allah.� Op mijn dertiende wist ik niet wat seks was, maar deze �wijze� woorden stelden me wel gerust. Ze bevestigden wat ik al vermoedde, namelijk dat moslims en koninklijke families niet aan seks deden. Deze mensen waren immers heilig, en seks was vies, iets voor de minder verheven westerlingen.

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Gun moslima’s eigen sexualiteit – Naema Tahir

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Internal Debates.

Liberales.be – Gun moslima’s eigen sexualiteit – Naema Tahir

�Moslims doen niet aan seks�, sprak een van mijn opvoeders, �wij krijgen onze kinderen van Allah.� Op mijn dertiende wist ik niet wat seks was, maar deze �wijze� woorden stelden me wel gerust. Ze bevestigden wat ik al vermoedde, namelijk dat moslims en koninklijke families niet aan seks deden. Deze mensen waren immers heilig, en seks was vies, iets voor de minder verheven westerlingen.

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Verkohlte Kircht�rme, verbrannte Moscheen

Posted on November 19th, 2004 by .
Categories: Murder on theo Van Gogh and related issues.

Frankfurter Rundschau online

Ein Land im Kriegszustand. Man sucht nach Erkl�rungen. Der 32 Jahre alte Doktorand Martijn de Koning ist einer der gefragtesten Gespr�chspartner in diesen Tagen. Sein Dissertationsthema: Junge Moslems und der Islam in den Niederlanden. In seinem Arbeitszimmer an der Freien Universit�t Amsterdam baute ein Fernsehteam Kamera und Beleuchtung auf. St�ndig klingelt das Telefon, immer neue Anfragen. Warum sich junge Moslems pl�tzlich radikalisieren? De Koning verweist darauf, dass die Betroffenen nicht zu den eigentlichen Verlierern des Einwanderungsprozesses geh�ren. Es sind Ausl�nder der zweiten Generation, mit guter Schulbildung, exzellenten Sprachkenntnissen. Dies gilt f�r Mohamed B. ,den mutma�lichen M�rder von Theo van Gogh, ebenso wie f�r die inzwischen festgenommen anderen Mitglieder seiner Gruppe.

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