Gates of Vienna News Feed 7/25/2008

There’s a lot of news tonight. These are just some of the headlines:

The GoV newsboy

  • Muslim Votes Crucial for Obama
  • Amanpour’s Ridiculous Racism
  • MAS Holds Farewell Dinner and Fundraiser for Former Sharon Imam Masood
  • Author Fears Possible ‘Fatwa’ After Publishing Fictional Book
  • Libya: Oil Shipments to Switzerland Halted After Diplomatic Row
  • Building Peace Between Jews and Muslims, One Pastry at a Time
  • Muslim Day at Six Flags a Time to Relax and Connect With Others
  • Italy and Libya Close to Accord
  • You Must Be Nicer to Muslims, Britain is Told by UN Human Rights Chiefs
  • Anti-Hijab McDonald’s

Thanks to Insubria, TB, Miss Kelly, Fausta, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Details are below the fold.
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Muslim Votes Crucial for Obama

CHICAGO — Disturbed by Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s apathy to reach out Muslim voters, American Muslims are being urged to act to show the White House hopeful that the Muslim vote will be crucial in the November election.

“Muslims need to let Obama know that he has to earn their votes,” Saaqib Rangoonwala, managing editor of Muslim magazine InFocus, told Reuters on Friday, July 25.



Amanpour’s ridiculous racism

During today’s press conference in Paris, Christiane Amanpour asked Sarkozy “if he feelt awkward praising black Obama when, only a few years ago, he was calling black French rioters “scum.”

I kid you not.

Watch: [go to Fausta’s for the video]



MAS holds farewell dinner and fundraiser for former Sharon imam Masood

(from Miss Kelly)

Apparently the DOJ and Masood’s lawyers worked something out for former Sharon imam Muhammed Masood and his family to take a “voluntary departure.” The Boston Muslim American Society is holding a farewell dinner and fundraiser tomorrow at a restaurant next to the Islamic Cultural Center (the new Roxbury mosque). Lots of people convicted of lying to federal agents do jail time, but not Masood. Perhaps it’s just as well to have the entire family leave the U.S.

I wonder how the government will manage a three year probation when he’s overseas, which was part of his pleas agreement. No word yet on where he’s going. Probably not back to Pakistan. This ought to be covered in the Quincy Patriot Ledger in a few days.

Stay tuned!



Author fears possible ‘fatwa’ after publishing fictional book

A popular writer is traveling under a false name after he published a fictional book dealing with the Koran and Mohammed.

Brad Thor authored the just-released international thriller The Last Patriot (Atria Books, July 2008) — and now he wonders if a fatwa might be issued against his life. “That is an issue for us and something that my family’s been concerned about because there have been multiple death threats,” he reports. A fatwa is an Islamic religious ruling or scholarly opinion on a matter of Islamic law.

Thor finds it difficult to believe anyone would become that upset over fiction. “My goal here is to entertain, not to inflame,” he points out. “But I think what we’ve learned from the Danish Mohammed cartoons, from the British school teacher in Sudan who let her children name their teddy bear Mohammed, there is definitely a subset of that population that has absolutely no tolerance for anything other than their radical Islamist hard-line,” Thor notes.



Oriana and the Cherries

In her novel-world, family chronicles interweave with history. It all starts with a hat full of fruit.

Let’s forget for a minute about 9/11 and its repercussions. Let’s forget the angry woman who took up the role of defender of the West against the terrorist — and cultural — threat of looming Islam, and the writer who with a free thinker’s ruthless insight coined the term Eurabia, brutally shattering some of our taboos about co-existence. Let’s rewind and go back in time, but not too far. We are not going back to the days of the outstanding reporter from Vietnam and the world’s other hotspots, author of memorable reports for Europe that were syndicated to all the international papers, or to the woman who described her obsessive political and romantic relationship with Alexander Panagoulis in her epic portrait Un uomo [A Man], or to the protagonist of Lettera a un bambino mai nato [Letter to a Child Never Born], which moved the world with its intimate woman’s story…

Alessandro Cannavò for Magazine

English translation by Giles Watson

Article in Italian



Morocco: Immigrants to Europe barred from country because of ‘al-Qaeda links’

Rabat, 24 July (AKI) — A group of Moroccan citizens living in Europe have been barred from returning to their country because of their alleged links with the al-Qaeda.

According to a report on the Casablanca-based newspaper Assabah, the security services have come up with a blacklist of the names of 28 people living in Europe who have been accused of links with the terrorist network.



Libya: Oil shipments to Switzerland halted after diplomatic row

Tripoli, 24 July (AKI) — Libya’s state-run oil shipping company said on Thursday it would no longer carry oil destined to Switzerland after the arrest of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s son, Motassim Bilal, also known as ‘Hannibal’.

Swizerland imports 50 percent of its crude oil supply from Libya.



TERRORISM: ONLINE INSTRUCTIONS ON ABDUCTION, ITALIANS TARGET

(ANSAmed) — WASHINGTON, JULY 24 — The Italians are in the top ten of the targets of kidnapping published by a website close to Islamic extremism, which also published detailed instructions for the activities of the Jihadist cells involved in “urban terrorism”. The instructions for kidnapping and the list with preferred “human targets” — to be used in order to demand the release of detainees or money for future operations — was intercepted by US-based research centre Jamestown Foundation, specialised in the study of terrorism. A large tutorial for the kidnappings (and in some cases for the “execution of the hostage”) was recently published online by an alleged terrorist identified by his combat name Abu Hajar Abdul al-Moqrin. Al-Moqrin presented a list with targets explaining that priority must be given to Jews from Israel and the US, who must be targeted before the Jews from Great Britain and France. Following are “the Christians, especially those from the US, Britain, Spain, Australia, Canada and Italy”. Then come the “apostates”, mainly leaders of the Muslim countries who have relations “with Jews and the Christian governments”, Egyptian Hosni Mubarak and the leaders of the Gulf Countries are mentioned. At the last place are “spies and security agents who protect Jews and Christians”. Al-Moqrin calls also to target, inside these categories, at top government officials and diplomats, with preference to old people, less protected and physically weak. Instructions are given on how to use weapon with silencer, anaesthetic injections and instruments for electrical discharges and on the modalities for hostage transport. The Islamic site, analysed by Abdul Hameed Bakier, an expert from the Jordan intelligence who is working for the US think tank, offers explanations on how to organise Jihad cells of four people to infiltrate the western cities, detailing any logistic and financial aspect of their activity. “The Jihad operations to be carried out in the cities include assassinations, abduction, vandalism and raids to release imprisoned Jihadists,” is explained. (ANSAmed).



Tunisian cartoon plotters remain jailed

A Danish court ruled Friday it was legal to continue holding two Tunisians suspected of plotting to kill a Danish cartoonist who satirized Islam’s Prophet Mohammed without trial.

The two men, aged 26 and 37 and residents of Denmark, have been held at the request of the Danish intelligence agency PET’s since February 12, when they were arrested on suspicion of planning to murder Kurt Westergaard



Building peace between Jews and Muslims, one pastry at a time:

[…]

One woman who participates in the monthly pastry workshop is Nathalie Obadia, a Jew of Tunisian origin who says she does not want divisive Middle East issues poisoning relationships with her neighbors. “What’s happening over there is over there,” said Obadia, 39. “Here, we’re in France.”



Muslim Day at Six Flags a time to relax and connect with others

Gurnee park expects about 1,200 Muslims to attend Saturday

On any other day, Sobia Ahmed would opt to forgo many of the snacks on offer at Six Flags Great America in Gurnee. To perform the Islamic prayers she recites five times a day, she likely would slip onto a secluded path at the amusement park or look for solace under a shady tree for a few furtive minutes.

But this Saturday Ahmed and her family will eat and pray at their leisure in the park with hundreds of other Muslims from the Chicago area who plan to visit the sprawling entertainment center for a day catered especially to them.

For the fourth time since 2004, Six Flags in Gurnee is sponsoring Muslim Day, bringing in outside caterers to provide halal food and turning an amphitheater into a makeshift mosque to accommodate Muslims who observe dietary laws and strict prayer schedules. Muslims who plan to go say they appreciate the sense of community the event creates as well as the opportunity to talk about Islam with curious non-Muslims at the park.



Swiss citizen arrests deepen Libyan crisis

Switzerland’s foreign ministry has voiced concern at the detainment of two Swiss nationals in “alarming conditions” in Libya.

The pair were held as Libya rolled out a retaliatory response to the arrest of Moammar Gaddafi’s son Hannibal in Geneva on July 15, including the alleged suspension of oil supplies to Switzerland on Thursday.

The Swiss nationals, one of whom is an employee of Swedish-Swiss firm ABB, have been formally arrested and charged with immigration offences, ministry spokesman Jean-Philippe Jeannerat said on Thursday.



Italy and Libya close to accord

(ANSA) — Rome, July 24 — Italy and Libya could sign a historic friendship and cooperation accord resolving issues related to Italy’s colonial occupation of the North African country by the end of August, Premier Silvio Berlusconi has said. Speaking to journalists on Thursday evening, the premier confirmed news leaked to Libyan television earlier in the day that the two countries were close to reaching an agreement after more than a decade of negotiations.

The accord would finally resolve issues related to Italy’s colonial occupation of the North African country in 1911 and the expulsion of some 20,000 Italians by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 1970.

“We are working intensely and with a strong desire to draw up a pact of friendship by August 31,” Berlusconi said.

Gaddafi’s son, Seif al-Islam, told Libyan television that the two countries were likely to sign a “billion dollar” agreement in the next few weeks.

The accord includes various projects, including the Italian construction of a large coastal highway costing an estimated six billion euros that would link Libya with Egypt and Tunisia.



You must be nicer to Muslims, Britain is told by UN human rights chiefs

Britain was told yesterday by a United Nations committee to take firm action to combat ‘negative public attitudes’ towards Muslims.

The nine-member human rights committee also criticised some of the UK’s antiterror measures.

The body, which is composed of legal experts, said it was concerned ‘ negative public attitudes towards Muslim members of society’ continued to develop in Britain.



Anti-hijab McDonald’s

CAIRO — Two young American Muslim women are suing the world’s largest chain of fast food restaurants McDonald’s over denying them jobs for donning hijab, the Detroit News reported on Friday, July 25. \

“I applied for the McDonald’s position maybe two weeks ago and he (the manager) simply (told me) I had to make a choice and remove my hijab, or I would not be able to establish employment there,” 25-year-old Quiana Pugh said.

“When I walked away, I was definitely hurt by it and disturbed. I was confused that it could happen here in Dearborn, with so many Muslims.”



LIBYA: RESPECT OUR RIGHTS TOO, REPATRIATES TO BERLUSCONI

(ANSAmed) — ROME, JULY 25 — A telegram to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to call for respect of the rights of the Italians repatriated from Libya and to ask for a meeting at the Italian government with a delegation of the association was sent by president of Association of Italians Repatriated from Libya (AIRL), Giovanna Ortu, after yesterday the son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, Saif al-Islam, announced the forthcoming signing of an agreement with Italy for compensations amounting to billions and the prime minister confirmed that Rome and Tripoli are working hard to reach an agreement “by August 31”. “In merit of Your statements on the forthcoming closing of the legal dispute with Libya with the same willingness which You have expressed last week to the Libyan prime minister and foreign minister, and from our modest position, we ask for equal dignity, certain that this time a delegation of the association will be granted a short meeting,” the telegram reads. “A government which defines itself democratic cannot continue ignoring our appeals and remaining deaf to the legitimate demands of Italian citizens, while it is ready to pay billions to favour the demands of a dictator who accuse us of an occupation that happened almost one century ago for which Libya has been already compensated in 1956 and blackmails with the bogy of the illegal immigrants,” Ortu says. In a statement, the president of AIRL estimates to three billion euro the compensations owed for the property confiscated from the Italians by Gaddafi in 1970, legitimate demands, Ortu states, in front of which “it would be unworthy that in the moment when the money for compensations amounting to billions are found for Libya there is no place in the budget for an allocation related to the compensations” owed to the repatriates. (ANSAmed).

20 thoughts on “Gates of Vienna News Feed 7/25/2008

  1. They do not wear hijabs at the McDonalds in Paris. They do play loud American rap music with obscene lyrics and incitements to kill white people

  2. During today’s press conference in Paris, Christiane Amanpour asked Sarkozy “if he feelt awkward praising black Obama when, only a few years ago, he was calling black French rioters “scum.”

    This enters the competition for the stupidest journalistic question of the year.

  3. At long last someone is covering Bush’s indulgence of a Heroin regime in the Afghan rat hole. There wasn’t a single heroin factory in Afghanistan, prior to the Karzai regime. That country would export raw opium. The Taliban had, and has, a 15% cut of the market. And they use those funds ($200,000,000) to buy guns for the murder of Americans. Bush could wipe them out since the bulk of the crop is grown in Helmand District.

    EUROPEANS: you can thank the Bush Crime Family if your neighborhood is full of druggies.

    Reminder: Taliban is a member group of al-Qaeda, and a signatory to the 1998 fatwah against Jews and Crusaders. Last month, Karzai praised Taliban for their “morality.” in Der Spiegel.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/27/magazine/27AFGHAN-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

  4. Another interesting article I found:

    “Africa is giving nothing to anyone — apart from AIDS
    No. It will not do. Even as we see African states refusing to take action to restore something resembling civilisation in Zimbabwe, the begging bowl for Ethiopia is being passed around to us, yet again. It is nearly 25 years since Ethiopia’s (and Bob Geldof’s) famous Feed The World campaign, and in that time Ethiopia’s population has grown from 33.5 million to 78 million today.

    So why on earth should I do anything to encourage further catastrophic demographic growth in that country? Where is the logic?…”

    http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/kevin-myers/africa-is-giving-nothing-to-anyone–apart-from-aids-1430428.html

  5. I’ve seen plenty of girls wearing the hijab and even the chador, whilst working in McDonalds in London and other places around old Blighty!

    The chador can be quite flattering to the female form!

  6. The chador can be quite flattering to the female form!

    Why don’t you buy one yourself?

    Your comment is like saying that a tent is flattering to the female form. Have a look at the picture I linked just above or at a Google image search on chador.

  7. Re Italy and Libya close to accord

    The two countries have struck a number of agreements regarding energy supply and combating illegal immigration.

    Italy is Libya’s biggest trade partner and 25% of Italian oil imports come from the North African country.

    Immigration continues to cause friction between Rome and Tripoli due to the large number of illegal immigrants still arriving on Italian shores from Libya despite a cooperation agreement to contain the phenomenon.

    On Thursday Berlusconi said six Italian coastguard craft were ready to start patrolling Libya’s 800-km coastline to stop migrants from setting off on the dangerous voyage, but they were still waiting for a green light from Tripoli.

    I look at the deal and it’s well negotiated. The gain is clearly bigger than the costs for Italy. This is precisely the sort of deals that Italy needs to make now. They way they are heading they might be forced to secede from the EU within a few years. Then they will be given the “South African” treatment by the EU establishment, i.e. economic blockades etc. Then Italy needs good trading partners outside of the EU/USA hellhole (the so called “world community”). I wouldn’t be surprised to see more trade and deals with Japan, Russia, India or China by Italy in a near future.

    The motive for trade with Libya is oil of course, but the aspect of immigration is even more important. This patrolling of Libya’s coastline is the best way to stop illegal aliens to enter Italy. Look at a map and you’ll understand how important this is for Italy. Actually all of Europe will benefit from this. We should be very grateful to Italy for doing this for us completely for free.

    Once again Berlusconi has showed himself to be realistic and responsible.

  8. “if he felt awkward praising black Obama when, only a few years ago, he was calling black French rioters “scum.”

    Well, he called them “French” too didn’t he? We can all figure out why he wouldn’t mention they were Muslim though; most people like to keep their heads attached to their bodies.

  9. conservative swede – I was just talking to someone who was just in Italy, and they were totally taken aback by the noticeable number of illegal immigrants in Italy.

    “a free man” was probably being sarcastic about the chador. Now if the chador was white, it would make a great ghost costume for Halloween; I wonder if it comes in white?

  10. Joanne —

    Please don’t paste long URLs into the comments; they make the post page too wide and mess up the appearance of the permalink page.

    Use link tags; the instructions are at the top of the full post’s comment section.

    ————————–

    Joanne said…

    “Britain was told yesterday by a United Nations committee to take firm action to combat ‘negative public attitudes’ towards Muslims.”

    “The body, which is composed of legal experts, said it was concerned ‘ negative public attitudes towards Muslim members of society’ continued to develop in Britain.”

    Well duh, and whose fault is that anyway. The government in Britain keeps pandering to the Muslims, while stripping the British natives of their rights. You can’t have a society where the native people are treated like second hand citizens, while Muslims are treated with kid gloves.

    I read a news article yesterday about two young Asian males who doused a British woman with fuel and then threatened to light her afire before grabbing her bag and making a run for it. The woman even chased after them to get her bag back.

    link

    This is absolutely freakin’ unbelievable. Who needs people like this living in your midst!

    The UN Human Rights can just shut its pie hole…..nobody is listening.

  11. if he felt awkward praising black Obama when, only a few years ago, he was calling black French rioters “scum”.

    Levels of ignorance here… The rioters were Muslims, which is much more of a problem than having a tan.

    Sarkozy used the term ‘racaille’, which means rabble, not ‘scum’. And he was only using the very same term the rabble were routinely using about themselves.

    I wouldn’t take Sarkozy too seriously, though. He’ll side with anyone who makes him look good, even his dictator friends at the south of the Mediterranian, who merrily attended Bastille Day, which used to be a celebration of freedom and democracy. Only Quaddafi had the honesty to decline the invitation.

  12. @teacher.paris

    They do not wear hijabs at the McDonalds in Paris. They do play loud American rap music with obscene lyrics and incitements to kill white people

    Teacher: I do hope your subject is not logic since these two have nothing to do with one another.

    And “rap music” coming out of the banileues of the “rabble” Sarkozy mentioned go American rap one better.

    While the rap in the US is anti-police, and quite misogynistic, it does not call America its “bitch” — which is what French rap does. The lyrics describe what they are going to do to La Belle France in pornographic, sadistic images. Much worse than the rap here.

    Or haven’t you been listening?

  13. Sorry, I didn’t realize long URL’s threw everything out. I guess I’ll have to learn how to use link tags; I knew the time would have to come sooner or later….too bad….ignorance was bliss.

  14. A Free Man: The chador can be quite flattering to the female form!

    Whatever you may be free of, it certainly isn’t ignorance. Would you be in favor of women walking around in full-body wetsuits—and only wetsuits—as mandated by law?

    Con Swede beat me to it. I don’t give a hot damn how “flattering” a garment is. If it’s the only legally acceptable garment there is, then it’s a travesty of justice and human rights.

    The burqa, chador, niqab, hijab and every other vestige of Islamically approved horse puckey means only one thing: Abject Gender Apartheid. Go ahead, argue the fact. Make my day.

    Dymphna: While the rap in the US is anti-police, and quite misogynistic, it does not call America its “bitch” — which is what French rap does. The lyrics describe what they are going to do to La Belle France in pornographic, sadistic images. Much worse than the rap here.

    I will respectfully dispute your point. The anti-establishment, pro-crime, misogynistic and violent themes of American “gangsta” rap—and rap “music” (sneer quotes intended) in general—go toe to toe with anything seen elsewhere in our world.

    While the Euro versions may be even more blatantly offensive, that in no way ameliorates the incredibly abusive and degrading aspects of American gangsta rap and, again, rap “music” in general.

    It is all of the same stripe. Thug mentality writ large. One may as well dispute the redeeming features of a less virulent AIDS virus.

    I’ll add that the communist agenda could not have been more to the point in specifying:

    22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to “eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms.”

    23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. “Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art.”

    The communists may as well have invented this monotonous, repetitive, atonal load of putrescent (c)rap. Rap “music”—regardless of its geographical source—fulfills every single aspect of those destructive imperatives in spades.

    Anyone tempted to remonstrate me about whatever creditable rap “artists” there may be can hold their breath. I’ve seen Digital Undergound, Queen Latifah and Yellowman perform, among many others.

    As someone who plays the flute, guitar, piano, saxophone, electric guitar, harmonica and synthesizer, writes his own lyrics and also composes in Classical, Renaissance, Baroque, Blues , Jazz, Rock & Roll, Rhythm & Blues, Hard Rock, Asian, Folk, Ballad, Latin and Spanish Classical forms, rap performers have left me uniformly unimpressed.

    Rarely have I seen such an artform that this world would be so much better off without.

  15. Wow, Zenster! Brilliant! The best description of rap “music” I’ve ever read. I remember a thinker who said “If you want to understand exactly what Communism is, you have to read the Criminal Law”. This perfectly applies to rap “culture”. Both Communist “art” and rap “music” are exaltations of the thug against the decent, “burgeois” people.

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