Month: August 2009

Face of Christian Angel Uncovered in Famous Mosque

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 FOX NEWS… July 24/09 ANKARA, Turkey  —  A Turkish official says restoration workers have uncovered the never-before-seen mosaic face of an angel at Istanbul’s Haghia Sophia — a former Byzantine cathedral.

The cathedral’s Christian mosaics were covered up in line with Muslim custom of destroying any reference to religions other than Islam shortly after Constantinople — the former name for Istanbul — fell to the Ottomans in 1453 and the cathedral was turned into a mosque.

Some of the mosaics were revealed after it was turned into a museum in 1935, but the angel image remained covered.

Ahmet Emre Bilgili, the head of culture and tourism affairs for Istanbul, told the Associated Press on Friday that restoration workers will now work to uncover a second mosaic angel image.

 

Bill Warner speaks on CFRA 580 Ottawa

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Link: Bill Warner CFRA aug 16 09-desktop

British non-Muslim swimmers are told to wear burkinis

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More from the “you have got to be fucking kidding me” files.

Telegraph.co.uk

dhimmi BritainBritish swimming pools are imposing Muslim dress codes in a move described as divisive by Labour MPs.

Under the rules, swimmers – including non-Muslims – are barred from entering the pool in normal swimming attire.

Instead they are told that they must comply with the “modest” code of dress required by Islamic custom, with women covered from the neck to the ankles and men, who swim separately, covered from the navel to the knees.

The phenomenon runs counter to developments in France, where last week a woman was evicted from a public pool for wearing a burkini – the headscarf, tunic and trouser outfit which allows Muslim women to preserve their modesty in the water.

The 35-year-old, named only as Carole, is threatening legal action after she was told by pool officials in Emerainville, east of Paris, that she could not wear the outfit on hygiene grounds.

But across the UK municipal pools are holding swimming sessions specifically aimed at Muslims, in some case imposing strict dress codes.

Croydon council in south London runs separate one-and-a half-hour swimming sessions for Muslim men and women every Saturday and Sunday at Thornton Heath Leisure Centre.

Swimmers were told last week on the centre’s website that “during special Muslim sessions male costumes must cover the body from the navel to the knee and females must be covered from the neck to the ankles and wrists”.

There are similar rules at Scunthorpe Leisure Centre, in North Lincolnshire, where “users must follow the required dress code for this session (T-shirts and shorts/leggings that cover below the knee)”.

In Glasgow, a men-only swimming session is organised by a local mosque group at North Woodside Leisure Centre, at which swimmers must be covered from navel to knee.

At a women-only class organised by a Muslim teacher at Blackbird Leys Swimming Pool, Oxford, to encourage Muslim women to learn to swim, most participants wear “modest” outfits although normal costumes are permitted.

The dress codes have provoked an angry reaction among critics who say they encourage division and resentment between Muslims and non-Muslims, putting strain on social cohesion. Continue Reading →

Nuclear riddle of missing ship as pirates demand a £1m ransom

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 Although there is no reported connection with Islam in this story, it has all the signs of being just that. So I will go out on a limb [a strong limb] and tag it with Islam. Arctic Sea

MailOnline…Pirates last night demanded a ransom of almost £1million for the release of the cargo ship which sparked an international search after vanishing from the English Channel a fortnight ago.

Police in Finland confirmed the ransom demand was made to the Finnish owners of the 4,000-ton Arctic Sea and that the case was now being treated as ‘a hijacking with aggravated extortion’.

They said the armed gang had warned they would pose a ‘threat to the life and health’ to the 15 Russian crewmen on board unless their demands are met.

The ransom demand came as The Mail on Sunday established radiation tests were carried out at the port of Pietarsaari in western Finland, where the Maltese-flagged ship Arctic Sea started its voyage.

The Turkish-built vessel, which was carrying £900,000 worth of timber, is feared to have been stormed by pirates looking for a ‘secret cargo’.

The fact that nuclear tests were conducted will fuel speculation that the ship did have a hidden cargo.

Enquiries by this newspaper have established that no checks were carried out on what was being transported in the hold prior to its departure from Finland on July 23.

And the FSB, the Russian security service, as well as MI5 have been involved in the investigation into the hijacked vessel.

Last night Finnish Detective Chief Superintendent Jan Nyholm said: ‘Yes, it is true that there has been a demand for ransom in cash and that it was made to the company which owns the ship, Solchart Management in Finland.’

Another police spokesman, Markku Ranta-Aho, said the ransom demand was for less than $1.5million (£900,000) – that it was ‘significant, but not huge’.

Finnish police also suggested the armed gang demanding the ransom were the same bandits who boarded the vessel off Sweden on July 24 – although other sources claimed it was a different group.

The police released the information after a news blackout during which they had tried to trace the ship, but did not say when the ransom demand was made. They said the hijackers had not been in touch with them.

It is the first time in modern maritime history that a ship has disappeared without trace in European shipping waters.

Until now, ship hijackings have been confined to Somali pirates seizing vessels off the coasts of Africa and in the Indian Ocean.

Yesterday there were reports that the Arctic Sea’s automatic identification system – which helps locate its whereabouts – briefly emitted a signal from the Bay of Biscay,
300 miles west of La Rochelle on France’s east coast. Continue Reading →

Iran Bahais face espionage trial

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Bahais IranBBC NEWS… Seven members of the Bahai faith in Iran are to go on trial on Tuesday on charges of spying for Israel and of “insulting sanctities”.

Six of the Bahais were arrested in May, 2008. The other one was arrested two months earlier. They were the leaders of the Bahais in Iran.

The Bahai faith is banned by the Islamic revolutionary leadership of Iran which considers it heretical.

Bahais claim some 300,000 members in Iran, where the faith originated.

Midnight raids

“The trial of the seven Bahais accused of spying for the Zionist regime of Israel and insulting sanctities will be held on Tuesday,” Hassan Haddad of the Tehran’s prosecutor office said, the official Iranian news agency reports.

Last year relatives of the six Bahai leaders arrested in May said they had been taken to Evin Prison in Tehran after intelligence ministry officers raided their homes in the middle of the night.

Hundreds of Bahai followers have been jailed and executed since Iran’s Islamic revolution in 1979, the Bahai International Community says.

However, the government denies it has detained or executed people because of their faith.

The Bahais consider the man who founded their faith in the 19th Century, Bahaullah, to be a prophet.

A proposal Saudis can’t refuse

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eunice-lieveld-burka1guardian.co.uk…It may be the world’s most puritanical kingdom but there are still legal ways to have sex on the side.

Saudi Arabia’s conservative society stands divided on the issue of misyar, a no-strings marriage of convenience that has become increasingly popular in the kingdom.

Misyar is a form of marriage that allows couples to live separately but come together for sexual relations. For the women who accept it – spinsters, divorcees and widows – it’s a something-is-better-than-nothing option, though they waive almost all the rights that a normal Muslim marriage entitles them to. For men it offers an opportunity for a bit of fun on the side, in secret, and at a huge discount.

Reasons for popularity of misyar include the high cost of marriage – the dowry, several dinners, parties, decoration of a flat or a villa and the honeymoon. All this may set back the groom by several hundred thousand riyals. Misyar for cash-strapped men is a boon.

Hamdan, a Saudi colleague of mine back in Jeddah – distraught and depressed after the break-up of his first marriage – entered into a succession of misyar marriages. None lasted for more than six months. He confided that he had hoped to find a compatible partner for a permanent relationship but it didn’t work out. He also said that misyar wives are crafty and inclined to extract money and gifts. In his words: misyar marriages are not cost-effective. The colleague is now married again – in a normal marriage – and hopes to live happily ever after.

Thanks to Bluetooth technology, friendly websites and an abundance of furnished apartments in major cities like Riyadh and Jeddah, there are tales of misyar wives who have clandestinely entered into more than one misyar contract. These enlightened ladies say misyar husbands never tell their full-time wives about their relationships so why can’t misyar wives have similar arrangements? Clerics view this as a dangerous trend.

Website ads for misyar marriages often reveal the immaturity and desperation of those looking for partners:

 

• Young man, 21, excellent monthly income, seeks marriage as soon as possible to single girls up to 70 kgs, living in Jeddah.
• Saudi clerk, 38, from a well-known family, seeks pretty, white, delicate, businesswoman or clerk for misyar marriage. With Allah’s help, if things work out, the marriage will be official.
• Accountant, 30, seeks misyar marriage with Saudi woman. Age, experience, number of children, widow or single or divorced unimportant. What is important is her ability to satisfy the needs of a man who desires things permitted by religion (halal). Continue Reading →

Taliban vow to bomb polling booths

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The Times of India… KANDAHAR: The Taliban on Sunday threatened for the first time to attack Afghan polling stations, escalating their bid to derail key elections this week after striking Nato in the heart of Kabul. The threat was made in leaflets, dropped in villages in the south, and authenticated by a Taliban spokesman who said the militia would accelerate its bloody campaign of violence on the eve of polls.

“This is to inform respected residents that you must not take part in the polls so as not to become a victim of our operations, because we will use new tactics,” said one leaflet distributed in Kandahar. “All people are being informed that you must not rent out property to voting centres and if anyone did — even after elections — they may face problems”, they said.

Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi confirmed the leaflets were authentic and that commanders were ordering the masses to boycott the vote. The leaflets marked the first direct threat from the rebels to attack polling sites.

The leaflets came even as supporters of the candidates came out in their thousands on Sunday. In his regional power base in the north, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, President Hamid Karzai’s main challenger, was mobbed by thousands of supporters who stormed a gate to surge into the compound where his helicopter touched down.

He was hoisted onto a pickup truck and driven through the town of Taloqan, surrounded by crowds of adoring supporters. “I told the crowd we have already won,” Abdullah said.

Karzai disappointed thousands of people in the southern city of Kandahar who were hoping he would make an appearance at a rally addressed by one of his half-brothers, Ahmad Wali Karzai, Kandahar’s provincial council chief. Kandahar is Karzai’s home town as well as the heartland of the Taliban, whose fighters have vowed to disrupt the poll with attacks.

Israel, wackos and hate

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Here are two editorials from Full Comment at the National Post. The first, written by Robert Fulford describes how Opposing Israel has become a fashionable, institutionalized ritual founded on anti-Semitism. The second, by Johnathan Kay describes the latest violent episode in Gaza where Hamas (wacko group#1) attacks Jund Ansar Allah (‘Soldiers of the Partisans of God’, wacko group #2).

Robert Fulford:
Posted: August 15, 2009, 8:45 AM by NP Editor ,

When Criticizing Israel becomes ritual

It begins, reasonably, as a response to apparently unnecessary violence by Israel. Then it moves on to accuse Israel of expanding on land the Arabs insist is theirs. Nothing wrong with criticizing that, surely. Israel, a state, deserves to be judged like any other.

Even those friendly toward Israel have often felt duty bound to point out its mistakes. In more innocent times, I imagined that intellectuals in the West paid careful attention to Israel’s faults because they expected it to set a high standard. Who would worry about the moral status of, say, Bolivia? No one except Bolivians. Jews, however, live with the injunction to be (as Isaiah quotes God) “A light unto the nations.”

But now everything has changed. Opposing Israel has become an institutionalized ritual. It’s now a movement across Europe and North America. It has its traditions, like Israel Apartheid Week, celebrated every spring in universities, often the cause of riots and an occasion to intimidate Jewish students. Vehement opposition to Israel appears to be the major interest of thousands of people all over the world. Many are Muslims, sympathizing with the Palestinians, but many are not. This week, attacks on Israel once more appeared on the agenda of the general council meeting of the United Church of Canada, a critic of Israel for generations.

Continue Reading →

Sex-starved Afghans can deny food to wives: Report

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From The Times of India:

Variant on the double decker?

Variant on the double decker?

LONDON: Afghanistan has enacted a new legislation empowering men of Shia sect of Islam to deny their wives food and sustenance if they refuse to obey their husbands’ sexual demands, a media report said on Saturday.

The new final draft of the legislation also grants guardianship of children exclusively to their fathers and grandfathers, and requires women to get permission from their husbands to work, The Guardian reported.

“It also effectively allows a rapist to avoid prosecution by paying ‘blood money’ to a girl who was injured when he raped her,” the report said quoting US charity Human Rights Watch.

In early April, US President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown joined an international chorus of condemnation when the earlier version of the law legalised rape within marriage.

Although Afghan President Hamid Karzai appeared to back down, activists

said the revised law still contained repressive measures and contradicted Afghanistan’s constitution and international treaties it is signed up to.

According to the report, the new law has been backed by the hardline Shia cleric Ayatollah Mohseni, who is thought to have influence over the voting intentions of some Shias, who make up around 20 per cent of the population.

Karzai has assiduously courted such minority leaders in the run up to next Thursday’s election, which is likely to be close, a poll indicated.

‘Jihad Shielas’ showing that Islam really is for psychopaths

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H/T jdamn

These women love the ‘clay pot’ logical fallacy. “I never borrowed your clay pot and it was broken when I got it.” It is their defence for nearly every time they are caught working with the enemies of Western Civilization.

It is also critical to understand what she and other Muslims mean when they say “Defend Islam with my life.” It means enforce Islam’s laws customs rules and edicts on us as Islam commands. Islam has many examples of lingusistic slight of hand and these women use them all. ‘Defence’ means attack you if you stop us from ruling you. ‘Innocent’ means a Muslim and ‘Guilty’ means an infidel. ‘Peace’ means we agree not to attack you until we have a strategic advantage and so on. This documentary is made from the perspective of these two Muslim converts. So stop it now and again and think about what you hear and see from these women. It’s like the old joke:

‘How do you know XXX is lying? Her lips are moving.’

In this case, its a studied practiced and codified system of fooling the non Muslim in order to rule them dating back to the time of Mohamed. Even Thomas Jefferson was taken in by a fake ‘peace treaty’ one in English, and the other not and the two treaties said radically different things.

Why Taliban leaders prefer dead diplomats

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The Guardian.co.uk…According to a Taliban spokesman the real target of the suicide bombing in Kabul was the American embassy

According to Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, the target of Saturday’s explosion in Kabul was not the headquarters of the International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) in Afghanistan but the American embassy. This careful clarification reveals the insurgents’ strategic logic.

For weeks analysts have been puzzled by the apparent lack of a effort to disrupt the polls. The Taliban have, after all, made assaults on relatively poorly protected Afghan government officials a key element of their strategy. Yet other than a couple of raids and a few bombings nothing on the scale of the operations that the Taliban could launch if they wanted has been seen. The next few days may see this change but all the activities associated with the election have passed off with little interference.

Mullah Omar, the leader of the Taliban, has not made any confirmed public declarations about the election and the insurgents have limited themselves to a statement posted on their internet site which calls on Afghans to boycott the polls. There are some reports of local intimidation and some leaflets in mosques dissuading potential voters but little else. It is as if the Taliban high command has decided to make their presence felt but not fully engage.

There are several reasons for this. Continue Reading →