Category Archives: Irrational religious authority
“Give me segregation, or give them death!”
More primitivism from the tablecloth brigade in Saudi. I swear that somewhere in Italy there is a restaurant that has the worlds highest linen bills.
From Real Courage.org
Reuters reports: “Whoever mixes the sexes should be killed: Sheikh Barrack
Shaikh Abdul-Rahman al-Barrak calls for death for those “mixing” sexes (Photo: Reuters)
Saudi cleric backs gender segregation with fatwa
A prominent Saudi cleric has issued an edict calling for opponents of the kingdom’s strict segregation of men and women to be put to death if they refuse to abandon their ideas.
Shaikh Abdul-Rahman al-Barrak said in a fatwa the mixing of genders at the workplace or in education “as advocated by modernisers” is prohibited because it allows “sight of what is forbidden, and forbidden talk between men and women.”
” Whoever allows this mixing … allows forbidden things, and whoever allows them is an infidel and this means defection from Islam … Either he retracts or he must be killed … because he disavows and does not observe the Shariah “
“All of this leads to whatever ensues,” he said in the text of the fatwa published on his website (albarrak.islamlight.net).
“Whoever allows this mixing … allows forbidden things, and whoever allows them is an infidel and this means defection from Islam … Either he retracts or he must be killed … because he disavows and does not observe the Shariah,” Barrak said.
“Anyone who accepts that his daughter, sister or wife works with men or attend mixed-gender schooling cares little about his honor and this is a type of pimping,” Barrak said.
Libya’s Gaddafi urges jihad against Switzerland
Is it my imagination, or does Muammer have the same plastic surgeon as Michael Jackson?
From Reuters:
BENGHAZI, Libya
Thu Feb 25, 2010 2:43pm EST
Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi attends the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Food Security Summit in Rome November 16, 2009.
Credit: Reuters/Filippo Monteforte/Pool
BENGHAZI, Libya (Reuters) – Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi called on Thursday for a “jihad” or armed struggle against Switzerland, saying it was an infidel state that was destroying mosques.
“Any Muslim in any part of the world who works with Switzerland is an apostate, is against (the Prophet) Mohammad, God and the Koran,” Gaddafi said during a meeting in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi to mark the Prophet’s birthday.
“The masses of Muslims must go to all airports in the Islamic world and prevent any Swiss plane landing, to all harbors and prevent any Swiss ships docking, inspect all shops and markets to stop any Swiss goods being sold,” Gaddafi said.
The Swiss Foreign Ministry said it had no comment on Gaddafi’s remarks.
Libya’s relations with Switzerland broke down in 2008 when a son of Gaddafi was arrested in a Geneva hotel and charged with abusing domestic servants. Continue Reading →
al-Shebab fashion police crack down on wardrobe malfunctions
Get the look: Men’s fashion in Somalia never looked better. Fatigues look great paired with inexpensive tea towels and strands of bullets. Finish off the look with some stolen plastic cups, a bamboo cane, rifle and you’re set to go. For a sexy, sporty look, rub some sand around the eyes. For women, the modern look and ease of the burqa is a must-have in any well-styled wardrobe. They come in two fabulous colours, complimentary to any Muslim women’s skin tone, black and blue. Original designs provided by the House of Allah, brought to you by al-Shebab.
From The Telegraph U.K.
No splitting hairs with fundamentalist fashion police
Armed with assault rifles and scissors, the Shebab’s religious police are imposing a reign of terror – as well as crew cuts and bushy beards – on Somalia’s youth.
By Ali Musa Abdi, in Mogadishu for AFP
Published: 11:05AM GMT 23 Feb 2010
Published: 11:05AM GMT 23 Feb 2010
Get the look: the fundamentalist fashion police. Photo: AFP/Getty Images
Wearing a T-shirt with a Western print, a pair of tight jeans and wavy gelled back hair, Ahmed Aydarus Abdi is a dedicated follower of fashion, but not the style advocated in the Shebab’s hardline Wahhabi brand of Islam.
“I was stopped by Shebab gunmen who asked me questions about my haircut. They said the way I designed my hair was very silly,” he said.
“Without waiting for my reply, one of the gunmen pulled out a pair of scissors and cut off huge locks on one side of my head. He was dealing with it like it was grass, not human hair,” Abdi said.
As he recounted how he reluctantly had to finish the job himself, the 19 year-old cast worried glances around him, aware that his appearance was likely to still be offensive to the canons of Shebab sartorial elegance.
His friends encouraged him to comply.
“If he had attempted to defend his right to wear his hair the way he chooses, he would have been lashed in public, so we restrained our friend,” 20-year-old Mohamoud Hassan said. Continue Reading →
Metastasizing political correctness leads to security lapses
“The Qur’an has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts.
From The Ottawa Citizen
What’s scarier than terrorists? Lawyers
By David B. Harris, Citizen Special February 20, 2010
A month after the panty kamikaze and his explosive shorts smouldered their way into history, the Christmas day flame-up in a Detroit-bound airliner continues to raise questions about aviation security.
Despite occasional hysterics about “security theatre,” there is much to be said for emerging recommendations, like smart screening and body scanning. But Canadians must look at a particular problem — and an unorthodox solution — that, weeks later, continues to escape honest scrutiny.
The problem is the increasing threat that metastasizing political correctness presents to air-passengers. A possible answer involves the only group more widely dreaded than terrorists: lawyers.
Abd Al-Rahman Al-Rashed, former editor of the London-based Al-Sharq Al-Awsat newspaper, famously said “not all Muslims are terrorists but, regrettably, the majority of the terrorists in the world are Muslims.” The British Home Office reveals 91 per cent of those jailed or remanded on terror offences, are Muslim. Continue Reading →
Canada: Sharia finance comes to Centennial College
Bankers are lining up to enroll in Canada’s first sharia finance course at Ontario’s Centennial College. Spring classes are full. ‘One of the fastest growing markets is the Islamic business community…..’ Meanwhile, an Ottawa Imam has issued a fatwa against the use of credit cards.
From The Globe and Mail
Toronto school to offer course in Islamic finance
Centennial College will be the first in Canada to offer subject
Dutch TV interviews imam Fawaz Jneid.
Dutch TV interviews a Muslim cleric who was on Geert Wilders list of witnesses for the defence, but was denied by the court. I believe the line ‘practised at the art of deception’ best suits this imam. Thank you Mr. Jagger.
Canada: Imam tells Muslims credit card use unIslamic
From The Ottawa Citizen
Don’t use credit cards: Ottawa imam
Muslim leader reminds faithful interest is forbidden
By Jennifer Green, The Ottawa Citizen February 18, 2010 3:06 AM
Imam Khaled Abdul-Hamid Syed isued a fatwa against credit cards because they entail usury.
Photograph by: Jean Levac, The Ottawa Citizen, The Ottawa Citizen
In an economy awash in easy credit, Ottawa’s leading imam is definitely swimming against the tide.
Imam Khaled Abdul-Hamid Syed has issued a fatwa against credit cards, even if they are paid off every month.
“I conclude that it contains usury … which is forbidden in Islam, so it should not be used,” Khaled said in an e-mail to members of the main mosque on Northwestern Avenue. Continue Reading →
Group urges Muslims to avoid body scans
An Islamic group is telling travellers to U.S. to opt for pat-downs instead
CBCNEWS… An Islamic group is urging Muslim travellers to choose to be patted down by airport security rather than go through airport body scanners, a practice that it says violate religious and privacy rights. Someone needs to tell the Muslims that being able to board a plane is not a right.
The Fiqh Council of North America (FCNA) said the scanners, which produce a three-dimensional outline of a person’s naked body, are “against the teachings of Islam, natural law and all religions and cultures that stand for decency and modesty.” The Saudi butt bomb presents a different picture of Islamic decency and modesty.
“It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women,” the group said in a statement last week.
“The Qur’an has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts. Human beings are urged to be modest in their dress,” the group said. And Muslims are urged not to cover their private parts with bombs.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations also issued a statement of support of the FCNA’s recommendation.
The United States began using the scanners capable of detecting items hidden underneath clothing at airports as part of new security protocols put in place in the wake of the failed bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound flight on Christmas Day. Continue Reading →
Iran uses ‘enemies of God’ charge on protesters
(CNN) — Iran hanged two men at the end of January — the first political prisoners known to be executed in Iran since the demonstrations protesting the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, according to Amnesty International.
It’s still not entirely clear what Arash Rahmanipour and Mohammad Reza Ali-Zamani’s crime was. Rahmanipour’s lawyer said he was already in jail on election day in June 2009, so he couldn’t have been involved in the post-election uprising, she said.
But whatever their earthly crimes were, the two men executed last month were also accused of another offense far more serious than simply protesting against a government.
They were convicted of being “mohareb,” enemies of God.
That is the worst possible crime in Shiite Muslim law, according to Abbas Milani, the director of Iranian studies at Stanford University.
The legal implications are clear, he said.
“A mohareb, according to Shiite law, is executed,” he said.
That the regime is labeling its opponents enemies of God is a sign of how rattled it is by the protests, he said. Continue Reading →
Airport body scanners violate Islamic law, Muslims say
Vladtepesblog absolutely predicted this:
h/t snaphanen
By Niraj Warikoo
Free Press Staff Writer
Saying that body scanners violate Islamic law, Muslim-American groups are supporting a “fatwa” – a religious ruling – that forbids Muslims from going through the scanners at airports.
The Fiqh Council of North America – a body of Islamic scholars that includes some from Michigan – issued a fatwa this week that says going through the airport scanners would violate Islamic rules on modesty.
“It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women,” reads the fatwa issued Tuesday. “Islam highly emphasizes haya (modesty) and considers it part of faith. The Quran has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts.”
The decision could complicate efforts to intensify screening of potential terrorists who are Muslim. After the Christmas Day bombing attempt in Detroit by a Muslim suspect from Nigeria, some have called for the use of body scanners at airports to find explosives and other dangerous materials carried by terrorists. Some airports are now in the process of buying and using the body scanners, which show in graphic detail the outlines of a person’s body.
But Muslim groups say the scanners go against their religion. One option offered to passengers who don’t want to use the scanners would be a pat down by a security guard. The Muslim groups are urging members to undergo those instead.
Two members of the Fiqh Council are from Michigan, Imam Hassan Qazwini of the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn, and Imam Ali Suleiman Ali of the Canton Mosque. “Fiqh” means Islamic jurisprudence.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, which has a chapter in Michigan, says it endorses the fatwa.
“We support the Fiqh Council’s statement on full-body scanners and believe that the religious and privacy rights of passengers can
be respected while maintaining safety and security,” said Nihad Awad, national executive director of CAIR.
Currently, there are 40 full-body scanners at 19 airports in the U.S., including two of them in Detroit, said spokesman Jim Fotenos of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). There are plans for 450 more body scanners in U.S. airports, he said.
In a statement, the TSA said it is committed to keeping passengers safe and also protecting their privacy.
“TSA’s mission is to keep the traveling public safe. Advanced imaging technologies are an important tool in a multi-layered security system to detect evolving threats such as improvised explosive devices. TSA’s use of these technologies includes strong protections in place to safeguard passenger privacy. Screening images are automatically deleted, and the officer viewing the image will never see the passenger.”
The TSA stressed that the body scanners are “optional to all passengers.” Those who turn them down, “will receive equivalent screening that may include a physical pat-down, hand-wanding, and other technologies. Physical pat-downs are performed by Transportation Security Officers of the same sex as the passenger in a private screening area, if the passenger requests.”
Body scanners “do not produce photos,” the agency said. Rather, the images “look like chalk outlines.”
Body scanner images are available at www.tsa.gov.
Contact Niraj Warikoo: nw******@*******ss.com
Fiqh Council advises Muslims on Islamic law
The Fiqh Council is based in Plainfield, Ind., where it is affiliated with the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and advises Muslims on sharia, or Islamic law.
An earlier version of the group started in the 1960s with the Muslim Students Association of the United States and Canada. The chairman of the Fiqh Council is Muzammil Siddiqi, religious director of the Islamic Society of Orange County in California and former president of ISNA.
In its fatwa, the council said the use of body scanners “is against the teachings of Islam, natural law.”
h/t Ethan for the video
Fatwa: Love is an evil disease of the mind.
“I love you more than words can wield the matter, Dearer than eyesight, space and liberty” King Lear, Act 1, Scene 1; William Shakespeare.
The following fatwa, offered just in time for St. Valentine’s by the shiek(s) at Islam Q&A, provides much insight as to why Islam is so completely callous. To render heart felt love as a sin, a weakness, the evil choice of fools, a psychological disease and a direct competition for Allah’s affection is wretched. Of course such pronouncements are necessary in order to keep Islam functioning at it’s ‘heart-felt’ best.
Fatwa #82941.
Q. If a girl loves a boy from afar, has she committed a sin?
A. Praise be to Allaah.
Islam came to close the doors that lead to evil and sin, and is keen to block all the means that may lead to corruption of hearts and minds. Love and infatuation between the sexes are among the worst of problems.
Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah (may Allaah have mercy on him) said in Majmoo’ al-Fataawa (10/129):
Love is a psychological sickness, and if it grows strong it affects the body, and becomes a physical sickness, either as diseases of the brain, which are said to be diseases caused by waswaas, or diseases of the body such as weakness, emaciation and so on. End quote. Continue Reading →
Where’s the beef? Muslims appeal to French mayor to stop school cafeteria from serving meat
From EuropeNews
France: Municipality wants school cafeteria to stop serving meat to Muslims
Islam in Europe 8 February 2010
I don’t fully understand this story. If the parents don’t want their children to eat meat in the cafeteria, who’s forcing them? Some families did not want their children eating meat at the school cafeteria in Angoulême (France) for religious reasons. The mayor wants to grant their request.
No meat from the menu, but no alternative either. The municipality wants to officially mediate the delicate problem which arose non-officially several years ago: The families who don’t want their children to eat meat in the cafeteria for religious reason have turned to the mayor. The municipality wants the cafeteria staff to grant their request. Continue Reading →
12 year old Saudi girl fights to divorce 80 year old husband
From The Telegraph U.K.
Girl, 12, fighting to divorce 80-year-old husband in Saudi Arabia
A 12-year-old girl who wants to divorce her 80-year-old husband in Saudi Arabia will receive legal assistance from the government in what could become a test case for banning child marriage in the kingdom.
Published: 7:00AM GMT 09 Feb 2010
The state-run Human Rights Commission has hired a lawyer to represent the girl when she takes her case to court in Buraidah, a conservative town near the capital Riyadh.
Saudi Arabia, a patriarchal society that applies an austere version of Sunni Islam, has no minimum legal age for marriage. Fathers are granted guardianship over their daughters, giving them control over who their daughters marry and when. However, it is rare for a child bride to challenge the match.
A draft law prohibiting child marriage is under discussion and activists hope that the case will be a watershed in the campaign to ban the practice. Continue Reading →
A perversion of sexuality: the chronic abuse of Muslim women
From EuropeNews
Sexual abuse widespread among Muslims
HRS 5 February 2010
By Nicolai Sennels
Here we will dive into a dark and closed universe; a universe where women are forced to commit to lifelong sexual relationships with close family members, where abuse of women is seemingly extremely widespread, where girls and women are forced to hide their female beauty behind veils, long unflattering coats, burkas etc., where men are free to rape women, because women are often automatically seen as the ones at fault.
Rape and forced sexual relations
In the article ‘A Question of Honor’ in The Independent on February 10th 2009, British police were quoted estimating that nearly 17,000 women in Great Britain fall victim to honor related assaults, including rape and forced marriage, every year.
Vibe Klarup Voetmann, director of the Copenhagen women’s refuge Dannerhuset, said to the Danish daily Kristeligt Dagblad on the 11th of June 2008 that 70 percent of the nearly 1.400 women who contact the centre each year come from a Middle-Eastern background. As ‘Dannerhuset’ is just one of 40 women’s refuges in Denmark, there is reason to fear that the number of Muslim women who seek shelter or counseling due to forced marriages, domestic violence or sexual abuse, is actually much higher. It is also worth taking into consideration the fact that many Muslim women keep quiet about assaults out of fear of retaliation from the family. Thus, in Denmark alone, the number of Muslim women who are abused each year is likely to exceed several thousand.
Where is the honor in raping a woman or forcing her to marry a man she does not love? Continue Reading →