Category Archives: Islam in the Americas

On honour killing– writers, experts and readers weigh in

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Since news broke of the tragic Kingston Locks Ontario, honour killings, several articles have been written related to the story and on the broader issue of honour killing itself.  They continue to pour in to a variety of newspapers across the country. Here is a small sample of what has been written:

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This first article written by Marian Scott describes the marked difference between honour killings and domestic violence.

Honour Killings are distinct experts say: from The Vancouver Sun, Gazette.

A distinct kind of violence: experts

Honour killings described as different from domestic violence

By MARIAN SCOTT, The Gazette July 25, 2009

Honour killings are distinct from other kinds of family violence – and to say so does not discriminate against minorities, say two experts on the phenomenon.

“Analysis of more than 50 reported honour killings shows they differ significantly from more common domestic violence,” Phyllis Chesler, emerita professor of psychology at City University of New York, says in the spring edition of Middle East Quarterly.

In her analysis, Chesler acknowledged that her position runs counter to many Muslim advocacy organizations that say honour killings have nothing to do with Islam, and that it is discriminatory to distinguish them from other forms of domestic violence. Continue Reading →

Obama White House: Ahmadinejad elected leader of Iran

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From the Ottawa Citizen

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White House calls Ahmadinejad elected leader of Iran

Iran opposition to keep pressure on

By Parisa Hafezi, Reuters

The White House called Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the 'elected leader' of Iran on Tuesday when asked whether President Barack Obama recognized the Iranian president after the country's disputed election.

The White House called Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the ‘elected leader’ of Iran on Tuesday when asked whether President Barack Obama recognized the Iranian president after the country’s disputed election.

Photograph by: Behrouz Mehri, Getty Images

The White House called Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the “elected leader” of Iran on Tuesday when asked whether President Barack Obama recognized the Iranian president after the country’s disputed election.

“This was a decision and a debate ongoing in Iran by Iranians, they were going to choose their leadership,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. “He’s the elected leader.”

The White House has been careful not to comment on the legitimacy of the Iranian election and has condemned the government for its crackdown on opposition demonstrators.

Meanwhile, two prominent defeated Iranian presidential candidates said they would maintain their campaign against Ahmadinejad’s re-election, which has sparked Iran’s worst unrest since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Ahmadinejad will be sworn in by parliament on Wednesday, and the authorities will want to avoid any repeat of the street unrest after the disputed June 12 poll in which at least 20 people were killed and hundreds were detained.

Leading moderates have accused the government of electoral fraud and have branded the next Ahmadinejad administration as “illegal”.

The wife of Iran’s opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi said on Tuesday he would continue to contest the election result.

“Despite all the hardship, we will continue our path to fight against the result (of the election),” Zahra Rahnavard was quoted as saying by the reformist website Mowjcamp.

Mehdi Karoubi, the most liberal of the presidential candidates, was quoted by the Spanish El Pais daily as saying he too would continue to oppose the government.

“Neither Mousavi nor I have withdrawn. We will continue to protest and we will never collaborate with this government. We will not harm it, but we will criticize what it does,” Karoubi said in an interview.

“Quite honestly, if the authorities had acted in a different way, we would never have had these problems, because the majority of those protesting only did so for that reason.”

U.S. President Barack Obama and the leaders of France, Britain and Germany have all decided not to congratulate Ahmadinejad on his re-election.

“In view of the circumstances of the controversial re-election, the chancellor will not, as usual, write the normal letter of congratulation,” said a German government spokesman.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said: “I don’t have any reason to believe we will send any letter.” The Iranian government says the presidential election was fair and transparent and has accused Western nations, especially Britain and the United States, of being complicit in the bloody post-election unrest, a charge they deny.

Two former presidents, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami, who backed Mousavi’s failed presidential bid, boycotted Monday’s endorsement of the president by the Supreme Leader although they were present at such events in the past.

After the ceremony a witness said hundreds of Mousavi supporters, some of them honking car horns, gathered near a central Tehran square, where riot police and Basij militia were assembled to prevent any demonstration.

Mousavi’s credentials as a loyal servant of Iran’s revolution may help explain why he has escaped arrest for leading protests against an election he says was stolen to keep Ahmadinejad in power.

The 68-year-old moderate may lack charisma, but he has not hesitated from speaking out, castigating authorities for their handling of the election and its tumultuous aftermath. He has even defied his relative, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who backed Ahmadinejad.

“What has endeared him to the public is the fact that, contrary to former President (Mohammad) Khatami who would be reluctant to stand up to Khamenei and others, Mousavi has stuck to his guns,” said Mehrzad Boroujerdi, an Iran scholar at New York’s Syracuse University.

Mousavi has previously demanded the elections in the world’s fifth biggest oil exporter be annulled, but may need a new goal once Ahmadinejad is reinstalled.

“The plan should be to call into question the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad’s administration at every turn, through civil disobedience, and also to press for some revisions to the constitution,” Boroujerdi said.

The president now faces the difficult task of assembling a cabinet which is acceptable to the mostly conservative parliament, which may object if he just picks members of his inner circle. Parliament has in the past rejected some of Ahmadinejad’s cabinet choices.

Mousavi has yet to unveil a promised new political front with his reformist and pragmatist allies, perhaps partly because so many leading figures are in jail, including 100 whose trial for inciting unrest began on Saturday and resumes on Thursday.

Karoubi backs talks with the United States and other Western governments to attempt to open up the channels of communication with Iran, which is locked in dispute over its nuclear program that it says is for energy and the West suspects is for arms.

“The most beneficial thing for the Iranians is negotiations. Nobody benefits from our ongoing problems with the United States,” said Karoubi, highlighting one of the fissures in the clerical leadership that the election has exposed.

Another potential source of friction with the United States arose on Saturday when Iran arrested three American hikers who an Iraqi Kurdish official said had strayed across the border and who were being questioned by the Iranians.

“They are definitely Americans. They were detained four days ago. We don’t know whether they are tourists or not. We are questioning them,” security official Iraj Hassanzadeh told al-Alam state television on Tuesday.

© Copyright (c) Reuters

Islamic supremacist group Hizb ut-Tahrir promotes event with a beheaded Lady Liberty

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Close to one week ago, Vlad reported details concerning the Islamist Supremacist group Hizb ut-Tahrir and it’s global, conference initiative. Now the group has beefed up it’s visual promo campaign with a poster image out of Malaysia of a beheaded Statue of Liberty accompanied by New York City left in dust rubble and smoking ruin. Consider following the instructions given in the previous post ‘ Canada: Hizb ut-Tahrir to meet this week in Ontario’ to contact officials expressing concern regarding this group.

From R.E.A.L.

(thanks to www.thereligionofpeace.com)

Islamic Supremacist Hizb ut-Tahrir Event Promoted with Beheaded Statue of Liberty

By R.E.A.L. Organization • on July 31, 2009

Islamic Supremacist organization Hizb ut-Tahrir’s branch in Malaysia promoted its July 26, 2009 conference for a global Islamic Supremacist Caliphate with an image of a “beheaded” Statue of Liberty and NYC in smoking ruins.   The HT web site refers to democracy as “perverted.”

Hizb ut-Tahrir promotion for Islamic Supremacist Caliphate conference shows "beheaded" Statue of Liberty and "burning" NYC Hizb ut-Tahrir promotion for Islamic Supremacist Caliphate conference shows “beheaded” Statue of Liberty and “burning” NYC

The Hizb ut-Tahrir blog promoting such Islamic Supremacist conferences, such as those in Canada, U.S., and other countries, also promoted this image of violence against the United States on its blog as well.  The Hizb ut-Tahrir blog promoted this as part of “Hizb ut-Tahrir’s Global Rajab Campaign.”

This is the same Hizb ut-Tahrir blog promoting their Islamic Supremacist conference at a government-managed public facility in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada and the Hizb ut-Tahrir blog that promoted a link to the Hizb ut Tahrir America conference in Oak Lawn, Illinois at the Hilton Hotel.

This same Hizb ut-Tahrir blog promoting the July 31 event in Canada also promotes a pamphlet (page 62) that supports killing those individuals who leave Islam as guilty of “treason and a political attack on the Khilafah.”

The Chicago/Oak Lawn, IL Hizb ut-Tahrir conference against democracy and freedom at the Hilton Hotel was challenged by pro-freedom, pro-democracy protesters, and the protest was covered by local and national media.   The response thus far to the Canadian Hizb ut-Tahrir conference in a government-managed facility on July 31 has mostly been indifference by the Canadian media, with vague promises of an “investigation” by Canadian government offices.

On Monday, July 27, Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) contacted the Mississauga mayor’s office, the entire city council, Recreation and Parks department, and Mississauga law enforcement regarding the Hizb ut-Tahrir event planned at a government-managed facility for July 31.  The mayor went out of town; the manager of the Recreation and Parks department we spoke to also went out of town once we spoke to her.  Our discussions with mayor’s office were that the “mayor’s office has asked for an investigation on how this happened,” but the mayor’s office representative expected no further action.  A member of the Mississauga Recreation and Parks department indicated that the matter was forwarded to their regional police department for an investigation.  In discussions with the Peel regional law enforcement, they indicate that the Hizb ut-Tahrir activity is “being investigated,” and that there will be a police presence at the [Hizb ut-Tahrir Canada] event” on Friday, July 31.

Dishonourable Muslim Mass Murder in Canada; Phyllis Chesler on Kingston murders

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“Mainstream media should be linking Islamic, terrorist jihad and the subordination of women far more closely; the behaviour of some Muslim immigrants in the West may often conform more closely to the culture in which they were raised than to the Western culture in which they now live- especially where women are concerned”.  From the Chesler Chronicles.

Pajamas Media.

July 27th, 2009 8:36 am

Dishonorable Muslim Mass Murder in Canada

An Ongoing Cultural Autopsy

The information is so overwhelming and so awful that even the mainstream media has increasingly been forced to describe the plight of women in Muslim lands. Over the weekend, Nicholas D. Kristof (who has always been good on this) tells the story of a new Pakistani hero: Sixteen-year-old, Assiya Rafiq, who was kidnapped, sold, beaten and raped for a solid year—and then raped again when she went to the police to press charges. She, her supportive parents and siblings now live in hiding as she prepares to prosecute both the gang-members and the police.

Today, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal both have articles about the return of the Taliban to the Swat Valley in Pakistan and about what that means: The increased kidnapping and indoctrination of children into becoming jihadic warriors and the parallel brutalization of women, infidels, and civilians through beheadings, acid attacks, forced, harsh veiling, and bans on women shopping.

Islam Watch has just reported an increase in the caning of women in Bangladesh (a dangerous and crippling punishment). The same article also discusses the typical nightmare of one battered Afghan wife whose husband and in-laws kept trying to kill her—and whose own brothers are now trying to kill her because she dared flee and divorce the human monster. This one particular woman has lost custody of her nine children and lives in hiding with the help of an American charitable NGO. This is a picture of Afghanistan today.

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Which brings me to the Afghan-Canadian family which has just been charged with the mass murder of four of its female members. We in the West had better start factoring in the international and cultural realities that govern the histories and psychologies of immigrants from Muslim countries.

When a story is breaking and I’m on deadline, I try to do the best I can—but sometimes, I get important details, as well as minor details, wrong. And, I do not always draw certain conclusions right away.

For example, the Canadian Kingston police did not describe the cold-blooded murder of three innocent Afghan-Muslim girls (Zainab, Sahar, and Geeti Safi) and one innocent Afghan-Muslim woman (Rona Amir Mohammed) as a “Muslim honor killing.” The Canadian radio announcer did so as did other journalists. The police were very careful, and rightly so, to refrain from explicitly saying this.

National Post photoNational Post photo

However, according to all accounts, the police are on record as saying that they have evidence that the submerged car, in which all four victims were found drowned, had been driven or tampered with by the three Safi family members now under arrest; and that a female relative of Rona’s who lives in France told the media and the police about credible “death threats” that were leveled against Rona, who was Mohammed Safi’s first wife, (a fact that Mohammed did not disclose to the police or to his neighbors). Implied, but not yet clear, were possible death threats against Zainab Safi, the oldest of the three murdered daughters, who was becoming too “western.”

It is my guess that Rona supported the girls in their desire to become “Canadians” and that no love was lost between her and Mohammed’s second wife, Tooba Mohammed Yahya, also charged with her murder. Please understand: This is a wild, intuitive guess on my part, subject to change.

Westerners—perhaps it is only me—often have a problem with the Muslim names. No, it is not because I am a “racist Islamophobe” but rather because everyone seems to be named Mohammed or Mumammed; it becomes quite confusing. In this one case, we have Mohammed Safi, Rona Amir Mohammed, Tooba Mohammed Yahya. Also, the spelling of names (shades of Ellis Island and all our ancestors!) is also subject to change. Thus, this Mohammed’s last name is spelled Safia, or Safii or Safi.

Another mea culpa. Safi and his second wife have seven children altogether. Three are now in state care and one, Hamid Mohammed, (another Mohammed!) is now in police custody.

Here’s a small but important detail that I did not develop. Initially, the family members put on quite a performance. Mohammed Shafi, his second wife, Tooba Mohammed Yahya, and the biological mother of the three murdered girls, went to the police to report that their family members and second car were missing. They wept, appeared distraught, seemed in shock, carried on like mourners. But it all may have been an act.

Now, where else have we seen such behavior? Ah yes: The iconic Mohammed al-Dura’s father was also distraught about his son’s death—presumably at Israeli hands. That death turns out to have been staged by Palestinians. The world was sold a bill of Pallywood goods. Read Philippe Karsenty, Richard Landes, Nidra Poller, and Pierre Rehov on the al-Dura case and on other instances in which Palestinian Muslim propagandists and terrorists have tricked the world media into believing that Israel was the “Nazi” aggressor—all the while diverting attention from Palestinian crimes against their own people, as well as from their considerable aggression towards Israelis, Jews, and Christians.

The entire world also believed that the Israelis committed a “massacre,” a “genocide” in Jenin—when the truth was quite the opposite; to avoid world condemnation, Israel chose to send soldiers in on foot, (24 angels died), to heavily booby-trapped streets and to buildings which hid expert Palestinian snipers dressed as civilians who, in turn, held real Palestinian civilians hostage. Palestinians subsequently spoke to the media on camera weeping about the “genocide,” claiming false injuries at Israeli hands, alleging that Israeli hospitals would not treat them. I wrote about this in my book The New Anti-Semitism. The Current Crisis and What We Must Do About It.

My points: Mainstream media should be linking Islamic, terrorist jihad and the subordination of women far more closely; the behavior of some Muslim immigrants in the West may often conform more closely to the culture in which they were raised than to the western culture in which they now live—especially where women are concerned.

Also of interest: A number of Canadian newspapers from Vancouver and Montreal to Toronto have cited my study on honor killings which appeared in the spring issue of Middle East Quarterly. To a lesser extent than usual, the media also found people who said that this may not be an honor killing (I agree, the case has not yet been proven in a court of law); that dishonorable honor killings are rare and certainly not as epidemic as western-style domestic violence (not true—not all domestic violence ends in femicide); that honor killings have nothing to do with Islam (alright, but if so, why are so many—mainly–Muslims murdering their daughters, sisters, and wives?)

A final point: My piece about the Kingston mass murders/dishonorable killings has drawn yet another Islamist to my site. For those who are interested, take a look. One fellow (maybe it’s a woman, who can tell?) first tried to convert the other commentators to Islam; then dismissed any and all criticism of Islam/Islamism by “unbelievers”; and finally ended by cursing the non-believing Kufar infidels.

Who could make this up?

Getting the story straight and the art of misdirection

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I thought I would juxtapose these two editorial pieces to illustrate how the intentional misuse of the words racism, bigotry, intolerance and discrimination have become useful distractions from the truth in any matter pertaining to Muslim violence. This is a deliberate strategy by Islamists and sadly by extension, some thoughtful but misguided people trapped in the relativist rabbit hole to avoid any and all legitimate reporting on Islamic extremism. It would appear that they would rather hide behind terms that were once reserved for real, not mythical instances of cruelty leveled at innocents by ignorant, bigoted thugs than confront the obvious hate crimes played out most often against each other, within their own communities.

The first is written by Dolores Chew and Farha Najah Hussain published in the Montreal Gazette. Both women are members of the Montreal based South Asian Women’s Community Centre. Let me say that I understand their call to end violence against all women, but to insist that honour killings have no connection to Islam is false. Worse, to label the media as a bunch of rabble-rousing racists for reporting such tragedies with obligatory honesty is simply wrong.

The second piece written by Leonard Stern in the Ottawa Citizen directly confronts the issue displayed in the first. So, not only does the media have to cover such violence, but too often have to write a story about the story, explaining the necessity for well, writing the first story with the inclusion of the facts.

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Patriarchy and violence against women exist in all societies

Media are wrong to focus on ‘honour killing’ as reason for violence

By DOLORES CHEW and FARHA NAJAH HUSSAIN, The GazetteJuly 28, 2009

Immigrant and Muslim women are often put in a paralyzing position when violence occurs against such women in Canada.

This position is a result of the media’s misunderstanding of how patriarchy manifests itself in societies around the world, including North America. This misunderstand forces us and our communities to fight the racism in media reports and readers’ commentaries when we should otherwise be facing the challenge of eliminating all forms of control and violence against women and children.

First, we would like to extend our sympathies to those who are grieving the loss of their friends, family and community members – Zainab Shafia, Sahari Shafia, Geeti Shafia and Rona Amir Mohammad.

And although Mohammad Shafia, Tooba Mohammad Yahya and Hamed Shafia have been charged with murder and conspiracy to commit murder, they have been convicted of nothing, so it is important to speak generally about the issue of violence against women and children.

Gender violence must be analyzed comprehensively, not viewed as a “cultural problem” among certain communities. If a white man kills his partner and/or children, he is seen as a murderer and a “bad apple.” But when non-whites and non-Christians kill, the crime is often called an “honour killing” and entire communities and cultures are labelled as “backward.”

We agree with the statement of Alia Hogben of the Canadian Council of Muslim Women: “Violence against women is endemic in societies where men wield control over women’s lives” and that patriarchal thinking is not limited to the Middle East and Asia. Indeed, as Adeema Niazi of the Toronto-based Afghan Women’s Organization states: “Violence against women exists everywhere.”

This violence includes the actions by partners or family members who think they can control the lives of women and children.

We would like to address the false premise in the Canwest News Service article. “Western freedoms a source of family conflict,” (Gazette, July 24). The article quotes Dianna Nammi saying that children of immigrants who grow up in Western nations take certain freedoms for granted, and this can lead to conflict with their parents.

Nammi states that when moving to another country, parents bring with them culture, traditions and religion and they “are choosing to show the worst part of that, and the worst and criminal part of that is controlling women.”

As an immigrant and a child of immigrants, we feel this assumes that women in other parts of the world are merely victims, not three-dimensional humans fighting to live dignified lives based on justice. Women all over the world are struggling against patriarchal violence.

In Canada, for example, aboriginal women continue to demand justice for more than 500 missing native women. In Afghanistan, women are fighting gender violence within family and local political structures as well as fighting against the violence caused by a foreign invasion.

It is wrong to think that the clash between parents and children is a simple matter of Western-influenced immigrant children vs. their backward parents. Inter-generational differences and conflict are not confined to any region or culture. Around the world, youths are in conflict with their parents about how to live their lives. This is nothing new.

As members of the South Asian Women’s Community Centre, we are no strangers to violence against women. The SAWCC, family and friends have been demanding justice for Milia, a young woman of Bangladeshi origin, who was murdered in Angrignon Park more than 10 years ago. The murder has never been solved. SAWCC has also held commemoration events for the Polytechnique women murdered by Marc Lépine as well as participated in countless campaigns demanding an end to violence against women and children.

It is important that the media stop resorting to stereotypes and clichés. Instead, they should analyze gender violence from an anti-racist and anti-patriarchal perspective to contribute effectively to discussions concerning patriarchal violence.

Dolores Chew is a founding member and Farha Najah Hussain is a member of the Montreal based South Asian Women’s Community Centre.

© Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette
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Politically incorrect, but honest

By Leonard Stern, The Ottawa CitizenAugust 1, 2009 5:04 AM

Muslim leaders have long cried foul when the media highlight the religious affiliation of suicide terrorists. Murders of all kinds happen every day and news reports don’t note which perpetrators attended a Methodist church or which were baptized Catholic. Why the double standard for Muslims?

The religion of those such as the 9/11 hijackers was — is — relevant because, in their minds, the crimes were religious acts. It’s impossible to ignore the Islamic dimension of crimes that are executed in the name of Islam. To pretend that the shared religious identity of al-Qaeda operatives is coincidence would be absurd.

Now it’s fair to ask the media at least to make clear that while terrorists see themselves as holy warriors, they might not represent true Islam. But that’s not what some Muslim leaders are asking. The Islamic Society of North America wants to abandon altogether any mention of the Muslim aspect. “We should just call them criminals,” said Muneer Fareed, the Islamic Society’s spokesman. The Canadian Islamic Congress has likewise referred to the “myth of ‘Islamic’ Terrorism.”

The legitimacy of the term “Islamic terrorism,” to denote terrorism committed in the name of Islam, is easy to defend. But in other criminal cases, it’s trickier to explore the relevance of culture, race, religion or national origin.

This is an issue journalists, police and politicians struggle with all the time. Much of the gun violence in Toronto, for example, is apparently connected to the black community, often Jamaican-Canadian, whose members comprise a disproportionate number of both victims and assailants. But for a long time you wouldn’t have known this from any public discussion about crime in Toronto.

Globe and Mail columnist Margaret Wente broke the taboo after the 2005 Boxing Day shooting death of Jane Creba, the 15-year-old who got caught in the crossfire between warring gangs. Wente said it was ridiculous that amid all the handwringing over Toronto’s unsafe streets, “the word ‘Jamaica’ can’t be found … even though police will tell you off the record that 80 per cent or more of the city’s gun crime is Jamaican-related.”

The downside of acknowledging these cultural connections is that doing so can unfairly tar an entire community and perpetuate stereotypes. I’m sure Wente got grief for her column.

But covering them up also incurs costs. First, it’s dishonest. Politicians and social activists who pretend that these shootings are just expressions of generic “youth violence,” when everyone knows otherwise, lose credibility. Secondly, it’s impossible to fix a problem when you deny it exists.

Resources are finite, and need to be directed where most needed. A Caribbean-Canadian growing up at Jane and Finch in Toronto is more vulnerable to gang influences, and therefore in greater need of interventions, than a Korean-Canadian teenager in Markham. A young Muslim in Mississauga is more likely to encounter images of militant Islam than his Italian-Canadian counterpart living around Dufferin Street.

Of course bad people can incubate in any community, but cultural or ethnic groups have particular vulnerabilities. It shouldn’t be forbidden to say so. As one who has always emphasized the Islamic dimension of suicide terrorism, I recently received a gloating letter from someone hoping to catch me in an inconsistency. The writer was under the impression that I would naturally object to news reports mentioning the Jewishness of Bernie Madoff, the Wall Street swindler.

Actually, if I had been the reporter to break the Madoff story, I’d have not only highlighted the Jewish connection, I’d have put it in the lead. Heck, I’d make it the headline. Sure it’s a little different from the issue of Islam and terrorism — Madoff wasn’t expressing an article of religious faith in defrauding people. But Madoff operated within a defined ethnic network, the monied Jewish community of New York, which is why police classified his escapade as a crime of “affinity.”

The crime was made possible because Madoff exploited his position as a big shot — a macher — in that network. I mentioned earlier that we shouldn’t be afraid to say that ethno-cultural groups have particular vulnerabilities. Madoff was as sleazy as they come but his perceived ability to make money conferred on him much status in the Jewish world, which he took advantage of.

Although financial misbehaviour is an equal opportunity vice, rabbis and others who teach Jewish ethics are not out of line to worry that the accumulation of Ivan Boeskys, Michael Milkens and Bernie Madoffs eventually points to misplaced values in some corners of the Jewish community.

Right now there’s a debate whether to situate honour killings in a Muslim context. Some people want simply to place these murders in the catch-all category of “domestic violence.” I suppose that it would be politically convenient for multiculturalists to de-Islamicize honour killings, but it sure won’t do much towards actually stopping them.

Leonard Stern is the Citizen’s editorial pages editor.

E-mail: ls****@****************st.com

Barbara Kay: Honour killing is not ‘domestic’ violence

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Barbara Kay makes an extremely important point, and one in urgent need of making. She points out in this excellent article below how Multi-culturalists insist on failing to differentiate between the exception and the rule. The exception? When a non Muslim murders a family member. The rule? when a Muslim does it because she (I treat it as given that the victim is female) broke the Islamic laws that require women to act as property and not as people capable of making choices. Choices that their owners, (father, brother or husband) may not like.

Canada’s first and best example perhaps of what Barbara is talking about below, might be the Ecole Polytechnique shooting by one ‘Marc Lepine’, the son of an Algerian Muslim who stated quite clearly that women should not be taught engineering but should be at home looking after men and children.

Canada’s feminists and media used this horrific mass killing as an excuse for misandry and, to the shame of all levels of government, so did they.

This monument, itself a direct and clear violation of Canada’s own hate literature laws was placed in downtown Ottawa to commemorate the Lepine massacre. To this day the vast majority of Canadians do not know that he was in fact Muslim, and his real name was Gamil Rodrigue Gharbi.

IMG_0033Eeyore for Vlad

Posted: July 29, 2009, 8:00 AM by NP Editor

Following news of the arrest last week of Mohammad Shafia, his wife, Tooba Mohammad Yahya, and their 18-year old son, Hamed, for the alleged murder of four female family members, a case exhibiting several earmarks of a culturally motivated crime, I steeled myself for the usual media scramble to deplore all acts of “domestic violence.” I was therefore pleased that Saturday’s Post instead featured plain-spoken anti-Islamist Tarek Fatah’s vigorous denunciation of the practice of “honour killing.”

No doubt ruffling many multi-culti feathers, the fearless Mr. Fatah, a distinguished scholar of Islam and religious hypocrisy’s scourge, categorically stated that “man-made shariah law, which has been falsely imputed divine status, does allow for the killing of women if they indulge in pre-marital or extramarital consensual sex.”

Liberals deliberately conflate domestic violence with honour killing because they feel that making any distinction would “racialize” the crimes, indicting a whole culture. But in order to avoid offending the minority communities in which honour killings occur, they must then “genderize” the practice by force-fitting it into the category of all male-on-female domestic violence.
For theory’s sake — all cultures are equal — they willingly indict an entire sex for these horrific crimes. Clearly liberal ideologues consider misandry a lesser evil than racism (and to many feminists no evil at all, rather an entitlement and a pleasure).

Male-female relations are culturally determined. In reality, for a Western man to kill a girl or woman under his protection for any “reason” at all — let alone her sexual choices — runs so counter to our own chivalric tradition of honour (vestigial as it is), that such rare acts are always linked to psychological derangement. To misrepresent the impulse to murder one’s wife or daughters as a generically male characteristic is a misandric slander, and every bit as contemptible as racism.
Part of the problem lies in the phrase “domestic violence,” which seems to encompass any violence that occurs in a household. And, unfortunately, it is received wisdom in our highly feminized society to believe that domestic violence, like honour killing, is a one-way street: male on female. That’s not the case, but cracking the shell of this unusually hard-boiled myth is a thankless task for truth-tellers in the field. Continue Reading →

United Church proposal attacked as anti-Semitic

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By Charles Lewis, National Post

A proposal being considered by the United Church of Canada that seeks peace in the Middle East through boycotts of Israeli institutions is an expression of “anti-Semitic behaviour” and an “obscene gesture from a religious group,” major Jewish organizations say.

The resolutions, which will be brought before the Church’s upcoming general council, call for a “comprehensive boycott of Israeli academic and cultural institutions at the national and international levels” and refer to the recent assault on Gaza as a “visible reminder of the ongoing Israeli regime of exclusion, violence and dehumanization directed against Palestinians.”

They also say that Israel was “built mainly on land ethnically cleansed of its Palestinian owners,” and make reference to the effectiveness of boycotts when dealing with state-sponsored racial discrimination and violence as was the case in South Africa.

“This puts the United Church in some very questionable company,” said Eric Vernon, director of government affairs for the Canadian Jewish Congress. “The use of boycott, divestment and sanction has been a weapon used by Israel’s enemies to destroy it. Those are elements of anti-Semitic behaviour in the contemporary world.”

“I am disgusted with the proposal,” said Frank Dimant, the chief executive officer of B’nai Brith Canada.

“I think at a time when we are fighting Islamofascism around the world, when Canadian soldiers are fighting Islamofascism [in Afghanistan], the attempt by these resolutions is to hurt in a most profound way one of the countries at the forefront in that battle. This is an obscene gesture by a religious group, and my hope is that Christians will turn their backs on this resolution,” Mr. Dimant said.

The resolutions, one of dozens of proposals on many different issues, will be debated and voted on at the Church’s general council in August. Proposals are brought forward by different regional bodies rather that a central committee of the whole Church, so it is impossible to tell how much support the proposal will have, said Reverend Bruce Gregersen, a United Church spokesman.

In 2006, a proposal to cut financial investments in Israeli companies never made it to a vote because a clear majority of delegates at that time had no interest in the measure, Rev. Gregersen said. Instead, he said, a resolution was passed to invest in Israeli companies that promote peace.

He said the Church has also criticized such countries as Myanmar and the Sudan for human rights abuses but only the former apartheid regime of South Africa was ever subject to a church boycott.

“The Canadian Jewish Congress has consistently argued that language that seeks to undermine the existence of the state of Israel is anti-Semitic. And we would agree with that,” Rev. Gregersen said.

“But these proposals are not meant to undermine the state of Israel but rather calling on them to make moves towards peace.

“In 2003, the Church said that we affirm the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state. And that’s a significant commitment. What is means is that we are strongly supportive of the existence of Israel for the sake of the Jewish people in the world.”

The current proposal also makes clear that Palestinians have to stop suicide bombings and other violent attacks directed at Israeli civilians.

Mr. Vernon of the Canadian Jewish Congress said he believes the vast majority of United Church members are decent people and when they are made aware of the facts they will reject the proposal.

“They have a commendable sense of issues dealing with international justice, but they just seem to have a very problematic perspective on the situation between Israel and the Palestinians.”

Canada considers harsher penalties for ‘honour killings’

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From Cnews:

h/t Grace

OTTAWA — Public Safety Minister Peter Van Loan opened the door to tougher penalties for honour killings yesterday, saying it is a crime Canadian society cannot accept.

“This notion that it is appropriate to kill a family member because of your disapproval of their lifestyle or choices like that is simply unacceptable in our society. I have a very serious problem with that.”

Van Loan’s comments come less than a week after Mohammad Shafia, his wife and son were arrested and charged with first degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder in connection with the deaths of three daughters and a female member of his family. The women were found in a car underwater in the Rideau Canal in Kingston in what some suspect may have been an honour killing.

Speaking to reporters outside a Conservative caucus meeting, Van Loan said murder is already against the law and the Shafia case will be tried under the existing criminal code.

However, Van Loan said he would be willing, if necessary, to look at changes to the law.

“I’m certainly open to seeing whether there is a place for changes but up to this point, I haven’t seen that there is a need for changes to the criminal code. Certainly that is something for the minister of justice to consider.”

Van Loan said he believes the very term honour killing is “highly inappropriate” and those who move to Canada need to know that “those kinds of norms and values” are not appropriate.

“We certainly try to encourage people when they come to Canada to recognize the importance of Canadian values and to respect the laws of this country. That’s something that we expect all people who come to Canada to do.”

el****************@******ia.ca

Canada: Hizb ut-Tahrir to meet this week in Ontario

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From R.E.A.L…. 

On Friday, July 31, 2009, the Islamic supremacist organization Hizb ut-Tahrir will be holding another public conference, this time in the Ontario, Canada city of Mississauga.  Unlike the July 19, 2009 Hizb ut-Tahrir conference which was held at a private facility in Chicago suburb Oak Lawn’s Hilton Hotel, the Canadian Hizb ut-Tahrir meeting will be held at a Canadian government-managed public facility, the Mississauga Valley Community Center.

1. Hizb ut-Tahrir Seeks to Promote Supremacism in Canada

The Islamic supremacist Hizb ut-Tahrir (HT) Canadian event is publicized on the Hizb ut-Tahrir web site as being sponsored by “Hizb ut-Tahrir Canada” as part of HT’s “2009 Khilafah Campaign,” which included the July 19, 2009 HT event in the Chicago Oak Lawn, IL suburb.  HT has advertised this event to be held at the Canadian govt-managed facility in Mississauga for: “Friday, July 31st, 6.30PM to 8.30PM, Frank Bean Lounge — Mississauga Valley Community Center, 1275 Mississauga Valley Blvd, L5A 3R8.”   The HT Canada event has also been promoted by a Toronto, Canada website called “TorontoMuslims.com”.  (R.E.A.L. contacted this Toronto Muslim website to ask why they were promoting such a supremacist organization’s event, and received no reply.)

The Hizb ut-Tahrir web site promoting the July 31 event in Canada also promotes a pamphlet (page 62) that supports killing those individuals who leave Islam as guilty of “treason and a political attack on the Khilafah.”

According to the Canadian Criminal Code Section 318:

“318. (1) Every one who advocates or promotes genocide is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years.”
“(2) In this section, ‘genocide’ means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy in whole or in part any identifiable group, namely,”
“(a) killing members of the group; or”
“(b) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction…”
“(4) In this section, ‘identifiable group’ means any section of the public distinguished by colour, race, religion, ethnic origin or sexual orientation.”

Researcher Madeleine Gruen believes that U.S. member of HT Mohammad Malkawi may speak at the Canadian conference, because Mohammad Malkawi has previously given speeches in Canada.  HT’s Mohammad Malkawi moderated the July 19 HT conference in Chicago suburb of Oak Lawn.

2. Efforts to Alert Canadian Government Agencies to HT Supremacist Meeting at Govt-Managed Facility

Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) has attempted to contact the Mississauga government to make them aware of the supremacist nature of the Hizb ut-Tahrir organization that it has rented use of the Mississauga Valley Community Centre Frank Bean Lounge facility to for their July 31 conference.  After speaking to a representative at the Community Centre (905-615-4670), we were re-directed to the Mississauga government agency involved in booking the Frank Bean Lounge facility, the Mississauga government recreation and parks department (905-615-4100, choose “facility booking”).

R.E.A.L.’s Jeffrey Imm spoke to a manager with the  Mississauga recreation and parks department on this, and she stated that they are “looking into this.”  The Mississauga recreation and parks manager also stated the person who made the booking of the Frank Bean Lounge facility for the Canadian Hizb ut-Tahrir meeting had held “previous meetings” there, and Mississauga “never had any problems or issues” with them.  On the Mississauga web site regarding renting such facilities, one of the primary concerns is the use of such facilities in terms of serving alcoholic beverages.

In addition, R.E.A.L.’s Jeffrey Imm contacted the diversity relations unit of Mississauga local law enforcement — highlighting that the group promoting the Canadian HT event – is also promoting a brochure that calls for the death penalty for Muslims who leave Islam as guilty of “treason and a political attack on the Khilafah” (page 62).

3. Contact Canadian and Mississauga Legislators

We urge those concerned about the growing threat of the Hizb ut-Tahrir supremacist movement and its efforts to justify violence against those who seek freedom of religion to contact Canadian and Mississauga legislators to voice their outrage about this supremacist group using a Mississauga facility.  Apparently, this is not the first time such proponents of Hizb ut-Tahrir’s supremacist ideology have used Canadian public facilities either.  Contact Canadian and Mississauga government officials to get an answer as to why Canadian public facilities are being used to spread such supremacist hate.

Contact Mississauga Mayor Hazel McCallion
Email: ma***@*********ga.ca
Phone: 905-896-5555

Contact Mississauga City Council – see list

Contact Mississauga Valley Facility Rentals:
Phone: 905-615-4670 — Fax: 905-615-4671

Contact Mississauga Valley Tourism:
Phone: 905-896-5998

Web Page to Contact Ombudsman Ontario

Contact Mississauga News

US textbooks show Jesus was a palistinian and the USA was discovered by Muslims

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Turkish police arrest ‘Islamists’

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LetsPretendThe same group that recently gathered in Chicago under a “Welcome to America” sign loses a few members to the authorities in Turkey.

BBC…Turkish police have arrested almost 200 people suspected of being members of the banned Islamist group Hizb al-Tahrir al-Islami, reports say.

The arrests were made early in the morning during simultaneous raids in 23 cities, the Anatolia news agency said.

Turkish police have repeatedly detained members of the group in the past.

Founded in 1953, Hizb al-Tahrir seeks to establish a pan-Islamic state covering all Muslim lands. It is banned in many countries throughout the world.

The group is widely viewed as extremist and anti-Semitic. However, it denies these charges and says it preaches non-violent political Islam.

Family disowns Arizona girl, 8, after alleged gang sex assault

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From: The Ottawa Citizen h/t Grace

By Maria PollettaJuly 24, 2009

PHOENIX – The family of an eight-year-old girl who was allegedly gang-sexually assaulted will not take her back into their home, declaring that the girl has dishonoured them.

Charges have been filed against four boys, ages nine to 14, suspected of sexually assaulting the girl in Phoenix, Arizona, last week, the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office announced Thursday.

County attorney Andrew Thomas has requested the oldest boy be tried as an adult.

The boys are accused of luring the girl with chewing gum to a shed by a vacant apartment unit, then restraining her and taking turns sexually assaulting her, according to Phoenix police.

The boys and the victim were resettled Liberian refugees.

The girl was turned over to state Child Protective Services after her family disowned her, Phoenix Police spokesman Sgt. Andy Hill said Wednesday. The girl’s parents blamed her for being victimized and bringing shame to the family, he said.

Thomas filed a criminal complaint against the 14-year-old suspect Wednesday, accusing him of two counts of sexual assault and one of kidnapping in the July 16 incident. He is being held without bond, which state law requires due to the nature of the crime.

The other three boys, aged nine, 10 and 13, will be prosecuted in juvenile court. The youngest faces a count of sexual assault, while the 10- and 13-year-old boys each face multiple counts of sexual assault and one of kidnapping, county attorney Andrew Thomas said in a news release.

The county attorney’s office has 15 days to determine whether to petition the court to transfer any of the remaining cases.

Ali Keita, a Liberian who immigrated to the United States in 1997, said the crime was “horrible” and “serious.”

As president of the Arizona Mandingo Association, Keita works with Liberian refugees to ease their integration into American society. Keita said many refugees he has worked with lived amidst rampant rape and brutal violence in Liberia, commonplace during the country’s recent civil war.

Keita suspects the four boys were no different.

“Most of those boys (probably) grew up in very broken family situations,” Keita said, explaining that many parents found it hard to maintain control over their children’s upbringing as rebel attacks constantly forced them to relocate.

But, he said, “there is no excuse for the crime, for the behaviour” of the four boys.

Keita was less clear when judging the girl’s family’s response to the situation.

Anger is common when Liberian families first find out a female relative has been raped or assaulted, he said, as they may question why girls were in a situation that left them open for attack.

Keita said that initial response likely stems from disappointment and frustration, not with the girl, but with the family’s circumstances.

“(As a parent), you feel like you’ve failed … to protect them,” he said.

Though Keita understood the root of the family’s initial anger, he firmly condemned the decision to disown the girl, which he said is not typical.

“(The family) should be the ones trying to get her all the help she can get,” he said. “You can’t blame the victims. Then, you’re victimizing them all over again.”

For more on this story, please visit the Arizona Republic at www.azcentral.com.

Frank Gafney on the confrence in Chicago

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Frank Gaffney on Fox News discusses Hizb Ut-Tahrir, the Muslim Brotherhood and the consequences of so-called ‘hate crimes’ legislation opening the door to shariah-influenced blasphemy laws.

Mark Steyn: Kingston not a good place for female Muslims.

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From The National Review:

Watery Graves [Mark Steyn]

Three or so weeks back, a submerged car was found in the Rideau Canal in Kingston, Ont., containing the bodies of three teenage girls and their aunt — a story initially reported as Mysterious Death Of 4 Quebecers Baffles Kingston Police. When it emerged that the four female Quebecers were, in fact, Muslim, the tearful parents offered up a strange tale of an impromptu midnight driving lesson gone tragically wrong (Driving Lesson May Have Led To Drowning).

La Presse is now reporting that the girls’ father, mother, and brother have been arrested en route to Montreal Airport, and that the deceased “aunt” or (alternatively) “cousin” was, in fact, the girls’ father’s first wife. The words “crime d’honneur” are beginning to creep into newspaper accounts.

Meanwhile, the blogger Scaramouche suggests that, while they’re looking into honor killings in the Kingston area, the constabulary might take a gander at another curious aquatic accident this month:

Police say 14-year-old Kinza Kaianad died Monday evening at Kingston General Hospital as a result of injuries she sustained Saturday in a hotel pool in Gananoque, roughly 30 kilometres east of Kingston.

Her mother, 43-year-old Naila Yasmin, died in hospital on Sunday.

Yasmin, Kaianad and another daughter, age 11, were found unconscious in the indoor hotel pool just before 9 a.m. Saturday.

There would seem to be a statistically improbable number of multiple drownings of female members of Muslim families in Kingston this summer. If you’re a young female Muslim, and you have any say in the matter, you might want to vacation elsewhere.

[UPDATE: The third Muslim girl found in the swimming pool has died. That’s seven drowned young Muslim females showing up in the same morgue within a month. In other circumstances, they’d be planning the movie with Ashley Judd or some such as the crusading feminist Assistant DA. But as the M-word’s involved I expect poor Zainab Shafi and the rest will be quickly forgotten.]

‘Honour killings’ of females on rise in Canada: Expert

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From Canada.Com:

By Shannon Proudfoot, Canwest News ServiceJuly 23, 2009 8:46 PM

As many as 5,000 women and girls lose their lives — most at the hands of family members — in “honour killings” around the world each year, according to the United Nations.

Up to a dozen have died for the same reason in Canada in the last decade, and it’s happening more often, says Amin Muhammad, a psychiatrist who studies honour killings at Memorial University in Newfoundland.

“There are a number of organizations which don’t accept the idea of honour killing; they say it’s a Western-propagated myth by the media, but it’s not true,” he says. “Honour killing is there, and we should acknowledge it, and Canada should take it seriously.”

Kingston, Ont., police are now investigating that as a motive in the deaths of three teenage sisters and an older female relative who were found in a car submerged in the Rideau Canal in Kingston on June 30. The girls’ mother, father and brother were arrested on Wednesday and charged with first-degree murder.

“In our Canadian society, we value the cultural values of everyone that makes up this great country, and some of us have different core beliefs, different family values, different sets of rules,” Kingston Police Chief Stephen Tanner said at a news conference on Thursday. “Certainly, these individuals — in particular, the three teenagers — were Canadian teenagers who have all the freedom and rights of expression of all Canadians.”

He added that he’d received an e-mail from an extended family member of the girls, suggesting honour killing was to blame for their deaths. Continue Reading →