Shabbat Shalom to All

Five match ban for Anelka

Posted by David Hirsh

Nicolas Anelka was charged by the Fooball Association as follows:

1. In or around the 40th minute of the match he made a gesture (known as the ‘quenelle’) which was abusive and/or indecent and/or insulting and/or improper, contrary to FA Rule E3(1); and

2. That the misconduct was an “Aggravated Breach” as defined by FA Rule E3(2) in that it included a reference to ethnic origin and/or race and/or religion or belief.

The Independent Regulatory Commission found charge 1 proved.

It found charge 2 proved also; but then it went on to say: “We did not find that Nicolas Anelka is an Anti-Semite or that he intended to express or promote Anti-Semitism by his use of the quenelle.”

So on the question of antisemitism: it was found that his gesture was aggravated by a reference to ethnic origin and/or race and/or religion or belief, but it did not find that Anelka was himself “an antisemite” or that he had an antisemitic intent.

It is the FA’s position that Anelka performed an antisemitic gesture but without intent to promote antisemitism or without being, himself, an antisemite.

Originally Anelka had said that the gesture was only performed in solidarity with his friend Dieudonné.

It seems to be the FA’s position that Anelka did not know that the gesture, or that Dieudonné who invented it, were antisemitic.  This is difficult to believe, particularly given that he described Dieudonné as his friend.

Dieudonné has been found guilty six times in France of antisemitism; he is a well known Holocaust denier; Anelka is French, and so, it is to be assumed, is more familiar with these issues than most people in the UK, at least before he decided to import them there.  The match was screened live in France.

They said what he did was antisemitic (aggravated by race etc) but they accepted his claim that he was stupid, and didn’t know what he was doing.  I’m not convinced he’s so stupid.

To understand the quenelle, its origins and how it works, see this piece by David Hirsh.

For the FA finding see here.

Click here for images of the quenelle being performed in explicitly antisemitic contexts.

'IM Plotted to Kidnap Jews to Bargain for Al-Qaeda Woman'

Indian Mujahideen was planning to kidnap "Jews" and "white persons" to bargain for release of Pakistani scholar Aafia Siddique, an alleged Al-Qaeda operative jailed for 86 years in the US, the NIA has said.

In a supplementary charge sheet filed before a Delhi court against IM co-founder Yasin Bhatkal and his three aides, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) said that during his stay in Nepal, Yasin had discussed with top IM member Riyaz Bhatkal about the plan to get Siddique released from jail.

"Investigation has established that during the stay of the accused A-6 (Yasin Bhatkal) in Nepal, Riyaz had also suggested kidnapping of Jews as a bargain to set free Aafia Siddique, imprisoned by USA," NIA said.

Siddique was alleged to be an operative of global terror organisation Al-Qaeda and was convicted and awarded 86 years jail term in USA in 2010 on charges of attempt to murder and assaulting US officers during her interrogation.

NIA, in its 277-page supplementary charge sheet, said that the IM operatives had also planned to kidnap "some rich Indian businessmen" and to acquire arms and hideout to execute the kidnapping.

Referring to the Internet chats between Yasin and Riyaz on April 6 last year, NIA said Yasin had informed Riyaz that they could kidnap Jews easily at Pokhara in Nepal.

It also said that during the Internet chat on June 7 last year, arrested accused Asadullah Akhtar had discussed with absconding IM operative Mirza Shadaab Beg the kidnapping of "white persons" for the release of Aafia Siddique, who was apprehended by the US authorities from Afghanistan in 2008.

NIA had recently filed the charge sheet against Bhatkal, Akhtar and two other suspected IM operatives in connection with alleged conspiracy to carry out terror acts in India.

The court had taken cognisance of the charge sheet and had fixed the matter for March 7 for further proceedings. 

http://news.outlookindia.com/items.aspx?artid=830686

According to the NIA, Bhatkal, wanted in around 40 terror cases and carrying a reward of Rs 35 lakh, and Akhtar were arrested from Indo-Nepal border on the night of August 28 last year.

Lust is kosher, believe me

By Shmuley Boteach, February 27, 2014
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When I was a young rabbi, sent by the [Lubavitcher] Rebbe to Oxford, I used to spend many a Shabbat speaking at Woodside Park and it’s an absolute delight to be invited back, especially to deliver the world premiere of my book Kosher Lust.

Marriage and long-term relationships are on the decline throughout the world as is marital sex, which has been reduced, in the United States, to about once a week for seven minutes at a time (which includes the time he spends begging).

Why is marriage dying and sex evaporating? Because it is based today on the Christian concept of love rather than the Jewish concept of lust.

The New Testament condemns lust. Love, by contrast, was seen as lofty. St Paul famously argued that “God is love” and that all marriages should be based on the comforts of compatibility, friendship, and shared experience.

Judaism rejects this and believes that marriage must be built on deep desire and covetousness. The holiest book of the Bible, Song of Solomon, is an erotic lust poem that describes the burning yearning between a man and a woman: “Your breasts are like two fawns, like twin fawns of a gazelle that browse among the lilies… Your stature is like that of the palm, and your breasts like clusters of fruit. I said, ‘I will climb the palm tree; I will take hold of its fruit’.”

For us, lust is hot, sexy, and holy.

The tenth commandment is clear: “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife,” which means you ought to be coveting your own. About 80 per cent of husbands who cheat on their wives claim to love their wives, but lust for another woman has trumped that love. Lust is, quite simply, much stronger than love. So why aren’t we using this powerful tool in our marital arsenal?

And this is true for women as well as men, as is exemplified by the phenomenal success of Fifty Shades of Grey. Why are liberated, educated women reading a book about a woman who voluntarily submits to being a “dominant” billionaire’s “submissive”? Because the essence of the novel is a man who lusts after a woman so mightily that he wants to have her above all else. And for most married women who feel loved but not desired, the novel became a form of wish-fulfilment.

How do we recapture erotic lust? By focusing on its three laws. The first is frustrated desire and erotic obstacles. Lust is enhanced through an inability to attain the object of your longing. It’s the reason that the Torah makes a wife sexually unavailable to her husband for 12 days out of every month (laws of niddah), so that sexual hunger may increase. But it’s also true of every other area of life. The fare in every fast-food restaurant always tastes bad. The reason: nobody made you wait for it. But in an upscale restaurant they purposely delay your food, even if you ordered the ready-made special of the day, because appetite is enhanced through denial.

The second law of lust is mystery. Lust is enhanced in darkness and shadows. Ironically, the more the body is covered the more one lusts after it. The third law of erotic lust is sinfulness. You’re walking along a beach. You see beautiful women in bikinis. Is that sexy? Perhaps. Is it erotic? Definitely not. What do most men do at a beach? Either fall asleep, or play Frisbee.

But now you’re walking home. A woman has accidentally left the blinds to her bedroom open and she’s walking around in her undergarments. Same amount of clothing as a beach, exposing the same amount of flesh. Except this time it’s not a bathing suit, it’s her underwear. What’s the first thing that comes to mind? Where’s my Frisbee?
Why is the second scenario so much more erotic? Peering into the privacy of a woman’s bedroom is forbidden. Now you know why the Torah made a wife sexually forbidden to her husband for a portion of every month, thereby injecting erotic sinfulness into marriage.

The “love marriage” is based on closeness and constant intimacy. The “lust marriage” is based on separation, renewal, and a measure of distance. If you want to hear more you’ll have to come to Woodside Park.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach will speak at Woodside Park Synagogue on March 3 at 7.30pm

Yesh Atid MK to Netanyahu: Bring Ukraine's Jews to Israel

JPost; 

Rina Frenkel, who once lived in Kiev, lobbied for "a formulated, budgeted government plan to bring the Jews of Ukraine to Israel on aliya."

Yesh Atid MK Rina Frenkel. Photo: Courtesy

The government must prepare an emergency plan to bring Ukrainian Jews to Israel, MK Rina Frenkel (Yesh Atid) wrote to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu Thursday.
 
Following recent anti-Semitic incidents in Ukraine, including the firebombing of a synagogue Monday, Frenkel, said she felt a responsibility to get involved, since she made Aliya from Kiev in 1990.
 
In her letter to Netanyahu, Frenkel warned that the events in Ukraine may turn into a civil war and that, at the same time, anti-Semitism is on the rise.
 
"Incitement is growing stronger. Newspapers and digital media mention 'Jewish conspiracies' every morning, anti-Semitic caricatures appear and in January, words turned into actions, as a local rabbi was attacked and a man was stabbed on the way to synagogue on Friday night," Frenkel wrote.
 
The Yesh Atid MK also wrote of the "tragic history of the Jews of Ukraine, who experienced pogroms and the Holocaust."
 
"In light of recent events," she added, "this community is under a clear and present danger. The State of Israel was founded on the background of our nation's tragic history."
 
"The establishment of an independent Jewish state with a sovereign government and an army is a way of saying 'Never again.' Now is the time to turn that saying into action," Frenkel stated.
 
Frenkel asked the Prime Minister to put together a plan with a budget to bring Ukrainian Jewry to Israel that would be a joint effort of the Prime Minister's Office, the Foreign Ministry, the Immigration Absorption Ministry, the Diaspora Ministry, the Jewish Agency and more.
 
The lawmaker quoted figures from the World Jewish Congress, which state that Ukraine has the third-largest Jewish community in Europe and the fifth-largest in the world, with 310,000 Jews and people with the right to move to Israel under the Law of Return.
 
"Not only will Israel save these Jews from possible harm, we will finish the process that began in the 1990s in absorbing immigrants from the Soviet Union. After the successful integration of immigrants then, I am sure that the rest of Ukrainian Jewry will contribute to the State of Israel and the Aliya will contribute to the immigrants themselves," Frenkel wrote.

ISRAEL TREATING SYRIANS: A Look Inside The World’s Biggest Humanitarian Endeavor

Pour en finir avec l’antisémitisme, quand même!

Mounadil al-Djazaïri

Photo: D.R.

Mardi 25 février 2014

Oui, pour en finir avec toutes les sottises sur l’antisémitisme que peuvent raconter des ignorants comme Manuel Valls ou François Hollande, disons tout net avec Avigdor Lieberman que l’antisémitisme est le meilleur allié du sionisme.

En effet, comment les sionistes pourraient-ils espérer attirer en Palestine occupée 3,5 millions de Juifs en dix ans ?

D’autant que, comme le dit si bien l’extrémiste de droite M. Lieberman, qui est (quand même) ministre des affaires étrangères de l’entité sioniste, reçu récemment par Manuel Valls (parce que les affaires étrangères juives sont les affaires intérieures de pays comme la France et vice versa), le plus grand danger pour le peuple juif est celui de l’assimilation.

Et que ce danger est plus pressant que celui posé par les Palestiniens ou même le prétendu programme nucléaire militaire iranien.

Photo: D.R.

Cet article a été publié par l’European Jewish Press mais uniquement dans sa version anglaise. On ne le trouvera pas en effet dans la version en langue française de cet organe de presse communautariste juif.

‘L’assimilation des Juifs américains est la plus grande menace pour la communauté juive mondiale’, déclare le ministre israélien des affaires étrangères Avigdor Lieberman qui appelle au financement de programmes d’éducation juive.

par Maud Swinnen, European Jewish Press 19 février 2014 traduit de l’anglais par Djazaïri

JERUSALEM (EJP)— Le ministre israélien des affaires étrangères Avigdor Lieberman considère que l’éducation dans la diaspora est « le dossier le plus urgent de l’agenda juif mondial, plus urgent que n’importe quel autre problème, y compris celui des négociations avec les Palestiniens ou la menace nucléaire iranienne.

Il a aussi déclaré que l’assimilation des Juifs américains est la plus grande menace pour la communauté juive mondiale et il a appelé le gouvernement israélien à mobiliser 365 millions de dollars par an pour des programmes d’éducation juive destinés à la diaspora et à renforcer la connexion juive à Israël.

Dans un discours devant la Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Lieberman a demandé aux dirigeants [communautaires] de participer à l’effort financier du gouvernement israélien pour de nouveaux programmes en faveur de la diaspora qui se concentreraient sur le maintien de la continuité juive.

« Je pense que le gouvernement israélien devrait contribuer à hauteur de 1 million de dollars par jour de l’année, soit 365 millions de dollars au total, somme dont j’espère que vous, dans la communauté juive de la diaspora, apporterez l’équivalent pour ce projet éducatif. Ce ne doit pas être un petit projet de plus mais l’axe central du partenatiat entre nous, » a-t-il dit.

 Il a aussi appelé à la création d’un réseau d’écoles internationales juives de haut niveau et à l’émigration de 3,5 millions de Juifs en Israël dans la prochaine décennie.

Lieberman a cité une étude américaine qui montre la baisse de l’identification en tant que Juif, affirmant que « ces statistiques démontrent que les Juifs d’Amérique risquent pas moins qu’une catastrophe démographique. » L’importante enquête publiée par le Pew Research Center porte sur l’assimilation et les mariages intecommunautaires chez les membres de la communauté juive américaine.

Parmi ses conclusions, elle observe qu’un Juif sur cinq se considère comme sans religion et que, « parmi les Juifs interrogés qui se sont mariés avant 2000, près de six sur dix ont un conjoint non juif. »

« Depuis de nombreuses années, les responsables israéliens ont fait appel à nos frères et sœurs de la diaspora, comme tous ceux d’entre vous qui sont réunis ce soir, pour consacrer votre temps, votre énergie et vos financements à Israël, » a-t-il dit.

« Je me tourne néanmoins vers vous aujourd’hui pour vous dire que, tout en étant énormément et pour toujours reconnaissants pour votre aide, nous avons la conviction qu’il est temps maintenant de nous concentrer sur les défis qu’affrontent vos propres communautés, particulièrement ceux qui émanent de tendances dangereuses dans la communauté juive démontrées par la récente enquête. »

Il a ajouté : « J’ai la plus grande conviction que l’antidote à cette montée de l’assimilation, du mariage inter communautaire et du désengagement est l’éducation. »

Photo: D.R.

« Pour prévenir cette tragédie, tous les enfants juifs devraient avoir la possibilité de fréquenter une école où ils recevront une éducation qui les instruira sur l’histoire, les valeurs et les traditions juives, à chérir leur identité juive et à éprouver un fort attachement à Israël et au sionisme. Nous devons faire en sorte que les écoles juives soient parmi les meilleures du monde.

« Nous devons créer un réseau mondial d’écoles juives d’une qualité supérieure à celle des réseaux d’écoles américaines et internationales. C’est seulement par un tel effort que nous garantirons notre longévité en tant que peuple, » a-t-il dit.

 

Israeli Bedouin Muslim and a proud Zionist

Outrageous Amnesty report on Israel removed from reality

BREAKING: Outrageous Amnesty report on Israel removed from reality

Posted by admin on Feb 26, 2014 

Embassy of Israel 26/02/2014

The Amnesty report to be published tomorrow (Thursday) reads like a public relations stunt rather than a serious report by a human rights organization. The report brings together carefully selected, unverifiable and often contradictory accounts from clearly politically-motivated individuals, which it then reports as unquestioned facts.

According to the skewed logic of the report, stone throwing, often using slings, as well as the use of petrol bombs and even live fire against IDF soldiers by Palestinians “poses little or no threat” to their lives. Therefore, any use of force by the IDF against these actions is considered “wilful killing”, or even a war crime. Even when evidence clearly points to soldiers being wounded in clashes involving live fire, their use of force is outrageously criticized by Amnesty as being excessive.

Amnesty is in need of an urgent reality check: In 2013, there were around 5000 events of rock-throwing – of which approximately half were against civilians. In 2011, 44 people were injured by rock-throwing; in 2012 this number rose to 71, and in 2013, it rose again to 132 victims, showing a dramatic increase in this deeply concerning activity. In this same period, scores of Israelis have been victimised by shootings, stabbings, and other forms of terror, none of which Amnesty sees fit to mention in its report.

Despite the practice of certain Palestinian groups, well documented by other monitoring organisations, of deliberately provoking violent clashes, Amnesty insists that all Palestinians involved are “peaceful demonstrators” or “human rights defenders”. The Amnesty report mentions the village of Nabi Saleh extensively, yet neglects to mention terrorists from the village, such as Ahlam Tamimi, who led a suicide bomber to a restaurant where he murdered 16 people. When she was released as part of the Gilad Shalit deal, there were huge celebrations in Nabi Saleh.

Amnesty’s obsessive focus on Israel beyond any relation to the large scale atrocities taking place in the region suggests a troubling political agenda. This is supported by the report’s outrageous recommendations, which include an arms embargo on Israel, but no suggestion (of course) that the Palestinian authorities should act against unlawful violence, or against the daily glorification of terrorism and murder in schools and mosques, which continues to poison the minds of a new generation.

This obsessive, outrageous report has nothing to offer in the genuine and important discussion about how law enforcement authorities should deal with the complex challenges of demonstrations containing violent and potentially lethal elements. The only trigger-happy and reckless party in connection with the report is Amnesty itself.

ENDS

Where is the outrage from "Save the Children" Christian Aid, Oxfam, Amnesty

* Boko Haram shoot and burn students

* Islamists have killed more than 300 this month

* Nigerian military under fire for not protecting civilians (Updates death toll from hospital official to 59, adds details)

By Joe Hemba

DAMATURU, Nigeria, Feb 25 (Reuters) - Gunmen from Islamist group Boko Haram shot or burned to death 59 pupils in a boarding school in northeast Nigeria overnight, a hospital official and security forces said on Tuesday.

"Some of the students' bodies were burned to ashes," Police Commissioner Sanusi Rufai said of the attack on the Federal Government college of Buni Yadi, a secondary school in Yobe state, near the state's capital city of Damaturu.

Bala Ajiya, an official at the Specialist Hospital Damaturu, told Reuters by phone the death toll had risen to 59.

"Fresh bodies have been brought in. More bodies were discovered in the bush after the students who had escaped with bullet wounds died from their injuries," he said.

Rafai, who had given an earlier estimate of 29 killed, said all those killed were boys. He said the school's 24 buildings, including staff quarters, were completely burned to the ground.

The Islamists, whose struggle for an Islamic state in northern Nigeria has killed thousands and made them the biggest threat to security in Africa's top oil producer, are increasingly preying on the civilian population.

Militants from Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sinful" in the northern Hausa language, have frequently attacked schools in the past. A similar attack in June in the nearby village of Mamudo left 22 students dead.

They have killed more than 300 people this month, mostly civilians, including in two attacks last week that killed around 100 each, one in which militants razed a whole village and shot panicked residents as they tried to flee.

That attack prompted U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to condemn Boko Haram for "unspeakable ... acts of terror".

The failure of the military to protect civilians is fuelling anger in the northeast, the region worst affected by the four-and-a-half-year-old insurgency. An offensive ordered by President Goodluck Jonathan in May has not succeeded in crushing the rebels and has triggered reprisals against civilians.

A military spokesman for Yobe state, Captain Lazarus Eli, said "our men are down there in pursuit of the killers," but gave no further details.

Addressing a news conference on Monday, Jonathan defended the military's record, saying it had had some successes against Boko Haram. He said Nigeria was working with the Cameroon authorities to try to prevent militants from mounting attacks in Nigeria and then fleeing over the border.

The military shut the northern part of the border with Cameroon on the weekend.

The insurgents mostly occupy the remote, hilly Gwoza area bordering Cameroon, from where they attack civilians they accuse of being pro-government. They have started abducting girls, a new tactic reminiscent of Uganda's cult-like Lord's Resistance Army in decades past. (Additional reporting by Ibrahim Mshelizza in Maiduguri; Writing by Tim Cocks; Editing by Andrew Roche)

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSL6N0LU1SW20140225?irpc=932

Who Is to Blame for "Islamophobia" in the UK?

by Mudar Zahran
February 24, 2014 

If you look at the London Tube Bombing of 7/7; the Madrid Train Bombing; two attacks on the World Trade Center; the murders of Lee Rigby, Theo Van Gogh, Daniel Pearl, Nick Berg, Ilan Halimi, and countless other attack and threats, how can we honestly expect people not to be "Islamophobic"? It would appear we have no one to blame but ourselves.

If we Muslims are actually opposed to these Islamist hate preachers, why are we failing to take a unanimous public stance against them, to disown and isolate them from our community?

After the murder of British soldier Lee Rigby by Islamic extremists in London last May, The Guardian reported a surge in the number of anti-Muslim offenses.

Also, last May, a poll by the British research firm, YouGov, showed that nearly two-thirds of Britons believe there will be a "clash of civilizations" between British Muslims and white Britons, and 34% believe that Muslims pose a serious threat to democracy.

As a Muslim living in the UK, I wonder, who is to blame for the increase in anti-Muslim feelings in the U.K.? Or is the problem "Islamophobia"?

If one dispassionately examines facts, it seems possible that if "Islamophobia" exists in the U.K., then perhaps we Muslims are to blame for it.

For a start, let us look at the murder of soldier Lee Rigby, who was butchered in Woolwich, near his army barracks, on May 22, 2013 by two British Muslim converts.

The murderers, Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale were both 29 and born to Christian families. Both are reported by the Daily Mail to have been inspired by the British Muslim cleric Anjem Choudary. Therefore, can we Muslims blame the British public if they fear for their young men and women, and would prefer them not to associate with us and possibly become Islamically radicalized?

Anjem Choudary -- the Muslim cleric who "inspired" Rigby's murderers -- has a lavish history of inciting Islamic fundamentalism and hatred against Britain. He refused, for example, to condemn the July 7, 2005 London bombings and even spoke favorably about the "black flag of Sharia flying over Downing Street [the Prime Ministers' office] by 2020".

In an interview on April 11, 2013 Choudhry said, "As Muslims, we reject democracy, we reject secularism, and freedom, and human rights. We reject all of the things that you espouse as being ideals ... There is nothing called a republic in Islam. When we talk about the sharia, we are talking about only the sharia. We are talking about rejecting the U.N., the IMF, and the World Bank."

So, why then, if Choudhry and other Islamist fundamentalists so oppose the British values of democracy and human rights, do they choose to stay in the UK? No one is keeping them here against their will.

Also, if we Muslims in the UK disagree with what Choudhry and his like-minded associates are saying, why do we never speak out against it? If we are actually opposed these Islamist hate preachers, why are we failing to take a unanimous public stance to disown and isolate them from our community?

The non-Muslims must be also asking themselves the same questions, and logically assuming from our silence that we agree.

The Islamists' damage to the British society does not stop with the hatred they spread, but also extends to exporting terrorism to the rest of the world.

For example, Abu Hamzah Al-Masri, who is now facing terrorism charges in the US after being extradited from the UK, turned a local London mosque into a recruiting ground for Islamic radicals. In the 1990s, Abu Hamzah's followers included the 9/11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui and failed "shoe bomber" Richard Reid, both now serving life sentences in the U.S.

As a sidebar, on May 28, 2009, three ofAbu Hamza's sons and his stepson were sentenced to imprisonment by a British court for a two-year fraud involving stolen cars. And in July 2010, another of Abu Hamza's sons was sentenced to twelve months prison after pleading guilty to one count of violent disorder at anti-Israel protests in January 2009. In 2012, another one of Abu Hamza's sons was convictedof armed robbery and illegal possession of a firearm with intent to commit an offense.

A phobia, by definition, is an irrational fear: a fear of something that is not real -- such as being afraid that there are snakes in the next room. But if you look at the London tube bombings; the death threats against a British schoolteacher whose kindergartners innocently decided to name a teddy bear Mohammed; the recent the murder and attempted decapitation of Lee Rigby, not to mention events abroad, such as two attacks on the World Trade Center, the Madrid train bombings the attempted attacks by the Underwear Bomber, the Shoe Bomber, the Times Square Bomber; the murders of Theo van Gogh, Ilan Halimi, Nick Berg, Daniel Pearl; Jews in Toulouse, Mumbai and Buenos Aires; the victims of US Army Major Nidal Hassan; assaults on Kurt Westergaard, and Lars Hedegaard, and the threats to Salman Rushdie, Geert Wilders and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, among other episodes -- these events are all too real, so how can we Muslims in the UK honestly expect people not to be "Islamophobic"? How can we blame the British society for being ill-disposed when some of their Islamic "leaders" are breeding both terrorists and criminals?

There also seems to be a pattern now of Muslim men "grooming" white underage non-Muslim girls into sex rings. For example: in May 2012, nine Muslim men were convicted of being part of a child sexual exploitation ring involving vulnerable white girls. Eight of the men were of British Pakistani origin and one was an Afghan; all Muslims.

The seven members of the Oxford child sexual grooming gang who were found guilty in June 2013 (clockwise from top left): Kamar Jamil, Akhtar Dogar, Anjum Dogar, Assad Hussain, Mohammed Karrar, Bassam Karrar, and Zeeshan Ahmed.

One of the victims told the court "of being raped by two men while she was "so drunk she was vomiting over the side of the bed. She later cried herself to sleep."

Further, in June 2013, seven Muslim men from Oxford were found guilty of groomingunderage white girls, aged between 11 and 15, into a sadistic sex ring.

Commenting on the case, Dr. Taj Hargey, the Muslim cleric of the Oxford Islamic Congregation, said, "[R]ace and religion were linked to the recent spate of grooming rings in which Muslim men have targeted under-age white girls." He added that, "Imams promote grooming rings' by encouraging followers to think white women deserve to be 'punished'".

Dr. Hargey also noted that, "all the men [involved in the Oxford sex ring] -- though of different nationalities -- were Muslim and they deliberately targeted vulnerable white girls, whom they appeared to regard as easy meat." Dr. Hargey added that pretending this is not a problem of the Islamic community is "ideological denial."

So, how can we Muslims blame the British public for fearing for their underage girls when Muslim men keep getting arrested and convicted for grooming white girls into sex rings?

As a Muslim living in the UK, I have come to believe that we Muslims are the main source of "Islamophobia" -- by the evil and disturbing acts of some Muslims, and above all by the silence of the majority regarding those acts.

It would appear we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Algérie : même la propre soeur d’Abdelaziz Bouteflika serait opposé au 4e mandat

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 26, 2014 9:28

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La guéguerre autour du quatrième mandat de Abdelaziz Bouteflika a gagné la famille du chef de l’Etat. Une guerre de « tranchées » semble faire des ravages au sein de la fratrie.

 

Cette guéguerre familiale est tellement grave qu’elle a atterri dans les colonnes des journaux. Le quotidien arabophone El Khabar a fait état, mardi, d’une dispute qui a eu lieu entre l’une des soeur du Chef de l’Etat et son frère, et conseiller également, Saïd.Zhor Bouteflika, qui a hébergé son frère malade chez elle sur les hauteurs d’Alger serait opposé au quatrième mandat, a-t-on appris de même source. Dans ce contexte, elle se serait disputée avec Saïd et aurait même fermé la porte devant son frère récalcitrant qui, lui, est l’artisan de la reconduite de son frère président pour un nouveau mandat à la magistrature suprême. La situation se serait tellement dégradée que le frère cadet a été obligé de faire intervenir d’autres membres de la famille pour calmer les esprits, surtout que la sœur préféré du Chef de l’Etat menace depuis quelque temps d’imposer un véritable embargo sur son frère aîné.

Cette nouvelle «bagarre» prouve que l’option du quatrième mandat divise non seulement la classe politique et les dirigeants, mais elle touche jusqu’à la famille du Chef de l’Etat en personne. Qui aura donc le dernier mot, le frère aîné, le cadet ou la sœur ? Soulignons enfin que, pour l’heure, la famille Bouteflika n’a nullement démenti cette information qui a suscité l’étonnement de plus d’un en Algérie.

 Essaïd Wakli

- See more at: http://www.algerie-focus.com/blog/2014/02/algerie-meme-la-soeur-dabdelaziz-bouteflika-serait-oppose-au-4e-mandat/#sthash.Fmqi1xFm.dpuf

No cool campus speaks for Jewish refugees

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

No cool campus speaks for Jewish refugees

No cool campus group spoke up for Jews from Arab countries in the 1970s - or now - writes Cairo-born Lucette Lagnado, an alumna of the Seven Sister college Vassar (pictured), where Jewish students have called for a boycott of academic exchanges with Israel. Read her piece in the Wall St Journal (with thanks: Lily):

Recently I was contacted by a fellow Vassar alumna through Facebook. She wanted to know if I was aware that our genteel alma mater had become a hotbed of anti-Israel, pro-boycott sentiment.

Suddenly, my stomach was in knots—a feeling that Vassar has managed to evoke in me ever since I went there in the 1970s. An Orthodox Jewish girl from Brooklyn on a full scholarship, I fixated on this Seven Sister school as my entryway to the American dream, the epitome of style and grace that also prided itself on teaching "critical thinking."

In this case the cause of my angst was a young woman named Naomi Dann, the president of the Vassar Jewish Union. She had penned a piece for the campus paper strongly supporting the recent move by the American Studies Association to boycott Israeli academic exchanges—a decision denounced by college presidents across the country, including Vassar's.

Her piece strung together all the familiar buzzwords and clichés used by Israel's critics: "atrocities," "oppressive," "abuses," "colonial," and, of course, "apartheid." Signed jointly with the co-president of Students for Justice in Palestine, Ms. Dann even slammed Vassar's president and dean of the faculty for daring to oppose the boycott against the Jewish state.

There was more to fuel my Vassar angoisse. The head of the Jewish Studies Program, a professor named Joshua Schreier, had also expressed support for the boycott movement. Prof. Schreier was quoted in the campus paper ruminating that while once "instinctively against" the boycott, he had heard more "substantiated, detailed" arguments on its behalf, and as a result "I am currently leaning in favor of it," he concluded delicately, as if choosing a flavored tea.
As for Vassar's rabbi, Rena Blumenthal, she was MIA—on leave in Israel, no less—and emailed to say she couldn't weigh in from afar. Huh?

To be sure, I had been aware that the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement had taken off on some college campuses, even in the Ivy League. It had become chic to attack Israel even—especially—if you were Jewish. I heard from an alum who was stopped by his own child, a Vassar student, from taking a public stand against the BDS movement. The student was fearful of being ostracized for having a parent who supported Israel.

Suddenly the toxic essence of this movement to make Israel and its supporters pariahs in the groves of academe and the cocktail parties of polite society hit home in a way it hadn't before. It also brought back painful memories about my own Vassar experience, and the shattered illusions that had marked it.

I had gone to Vassar a naïf, a sheltered girl from an immigrant community. Mine was a neighborhood of Jewish exiles thrown out or pressured out of Arab countries in the 1950s and 1960s—in my family's case, Egypt. We were victims of the Middle East conflict who were barely mentioned in the history books. 

Though we had been mistreated and denied our homelands, we suffered alone and in silence. No cool campus groups spoke up for us then, or now.
(My emphasis - ed)

Our values were God, faith, family and Israel. We were passionate about the Jewish state, a country that took so many Middle Eastern Jews in when, one after another, Arab countries had forced or pressured us out. I was raised as a Sabbath observer, a keeper of dietary laws, and, oh, expected to marry young and refrain from sex before marriage.

Those were the quaint values I carried to Vassar, which I had chosen from among a multitude of schools for the old-fashioned ideals its name evoked. I had read a brochure alluding to a tradition of students drinking sherry with faculty. To someone more familiar with Manischewitz wine, sipping sherry with my professors epitomized what I wanted on this earth: a life of civility and grace. This was Jackie Kennedy's Vassar.

Instead, I found myself on a campus in the throes of a 1970s rebellion. There was a drug culture and a drinking culture, but no sherry culture I could find. Vassar prided itself on being edgy and embraced open sexuality and every other cause of the tumultuous era.

My disillusionment came fast. My first day I wandered to the "ACDC"—the forbidding central dining hall—and timidly asked a manager where I could find the kosher section. She looked at me as if I were from another planet.

What followed were months of kosher TV dinners, in big aluminum packages. It was incredibly decent of Vassar to obtain those for me, yet every time I lugged one these dinners from the kitchen to the table in their silver foil, I felt the stares of my fellow-diners.

It never got easier. I could never take that train from Grand Central back to Poughkeepsie on Sunday nights without the blues setting in. And now, so many years later, my Vassar blues were back.

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