And if you do not like it here

Ah the mayor of Rotterdam – what an admirable guy. A story from January 8, the day after the massacre at Charlie Hebdo.

Rotterdam Mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb appeared on television programme Nieuwsuur Wednesday night, and lashed out at Muslims living in this society despite their hatred of it. “It is incomprehensible that you can turn against freedom,” he said. “But if you do not like freedom, in Heaven’s name pack your bag and leave.”

“There may be a place in the world where you can be yourself,” he continued. “Be honest with yourself and do not go and kill innocent journalists,” Aboutaleb, a Muslim himself, said.

“And if you do not like it here because humorists you do not like make a newspaper, may I then say you can fuck off.”

Unimprovable.

 

Playing house with beheaders

The Beeb has more details on the three addled teenage girls who ran off to be with IS, and how much fun they can expect to have there.

Dr Erin Saltman, from the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, which offers independent expertise in counter-terrorism, said IS propaganda targets young women specifically with the promise of being part of a humanitarian movement.

She said: “They are the wives and mothers of the future jihadists so quite a lot of dedication and time has been put into trying to allure these younger women to come and join in these efforts. [Read more…]

Compatibility

Just as I said. Amir Taheri in the New York Post –

The three-day White House conference on “violent extremism” exposed anew Obama’s inability or unwillingness to understand the challenge of Islamist terrorism, let alone to lead the fight against it.

The conference was billed as a global event bringing together people of different views from more than 60 countries. In practice, however, it acted more as an echo chamber for Obama’s politically correct approach.

“Violent extremism” is misleading, to say the least. (Is there extremism without violence?) The generic term obscures the fact that we face a specific form of terrorism rooted, nurtured and waged in the name of Islam.

[Read more…]

Where this campaign is urgently needed

Leo Igwe points out that Africa badly needs the anti-blasphemy campaign.

On January 30 2015, the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) launched a campaign aimed at abolishing “blasphemy laws” worldwide. The campaign is gaining momentum across Europe and beyond. But there is still no significant support from groups in Africa. Meanwhile Africa is a continent where this campaign is urgently needed. [Read more…]

Because it is required by Islam

Pakistan Today reports that FGM is very popular in Malaysia, and getting more so all the time.

Syahiera Atika, a 19-year-old Malaysian girl  has happily embraced western-style capitalism but in contrast strictly follows the local interpretation of Islam as she informed the Vice of her circumcision.

Female circumcision involves the surgical removal of all or part of a woman’s clitoris. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has classed this procedure as Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).

WHO also defines it as an operation that “involves partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.”

Syahiera however, rejects the notion that it is inhumane and says that ”I’m circumcised because it is required by Islam.” She refers to it as ‘wajib’, which means any religious duty commanded by Allah.

[Read more…]

Grooming in Bethnal Green

Three teenage girls from London went traipsing off to Syria to play house with IS last Tuesday. Sara Khan says it’s grooming, just as it’s grooming when teenage girls go into prostitution.

As the prime minister expressed deep concern over the disappearance of the three east London schoolgirls who are thought to be on their way to join Islamic State (Isis) fighters in Syria, the head of Inspire, a human rights organisation working with Muslim women, called on schools to do more to burst the “romanticised notion” of Isis that is being peddled to young people by a slick online propaganda machine.

The head of Inspire, Sara Khan, said the tactics used by those luring young girls to Syria and Iraq to marry them off to jihadis or force them into domestic servitude, were the grooming methods of paedophiles. [Read more…]

This Street UK is not that Street UK

Andrew Gilligan at the Telegraph spots another mess – another case of a government body tangling itself up with an Islamist group, either cluelessly or…not. Oxfordshire County Council has hired a group called Street UK to “mentor” people.

The contract is part of Oxfordshire County Council’s response to Operation Bullfinch, which saw seven men convicted of 59 sex crimes against children and sentenced to a total of 95 years in prison. Five were of Pakistani origin and two were North African.

The trouble is, Street UK is an Islamist group. [Read more…]

Many of them teenage girls

The Guardian reports on the peace vigil in Oslo today.

Norwegian Muslims organised a peace vigil in Oslo on Saturday in a show of solidarity with Jews a week after fatal shootings in Denmark targeted a synagogue and free-speech seminar.

As the mainly elderly Jewish congregation filed out of the synagogue after Shabbat prayers, a group of young Muslims, many of them teenage girls wearing headscarves, formed a symbolic ring outside the building to applause from a crowd of more than 1,000 people.

[Read more…]

In memory of Özgecan Aslan

Hurriyet reports on a protest in Istanbul’s Taksim Square in which men wore skirts to protest violence against women.

“I would walk around in Taksim wearing a skirt, if you can do that…”

For many Turkish men, this is a common phrase they use when they want to assert a claim or make a bet. It has turned into reality when a group of men went to Istanbul’s iconic Taksim Square wearing skirts, keeping their word they have been pledging for the past few days on social media.

On Feb. 17, Erkan Doğan had donned a skirt in Istanbul’s Asian side neighborhood of Kadıköy to demonstrate in memory of slain 20-year-old student Özgecan Aslan. [Read more…]