Ten reason why Sharia law is cruel and should be banned

Top ten reasons why sharia is bad for all societies

1. Islam commands offensive and aggressive and unjust jihad.

2. Islam orders apostates to be killed.

3. Islam orders death for Muslim and possible death for non—Muslim critics of Muhammad and the Quran and even sharia itself.

6. Islam commands that highway robbers should be crucified or mutilated.

Via Link

Ground zero mosque: One nation under Allah, with misery and sharia for all.

Planned Ground Zero mosque imam wants sharia law in America

via link

Rajinder Singh, first Sikh to join British right wing party BNP: Only party he feels would take on Islamic fundamentalism

Rajinder Singh: ‘Why I’m proud to join the BNP’
Monday 15th February 2010

A 78-year-old Sikh, soon to be the first non-white member of the BNP, told today why he supports the far-right party.

Rajinder Singh (pictured) spoke a day after the BNP voted to change its constitution to allow black and Asian people to join.

The party made the decision at an extraordinary general meeting in Essex yesterday after it was told by Central London County Court to amend its constitution to comply with race relations laws or face legal action by the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

Yesterday, leader Nick Griffin said he expected to welcome Mr Singh soon as the BNP’s first non-white member.

Today, Mr Singh said he would gladly join the party, although being a member or not would not change his support of its policies.

“If they say ‘join’, I can’t chicken out now,” he said.

“I will support them to the hilt, for their policies.

“I’m just pleased for them, not pleased for myself, because it doesn’t change anything in me.

“It doesn’t change my attitude to them, my loyalty to them. That doesn’t change whether I am a member or not. I am still loyal to them.”

Speaking at his home in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, Mr Singh praised Mr Griffin for “taking on the whole storm of lefties” who, he said, wanted to encourage multiculturalism.

Mr Singh, who was born in West Punjab, India, said he left the country in 1967 after seeing years of violence caused by the partition of the country, which also saw the death of his father.

Today he said the BNP was the only party he felt would take on the spread of Islamic fundamentalism, and “save” Britain – preventing any repetition of what he had seen in India.

He said: “Britain is changing, it’s not the Britain I came to when I came in. The British people are worried, and the BNP is the expression of their worry.

“BNP are home-grown sons of this soil, not home-grown terrorists – there’s a big distinction.

“They want to save this country and, when they save it for themselves, it will be good for me too.”

He said he felt the BNP was currently “put in the corner” but added: “Opening up the doors to Asians will make them legal, make them diluted. It’s all positive, positive, positive.”

The retired schoolteacher, who provided a character reference for Mr Griffin at his trial in 2006, said he adhered to the idea of “when in Rome, do as the Romans do” and had adopted the “British way of life”.

“Some Sikhs say ‘You are not a Sikh’, but I have core Sikh values,” he added.

Responding to suggestions that he may be being used by the party, Mr Singh said: “I don’t say that he used me. My point of view is that I helped them out.

“From my side, I am being helpful and that’s a positive thing. From his side, there’s a little bit of joy that I am here and making the face of the party acceptable.”

But he said it would take time before more non-white members joined the party, especially after incidents such as its membership list being published, and the backlash some members received.

“The Labour Party pronounces judgment on the BNP as if they are wolves, and at the same time overlook the real wolves who say ‘We will Islamise Britain, we will enforce Sharia law’,” he said.

“I will not become Islamised, I would rather die.”

But when asked about some of the BNP’s other policies, Mr Singh maintained that its efforts to combat Muslim extremism were the most important.

He said: “Imagine a ship, huge inside, with chandeliers and dining tables.

“But there is a pinprick-sized hole in the hull. Nothing else matters.

“Nick Griffin is plugging that gap. And when the gap is plugged, we can get on with eating the meal. You think of the security of the ship first and then have champagne and a candlelit dinner.

“The British way of life is only ensured if that hole is plugged. But Tony Blair himself took an axe to it, by opening up the gates.”

He said he had seen the “potential of Islam” in India and did not want to see it repeated in Britain.

“Islam is global, it has zero loyalty to Britain.

“The BNP are sons of soil and they are standing up for their soil.

“I wish we had a counterpart of the BNP in India in 1946.”

But today the Unison union called for racism to be kicked out of politics.

General secretary Dave Prentis said: “Without the efforts of workers from abroad, the NHS would crumble, our schools couldn’t function and our elderly and vulnerable would be without the care they need.

“It is time that this massive contribution to our country was recognised.

“The BNP’s commitment not to be a ‘whites only’ party should not fool anyone.

“It is a ploy to make sure they can take part in the next election.

“They were forced to make a change to their constitution after legal action was taken against them. The party are already backtracking by promising not to become ‘multiracial’.

“However much they try to deny it, racism is at the heart of the BNP.

“And racism should have no part in 21st century Britain. It is time to kick racism out of politics.”

Rise in Bangladesh female canings alarms rights groups

Rise in Bangladesh female canings alarms rights

Wednesday, 24 Jun, 2009 

 ‘Perhaps they are inspired by the kinds of courts used by the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan,’ a Bangladeshi lawyer said. — AFP World

DHAKA: The cuts on Rahima Begum’s legs are healing but the unmarried mother of one will carry the psychological scars from a public whipping for revealing the father of her child for a long time to come.

In conservative Muslim Bangladesh, having a child out of wedlock is taboo, and the elders in Rahima’s eastern village decided she should be taught a lesson after pointing the finger at a neighbour, who denied he was the father.

‘They called me before a makeshift court and ruled that I was a liar,’ the 22-year-old told AFP from her hospital bed.

Rahima’s punishment was to be caned 39 times in front of elders and Islamic clerics.

The case shocked many in Bangladesh, with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina ordering Rahima to be moved from a small village hospital in Comilla to one of the best in the capital Dhaka.

There, she is receiving treatment, including counselling, a month after the beating.

‘Every time I close my eyes, I play the scene over and over in my head,’ she said.

Human rights groups say Rahima’s plight is becoming increasingly common in Bangladesh, with hardline clerics taking the law into their own hands and handing down harsh punishments, mostly to women, found guilty by village courts.

The so-called crimes heard by the courts — most common in rural areas, and not recognised as legitimate — range from adultery to being raped, and in one case a Muslim woman was whipped for talking to a Hindu man.

Women’s groups and human rights activists have protested the unexplained rise in caning cases in the past two months, and note that many such incidents of violence probably go unreported.

‘We’ve recorded 15 such incidents in May and June. We’ve never seen such a sharp rise in cases. It’s very worrying,’ said Ayesha Khanam, president of the women’s group Bangladesh Mahila Parishad.

‘There are undoubtedly many more than have gone unreported.’

In Rahima’s case, police arrested the men who whipped her, but campaigners say most get away with the beatings because the kangaroo courts have until recently largely been ignored by authorities.
Salma Ali, head of the Bangladesh National Women Lawyers Association, said that while urban parts of the country were becoming more progressive in dealing with women’s rights, some rural areas were going the other way.

‘Conservative Muslim clerics are losing power in a country where women are increasingly holding more prominent positions,’ she said.

‘But some parts of the country are becoming more conservative.’

‘Perhaps they are inspired by the kinds of courts used by the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan.’

Rahima said the physical and mental suffering of being publicly whipped mean that her hospital bed in Dhaka, 80 kilometres away from her village home, is the safest place for her right now.

‘My legs are almost healed but I’m not ready to go back to the village. I don’t know whether I can ever go back,’ she said.

Indian Muslim leaders rage against legalising homosexuality, say it is against Islamic law

After Deoband, other Muslim leaders condemn homosexuality
1 Jul 2009,PTI

NEW DELHI: Amid government moves for a re-look at criminalising homosexuality, several Muslim leaders have said any attempt to legally permit  unnatural sex is an attack on religious and moral values.

“Legalisation of homosexuality is an attack on Indian religious and moral values,” over a dozen prominent Muslim religious leaders said in a statement.

The statement has been endorsed by Maulana Jalaluddin Omari, President of the Jamaat-e Islami Hind, Maulana Muhammad Salim Qasimi, Rector of Darul Uloom Waqf, Deoband, Maulana Mufti Mukarram Ahmad, Shahi Imam of Jama Masjid Fatehpuri, among others.

“We are shocked to see reports in the media that the Union government is considering the repeal of Section 377 of the IPC, which means making homosexuality legal,” the statement said on Tuesday.

It said that homosexuality is a sin and a social evil which will only lead to societal disintegration and break-up of the family.

Appealing to the government not to be influenced by the “decadent trends of the Western culture” and not to give in to the demands of a minuscule minority, the statement said the government should not test the patience of the silent vast majority of the country which abhors such behaviour.

A prominent body of Muslim community Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind had earlier hit out at the government’s proposed move, saying the repeal of the section would create “sexual anarchy” in the society.

“The section should stay as its repealing would result in sexual anarchy in the society. Those opposing the section are influenced by Western culture. Those who argue for independence do not realise that independence should have its limits,” Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind spokesperson Abdul Hameed Noamani said.

Leading Islamic seminary Darul Uloom Deoband had earlier also opposed the Centre’s move to repeal a controversial section, saying unnatural sex is against the tenets of Islam.

“Homosexuality is offence under Shariat Law and haram (prohibited) in Islam,” Deputy Vice Chancellor of the Darul Uloom Deoband Maulana Abdul Khalik Madrasi has said.

The reaction came after reports that Centre was likely to convene a meeting soon to evolve a consensus on repealing a controversial section of the Indian Penal Code which criminalises homosexuality.

Gay sex against tenets of Islam: Deoband
29 Jun 2009, 1353 hrs IST, PTI

MUZAFFARNAGAR, UP: A leading Islamic seminary on Monday opposed Centre’s move to repeal a controversial section of the penal law which criminalises  homosexuality saying unnatural sex is against the tenets of Islam.

“Homosexuality is an offence under Shariat Law and haram (prohibited) in Islam,” deputy vice chancellor of the Darul Uloom Deoband Maulana Abdul Khalik Madrasi said.

Madrasi also asked the government not to repeal section 377 of IPC which criminalises homosexuality.

His objection came a day after law minister Veerappa Moily said a decision on repealing the section would be taken only after considering concerns of all sections of the society, including religious groups like the church.

Terming gay activities as crime, Maulana Salim Kasmi, vice-president of the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), said homosexuality is punishable under Islamic law and section 377 of IPC should not be tampered.

Maulana Mohd Sufiyan Kasmi, an AIMPLB member, and Mufti Zulfikar, president of Uttar Pradesh Imam Organisation have also expressed similar views on the issue.

Kasmi said it would be harmful for the society to legalise gay sex.

Buoyed by the news that the Centre is considering repealing the controversial section of the IPC, members of the gay community on Sunday held parades in several cities.

Ancient India didn’t think homosexuality was against nature
27 Jun 2009, 0018 hrs IST, Manoj Mitta, TNN

NEW DELHI: Was Indian society tolerant of homosexuality before the colonial administration proscribed it in 1860? The government has taken
conflicting positions on this within the country and outside.

On a petition pending before the Delhi high court seeking to decriminalize homosexuality, the government said in its counter affidavit that that there were “no convincing reports to indicate that homosexuality or other offences against the order of nature mentioned in Section 377 IPC were acceptable in the Indian society prior to colonial rule.”

But when it was being reviewed by the UN Human Rights Council last year for the first time ever, India distanced itself from that provision when Sweden, arguably the most gay-friendly country in the world, questioned its record in ensuring equality irrespective of a person’s sexual orientation.

This is how Goolam Vahanvati, who was then solicitor-general and is now attorney-general, tried to save India’s face before the council as part of its official delegation. “Around the early 19th Century, you probably know that in England they frowned on homosexuality, and therefore there are historical reports that various people came to India to take advantage of its more liberal atmosphere with regard to different kinds of sexual conduct.

“As a result, in 1860 when we got the Indian Penal Code, which was drafted by Lord Macaulay, they inserted Section 377 which brought in the concept of ‘sexual offences against the order of nature’.

Now in India we didn’t have this concept of something being ‘against the order of nature’. It was essentially a Western concept, which has remained over the years. Now homosexuality as such is not defined in the IPC, and it will be a matter of great argument whether it is ‘against the order of nature’.”

Vahanvati’s admission on the international forum that the ban on homosexuality was a western import and its relevance was debatable flies in the face of the government’s unabashed efforts before the Delhi high court to retain Section 377, complete with its colonial baggage and archaic notion of unnatural offences.

Whatever the politics behind this glaring contradiction, there is ample evidence placed before the high court by petitioner Naz Foundation substantiating in effect Vahanvati’s view that in the centuries prior to the enactment of section 377, India was rather accommodating of homosexuals.

While the penalty imposed by Section 377 goes up to life sentence, there is nothing close to it in Manusmriti, the most popular Hindu law book of medieval and ancient India. “If a man has shed his semen in non-human females, in a man, in a menstruating woman, in something other than a vagina, or in water, he should carry out the ‘painful heating’ vow.” Thus, this peculiar vow, involving application of cow’s urine and dung, was meant not only for homosexuals but also errant heterosexuals.

The penalty is even milder if the homosexual belongs to an upper caste. As Manusmriti puts it, “If a twice-born man unites sexually with a man or a woman in a cart pulled by a cow, or in water, or by day, he should bathe with his clothes on.’’

Since Manusmriti was written at a time when bath generally meant taking a dip in a river or a lake with other members of the same gender, the penalty of making a homosexual bathe without taking off his clothes was probably designed to avoid the embarrassment of his being sexually aroused in public.

In another indicator of the liberal Hindu heritage, Kama Sutra, a classic written in the first millennium by Sage Vatsyayana, devotes a whole chapter to homosexual sex saying “it is to be engaged in and enjoyed for its own sake as one of the arts.” Besides providing a detailed description of oral sex between men, Kama Sutra categorizes men who desire other men as “third nature” and refers to long-term unions between men.

Muslim mother caned for talking to a Hindu man in Bangladesh under Sharia law

Muslim woman caned for talking to Hindu man

Canwest News Service June 7, 2009

A Muslim mother has been caned for talking to a Hindu man in Bangladesh, police said Saturday, prompting fresh concerns about a rise in harsh treatment of women under strict Islamic law.

The punishment was carried out in a remote village on the orders of village elders, said local police chief Enamul Monowar.

The elders found Kamala Begum, 38,a mother of four, guilty under Islamic sharia law of chatting with an unidentified Hindu man, Monowar said. Hindus make up around 10 per cent of Bangladesh’s population.

“The villagers got bundles of 25 sticks and hit her four times on the back. They claimed it was a symbolic punishment. But she’s humiliated and has been in great mental pain,”Monowar said.

Police have arrested one man and are looking for others who meted out the punishment to the woman in Shason in northeastern Bangladesh, Monowar said.

It is the third such reported case in two weeks and stirred concern among women’s groups in Muslim majority but officially secular Bangladesh about what they say is a rise in brutal treatment of women under locally applied Islamic laws.

“In the last few months, we have seen villagers invoking sharia to mete out barbaric punishments to women,” said Salma Ali, head of rights group Bangladesh National Woman Lawyers Association.

© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald

http://www.calgaryherald.com/Life/Muslim+woman+caned+talking+Hindu/1671312/story.html

Muslim woman caned for talking to Hindu man

Canwest News ServiceJune 7, 2009

A Muslim mother has been caned for talking to a Hindu man in Bangladesh, police said Saturday, prompting fresh concerns about a rise in harsh treatment of women under strict Islamic law.

The punishment was carried out in a remote village on the orders of village elders, said local police chief Enamul Monowar.

The elders found Kamala Begum, 38,a mother of four, guilty under Islamic sharia law of chatting with an unidentified Hindu man, Monowar said. Hindus make up around 10 per cent of Bangladesh’s population.

“The villagers got bundles of 25 sticks and hit her four times on the back. They claimed it was a symbolic punishment. But she’s humiliated and has been in great mental pain,”Monowar said.

Police have arrested one man and are looking for others who meted out the punishment to the woman in Shason in northeastern Bangladesh, Monowar said.

It is the third such reported case in two weeks and stirred concern among women’s groups in Muslimmajority but officially secular Bangladesh about what they say is a rise in brutal treatment of women under locally applied Islamic laws.

“In the last few months, we have seen villagers invoking sharia to mete out barbaric punishments to women,” said Salma Ali, head of rights group Bangladesh National Woman Lawyers Association.

© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald

Muslim cleric bans music in West Bengal village

December 06, 2006

Music fatwa at home or out
The Telegraph, Calcutta

ALAMGIR HOSSAIN

Jangipur, Dec. 5: A maulana in Murshidabad has banned listening to music at home or in concerts and playing songs in public.

The “fatwa”, written in bold on walls on both sides of the approach road to Kanpur village in Raghunathgunj, bears the stamp of the local club and the Mazaar and Madarsa Committee.

“Music is prohibited in this village,’’ reads one.

From the tea stall owner to residents, everybody has been served with the notice, asking them not to play music or watch a dance performance on stage or on television.

Members of the Kanpur Nabajagaran Club are even visiting households to keep a check. The penalty for defying the order: Rs 1,000.

Lutful Sheikh, the secretary of the club, about 280 km from Calcutta, said Rajjak Sheikh, who deals in children’s toys at the local market, was fined for playing a CD in his shop.

A religious leader from Uttar Pradesh first imposed the ban. “Sayed Ahmed Kalimi from Katra Sharif in Shahjahanpur visits us every year being the peer sahib of our village and the head of the local madarsa. He imposed the ban in May,” the club secretary said.

Mohammad Safiullah, the head maulana of the village madarsa, said: “Shariyat does not permit Muslims to enjoy music.”

“I declared the fatwa after consulting the senior people of this village. In the past seven months no one has dared to challenge my directive but for one businessman,” Safiullah said.

Hyder Ali, a member of the Kanpur village panchayat, said: “The villagers have supported the fatwa as it has helped develop the moral character of the present generation. Present trends of music and other forms of entertainment affect the upbringing of a child.”

However, Sukhchand Sheikh, who owns a tea stall, said his business has suffered because of it. “I had a TV set in my stall and everybody enjoyed music and other programmes. Now that it is switched off, the number of customers has declined.”

The inspector in charge of the Raghunathgunj police station, Subhendu Banerjee, was, however, “not aware of any such fatwa”.

Pakistanis, Indians, the same people? Surely not (must read)

“Pakistan was founded on the basis of Islam. It still defines itself in
terms of Islam. And over the next decade as it destroys itself, it
will be because of Islamic extremism.

India was founded on the basis that religion had no role in
determining citizenship or nationhood. An Indian can belong to any
religion in the world and face no discrimination in his rights as a
citizen.”

The same people? Surely not

Vir Sanghvi, March 07, 2009, Hindustan Times

Few things annoy me as much as the claim often advanced by
well-meaning but woolly- headed (and usually Punjabi) liberals to the
effect that when it comes to India and Pakistan, “We’re all the same
people, yaar.”

This may have been true once upon a time. Before 1947, Pakistan was
part of undivided India and you could claim that Punjabis from West
Punjab (what is now Pakistan) were as Indian as, say, Tamils from
Madras.

But time has a way of moving on. And while the gap between our
Punjabis (from east Punjab which is now the only Punjab left in India)
and our Tamils may actually have narrowed, thanks to improved
communications, shared popular culture and greater physical mobility,
the gap between Indians and Pakistanis has now widened to the extent
that we are no longer the same people in any significant sense.

This was brought home to me most clearly by two major events over the
last few weeks.

The first of these was the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team on
the streets of Lahore. In their defence, Pakistanis said that they
were powerless to act against the terrorists because religious
fanaticism was growing. Each day more misguided youngsters joined
jihadi outfits and the law and order situation worsened.

Further, they added, things had got so bad that in the tribal areas
the government of Pakistan had agreed to suspend the rule of law under
pressure from the Taliban and had conceded that sharia law would reign
instead. Interestingly, while most civilised liberals should have been
appalled by this surrender to the forces of extremism, many Pakistanis
defended this concession.

Imran Khan (Keble College, Oxford, 1973-76) even declared that sharia
law would be better because justice would be dispensed more swiftly!
(I know this is politically incorrect but the Loin of the Punjab’s
defence of sharia law reminded me of the famous Private Eye cover when
his marriage to Jemima Goldsmith was announced. The Eye carried a
picture of Khan speaking to Jemima’s father. “Can I have your
daughter’s hand?” Imran was supposedly asking James Goldsmith. “Why?
Has she been caught shoplifting?” Goldsmith replied. So much for
sharia law.)

The second contrasting event was one that took place in Los Angeles
but which was perhaps celebrated more in India than in any other
country in the world. Three Indians won Oscars: A.R. Rahman, Resul
Pookutty and Gulzar.

Their victory set off a frenzy of rejoicing. We were proud of our
countrymen. We were pleased that India’s entertainment industry and
its veterans had been recognised at an international platform. And all
three men became even bigger heroes than they already were.

But here’s the thing: Not one of them is a Hindu.

Can you imagine such a thing happening in Pakistan? Can you even
conceive of a situation where the whole country would celebrate the
victory of three members of two religious minorities? For that matter,
can you even imagine a situation where people from religious
minorities would have got to the top of their fields and were,
therefore, in the running for international awards?

On the one hand, you have Pakistan imposing sharia law, doing deals
with the Taliban, teaching hatred in madrasas, declaring jihad on the
world and trying to kill innocent Sri Lankan cricketers. On the other,
you have the triumph of Indian secularism.

The same people?

Surely not.

We are defined by our nationality. They choose to define themselves by
their religion.

But it gets even more complicated. As you probably know, Rahman was
born Dilip Kumar. He converted to Islam when he was 21. His religious
preferences made no difference to his prospects. Even now, his music
cuts across all religious boundaries. He’s as much at home with Sufi
music as he is with bhajans. Nor does he have any problem with saying
‘Vande Mataram’.

Now, think of a similar situation in Pakistan. Can you conceive of a
Pakistani composer who converted to Hinduism at the age of 21 and
still went on to become a national hero? Under sharia law, they’d
probably have to execute him.

Resul Pookutty’s is an even more interesting case. Until you realise
that Malayalis tend to put an ‘e’ where the rest of us would put an
‘a,’ (Ravi becomes Revi and sometimes the Gulf becomes the Gelf), you
cannot work out that his name derives from Rasool, a fairly obviously
Islamic name.

But here’s the point: even when you point out to people that Pookutty
is in fact a Muslim, they don’t really care. It makes no difference to
them. He’s an authentic Indian hero, his religion is irrelevant.

Can you imagine Pakistan being indifferent to a man’s religion? Can
you believe that Pakistanis would not know that one of their Oscar
winners came from a religious minority? And would any Pakistani have
dared bridge the religious divide in the manner Resul did by referring
to the primeval power of Om in his acceptance speech?

The same people?

Surely not.

Most interesting of all is the case of Gulzar who many Indians believe
is a Muslim. He is not. He is a Sikh. And his real name is Sampooran
Singh Kalra.

So why does he have a Muslim name?

It’s a good story and he told it on my TV show some years ago. He was
born in West Pakistan and came over the border during the bloody days
of Partition. He had seen so much hatred and religious violence on
both sides, he said, that he was determined never to lose himself to
that kind of blind religious prejudice and fanaticism.

Rather than blame Muslims for the violence inflicted on his community
— after all, Hindus and Sikhs behaved with equal ferocity — he adopted
a Muslim pen name to remind himself that his identity was beyond
religion. He still writes in Urdu and considers it irrelevant whether
a person is a Sikh, a Muslim or a Hindu.

Let’s forget about political correctness and come clean: can you see
such a thing happening in Pakistan? Can you actually conceive of a
famous Pakistani Muslim who adopts a Hindu or Sikh name out of choice
to demonstrate the irrelevance of religion?

My point, exactly.

What all those misguided liberals who keep blathering on about us
being the same people forget is that in the 60-odd years since
Independence, our two nations have traversed very different paths.

Pakistan was founded on the basis of Islam. It still defines itself in
terms of Islam. And over the next decade as it destroys itself, it
will be because of Islamic extremism.

India was founded on the basis that religion had no role in
determining citizenship or nationhood. An Indian can belong to any
religion in the world and face no discrimination in his rights as a
citizen.

It is nobody’s case that India is a perfect society or that Muslims
face no discrimination. But only a fool would deny that in the last
six decades, we have travelled a long way towards religious equality.
In the early days of independent India, a Yusuf Khan had to call
himself Dilip Kumar for fear of attracting religious prejudice.

In today’s India, a Dilip Kumar can change his name to A.R. Rahman and
nobody really gives a damn either way.

So think back to the events of the last few weeks. To the murderous
attack on innocent Sri Lankan cricketers by jihadi fanatics in a
society that is being buried by Islamic extremism. And to the triumphs
of Indian secularism.

Same people?

Don’t make me laugh.

75 year Saudi woman, sentenced to 40 lashings

Elderly Saudi woman sentenced to lashings
Published: March 9, 2009

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, March 9 (UPI) — A 75-year-old Saudi Arabian woman has been sentenced to receive 40 lashes for hosting two unrelated men in her house, local media reported.

The Saudi daily newspaper al-Watan said the woman, Khamisa Mohammed Sawadi, has appealed her sentence after being charged with offenses against Islam by the religious police, the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, CNN reported Monday.

Sawadi says the two men in her house were a man she considers her son because she breast-fed him as a baby and a friend who was escorting him as he delivered bread to the elderly woman.

“It’s made everybody angry because this is like a grandmother,” Saudi women’s rights activist Wajeha Huwaider told CNN. “Forty lashes — how can she handle that pain? You cannot justify it.”

The U.S. broadcaster reported that Saudi religious police last week also detained two male novelists for questioning after they approached a female writer, Halima Muzfar, for an autograph at a book fair in Riyadh.

Is banning Islam the way to go?

To ban Islam is the most natural way to go
(Reader comment on article: Trouble in Londonistan
in response to reader comment: Root cause of Muslims’ problems
Submitted by Alain Jean-Mairet (Switzerland), Jul 19, 2006 at 06:17)

As soon as you clearly see what Islamic laws do mean – wars against all people who refuse to bow to Islam, religious hatred and segregation, mutilations and collective murder in public places, systematic slavery – you understand that the thing must be banned. This simple fact is confirmed even by a fully politically correct institution like the European Court of Human Rights (this judgment is also presented and explained, in French, on precaution.ch).

The problem is just political.

For most people, and for many Muslims, too, Islam is a normal religion, that is, a good thing, a guide in life, a way to live according to the will of a good and merciful god. And that is not supposed to be questioned. And if it is questioned nevertheless, most people think that you can interpret the sacred texts at will, and find there the best just as well as the worst.

But the latter isn’t true. The best effort ever to interpret Islam’s sacred texts was that of jurists, elaborating the Islamic laws (Sharia). They formed several colleges (madhahib) where all members had to know the Koran and most hadiths by heart for discussing them. They debated for a long time, of all possible matters treated in the Islamic scriptures.

They did disagree on many details. But they fully agreed on jihad being a war of conquest, waged against all infidels until Islam reigns supreme. They did agree too on dhimma, being an inferior, humiliating statute for “people of the book”, as they wanted to label believers of other monotheist faiths. They did agree on most hudud, punishments for violations of the claims of God (huquq Allah) which is why adultery still can be punished by stoning (collective murder with the help of the public) in Islam. They did agree on slavery being a totally normal statute for servants, concubines, workers of all kinds.

One really can doubt whether it is possible to conclude anything else than what those men agreed upon, in separate colleges, soaked in different basic cultures, without consultation nor hardly any political affinities beyond the belonging to Islam.

But fact is, those laws didn’t, don’t and won’t do. They have to be changed or abandoned. So the question is just how?

Obviously, only Muslims can gather and decide that their sacred laws have changed. They have to be encouraged to do so. That means encouraging the learning and questioning of those laws and their basis, and debating some ways to reform them. Within Islam, it is a religious procedure, as those laws are supposed to be divine. I guess it must be done in Mecca or so. But without Islam, the most natural form of encouraging that process is to forbid Islam as long as its laws will stay “incompatible with the democratic regime” (point 25 of the ECHR judgement).

The mere effort, successful or not, towards the banning of Islam based on those reflections will foster the reconsidering of Islamic laws, will awake Westerners to the danger of Islam at large and will strengthen the position of Muslims reformers, within and without Islam.

That’s why, in a nutshell, banning Islam is the way to go. Until it will be reformed.