Hizbullah supporters at an election rally. / AP
The Iran-backed terrorist group Hizbullah is expected to win a majority in Lebanese parliament following the nation’s first general election in nine years.
Preliminary results from the May 6 election show the Resistance Movement bloc of parties, led by Hizbullah, is expected to win more than 64 seats in the 128-member parliament. Continue reading
Chechens have said in interviews that expectations for behavior are more rigid and strict in among Chechen emigrants in Germany than in Chechnya itself — “a competition in righteousness.” Threats of violence against “errant” women are viewed as “acts of patriotism.” Pictured above: A volunteer tutor (left) instructs an asylum-applicant from Chechnya in a German-language class, on November 10, 2015, in Berlin, Germany. (Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
- Threats of violence against “errant” women are viewed as “acts of patriotism.
- “They have come to Germany because they wanted to live in Germany, but they keep trying to turn it into Chechnya with its medieval ways.” — Social worker interviewed by Meduza.
- “Everyone’s attention is fixed on the Syrians, but the Chechens are the most dangerous group. We are not paying sufficient attention to this.” — Police in Frankfurt (Oder).
A hundred Islamists are now openly enforcing Sharia law on the streets of Berlin, according to local police who are investigating a recent string of violent assaults in the German capital.
The self-appointed morality police involve Salafists from Chechnya, a predominantly Sunni Muslim region in Russia. The vigilantes are using threats of violence to discourage Chechen migrants from integrating into German society; they are also promoting the establishment of a parallel Islamic legal system in Germany. German authorities appear unable to stop them. Continue reading
After the documentary “Sharia in Denmark” embarrassed Danish authorities, the government reached a new a political agreement, which Danish Member of Parliament Naser Khader supported, saying, “this stops hate preachers from coming to Denmark, preachers who only want to come here in order to sow discord between population groups and who encourage violence, incest and pedophilia.”
- “All the bullying happens in Arabic… The hierarchy of the Arab boys creates a very violent environment. … I have filmed the particularly vile bullying of a Somali boy. You can see the tears in his eyes. They are destroying him; it is very violent. ” — From a dissertation by Jalal El Derbas, Ph.D.
- Danish teachers are the least respected and are spoken of in denigrating and humiliating terms.
- “I am not saying that all the Arab children did ugly things, but we witnessed on a regular basis… using derogatory Arabic language towards Somalis and girls.” — Lise Egholm, former head of the Rådmandsgade school in Copenhagen.
- Whether Danish parliamentarians wish to acknowledge this problem or not, they are up against far wider issues than that of religious incitement in mosques by radical preachers.
After the television documentary, “Sharia in Denmark“, embarrassed Danish authorities by revealing how widespread the preaching of sharia is in mosques in Denmark, the Danish government, in May, concluded a political agreement about “initiatives directed against religious preachers who seek to undermine Danish laws and values and who support parallel legal systems”.
Al-Sabirin logo
Al-Sabirin (the name comes from the Arabic word for “patience”) has begun recruiting an intended initial force of 400 fighters, the TV report said, and is directly funded by the regime in Tehran.
Because it follows Shi’ite Islam — as does Iran and the Iranian proxy militia Hezbollah in Lebanon — it is having a difficult time gaining recruits among Gaza’s Sunni Muslims. Nonetheless, the report said, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards is allocating funds to the nascent group, transferred through a charitable organization named after the founder of Iran’s Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini. Continue reading
- A deeper look into the history of Turkey reveals that, unfortunately, Turkey has never been either truly secular or democratic. In Turkey, freedom of conscience and religion is respected — but only if you are a practicing Sunni Muslim.
- The problem is that “modern” Turkey claims to be a “secular” republic; a secular republic is supposed to treat all people — Muslims and non-Muslims — equally. The objective of the Diyanet (Presidency of Religious Affairs), on the other hand, is to keep religion (Islam) under the control of the state, and to keep the people under the control of the state by means of religion.
- “Those who are not genuine Turks can have only one right in the Turkish fatherland, and that is to be a servant, to be a slave. We are in the most free country of the world. They call this Turkey.” — Mahmut Esat Bozkurt, Turkey’s first Minister of Justice, 1930.
When many Western analysts discuss the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey, they rightfully criticize it for its religious intolerance, authoritarianism and lack of respect for secular principles and minorities. They also tend to compare the AKP to former Kemalist governments, and draw a distinction between the Islamist AKP and former non-Islamist governments.
They claim that Turkey was “secular” and somewhat “democratic,” until the AKP came to power.
(Reuters) – Saudi Arabia is moving heavy military equipment including artillery to areas near its border with Yemen, U.S. officials said on Tuesday, raising the risk that the Middle East’s top oil power will be drawn into the worsening Yemeni conflict.
The buildup follows a southward advance by Iranian-backed Houthi Shi’ite militants who took control of the capital Sanaa in September and seized the central city of Taiz at the weekend as they move closer to the new southern base of U.S.-supported President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. Continue reading
Yazidi activist claims President Obama’s statement that a military evacuation of Mount Sinjar was no longer necessary encouraged Isis militants
A leading Yazidi politician said yesterday that he was preparing to make a last stand in his home village in northern Iraq, as members of the religious minority warned that another massacre of civilians by the extremist militants of the Islamic State (formerly Isis) showed that the crisis was far from over. The United Nations said it was trying to confirm reports of the worst single atrocity against Yazidis since the Islamic State offensive began on 3 August, with two separate sources saying up to 400 men had been executed in the village of Kocho after refusing to convert to Islam.
Last night, Kurdish forces backed by US air strikes were attempting to retake control of the Mosul Dam, which helps power parts of northern Iraq, with some eyewitness reports claiming a ground offensive had been launched as part of the operation. Eleven fighters from Islamic State, which has controlled the dam since 7 August, were said to have been killed. The strikes came a day after Barack Obama said it was no longer necessary to carry out a military evacuation of Mount Sinjar – where tens of thousands of people had been trapped by militants earlier – since many people had managed to escape following US air strikes.
But a leading Yazidi activist, Dr Mirza Dinnayi, who had spoken to Kocho’s senior official before the massacre, claimed there were still 25,000 people in the area and described Mr Obama’s remarks as “a very big mistake”.
When the US said that the siege of Sinjar was effectively over, “this encouraged Islamic State to attack 24 hours later”, he told Jonathan Rugman, of Channel 4 News. “We had a massacre yesterday [and] could have another.”
Saudi Arabia appears resolute: It wants Bashar Al-Assad out of Damascus. The Saudis view the fighting in Syria with the same intensity that they did the civil war in Yemen that raged in the 1960s—as a conflict with wide and serious repercussions that will shape the political trajectory of the Middle East for years to come.
The Syrian war presents the Saudis with a chance to hit three birds with one stone: Iran, its rival for regional dominance, Tehran’s ally Assad and his Hezbollah supporters. But Riyadh’s policy makers are wary. They know that once fully committed, it will be difficult to disengage. And so they are taking to heart the lessons of another regional war that flared on their border 50 years ago. Continue reading
This is what precisely makes a war against Syria (which is also an attack on Iran because of a mutual defense pact) so dangerous, as compared to countries like Iraq or Libya. They have the capability to hit at the American homeland, and one shouldn’t dismiss the fact that it will happen as because the threat sounds like rhetoric from just another random third-world nation madman.
When you go to war with a country in the Middle East, such as Iran or Syria, you better be prepared to fight for more than a thousand years. Why? Because they already have been at war back and forth that long with other nations and kingdoms. They are hardened and used to it, whereas the American memory of history and events lasts 24 hours and the “stomach” for war lasts maybe a few years, at best, as proven by the prolonged wars the U.S. is already involved in.
With the White House closer to launching a surgical military strike on Syria, questions swirl over the extent to which such an attack could trigger a wave of terrorism directed at the U.S. and Israel.
Some analysts say that Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Lebanese militia fighting in support of embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad, likely would be inspired to ramp up operations in Iran’s “shadow war” with the U.S. and its allies. Continue reading
The warning, the third in as many weeks by a member of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council(GCC), comes amid increased nervousness in the region over Iran.
Shi’ite-led unrest is resurgent in Bahrain a year after the ruling Al Khalifa family brought in Saudi andUAE troops to help suppress an uprising seen by Sunni Muslim Gulf rulers as sectarian in nature and driven by Shi’ite giant Iran.
“Any harm that comes across any of our countries is harm that touches us all,” Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Nayef said in a speech at a meeting of GCC interior ministers in Riyadh.
Nayef also condemned what he called Iran’s “occupation” of the island and its role in events in Bahrain.
“We stress that Saudi Arabia and the rest of the council countries are standing in a unified line with Bahrain and the UAE to protect sovereignty and stability, considering their security a part of the council’s security as a whole.”
Full article: Saudi Arabia warns Iran over Gulf islands, Bahrain (Yahoo!)
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