(Local) In a further sign of divisions within Italy’s populist coalition government, politicians from the far-right League blasted Foreign Minister Enzo Moavero Milanesi for comparing the mass migration of Italians in the past to the foreigners landing on the country’s shores today. […]
(AFP) An appeals court in Paris has upheld a decision by judges to keep Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan in jail while he is being investigated on rape charges brought by two women, a legal source told AFP on Thursday. Lawyers for Ramadan […]
(Deutsche Welle) A spokeswoman for the German Interior Ministry said Wednesday that an agreement had been made to send back to Spain some migrants arriving in Germany. Eleonore Petermann said the deal had been signed by the German and Spanish interior ministries on […]
(AP) German authorities say they have arrested a German man who is accused of spying on a mosque for Jordan. Federal prosecutors said the 33-year-old, identified only as Alexander B. because of German privacy rules, was arrested Tuesday. They didn’t specify where. […]
(Swiss Info) A ban on face-covering clothing in the southern Swiss canton of Ticino has affected masked football supporters the most. Hardly any wearers of burkas or niqabs, the original targets of the ban, have been fined. In 2013, two-thirds of Ticino’s […]
(Local) Rachid Nekkaz, a French-Algerian businessman and activist, has said he will keep a promise he made earlier this year to pay fines issued in Denmark for breaches of the new law against face-masking garments. The law, popularly known as the “burqa […]
(AP) A Muslim civil rights organization said Tuesday it plans to file a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the federal government’s terror watch list system, including a newly disclosed program in which air marshals have secretly monitored air passengers with no known […]
(Deutsche Welle) Children from Islamist households in Germany represent a “not insignificant potential threat,” the head of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), Germany’s domestic intelligence service, Hans-Georg Maassen said Monday. In a new report cited by the Funke media […]
(BBC) Former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has been accused of Islamophobia after saying Muslim women wearing burkas “look like letter boxes.” He said he was against bans on face-covering veils in public places, in his Telegraph column, but added that they looked […]
(AFP) German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer on Sunday said he hoped for a breakthrough this week in talks with Italy and Greece on taking back asylum-seekers already registered in those countries, as Berlin toughens its migration policies. Seehofer, whose push for tighter […]
(Dutch News) A mosque in Amsterdam has been giving shelter to fundamentalist Muslims who went on to join Islamic State, the Telegraaf reported on Friday. The paper bases its claim on a photograph which it says shows four “heavyweights from extremist circles” […]
(AFP) A 28-year-old woman wearing a niqab on Friday became the first person in Denmark to be fined for violating a new controversial law banning full-face Islamic veils in public places, media reported. Police were called to a shopping centre in Horsholm, […]
(Local) A photo of a police officer hugging an emotional niqab-wearing woman at a demonstration in Denmark on Wednesday has become one of the country’s most widely-shared images this week. The demonstration in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro neighbourhood on Wednesday took place as a […]
(BBC) Former English Defence League (EDL) leader Tommy Robinson has been released on bail after winning an appeal against a contempt of court finding. The 35-year-old admitted the charge and was jailed in May for filming outside Leeds Crown Court during a […]
(AFP) France’s parliament Wednesday signed into law a controversial asylum and immigration bill — despite opposition on the left which decried an effort to limit arrivals while the far right saw the measure as not going far enough. The bill is designed […]
(AFP) Denmark’s ban on the Islamic full-face veil in public spaces came into force on Wednesday, with anyone wearing a garment that hides the face in public risking a fine. Human rights campaigners have slammed the ban as a violation of women’s […]
(IPT) While polls show him lagging in third place in a three-candidate primary, Abdul El-Sayed promises to shock the political world Aug. 7 by becoming Michigan’s Democratic nominee for governor. He’s running an ambitious campaign that mirrors the success political novice Alexandria […]
(BBC) Australia’s first openly gay imam, Nur Warsame, counsels Muslims around the world not to feel shame about sexuality. Unable to travel due to security concerns, he set up Marhaba — an online prayer group — five years ago. He tells the […]
(Local) Green Party co-chairman Robert Habeck has weighed in on the debate surrounding Mesut Özil’s retirement from the German national football team, saying that interior minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) must shoulder some of the blame. Habeck said that Seehofer, who is also […]
(AFP) Danish prosecutors on Tuesday charged an imam with calling for the killing of Jews in the first case of its kind in the Nordic nation and which sparked political outrage. Imam Mundhir Abdallah, who preaches in the Copenhagen neighbourhood of Norrebro […]
(Arab News) The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) condemned a cartoon competition to depict the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). The contest was announced by the Dutch far-right Party for Freedom (PVV), headed by anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders. “While the whole […]
(JTA) Austria’s vice chancellor has called for a ban on ritual slaughter in the country, including Jewish shechitah. Heinz-Christian Strache, the nation’s interior minister and head of the far-right Freedom Party, in a Facebook post Monday said animals should be stunned before […]
(AFP) French police on Monday cleared some 450 Sudanese and Eritrean migrants from a park in the western city of Nantes where they had been camping for more than a month. Regional authorities said 455 people were cleared in the operation, ordered […]
(Middle East Monitor) The Arab Organisation for Human Rights in the UK has revealed details about the deportation of an Egyptian Islamic preacher who is opposed to the Egyptian regime by the Spanish authorities. Spain handed over Alaa Mohamed Said, 45, who […]
(JTA) A Dutch municipality rejected a Turkish entrepreneur’s plan to transform a 125-year-old synagogue into a restaurant. The city council of Deventer in the east of the Netherlands last week deemed the plan “inconsistent with the building’s character,” a decision which blocked […]
(Deutsche Welle) In a local vote on Sunday, the residents of Kaufbeuren, a small town in Bavaria, decided against providing public land for the construction of a mosque. At issue was the question of whether the city would provide the local branch […]
(Odessa American) The Odessa waiter whose story about being called a terrorist by a customer spurred national attention last week now admits it was all a hoax. The waiter, Khalil Cavil, 20, admitted he wrote the racist note himself in a Monday […]
(AFP) Italy agreed Monday to continue accepting migrants rescued at sea, at least until a broader EU strategy to address fair distribution of people can be defined. Foreign Minister Enzo Moavero Milanesi said after talks with his German counterpart Heiko Maas in […]
(Local) Denmark is ranked below many of its European counterparts when it comes to offering Muslim-friendly travel services and accommodation, 2018’s Global Muslim Travel Index finds. In the Netherlands, Muslim tourists can find their way to their nearest mosque by using a […]
(AFP) French judges have rejected a request by lawyers for Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan to drop charges of raping two women, a source close to the inquiry told AFP on Friday. Ramadan, a Swiss citizen and Oxford University professor whose grandfather founded […]
(AFP) Austria rejected Friday registering Jews who want to purchase kosher meat after a far-right politician proposed introducing stricter controls on ritual slaughtering to reduce the practice citing animal rights. Gottfried Waldhaeusl, a cabinet minister of Lower Austria and member of the […]
(WGME) A new effort to ban female genital mutilation on the state level has taken shape in Maine. A political action committee has filed paperwork to begin the process of getting the question on the November ballot. While FGM is illegal federally, […]
(WGME) A group in Maine is trying to get a referendum on next year’s ballot to outlaw female genital mutilation in Maine. Thursday, the Prevent FGM in Maine Political Action Committee filed a request to collect signatures with the secretary of state’s […]
(Radio Poland) Poland is scrapping plans to ban the ritual slaughter of animals, the country’s agriculture minister has said. Jan Krzysztof Ardanowski said that ritual slaughter was allowed in a number of countries around the world. He added that Muslim countries were […]
(AFP) Greece will process 1,500 asylum applications from Germany as part of a deal signed between the two countries, Greece’s migration minister said Wednesday. “In the first half of 2018 there were 1,500 requests for processing by Germany, and they will be […]
(JTA) A 69-year-old Jewish man wearing a kippah was assaulted in Paris by a young Arab man who shouted about Allah and Hitler. In Tuesday’s incident, the alleged assailant hit the Jewish man, pushed him to the ground and dragged him by his […]
(BBC) The Austrian ambassador to Israel has downplayed reports of a plan by an Austrian state to require Jews and Muslims to register before they can buy kosher and halal meat. Martin Weiss said politicians in Lower Austria would work with religious […]
(BBC) One of the men accused of killing a jeweller has said a co-defendant entered the victim’s shop with a gun hidden beneath a burka. Ramniklal Jogiya was abducted near his Leicester shop on 24 January, with his body found in Stoughton […]
(BBC) Judges have delayed their decision in an appeal by far-right activist Tommy Robinson against his conviction and jailing for contempt of court. The Court of Appeal expects a judgement on the former English Defence League leader to be made by the […]
(AFP) An asylum seeker deported to Afghanistan this month will be returned to Germany, the interior ministry said Wednesday, in the latest of a series of scandals surrounding Berlin’s hardening migration policy. A ministry spokeswoman said the federal migration and refugee agency […]
(New Arab) Protests took place around the world on Tuesday to demand the release of Tariq Ramadan, a Swiss Muslim academic who was detained in France after being accused of rape. Solidarity rallies as part of the Free Tariq Ramadan Campaign’s “International […]
(AFP) Four people accused of illegally helping migrants cross the border into France were being questioned by police on Tuesday, the latest case over aid provided to refugees on the move through Europe. The activists, part of the “Tous Migrants” association, took […]
(JTA) A regional politician in Austria defended a plan to limit access to kosher meat, conditioning its sale on permits that would be individually issued to observant Jews. The Wiener Zeitung daily reported Tuesday about the draft decree in the state of […]
(New Arab) The United Arab Emirates helped to “cement Islamophobia” in the UK in order to boost its standing in the west, through a range of campaigning techniques, which are similar to those used by pro-Israel lobbyists in the US and Europe, […]
(AFP) The number of migrants arriving in Spain by boat is surging, the UN said Tuesday, and it has now surpassed Italy as the top destination for Mediterranean crossings. So far this year, 50,872 migrants have crossed the Mediterranean to Europe — […]
(Swiss Info) The Federation of Islamic Organisations in Switzerland has warned against associating crimes with a certain religion. In an interview with the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) on Tuesday, federation spokesperson Pascal Gemperli said that someone’s religious affiliation was not a determining factor […]
(Charity Today) Arrests and prosecutions alone will not end the problem of FGM, said a police inspector speaking at the National FGM Centre’s annual conference, this week. More preventative work with affected communities is needed in order to end the harmful practice, […]
(Arab News) The British government has been urged to launch an investigation into allegations Al Jazeera has given a “platform” to an extremist group linked to some of the UK’s bloodiest terror attacks. The Qatar-owned broadcaster has featured members of the outlawed […]
(AFP) Several thousand people protested Saturday on the France-Italy border against European states closing their frontiers to migrants, AFP journalists said. They said about 3,000 people — mostly Italian, French, German, Dutch and Spanish — marched from the small Italian town of […]
(AFP) Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen used an interview published on Saturday to criticise proposals put forward by the government to make it impossible to claim asylum on European soil. “Whoever comes to our country and applies for asylum should be […]
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