'The Man Had Used Filthy Language. Otherwise the Ceremony Was OK'

Note to self: Cancel that planned trip to the Maldives.

THE Maldives expressed "shock and disgust'' after a video surfaced of a Swiss couple being mocked and insulted by a celebrant during their marriage ceremony at a luxury hotel.

In the video, posted on YouTube several days ago, a couple can be seen seated opposite the celebrant as they renew their wedding vows at the Vilu Reef hotel, which charges $400 a night for the use of its honeymoon suite.

Speaking in the local Dhivehi language, the celebrant calls the couple "swine'' amid a host of other insults during a hateful profanity-laced tirade littered with often bizarre personal and religious-tinged taunts.

Muslim-majority Maldives, a nation of 1,192 tiny coral islets scattered some 550 miles (880 kilometres) across the equator, is one of South Asia's most expensive holiday destinations and is popular among Western honeymooners.

Foreign Minister Ahmed Shaheed said he was "horrified'' to see the video.

"I was shocked and horrified,'' Shaheed said when contacted in the capital of the atoll nation, Male.

"I could not see the entire video because my children were around and I didn't want them to hear the bad language that was used.

"This is a rip-off of the couple who in good faith went to this resort to renew their vows. This incident will damage the reputation we have built over the years for professional quality service.

"I expect the hotel to refund the money and make a full apology.''

Vilu Reef general manager Mohamed Rasheed said the hotel had apologised to the couple who had the ceremony on October 11 and had taken disciplinary action against those involved.

The disgraced celebrant has been suspended and the hotel company, Sun Hotels and Resorts, said in a brief statement it had asked the police to investigate.

"We have apologised to the couple as well as to the general public,'' Rasheed said.

"The man had used filthy language. Otherwise the ceremony was OK.''

Good thing Islam is so tolerant and respectful of others, otherwise people might be upset.

Here's some video:

Buffalo Headchopper Claims He Was a Battered Spouse

Quite a unique defense for this practitioner of the Religion of Peace.

The judge in Muzzammil S. "Mo" Hassan's murder case today barred his new attorney from using an emotional-disturbance defense and said he would only grant the jailed businessman further delays in his trial based solely "in the interests of justice."

Hassan is accused of beheading his estranged wife, Aasiya Zubair Hassan, 37, last February.

Hassan's new defense attorney, Frank M. Bogulski, today told reporters that he is "confident" he can get an acquittal for Hassan on an unprecedented defense combining psychiatric elements and justification based on claims Hassan was "a battered" spouse who was verbally abused and humiliated by his wife.

Homicide Prosecutor Colleen Curtin Gable, though, noted that Aasiya Zubair Hassan was beheaded about a week after she began formal divorce proceedings.

And Gable today won her months-old motion to bar a psychiatric defense.

The judge told Bogulski he can make motions in coming months seeking permission to reinstate a psychiatric defense but as of now, such a defense claiming Hassan was emotionally out of control when he killed his wife "is precluded."

Nothing like a little alleged verbal abuse to turn you into a headchopping monster. Scary thing is they only need one idiot juror to believe him.

Joys of Islam, Part 856: Almost Half of Egyptian Wives Beaten

This would normally be considered a world calamity, but since they're beaten in the name of the Religion of Peace, it barely gets noticed. Imagine the reaction if it was reported that half of American wives were beaten. This elicits stifled yawns.

Almost half of married Egyptian women have been physically abused by their husbands, a study by the government statistics centre said on Wednesday.

The study by CAPMAS said that 47 percent of women between the ages of 15 and 49 reported being victims of domestic violence and seven percent said a spouse raped them, state news agency MENA reported.

Domestic violence is punishable under Egyptian law, but police are reluctant to intervene in something that is considered a private matter, said an Egyptian women's rights activist.

"If a woman complains, it would be considered a crime. But if she doesn't, the husband won't be punished," Nahed Abu el-Qumsan, head of the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights, told AFP.

The National Association of Gals were unavailable for comment.

RoP Across The Pond: Terrorist Says He Was 'Simply Taking Part In A Protest'

Terror trial: NHS doctors planned terrorist 'spectacular'

Two NHS doctors planned a campaign of "indiscriminate and wholesale murder" with a series of car bomb attacks across Britain which culminated in a failed suicide attack on Glasgow Airport, a jury has been told.

Islamic extremists Bilal Abdulla, 29, and Mohammed Asha, 27, plotted the "spectaculars" as "punishment" for Britain's foreign policy in Iraq and Israel, it is alleged.

Iraqi national Abdulla and a third man, Kafeel Ahmed, tried and failed to blow up cars packed with gas canisters, nails and petrol outside a nightclub in London's West End in June 2007.

When those devices failed to detonate, Abdulla and Ahmed launched the alleged suicide attack on Glasgow Airport the following day. Ahmed, 28, later died from burns he sustained after setting off petrol bombs which failed to blow up their Jeep.

Saudi-born Asha, a senior house officer in the neurology department of University Hospital of North Staffordshire, was not directly involved in either attack but supplied money to buy the cars and bomb components, was in touch with the other two men at crucial stages of the plot and may have offered "spiritual and ideological guidance", the prosecution allege.

Three other cars had been purchased by the gang and other possible targets including the Old Bailey and the City of London had been filmed by the plotters, Woolwich Crown Court in south east London was told.

Jonathan Laidlaw QC, prosecuting, said: "In addition to the killing of the innocent the objective was to seize public attention, both here and internationally. By the carrying out of a series of explosions, with no warning as to where the next strike would occur, the terrorists knew the public would be gripped by fear."

He added that the attacks failed through sheer "good fortune" on the part of the public.

"Apart from the shocking nature of the activity these two defendants were engaged in, the extraordinary thing is that both men are doctors," said Mr Laidlaw. "They turned their attention away from the treating of illness to the planning of murder."

Mr Laidlaw said the plot had not been picked up by the security services, but "who would have suspected two doctors to have been involved in such planning?"

Both men deny conspiracy to murder and conspiracy to cause explosions.

The jury was told that the plot, which had taken six months to plan, was put into action when Ahmed and Abdulla drove two Mercedes cars packed with gas canisters and nails from their rented house in Glasgow to London, where they parked outside the Tiger Tiger nightclub in the Haymarket, which was packed with more than 500 people.

The second of the cars, a blue, L-registered Mercedes, was parked near a bus stop in Cockspur Street, just south of the night club, possibly as a secondary device "deliberately placed there so it would be in the path of those evacuated."

The two men, who had stopped at London's Gateway services to fill the cars with "as much fuel as possible" on the way, opened the valves on the gas cylinders and retreated to "a safe distance".

At around 1.30am on June 29, 2007, the two men allegedly tried to detonate the car bombs by calling mobile phones inside the cars which had been rigged up to home-made detonators.

"Had it been executed in the way intended [it] would have resulted in the loss of many lives particularly among the young seeking entertainment in the area or on their way home after a night out," the prosecutor said.

But a miscalculation meant the car bombs failed to detonate, and the two men decided on a drastic change of plan.

Because the cars had not been destroyed, the men knew that the police would quickly piece together their identities from the car registrations, the mobile phones and CCTV images, said Mr Laidlaw.

"The change in approach was that the next attack was to be a suicide attack," said Mr Laidlaw. "The bombers, even though the attack was likely to result in their own deaths, were absolutely determined that the next vehicle would explode. There was to be no repeat of the failure of the devices in London."

The next day, on Saturday June 30, the busiest day of the year at Glasgow airport, a Jeep packed with gas canisters was driven into the main doors of the terminal building with Ahmed at the wheel and Abdulla in the passenger seat. The men threw down petrol bombs in an effort to ensure the vehicle exploded.

"Again fortune intervened to save those inside the terminal," Mr Laidlaw said. "The Jeep became trapped in the terminal doors and despite the best efforts of the bombers and although there was a fierce fire, the jeep did not explode."

The jury was told that the men had first met in 2004 and 2005, whilst staying at an Islamic centre in Cambridge, where Asha was working at Addenbrooke's Hospital.

At some point the men, who all adhered to "extreme Islamic beliefs", decided to launch "revengeful" attacks on Britain, said Mr Laidlaw, because of what they saw as the country's "persecution" of Muslims in the Middle East.

They spent six months planning the attacks, it is alleged, with e-mails between Ahmed and Abdulla talking about "experiments" in February 2007.

In April Abdulla rented a house in a quiet residential street near Paisley, Renfrewshire, 14 miles from Glasgow, where they could prepare and arm the vehicles, the court was told.

Ahmed flew back to Britain in May after eight months in India, and within days he and Abdulla, a junior house officer in general surgery at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, had carried out reconnaissance in London, Mr Laidlaw said.

Among the areas they visited were Aldgate in the City, Leicester Square, Charing Cross, Ludgate Hill, near the Old Bailey, and Upper St Martin's Lane, near the Haymarket.

They were in frequent contact with Asha during the visit to London, Mr Laidlaw said.

"It is as if Abdulla was reporting back, taking instructions from or seeking the approval of (Asha)," said Mr Laidlaw.

Having bought three Mercedes cars, a BMW 525 and a Jeep through Autotrader magazine, the men bought gas canisters and large quantities of nails from B&Q and petrol cans from Halfords and duvets and pillows from Tesco and Asda to cover up the gas cylinders.

Abdulla claims he never intended to kill or injure anyone, but was simply taking part in a protest, a defence dismissed as "ludicrous" by the prosecution.

The trial continues.

William Ayers and wife & fellow former Weather Underground fugitive Bernardine "Dig it! First they killed those pigs and then they put a fork in their bellies. Wild!" Dohrn were unavailable for comment.


Via The Telegraph

Brad Thor - The Last Patriot

Brad Thor's newest book goes on sale officially tomorrow, and Amazon is allowing pre orders. So why am I telling you about this book? There are no guarantees on how long this book will be available. Not because it will sell out, which it probably will, but rather because forces within the Islamic community will stage their usual protest, feign outrage and threaten all sorts of acts of violence to prove they are a religion of peace. Brad Thor has a loyal following from his previous books he has written. He writes thrillers full of political intrigue, but in his latest, which some are describing as the Islamic Da Vinci code, he dares to venture into that cult of which nothing ill is ever allowed to spoken evil of.
The premise of the book is that a manuscript has been discovered that contains the last revelation of Mohamhead, and if it is made public Islam will never be the same. Apparently even putting forth such a premise, in a work of fiction, is even to ruffle the feathers of those thin skinned Muslims who kill over cartoons.
It will be interesting to see what kind of uproar the book causes. The author has already received death threats in advance of the release, but what remains to be seen is if there will be any public photo ops for the Islamic Rage Boy.

Bridging The Cultural Divide

WIPE OUT THE JEWS

Anti-Semitic Hate Speech in the Name of Islam
Though most Muslims reject Islamism and its propaganda, anti-Semitic messages from satellite channels like the Hamas-run Al-Aqsa are helping to bring a message of hate and intolerance to Europe. The effects of such hate preaching can already be felt in Germany.

Sowing the seeds of hate: The Hamas satellite station Al-Aqsa recently used a Mickey Mouse clone to teach Muslim children -- in Gaza and Europe -- to hate Jews.

"Sanabel, what do you want to do to help the Al-Aqsa Mosque?" Farfur asks on the children's program of Hamas's Al-Aqsa television station. "We want to fight." "And what else?" "Wipe out the Jews." Now Farfur, the cartoon character on Hamas's children's television program, is satisfied. Farfur is a carbon copy of Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse, but the Hamas version does something that Mickey would never do: He entertains children while propagating the murder of Jews.

Just like Old McDonald wouldn't entertain children by having Porky Pig attack Muslims.

International protests forced Hamas to take its Disney clone out of circulation. Al-Aqsa complied, but promptly turned Farfur's departure into an anti-Semitic statement: Farfur was clubbed to death by an Israeli official. Then the girl hosting the program turned to the camera and said: "You've seen how the Jews killed Farfur as a martyr. What do you want to say to the Jews?" A three-year-old girl named Shaima called into the show to say: "We don't like Jews, because they are dogs! We will fight them!" "Oh, Shaima, you're right," the girl in the studio replied, "the Jews are criminals and our enemies."Farfur's appearances are typical of Hamas's anti-Semitic propaganda, which the organization also exports to Germany via satellite, hoping to breed new generations of fanatical anti-Semites and suicide bombers.

Imagine the seething outrage if a TV program showed infidel kids interacting with, "We don't like Muslims, because they are dogs! We will fight them!" "Oh, Samantha, you're right," a girl in the studio replies, "the Muslims are criminals and our enemies."? The UN would go apeshit crazy in the mad rush to condemn the source.

The Hamas station, founded in 2006, is modeled on the Hezbollah station in neighboring Lebanon, al-Manar. Al-Manar's children's program shows children wearing explosive belts and images of dying Israeli soldiers, with triumphant chants as background music. Cartoons depict scenes like that of a child blowing himself up near Israeli soldiers, or of a smiling boy flying toward Israel on a missile. Adult viewers can enjoy video clips that use inspirational graphics and rousing music to glorify the act of committing a suicide bombing, while the evening lineup offers family entertainment with a series of films based on the classic anti-Semitic forgery "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion."

In late 2004, France banned the broadcasting of al-Manar through the European Eutelsat satellite system, citing the station's anti-Semitic content. Nevertheless, messages of hate were still being broadcast into the living rooms of Muslims in Germany via satellites controlled by Saudi Arabia and Egypt, ArabSat and NileSat. Exposure to this programming was apparently not without consequences.

Rabbi Zalman Gurevitch was wearing a traditional black robe when he left his synagogue in Frankfurt's Westend neighborhood on Sept. 7, 2007. It was the Sabbath. According to the police report, he encountered a 22-year-old German of Afghan descent "spontaneously and coincidentally" a short time later. It was early evening and the man, shouting "You shit Jew, I'm going to kill you," plunged a knife into the rabbi's abdomen. Gurevitch was recognizable as a Jew. He survived, thanks to luck and emergency surgery.

Although this attack was an isolated incident, it is hard to overlook how hatred imported from Beirut and Gaza resurfaces in the form of daily acts of anti-Semitism in schools and athletic clubs, on streets and in the subway. Young children raised to be anti-Semitic are already using the phrase "You Jew!" as a derogatory expression in kindergartens and on playgrounds. Schoolchildren berate their teachers, calling them Jew dogs, for not offering Sharia-compatible instruction, and Jewish schoolchildren are attacked and feel compelled to switch to Berlin's Jewish high school and to hide the insignia of their Jewish faith -- the yarmulke and the Star of David -- when in public.

Neo-Nazi sentiments were behind the majority of anti-Semitic incidents reported in 2006. At the same time, however, the number of anti-Semitic criminal offences committed by Muslims jumped from 33 to 88.

In 2007 the German Interior Ministry published a study on the worldviews of "Muslims in Germany," the most comprehensive of its kind to date, which confirmed this trend. According to the study, "anti-Semitic attitudes were found among young Muslims far more often than among non-Muslim immigrants or domestic non-Muslims." The study cited examples of Muslim students to illustrate that this anti-Semitism cannot be dismissed as the product of an underdog attitude within marginalized social groups, but instead represents an ideological way of thinking. "The pervasiveness of sweeping anti-Semitic prejudices among Muslim students was also noticeable," the study pointed out. "Such prejudices, expressed indirectly by slightly more than one-third and in extreme form by about 10 percent of students, are significantly more common than anti-Christian sentiments."

What is the source of this profound hatred, which stations like al-Aqsa and al-Manar are spreading and one in 10 of the Muslim students surveyed embraces? The Middle East conflict is often cited as a reason, but this is too simplistic. Hostility toward Jews has existed since Islam came into being. In its charter, Hamas quotes the Prophet Muhammad as saying: "The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight Jews and kill them. Then, the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will cry out: 'O Muslim, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him." Through the use of such language, the hatred of Jews is given a religious justification.

Nazi Germany entered the picture in the 20th century. The Nazis, hoping to use early Islamic hostility toward Jews for their own ends, paid substantial sums of money to support the Muslim Brotherhood's anti-Jewish campaigns in Egypt. And just as they had radicalized widespread Christian anti-Semitism in Europe, the Nazis did their utmost to radicalize the latent anti-Judaism that had originated in early Islam.

While everything Jewish was considered evil in early Islam, everything evil was now being labeled as Jewish, from wars and revolutions to the drug trade and the decline of moral values. Between 1938 and 1945, the Nazis' radio station broadcast its lies about a supposed Jewish world conspiracy into the Islamic world every evening. The professionally produced programs were broadcast in Arabic, Persian and Turkish, and were very popular. Thus, it comes as no surprise that the Hamas charter has also adopted this legacy.

The Jews, we read in Article 22, "stood behind the French Revolution, the Communist Revolution and most of the revolutions we hear about... They stood behind World War I ... There is no war going on anywhere without them having their finger in it."

Whether in the case of Muhammad or here, in both cases Hamas used sources to justify its hatred of the Jews that are older than Israel. But once someone has fallen for this demonizing delusion, he will find his anti-Jewish concept of the enemy confirmed in everything that an Israeli government does or fails to do. What is more, those who hold Jews responsible for all the world's ills will paint the Jewish state as the root of all evil. Following Hamas's example, they will celebrate or deny the Holocaust, even in Berlin.

Teachers in the German capital are sometimes confronted with Muslim students who expressly use the Holocaust to justify their sympathies for the Nazis ("I like Hitler; he did the right thing with the Jews"), refusing to take part in school trips to concentration camp memorials. During one excursion to the German Historical Museum, a group of Muslim youth gathered in front of a replica of a gas chamber in Auschwitz and applauded.

Can we blame Israel for the mindset that leads to such activities? Perhaps it would be more apt to conclude that the waves of hatred that the Nazis' shortwave radio transmitter once broadcast into the Arab world are now returning in the form of a delayed echo.

Read the rest at Spiegel International.

See also: Anti-Semitism at German Schools.

The Archbishop's New Best Friends

Two children die as Iraqi poison plot recalls Saddam's assassination method of choice

• Cakes laced with thallium left at popular sports club
  
• Britain sends antidote to Basra base and hospitals
  

Iraqi authorities are investigating a case of poisoning at a Baghdad sports club popular with the army in which two children have died and nine people have been taken to hospital. All were reported to have eaten cakes laced with thallium, the toxin that was often used by Saddam's secret police to kill political opponents.

Security officials said it was the first known incident of deliberate thallium poisoning since the fall of the regime.

Police said they had traced the two cakes to a bakery in Baghdad's Adhamiya district. This Sunni Arab stronghold was a bastion for supporters of the late dictator, and more recently a major locus of activity for Sunni extremists.

"This is a disturbing incident," said Mohammed Abbas, a police official. "The use of thallium in this way appears to show that someone in Adhamiya is reviving the techniques of the mukhabarat [the Saddam-era secret police].

"What happens if al-Qaida gets the know-how? We are urgently trying to discover how much thallium is out there and who would know how to utilise it."

Interior ministry officials said they believed the cakes were intended to kill senior members of the club. No treatment for thallium poisoning is available in Iraq and doctors say they are desperately trying to get the antidote. World Health Organisation officials in neighbouring Jordan, where some of the most serious cases are being treated, have requested help from Britain, which has flown medicines and other supplies to Basra.

Mohammed al Askari, a defence ministry spokesman, said the incident occurred at the capital's Airforce club about 10 days ago, when a former employee, a combat sports coach, turned up with two cakes as gifts for officials at the club. He had reportedly been fired several months earlier and had fled to Syria.

The Airforce club is owned by the defence ministry and runs one of Iraq's best-known football teams. Its manager, Samir Khadim, was a star of the Iraqi team throughout the 90s.

Khadim said the former employee, who he declined to name, "came to the club saying he wanted to have a reconciliation with a number of the officers and administrators here. He brought with him two handsome-looking cakes as a kind of peace offering."

But Khadim, who was not at the gathering, said the cakes went uneaten and were taken home by two officers to share among their families. Hours later the six-year-old daughter of one began to show signs of illness. The family took her to a hospital in Baghdad, where doctors pumped her stomach, but she died shortly afterwards.

Hours later the officer began to feel ill, as did three other members of his family. Again doctors pumped their stomachs. Blood tests were taken, and four days later they tested positive for thallium.

The other officer also soon fell ill; he too lost a daughter, and five close relatives were also affected. The two officers remain on the critical list.

Thallium was a favoured method for dispatching enemies of Saddam Hussein. It causes a slow, painful death. In the 80s a number of leading Kurdish rebels, including the present speaker of the Kurdish regional parliament, survived assassination attempts using thallium.

Antidotes and other supplies are understood to have arrived at the British base in Basra and arrangements are being made to take them to hospitals in Baghdad and Amman. The British department of health said: "The World Health Organisation has asked for assistance from the UK government in responding to a health incident in Iraq involving a small number of Iraqi citizens. We are cooperating fully in providing assistance."

Police said one man had been arrested in the investigation.

Khadim said: "These poor children were poisoned by mistake. For sure I and the other officers were the real target. I hope this is not the start of a trend and they find out who has these poisons. Iraq has enough on its plate already."

Religion of Peace™


Via The Guardian

Celebrate the Holidays With Mass Murder

Homicide bomber detonates in Pakistan, killing at least 54.

No word whether they used bombs strapped to a baby this time.

At least 54 people were killed Friday in a suicide bombing at a mosque in northwest Pakistan targeting a former interior minister and close ally of President Pervez Musharraf.

The bomber blew himself up in a crowded mosque at the residential compound of Aftab Sherpao, an outspoken opponent of Islamic militancy who until last month was the top civilian anti-terrorism official.

Sherpao was reportedly unhurt in the attack, which hit as the mosque was crowded with Muslim faithful celebrating the first day of the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha.

The carnage raised the spectre of a bloody run-up to controversial national elections on January 8, with Musharraf -- a pivotal figure in the US-led "war on terror" -- battling to contain Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants.

The president condemned the "distorted thinking" of the militants and ordered the security and intelligence agencies to "track down the masterminds behind this abhorrent act," the official Associated Press of Pakistan said.

"Fifty-four people were killed," district police chief Feroz Shah told AFP. He said the attacker was believed to have been carrying six to seven kilograms (13 to 15 pounds) of explosives.

Naturally, the killer declared his love for Allah at the moment of impact.

Another witness, Jangrez Khan, said the bomber detonated as the prayer leader said "Allahu Akbar," or God is Greatest.

Police to Swedish Artist: You Better Leave Now

This is what happens when you pander to a bloodthirsty mob.

But don't forget, they're the Religion of Peace.

Good thing they're celebrating Ramadan, otherwise he might be dead already.

Police tell threatened Swedish artist to leave home

A Swedish artist threatened with death over his drawing of Islam's Prophet Mohammad has been told by police he is no longer safe living at home.

Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, leader of the self-styled Islamic State in Iraq, offered up to $150,000 on Saturday for the murder of artist Lars Vilks for drawing the head of the Prophet on the body of a dog.

"I can't live here," Vilks told Reuters by phone. "SAPO (Sweden's security service) have judged that it (the threat) is very serious."

He was allowed to go home and collect some things but it may be a long time before he is able to return again, he said.

"We have had contact with him (Vilks) and together with him are taking the decisions that are necessary," a police spokesman said.

In an audiotape posted on the Internet, Baghdadi offered a lower bounty for the death of the editor of daily Nerikes Allehanda, which published the drawing last month in what it called a defense of free speech.

Top Swedish firms such as truck maker Volvo, mobile network builder Ericsson and retailer Ikea were also threatened unless an apology was forthcoming for the drawing.

The threats against Vilks and the newspaper mirror a crisis in Denmark last year.

Cartoons published in a Danish paper and reprinted around the world sparked riots in the Middle East, Asia and Africa in which at least 50 people died, and attacks against Danish embassies and a boycott of Danish goods.

That silence you hear is emanating from the leftist freedom of speech crowd.

Courage In The Face Of Adversity

Yesterday, Charles over at Little Green Footballs focused attention on the mayor of Brussels, Belgium, who has cancelled a 9/11 memorial march because You Know Who might be offended.

From Flanders News:

It is feared that conflict would arise between the protesters and members of the capital's large Muslim community if the planned demonstration were allowed to go ahead.

Mr Thielemans told journalists that "there could be a counter-demonstration. I'm not prepared to allow something to take place that could bring chaos to the streets".

Mr Thielemans says that he receives between five and six hundred requests for demonstrations each year and has only banned about half a dozen demonstrations since becoming Mayor at the beginning of 2001.

The organisers claim that Mr Thielemans' reasons for banning the demonstration prove their point.

They add that the demonstration will be held and that Mr Thielemans "is not fully aware of his responsibility, for as a mayor at EU's capital you cannot simply forbid ordinary European citizens from expressing their constitutional freedoms."

Three organisations are behind the planned demonstration; the Danish anti-Islam party SAID, the British group No Sharia Here and the German organisation Pax Europa.

Stop the Islamisation of Europe announced on Friday afternoon that it is [to] mount a legal challenge to get the ban lifted.

In response to this nitwittery, Stop the Islamisation of Europe, proponents of the march, has also launched an online petition drive.

Someone was even so kind as to provide the email addys of the governor of Brussels, Mme. Veronique Paulus de Chalet and the mayor of Brussels, M. Freddy Thielemans.

I wonder if Mayor Numbnuts would have the courage of his convictions to ban a march that would feature slogans such as, Jews Out Of Palestine, What Holocaust?, Death To Israel And The Great Satan, Ahmadinejad Is Right, or Submit Or Die?

For some reason, I doubt it.

Wouldn't want to offend anybody, you know.

Religion of Peace

Here's video of BBC reporter Alan Johnston outfitted with a suicide belt.



Also at LGF, Hot Air.

Where it's not: People's Revolutionary Republic of Koslamistan, PuffHo, MyDD . . . .

Reality Bites

Gaza Diary
We couldn't leave our home. You don't know who is your enemy.

Mowaffaq Alami, 35, lives in an apartment in Gaza City with his wife Suha, his son Ismail, two, and his 16-month-old daughter Maya. He has a degree in sociology and psychology from Bethlehem University and runs the Gaza office of One Voice, an initiative that works to support a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Read it all.

Police and Prosecutors Target 'Hotspots'

Special units to crack down on honour killing

Dedicated teams of senior prosecutors are to be deployed in the UK's honour killing hotspots in the wake of the failings exposed this week by the case of a young Kurdish woman murdered by her family.

The prosecutors, who have all had experience of complex organised crime cases, will start work this month as part of an overhaul of how cases are handled. The move is designed to boost conviction rates and improve protection for victims.

The Crown Prosecution Service has revealed the changes after the justice system was criticised for doing too little to protect vulnerable women. Senior police officers told the Guardian that there are systemic failures in how cases are handled - measures proposed years ago have been shelved, delayed or ignored, they warn.

Chief constables and the Home Office are also working together with other agencies to ensure that women in danger are identified early and dealt with properly to improve protection for victims. Plans to be published soon by the Association of Chief Police Officers will tell forces to follow new risk assessment models to ensure women are taken seriously if they complain of family violence.

The changes come after Banaz Mahmod, a 20-year-old Kurd, was murdered by her father and uncle because they disapproved of her boyfriend who was not a strict Muslim and was not of their tribe.

Don't tell the Progressives but it's merely traditional family values of the Religion of Peace.

The Kiss Of Death

The Koslings and others of the Progressive stripe ignore the fact of honor killings. Therefore, as any good apparatchik knows, they don't exist. Then, lo and behold, this eeevil little thing called reality rears its ugly head (again): Victim Reported Fears To Police.

It began with a kiss on a south London street. For Banaz Mahmod, 20, and the secret lover she called "my prince, my shining one", it was a symbol of their love and the freedom they longed for.

Police are failing to protect young women at risk of being murdered by their families in so-called "honour" killings, despite a high-profile prevention scheme set up four years ago, senior officers have told the Guardian. They say a raft of measures aimed at saving lives have been shelved, delayed or ignored by Scotland Yard. Among them were plans to train frontline staff in how to spot vulnerable women and a system to ensure potential victims of "honour"-based violence were risk-assessed and properly dealt with.

The admissions came as the Metropolitan police were criticised for their handling of the case of Banaz Mahmod, a young Kurdish woman whose father and uncle were yesterday convicted of her murder. One detective, who asked not to be named, said that if the Met prevention scheme had been in place Ms Mahmod might be alive today.

He said: "We started to learn lessons and then stopped learning them as a result of political correctness.

Instead of being considerate and understanding of other cultures, the coppers were profiling, you see.

And then Banaz died and that should never have happened."

A lack of formal training for officers had also resulted in a "police station lottery", where women like Ms Mahmod were in danger of being ignored or not given adequate protection.

Another officer said: "If it were young white girls complaining that their lives were at risk, there would be an outcry."

In the Mahmod case, the Old Bailey heard that she had repeatedly told police her family was trying to kill her.

Banaz Mahmod, 20, told officers on at least four occasions between December 4 2005 and January 23 2006, about threats made. She wrote a letter, naming those she thought were plotting against her.

On New Year's Eve that year, she told them her father had tried to kill her but the officer did not take her claims seriously.

Her body was found months later on April 28 2006, crammed into a suitcase and buried in a pit, the bootlace used to strangle her still around her neck.

Although her father, uncle and two others have been convicted of her murder, it's a safe bet that the reality-based community will blame exclusively . . . .

Read it all.

Palestinian Ceasefire Update

Fresh Gaza violence leaves seven dead

Seven Palestinians were killed in Gaza today during fighting between rival armed factions, including a gun battle inside a hospital, which left three dead and several more injured.

Although Egyptian mediators have arranged several brief ceasefires between gunmen from the Islamist movement Hamas, which won elections last year, and its rival, Fatah, there still appears to be no agreement between the groups to halt the battles.

MENSA member?

Shooting broke out in Beit Hanoun, a town in the north of Gaza, with the killing of a Fatah bodyguard and a Hamas fighter. The gun battles then continued when armed men stormed into the Beit Hanoun hospital, which was being guarded by Hamas gunmen. Three people in the hospital were killed - a father and two sons. One was apparently shot from close range. At least 19 others were injured.

In Gaza City, gunmen fired on the offices of Ismail Haniyeh, the prime minister and a Hamas leader, as he was holding a cabinet meeting. No one was hurt, but the cabinet meeting was cancelled. Most of the cabinet members present were from Hamas, although one was from Fatah.

In a separate incident, the home of the sports minister, a Hamas figure and close ally of Mr Haniyeh, was fired on but no one was injured. Later there were also shots exchanged at Gaza City's main hospital, Shifa.

The factional fighting, which Palestinian analysts say is fuelled mostly by a struggle for power, has now claimed around 620 lives since Hamas came to power early last year. The violence has left many senior Palestinian figures warning of civil war in Gaza.

I know, let's give 'em a state!

Afghan Woman Radio Boss Shot Dead

A real puzzle, this one.

Zakia Zaki was shot seven times, including in the chest and head, as she slept with her 20-month-old son at her home north of Kabul, officials say.

The governor of Parvan province, where the attack took place, told the BBC he did not know who killed her. No one has admitted carrying out the attack.

Her murder came just days after a woman newsreader was killed for reasons which were described as "family-related".

The governor may not know who killed her, but maybe we can provide some hints.

Zakia Zaki, was 35 years old and worked as a reporter and a schoolteacher.

She was one of the few female journalists in the country to speak out during the Taleban's rule.

She had also headed the US-funded station, Radio Peace, since it opened after the fall of the Taleban in 2001.

The BBC's Charles Haviland in Kabul says that at times Ms Zaki criticised the former mujahideen, some of who have been implicated in war crimes.

Clearly, this murder was carried out by Quakers. Or Mennonites.