EEOC claims on rise as Americans view Islam more and more negatively

Eve Tahmincioglu, MSNBC… [Read more…] A poll released l[in September 2010] by the Pew Research Center that shows that the public’s view of Islam has deteriorated, with only 30 percent of Americans expressing a favorable opinion of Islam, compared with 41 percent in 2005. “One can easily conclude that since the general situation is so unfavorable… [Read more…]

Anti-religious stereotyping by any government body is dangerous.

Christian Science Monitor Editorial Board, 3/10. 2011 King hearings on Muslim Americans: When government hits on one group The House hearings chaired by Rep. King focused almost solely on Muslim Americans. Such religious stereotyping by any government body is dangerous. When government makes assumptions about a whole group of people, it’s not the same as… [Read more…]

U.S. Muslim Servicemen who Have Died in the Service of Our Country

Crescents Among the Crosses at Arlington Cemetery Source: ThinkProgress.org “As of 2006, some 212 Muslim-American soldiers had been awarded Combat Action Ribbons for their service in Iraq and Afghanistan, and seven had been killed,” the New York Times reported in 2009. On Memorial Day, 2008, the organization Muslim Military Members asked that the Muslim soldiers… [Read more…]

Muslims in America are in need of help

Karin Friedemann (LETTER FROM AMERICA) 1 January 2011 Khaleej Times Since 9/11 hundreds if not thousands of Muslims have faced “preemptive prosecution,” where Muslims who are deemed “dangerous” are prosecuted before they commit a crime. In these prosecutions, there are so many holes in the government’s theories that the case is nothing but a list… [Read more…]

2010 in review: The year for Muslims in the U.S.

NPR Please click here to listen to an interview of Moustafa Bayoumi, author of “How does feel to be a problem?” on NPR. He reviews 2010 with respect to American Muslims. Note from Rafik Beekun: My blog was hacked, and the above link to the interview was changed to refer to a link promoting a… [Read more…]

Anti-Muslim and Anti-Islam trainers being hired to train law enforcement and public officials

Berkeley schools sued over denial of Muslim pilgrimage

December 14, 2010 The federal government has sued a west suburban school district for denying a Muslim middle school teacher unpaid leave to make a pilgrimage to Mecca that is a central part of her religion. In a civil rights case, the department said the school district in Berkeley denied the request of Safoorah Khan… [Read more…]

Employers in Europe discriminate against Muslims, study finds

By Steve Connor, Science Editor, independent.co.uk Muslims face “massive discrimination” when applying for jobs, according to the first scientifically validated study of anti-Muslim bias among employers in France. Researchers now want to study whether there is a similar bias in Britain, where unemployment among Muslims is higher than in any other religious group. The French… [Read more…]

If you are wearing “Islamic garb”, you may be removed from the flight and interrogated by the FBI

Thank you, Juan Williams. Your Islamophobic attitude has now spread like wild fire!! Video 1 Video 2

The real danger from NPR’s firing of Juan Williams

Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com I’m still not quite over the most disgusting part of the Juan Williams spectacle yesterday:  watching the very same people (on the Right and in the media) who remained silent about or vocally cheered on the viewpoint-based firings of Octavia Nasr, Helen Thomas, Rick Sanchez, Eason Jordan, Peter Arnett, Phil Donahue, Ashleigh Banfield, Bill Maher,… [Read more…]

Muslims Say They Face More Discrimination at Work

By STEVEN GREENHOUSE, New York TImes At a time of growing tensions involving Muslims in the United States, a record number of Muslim workers are complaining of employment discrimination, from co-workers calling them “terrorist” or “Osama” to employers barring them from wearing head scarves or taking prayer breaks. Such complaints were increasing even before frictions… [Read more…]

United States of Islamophobia?

Arsalan Iftikar, CNN Editor’s note: Arsalan Iftikhar is an international human rights lawyer, founder of TheMuslimGuy.com and legal fellow for the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding in Washington. (CNN) — Almost everybody has heard about the protests against the mosque and Islamic center planned to be built about two blocks from ground zero in… [Read more…]

Fire and Gunshots at Tennessee Mosque Site Called ‘Terrorism’

By ROBERT MACKEY, New York Times Updated | 11:19 a.m. On Sunday, one day after a fire at the site of a planned Islamic center and mosque in the Nashville suburb of Murfreesboro, Muslim community members reported hearing gunshots as they inspected the damage. Saleh Sbenaty, an engineering professor at Middle Tennessee State University who… [Read more…]

Tea Party Reveals Real Reason Behind Mosque Opposition Frenzy

Ahmed Rehab, The Huffington Post Leaders of astroturf groups opposing the Not-At-Ground-Zero-Muslim-Center can’t seem to decide on an argument. They have thrown everything and the kitchen sink at us in the way of fabricated reasons. First, they tried the “legal” route. When it became apparent that American Muslims had a constitutionally guaranteed right to religious,… [Read more…]

No compromise on religious freedom

By Richard Cohen, Washington Post Tuesday, August 24, 2010; A15 When it comes to the mosque that’s neither too close to Ground Zero for its proponents nor far enough away for its opponents, the disturbing word “compromise” is now being tossed around. It has been suggested by New York Gov. David Paterson, Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan and,… [Read more…]

How a Lunatic, Racist Blogger Is Fanning Hate Against Muslims — With the Help of Our Dumb Media

Joshua Holland, Alternet Anti-Islam groups created by extremists like Pamela Geller are on a crusade against U.S. Muslims. August 22, 2010 | Pamela Geller, the once-obscure right-wing blogger known for peddling hateful, wildly over-the-top rhetoric (she once claimed that Barack Obama was the bastard stepchild of Malcom X) and for pulling stunts like taping a… [Read more…]

Time Magazine Upcoming Issue: Is America Islamophobic?

The GOP’s new McCarthyism against Muslims

7:23 am August 17, 2010, by Cynthia Tucker What has happened to the leadership of the Republican Party? Are there no longer any statesmen/women in the GOP? Does the party have any leading figures who believe in the Bill of Rights? The GOP’s leadership has been taken over by a group of shrill demagogues who… [Read more…]

Kudos to Keith Olberman for speaking up: There is NO “Ground Zero Mosque”

Keith Olbermann Special Comment: There Is No ‘Ground Zero Mosque’ – 08/16/10

How the “ground zero mosque” fear mongering began

Justin Elliott, Salon.com A group of progressive Muslim-Americans plans to build an Islamic community center two and a half blocks from ground zero in lower Manhattan. They have had a mosque in the same neighborhood for many years. There’s another mosque two blocks away from the site. City officials support the project. Muslims have been… [Read more…]

Thank you, New York Times, For Your Editorial: A Monument to Tolerance

Note from Rafik Beekun: Thank you New York TImes.  You got it right in this editorial about the Muslim Community Center in Lower Manhattan. It has been disturbing to hear and read the vitriol and outright bigotry surrounding the building of a mosque two blocks from the site of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.… [Read more…]

Correcting the Distorted Lens of Islamophobia

Sally Steenland, Huffington Post Protesters have recently been rallying against a proposed Islamic educational center containing a mosque near Ground Zero, claiming that the proximity of anything Muslim to Ground Zero would contaminate a hallowed place. Protesters claim they aren’t anti-Muslim; they merely want the center and mosque to be built someplace else. But it… [Read more…]

Is Islamophobia the new anti-communism for the GOP?

Republicans in the USA are using Islamophobia to galvanize their political base for the upcoming elections.

Crimean Tatars Fear for Future in Russia

Al Jazeera “I’ve already been here for 960 days, and today is the 961st,” said the weather-beaten Tatar man, squinting beneath the powerful Crimean sun. Seydamet Smailov has spent almost three years living alone in a dilapidated cabin by the side of a busy road in the Ukrainian city of Simferopol because he has a… [Read more…]

CNN host, Fareed Zakaria, returns ADL award over stance on Islamic center

Commentary from Rafik Beekun: Thank you, Fareed Zakaria, for standing up to the Islamophobic stance on the part of ADL against the Muslim Community Center two blocks from Ground Zero. CNN.com New York (CNN) — Fareed Zakaria, the CNN host and Newsweek columnist, has returned a prestigious prize to the Anti-Defamation League, another rebuke for… [Read more…]

Pamela Geller exposed as an Islamophobe: “Hitler inspired by Islam”

Pamela Geller v/s Ron Reagan

CAIR Action: Ask NY Commission to Defend Religious Freedom

Share Today at 12:52pm (WASHINGTON, D.C., 8/2/10) — CAIR today called on American Muslims and other people of conscience to contact New York’s Landmarks Preservation Commission to ask that its members defend religious freedom and reject efforts by Islamophobes to block construction of an Islamic community center in that city. The commission will vote Tuesday… [Read more…]

Complete Text of Degrading Racist Satire from Tea Party Leader, Mark Williams

Source: Gawker.com Sample Racist Signs at Tea Party Events Reacting to the NAACP’s resolution asking Tea Partiers to root out racism, Tea Partly Leader wrote a very racist satire on his blog which has now led to  his deserved expulsion.  Mark Williams is also the same person who stated that Muslims worship a “monkey-god”. Here… [Read more…]

“Controversy” over Muslim Community Center two blocks from Ground Zero

In Part 1- Campbell Brown discusses the recent contentious Landmark commission hearing about the Building slated to become a Muslim community center two blocks from Ground Zero. She sets the stage for a debate on the issue between Dr. Zuhdi Jasser (AIFD President) and Reza Aslan Part 1 of 2 Part 2 of 2 Reza… [Read more…]

Rabid Islamophobia from the Tea Party Keeps Muslims Away

CAIR Ibrahim Hooper from CAIR has recently listed some very distasteful examples of Islamophobic incidents that members of the Tea Party have engaged in.  [Note from Rafik Beekun:  Tea Party officials should remember that Americans know hate speech when they see it and that there are over 6 millions American Muslims in the USA many… [Read more…]

Good Samaritan 101: Thank you CBS and NBC for rejecting Islamophobic TV ad

Note from Rafik Beekun: The ad below is one of the most Islamophobic ads I have ever seen.  It has been launched by the National Republican Trust Pac, and plays on the worst fears of my fellow countrymen in the US.  As the former President of the Northern Nevada Republican Men’s club,  I deplore this… [Read more…]

U.S. Muslim Travelers Warned of Forced Exile

CAIR is suggesting that all U.S. Muslim Travelers (US citizens included) obtain the cell phone of an attorney before traveling overseas just in case they are placed on the No-Fly list and they are prevented from returning to the US. U.S. Muslim Travelers Prevented From Returning to the U.S. FBI Prevents Virginia Muslims From Returning… [Read more…]

Muslims Rising Against Terrorism Globally

BBC Radio U.S.A. India Pakistan United Kingdom This part 1 of 8. Please go to Youtube.com to view the remaining parts. Canada Middle East

Keith Olbermann Slams Racist NY Anti-Mosque Protesters

Courageous Afghan Girls Brave Taliban Terrorists To Get An Education

English.aljazeera.net The Taliban has waged a violent campaign against girls who go to schools in their Afghan strongholds. A series of attacks against schools and female students have driven many girls to go underground to receive an education. In one attack in Kandahar in 2008, around 15 girls and teachers were sprayed with acid by… [Read more…]

More U.S. Muslims facing problems in return from travel abroad

By Tara Bahrampour Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, April 2, 2010; A06 Muslim advocacy groups say an increasing number of Muslim and Arab U.S. citizens and permanent residents who travel abroad are facing new complications in returning to the United States because of heightened security. An attempted Christmas day bombing on a Detroit-bound airplane caused… [Read more…]

Man Who Alerted Police To Failed Times Square Bombing Is A Muslim Immigrant

Media Ignore The Fact That Man Who Alerted Police To Failed Times Square Bombing Is A Muslim Immigrant This post originally appeared on Think Progress. The chief suspect in the case of the failed Times Square car bombing is Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad, who has confessed to the plot. Much of the media has latched onto Shahzad’s Muslim… [Read more…]

Discrimination Against Black Iraqis

Rafik Beekun Islam opposes all forms of discrimination, and in Islam the only thing that distinguishes one person from another is supposed to be his/her level of taqwa (piety). However, Iraqis of African ancestry seem to be bearing the brunt of discrimination in Iraq both in the workplace and other walks of life. Al Jazeera… [Read more…]

Tariq Ramadan on Democracy Now

Once-Banned Muslim Scholar Tariq Ramadan on His First Visit to US in Six Years, President Obama and Why Muslims Should Make Their Voices Heard Democray Now speaks with leading Muslim scholar Tariq Ramadan, who was banned from entering the United States for six years. In 2004, Ramadan had accepted a job to become a tenured… [Read more…]

CIA given details of British Muslim students

Outrage as personal files of undergraduates at Detroit bomb suspect’s college handed to US By Syma Mohammed and Robert Verkaik, independent.co.uk Thursday, 1 April 2010 Personal information concerning the private lives of almost 1,000 British Muslim university students is to be shared with US intelligence agencies in the wake of the Detroit bomb scare. The… [Read more…]

Travelers with Muslim names find themselves fighting for U.S. visas

By Edward Cody, washington post foreign service Thursday, April 1, 2010  LYON, FRANCE — The clean-cut young Frenchman seemed to have everything going for him. Graduate of an elite French engineering school, he had interned at the upper-crust Rothschild bank in Paris, handled wealth management for a while on Wall Street and was accepted for… [Read more…]

Muslim American Soldier Fights Islamophobia On His U.S. Army Base

By William Wan Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, March 24, 2010; A08 At 2 o’clock on a Monday morning, the sound of angry pounding sent Army Spec. Zachari Klawonn bolting out of bed. THUD. THUD. THUD. Someone was mule-kicking the door of his barracks room, leaving marks that weeks later — long after Army investigators… [Read more…]

Possible Anti-Islam Bias in Military Training?

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CAIR Seeks Probe of Anti-Islam Bias in Military Training Training film features Islamophobes, Islam compared to Nazism, ‘Hajji’ used as pejorative (WASHINGTON, D.C., 3/23/2010) – A prominent national Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization today said it has asked the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) to investigate a report of anti-Islam bias… [Read more…]

Federal Panel Finds Bias in Ouster of Principal, Debbie Almontaser

March 12, 2010 By ANDREA ELLIOTT, New York Times A federal commission has determined that New York City’s Department of Education discriminated against the founding principal of an Arabic-language public school by forcing her to resign in 2007 following a storm of controversy driven by opponents of the school. Acting on a complaint filed last… [Read more…]

Action: Contact Abercrombie & Fitch About Hijab Firing

Calif. Muslim employee fired for refusing to remove scarf in public (SANTA CLARA, CA, 2/24/10) – The San Francisco Bay Area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-SFBA) is calling on Abercrombie & Fitch customers who value diversity and inclusion to contact the company to express their concerns about a Muslim employee who was… [Read more…]

Does Full Body Scanning Violate Islamic Religious Rulings?

The Fiqh Council of North America (an association of Muslims who interpret Islamic law on the North American continent) issued a ruling (fatwa) earlier this week that says Muslims shouldn’t go through full body scanners since this violate Islamic rules on modesty. Nihad Awad heads the Council on American-Islamic Relations, and their purpose is to… [Read more…]

In U.S., Religious Prejudice Strongest Against Muslims than Against Christians, Jews or Buddhists

43% of Americans admit to feeling some prejudice toward followers of Islam Analysis by the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies WASHINGTON, D.C. — More than 4 in 10 Americans (43%) admit to feeling at least “a little” prejudice toward Muslims — more than twice the number who say the same about Christians (18%), Jews (15%)… [Read more…]

Good Samaritans: Malaysian Muslims Protect Churches

Islamonline.com Muslim groups in Malaysia are offering their help to prevent any further attacks on Christian places of worship amid a spree of attacks on churches in the multi-ethnic, Muslim-majority Asian country, The Star reported on Sunday, January 10. “This is an offer of peace and goodwill,” Nadzim Johan, the executive secretary of the Muslim… [Read more…]

Open Season on Muslims: Increase in Profiling

CAIR Nadia Hassan says she was the victim of profiling during a full body search at an airport. CNN’s Alina Cho reports. (CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad quoted on profiling incidents.) Muslim Fears Over Profiling Heightened Debate over Racial Profiling

Islamophobia 101: Episode 36–Mayor Koch: Hundreds of Millions of Muslims Are Terrorists

Rafik Beekun Amazing words from Mayor Koch who suddenly sounds like right wing extremists, Steve Emerson and Ann Coulter, labels “hundreds of millions” of Muslims as terrorists, and voices his support for profiling every Muslim who is flying. Should we profile every person of Jewish faith because of the past actions of the Jewish Defense… [Read more…]