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Tuesday, June 6, 2017

Pamela Geller : Post-Terror Dawah

Pamela Geller: Post-Terror Dawah




by Pamela Geller

 6 Jun 2017


You can set your watch to it. In the wake of every jihad terror attack, no matter how heinous and horrifying, in come the washerwomen with buckets of dirty water working double time to scrub and censor the motive from the attack.

No matter the monstrosity, nothing changes. If the torn, dismembered bodies of little girls at an Ariana Grande concert were not a game-changer, then nothing will move the conquered and the unmovable. 

Not only do we, the victims, have to clean up the flesh and bone and blood running down the pavement, we must subject ourselves to endless dawah (proselytizing) for Islam on mind-numbing news shows on the BBC, CNN, MSNBC, and the like. 


FOX is lost. Sunday morning, Fox and Friends had on dissembler Mubin Shaikh. He said, “we must never equate Islam and terrorism.” The hosts nodded gravely. There is nowhere on TV you can get reality.

One of the three London Bridge jihadi attackers said, according to a neighbor, “I’m ready to do whatever I need to do in the name of Allah. I am ready in the name of Allah to do what needs to be done, including killing my own mother.”

What further proof does anyone need? Why the madness and irrational denial? Sixteen years after 9/11 and over thirty thousand deadly Islamic attacks, according to the website thereligionofpeace.com, this is where we are?

Prime Minister Theresa May and every major media news outlet insists jihadis have “perverted” and/or “hijacked” Islam. How have they perverted it? They cite Quranic texts and teachings chapter and verse. They follow the hadith, Muhammad’s example.
Harun Khan, who leads the Muslim Council of Britain, said, “I am appalled and angered by the terrorist attacks at London Bridge and borough market, in my home city. These acts of violence were truly shocking and I condemn them in the strongest terms.” 
Is that so? What have Khan and his coreligionists — who allege that this is a misunderstanding of Islam — done to combat it? 
With the Islamic State energetically recruiting young Muslims in the U.S., that is a significant problem.
The Sun says that Ramadan is meant for devotion and peace. Since when?
As Robert Spencer has noted:
A jihad group explained it back in 2012: ‘The month of Ramadan is a month of holy war and death for Allah. It is a month for fighting the enemies of Allah and God’s messenger, the Jews and their American facilitators.’ Referring to a jihad attack that happened at that time, the message continued: ‘One of our groups aided by Allah managed to bomb a bus full of Jewish tourists, plunderers of holy lands, after careful tracking. The holy war is not confined to a particular arena and we shall fight the Jews and the Americans until they leave the land of Islam.’
You won’t hear much about these scenes from the London jihad slaughter from the enemedia:

–”‘He just stepped outside the bar for a second and a man ran up to him and said: “This is for my family, this is for Islam”, and stuck a knife straight in him. He’s got a seven-inch scar going from his belly round to his back,’ Elizabeth O’Neill told reporters outside King’s College hospital.”

–”[The van was] probably travelling at about 50 miles an hour” … “and then hit about five or six people,” said BBC reporter Holly Jones.
–”According to another witness, Eric, the men inside jumped out once the van crashed and ‘ran towards the people that they nearly ran over’…. ‘[Then] they literally just started kicking them, punching them, they took out knives… it was a rampage really,’ he said.”

–One man, Gerard, said he saw a woman being stabbed “10 or 15 times.” Another witness, Eric, told the BBC the men were shouting “This is for Allah.”

Nor will you hear much about the words spoken to a mother in London before a jihadi plunged a knife into her son’s stomach: “This is for Islam.”

Will we ever learn their motive?

One of the jihadis who attacked London with two coreligionists before being shot dead by police deceived his neighbors into thinking he was a great guy, a good neighbor. 
He played football with their children on the nearby field.
Secretly, he had a devout, destructive hatred, and he frequently changed his appearance in preparation of unleashing a deadly Islamic attack on the capital city, during which seven people died and up to 50 were injured last night.

One of the London jihadi was turned in twice, once by a neighbor and another time by a friend. Why wasn’t anything done? Perhaps because law enforcement did not want to appear to “islamophobic” or “racist” (even though Islam is not a race).



Pamela Geller is the President of the American Freedom Defense Initiative (AFDI), publisher of PamelaGeller.com and author of The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration’s War on America and Stop the Islamization of America: A Practical Guide to the Resistance. Follow her on Twitter here. Like her on Facebook here.


http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/06/06/pamela-geller-post-terror-dawah/
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Soeren Kern : Germany: Surge in Stabbings and Knife Crimes

  • Not only are knife-related crimes surging, but the perpetrators and victims of such crimes are increasingly younger and increasingly female.
  • Germany's knife-crime problem is being exacerbated by its lenient judicial system, in which offenders receive relatively light sentences, even for serious crimes. In many instances, individuals who are arrested for knife-related crimes are released after questioning from police. This practice allows criminal suspects to continue committing crimes with virtual impunity.
  • More than 1,600 knife-related crimes were reported in Germany during just the first five months of 2017 — an average of 300 such crimes each month, or ten a day.
A Syrian migrant was stabbed to death in northern Germany by another Syrian because he was eating ice cream during Ramadan. The murder — which occurred in broad daylight in a busy pedestrian shopping area in Oldenburg and caused great consternation among local citizens — is not just the latest example of Sharia law being enforced on German streets. The crime also highlighted the growing epidemic of knife violence in Germany.

Knives, axes and machetes have become weapons of choice for criminals in Germany, which has some of the strictest gun laws in Europe. Knives are not only being used to carry out jihadist attacks, but increasingly to commit homicides, robberies, home invasions, sexual assaults, honor killings and many other kinds of violent crime.


(Images source: Pixabay)

Reliable statistics on knife violence in Germany do not exist.
A search of German police blotters, however, shows that during the past ten years the number of knife-related crimes in Germany has increased by more than 1,200%. 
Around 4,000 such crimes were reported to police in 2016, up from just 300 in 2007.
It is also impossible to determine how many of these knife crimes involved migrants. Increased censorship by the police and the media, aimed at stemming anti-immigration sentiments, makes the public incapable of knowing the names and national origins of many perpetrators or victims.
The surge in knife-related violence in Germany does, however, coincide with Chancellor Angela Merkel's decision to allow in some two million migrants from Africa, Asia and the Middle East.  
The number of reported knife crimes in Germany jumped by 600% during the past four years — from about 550 in 2013 to nearly 4,000 in 2016.
Police reports show that both migrants and non-migrants are responsible for the increase in knife crimes in Germany. Merkel's open-door migration policies appear to have set in motion a self-reinforcing cycle of violence in which more and more people are carrying knives in public — including for self-defense. Her policies appear to be leading to more and more stabbings, especially when alcohol is involved.
Not only are knife-related crimes surging, but the perpetrators and victims of such crimes are increasingly younger and increasingly female:
  • In Bochum, a 19-year-old woman stabbed two boys, aged 12 and 13 years. Police said the three had been arguing when the woman pulled out a knife. The boys ran away and tried to hide in a parking garage, but the woman pursued and attacked them.
  • In Soest, a 16-year-old boy stabbed a 17-year-old classmate seven times in the chest in a dispute over a girl. The victim was hospitalized with life-threatening injuries to his heart. The assailant was released after a psychiatrist persuaded prosecutors that he could not be held responsible for his actions because he acted in the "heat of passion" (im Affekt).
  • In Essen, two boys, aged 11 and 13, pulled a knife on a 20-year-old woman in an effort to rob her of her cellphone. She resisted and called police, who detained the attackers.
  • In Wuppertal, a "southern looking man" (südländisches Erscheinungsbild) stabbed a 13-year-old boy after he looked at his attacker supposedly "the wrong way."
  • In Kirchdorf, a "southerner" (südländische Erscheinung) pulled a knife on a 12-year-old girl.
  • In Nachrodt-Wiblingwerde, a group of teenagers drew a knife on a 17-year-old girl after she "provoked" them.
  • In Berlin-Neukölln, a 16-year-old boy was stabbed during an altercation with a 32-year-old man.
  • In Neumünster, a 15-year-old stabbed a 19-year-old after two groups of teenagers got into an altercation.
  • In Gevelsberg, a "dark-skinned" man (dunkelhäutig) stabbed a 14-year-old girl near the central train station as she was walking home.
Some knife attacks appear to have political or religious motives:
  • In Hanover, a 16-year-old German-Moroccan girl stabbed a police officer in the neck with a kitchen knife. Police said the incident, which occurred at the central train station, was the first jihadist attack in Germany inspired by the Islamic State. "The perpetrator did not display any emotion," a police spokesperson said. "Her only concern was for her headscarf. She was concerned that her headscarf be put back on properly after she was arrested. Whether the police officer survived, she did not care."
  • In Prien am Chiemsee, an Afghan man stabbed to death an Afghan woman who had converted to Christianity. The attacker ambushed the woman as she was exiting a grocery store with her two children.
  • In Munich, a man shouting "Allahu Akbar" and "infidels must die" stabbed one person to death and slashed three others in an attack at a train station.
  • In Würzburg, on a train, an Afghan asylum seeker shouting "Allahu Akbar" attacked five people with an axe.
  • In Oberhausen, a man shouting "Allahu Akhbar" stabbed a 66-year-old woman and a 57-year-old man who were picnicking.
Knife attacks are also common during brawls involving feuding ethnic groups:
  • In Gelsenkirchen, gangs of Syrian and Lebanese youths got into a mass knife fight in the city center. Police said that the level of violence was "brutal."
  • In Mülheim, around 80 members of two rival Lebanese clans got into a knife fight in the center of the city. It took hundreds of police, armed with machine guns, dogs and helicopters, more than three hours to restore order.
  • In Hanover, members of two rival Kurdish clans got into a knife fight in front of the central train station.
  • In Mainz-Gonsenheim, several people were stabbed during a mass brawl between Syrians and Iranians.
  • In Dortmund, an immense brawl ensued after a member of one ethnic group pulled a knife on someone from another ethnic group.
  • In Neumünster, a 15-year-old stabbed a 19-year-old after two groups of teenagers from feuding ethnic groups got into an altercation.
  • In Gütersloh, two men were stabbed and seriously wounded during a fight between two feuding ethnic groups.
  • In Leipzig, an Iraqi man was stabbed and seriously injured during a massive brawl in front of a Kebab restaurant. When police tried to intervene, the mob attacked them with bottles and stones
  • In Hamm-Herringen, two men were stabbed and seriously wounded during a fight between two feuding ethnic groups.
Other knife attacks are seemingly random:
  • In Hamburg, a 16-year-old boy and his 15-year-old girlfriend were walking along the banks of the Alster, a lake in the heart of the city, when a stranger ambushed them from behind and plunged a knife into his back. The attacker then pushed the girl into the water and walked away. The girl survived but the boy died. The suspect, a "southern-looking" (südländischer Erscheinung) man in his early twenties, remains at large. Police say the victims were not robbed and there is no evident motive for the crime: they said that the suspect appears to have randomly stabbed the boy just because he felt like it.
  • In Bremen, a 29-year-old man was randomly stabbed and seriously wounded at the Waterfront shopping center. The entire facility was closed after the attack.
  • In Dessau-Roßlau, two Syrian asylum seekers randomly stabbed two German female passersby in a pedestrian zone in broad daylight.
  • In Düsseldorf, a man brandishing a machete randomly stabbed an 80-year-old man in the Kalkum district. He remains at large.
  • In Wrohm, an Eritrean migrant randomly stabbed a 51-year-old woman.
Knife-related incidents are also becoming increasingly common on public transport hubs:
  • In Hamburg-Billstedt, two brothers were stabbed during a robbery at the Legienstraße subway station.
  • In Frankfurt, two "presumably East Europeans" (mutmaßlich Osteuropäer) wielding knives attacked commuters at the "Bonames Mitte" subway station.
  • In Dortmund-Bochum, two feuding ethnic groups got into a knife fight on the S-1 line.
  • In Dresden, a man carrying a 20-centimer (8-inch) knife was arrested at the central train station.
  • In Schönefeld, a man randomly pulled a knife on a traveler at the airport. It remains unclear how the perpetrator passed the knife through airport security.
  • In Baden-Baden, a man wielding a knife threatened passengers on a train.
Knives appear to be the weapon of choice in so-called honor killings:
  • In Kiel, a German-Turkish man stabbed to death his estranged Turkish wife in front of a daycare center.
  • In Bocholt, a Lebanese man stabbed to death his Moroccan wife, the mother of his three children, because he thought she wanted to divorce him.
  • In Scheeßel, an Iraqi man stabbed to death his wife. Police described the murder as an honor killing.
  • In Ahaus, a Nigerian asylum seeker stabbed to death a Hindu woman after she seemingly offended his honor by rejecting his romantic advances. The woman was employed at the asylum shelter where her attacker lived.
  • In Hanover-Mühlenberg, a Serbian man stabbed his ex-girlfriend after she ended their relationship and had begun seeing someone else.
  • In Berlin, a 32-year-old Bosnian man stabbed to death his former girlfriend after she ended their abusive relationship.
  • In Hanau, a Syrian refugee stabbed to death his 30-year-old sister, who was 23 weeks pregnant and was accused of having brought shame to her family. Her unborn child also died in the attack.
  • In Freiburg, a Syrian asylum seeker stabbed his wife, a Kurdish Christian who had moved out of the couple's apartment, but had returned to collect some personal belongings.
  • In Köln-Buchheim, an Iraqi man stabbed to death his 19-year-old daughter because he did not approve of her boyfriend. The man may never face justice; he is believed to have fled to Iraq.
  • In Bonn, a Palestinian brandishing a "Rambo knife" and shouting "Allahu Akbar" tried to behead a doctor. The attacker's 19-year-old son had complained about the doctor's treatment for a fractured leg. The man, holding the doctor down on the floor, said: "Apologize to my son. Go down on your knees and kiss his hand."
Germany's knife-crime problem is being exacerbated by its lenient judicial system, in which offenders receive relatively light sentences, even for serious crimes. In many instances, individuals who are arrested for knife-related crimes are released after questioning from police. This practice allows criminal suspects to continue committing crimes with virtual impunity.
In Berlin, for example, a migrant who stabbed and seriously injured another migrant after he refused to give him alcohol and drugs was released and financially compensated because no witnesses to the crime could be found.

Also in the German capital, investigators discovered that Anis Amri, the 24-year-old suspect in the December 2016 Berlin terrorist attack in which 12 people died, had been involved in a knife-fight in the city's Neukölln district in July 2016, but police failed to arrest him. Had Amri been deported, as he should have been, the Berlin attack possibly could have been prevented.

According to Arnold Plickert, the deputy national chairman of the GdP police union, much of the knife-violence in Germany can be attributed to certain segments of society that live according to their own rules, not those of the German state. In an interview with knife-blog.com, a German forum for knife enthusiasts, he said:
"We are monitoring a specific target group, which mainly consists of young males who are armed in everyday life and basically are dedicated to armed confrontation. We see this particularly in large Arab families, Lebanese clans, for whom knives are standard gear. Knives are also basic equipment for career criminals and members of youth gangs."
Plickert also noted changes in German society, including a growing disrespect for police and rescue workers: "From my point of view, I can say that the inhibition threshold to the use of violence has significantly decreased."

Meanwhile, more than 1,600 knife-related crimes were reported in Germany during just the first five months of 2017 — an average of 300 such crimes each month, or ten a day. Notable knife-related incidents during the month of May include:

In Freiburg, a Turkish man stabbed another Turk sitting in the passenger seat of a car stopped at a traffic light.
In Karlsruhe, a Somali asylum seeker stabbed another Somali asylum seeker. Police said the attack was an act of revenge: the stabbing victim had recently stabbed the stabber.
In Aachen, a North African man pulled a knife on a security guard at a grocery store after he was caught shoplifting.
In Schwerin, a Syrian man pulled a knife on another Syrian man in a dispute over a 15-year-old girl who is not Syrian.
In Gelsenkirchen, a 20-year-old pulled a knife on a 46-year-old man during a traffic incident.
 In Bad Oldesloe, four teenagers pulled a knife and robbed a 61-year-old man.
In Wiesbaden, a "southern-looking" man pulled a knife and tried to rob a man at a sports complex.
In Hofheim, a man with an "Eastern European accent" pulled a knife and tried to rob a store.
In Peine, an asylum seeker from Sudan stabbed and seriously wounded an asylum seeker from the Ivory Coast.
In Kassel, a Syrian migrant stabbed a Turkish man during a dispute over money.
In Bad Reichenhall, a man stabbed another man in the neck during an altercation at a bar.
In Bühl, a man stabbed several people at a public swimming pool.
In Wiesbaden, a man was stabbed and seriously wounded during an altercation at a city park.
In Augsburg, two men were stabbed by a random attacker at a grill fest.
In Hamburg, an unknown assailant stabbed a migrant from Guinea-Bissau.
In Rheine, two men speaking German with a French accent pulled a knife on a woman and robbed her.
In Berlin, a man stabbed and seriously wounded his former girlfriend and her new partner during an altercation at a restaurant in Waidmannslust.
In Duisburg, a man pulled a knife on a cashier at a supermarket.
In Salzgitter, a man stabbed another man in a restaurant.
In Freiburg, an Eastern European-looking man (osteuropäisch) stabbed a 15-year-old boy during an altercation at a restaurant. In Danndorf, three men were stabbed during an altercation over drugs.
In Mölln, a man stabbed a co-worker in the back.
In Michelstadt, a man stabbed another man during an altercation.
In Essen, a man pulled a knife on his wife at the central train station.
In Karlsruhe, a man was stabbed by his girlfriend's former boyfriend.
In Cologne-Ostheim, a 16-year-old student pulled a knife on his classmates and teacher.
In Neuenburg, two men were stabbed during an altercation at a restaurant.
In Kassel, a man was stabbed in the neck during an altercation at a café.
In Dortmund, a man was robbed at knifepoint at the central bus station.
In Cottbus, members of Syrian gang stabbed five Germans.
In Lich, a man was stabbed during an altercation.
In Kassel, a man was randomly stabbed by a man with a "southern appearance" (südländisches Äußeres).
In Preetz, a man pulled a knife on shoppers at a supermarket.
In Dortmund, two men were stabbed during an altercation in the city center.
In Frankfurt-Schwanheim, a man wielding a knife robbed a local post office.
In Pforzheim, a 53-year-old Tajik man stabbed to death his 50-year-old wife at her place of employment, a Christian daycare center. It remains unclear if the woman was a convert to Christianity.
 In Wardenburg, an Iraqi man stabbed to death his wife, the mother of his five children, while she was asleep in her bed.
In Tübingen, a man was stabbed and seriously injured at the central train station during an altercation.
In Hamburg-St. Georg, two men were stabbed and seriously injured near the train station.
In Berlin-Wedding, two brothers were stabbed during an altercation with another man at a Kebab restaurant.
In Kreuztal, a 53-year-old man was stabbed and seriously wounded during an altercation at his home.
In Lübeck, a 21-year-old man was stabbed and seriously injured during an altercation between two groups near the central bus station.
In Diez, a woman stabbed a man in the back.
In Ründeroth, a 17-year-old was stabbed and seriously wounded at a local festival.
In Neuendettelsau, an Ethiopian asylum seeker stabbed his girlfriend in the stomach at a restaurant after she allegedly "provoked" him. The woman, five months pregnant, survived but the unborn baby died.
Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter.

Judith Bergman : Finland: Now We Want a Mega-Mosque

  • The mosque boasts that it has been "able to organize many activities". One of these, it says, "is to spread Islam to the non-Muslims in Finland".
  • Now Muslims in Finland want a mega-mosque. The idea that mega-mosques "prevent radicalization" is clearly popular among proponents of Finnish mega mosques, but on what evidence is this view based? Can they name one country where this was actually the case?
  • Finland would be wise to look at what the establishment of Saudi and Gulf state-funded mosques in the rest of Europe has already done to the continent in terms of Islamization and radicalization.
In recent years, Muslims in Finland have been complaining about not having an official mosque. This is not entirely true; the Finnish Tartars have an official mosque with a minaret -- in Träskända -- which other Muslims are free to use. There are also around 80 small mosques in Finland, around 30 of them in converted buildings or private flats in Helsinki, although many of them are referred to as "prayer rooms". One such mosque is the Masjid Iman mosque, located in Helsinki on the Munkkiniemen street. According to its website, the 214-square-meter mosque, which calls itself "The Islamic Multicultural Dawah Center", was established in 1999 and is "one of the well-known mosques in the Helsinki area". As is increasingly taking place, the mosque, according to the website, was formerly a church. The mosque boasts that it has been "able to organize many activities". One of these, it says, "is to spread Islam to the non-Muslims in Finland".

Now Muslims in Finland want a mega-mosque. Two years ago, a Finnish convert, Pia Jardi, spokesperson for the mega-mosque project, known as "Oasis", said, "There is a need for a grand mosque because so far we do not have one in Helsinki. A mosque would signal to the Muslims that they are a part of society".
Another board member of the Oasis project, Imam and then chair of the Islamic Society of Finland, Anas Hajjar, was less modest. In October 2015, he told Yle, a Finnish news outlet, "...the need for mosques in the capital region keeps growing... We need three mosques in Helsinki, and one in Esbo and one in Vanda". According to Hajjar, the planned mega-mosque will be 20,000 square meters, but besides the actual mosque, there will also be sports and youth facilities. The actual prayer room will accommodate 1,500 people. Hajjar told Yle that mega-mosques, "prevent radicalization, as they make young Muslims feel like part of society".

Anas Hajjar has been linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. In 2014, after the United Arab Emirates designated the Muslim Brotherhood and its local affiliates a terrorist organization, Anas Hajjar's organization, The Islamic Society of Finland, was included on the list. The Helsinki Times reported the surprise of The Islamic Society of Finland at its inclusion on the terror watch list: "We're very surprised by such a decision, and we have no idea why we're on the list. We condemn such, outright arbitrary, decisions," said the society's director of public relations, Abdihakim Yasin.

"The need for mosques in Finland is urgent," Susanne Dahlgren, a lecturer in Islam at Tammerfors university, told Yle in October 2015. "Mosques do not contribute to radicalization. On the contrary, they send a welcoming message."[1]

The chair of the Helsinki Finns Party, Seppo Kanerva, also said in July 2015 that he supports establishing a grand mosque in the capital, so long as it does not have a minaret with "someone wailing at five in the morning". The proposed mosque was "welcome" he said; it would promote peace between different religions:
"If we build churches, then why not mosques, so long as it's built using its own money? It's a question of civil peace. If a suitable location can be found, and the funding comes from elsewhere, then let it go ahead."
The idea that mega-mosques "prevent radicalization" is clearly popular among proponents of Finnish mega-mosques, but on what evidence is this view based? Nearly every European country today has one or several mega-mosques, which were, according to Hajjar and Sardi, supposed to make the Muslims of that country less radical by making them feel "part of society". Can they name one country where this was actually the case?

In December 2016, the Oasis foundation for the establishment of the grand mosque of Helsinki was officially established. Muslim Brotherhood-linked Anas Hajjar is one of the board members. According to the Oasis foundation, the royal family of Bahrain is going to fund the project with more than 100 million euros. The Finnish news outlet Kirkkojakaupunki reported: "the Foundation is also ready to receive funding from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates if they agree to the same conditions as Bahrain".
According to Pia Jardi, the "conditions" include:
"no radical teachings or ways of operation... The plan is clear that the activities of the mosque will be managed by Finnish Muslims and that activities will also be organised in Finnish. The Friday sermons, for example, must be organised in both Arabic and Finnish."
Why would Finns believe that those rules will be upheld once Bahrain -- and possibly Saudi Arabia and Qatar -- have bought and paid for the mosque? Why would these nations, which spread Islamic extremism across the planet, act any differently in Finland, than they have done in any other country where they have sponsored building mosques and "cultural centers"?

"I personally believe that the large mosque envisaged at Kalasatama is a Muslim Brotherhood-driven project", a Finnish researcher, Alan Salehzadeh, wrote in March 2017. "The political Islamic agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood is led by the governments of Turkey, Qatar, Bahrain and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood", he explained.
"In Finland, dozens of mosques are already working today whose establishment has been supported by influential countries such as Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia. ... Erdogan has called for the resistance of the Turkish diaspora and to be faithful only to Turkey".
Finnish politicians are also wary of agreeing to the project. Tarja Mankkinen, the interior minister responsible for Finland's anti-radicalization policy, said the ministry found many "positive aspects" in the mosque project, but that
"the challenge is that the mosque is planned to be funded by Bahrain and possibly by other Gulf countries.
"The role of the actors who fund the mosque and its activities might consist a [security] risk if it decreases the feeling of belonging to the Finnish society among the Muslim population."
Jan Vapaavuori, the newly elected (April 2017) mayor of Helsinki, opposes the mosque. "I do not think that such a mosque is needed in Helsinki. I will certainly work towards making sure the mosque will not be built in Helsinki," he said.
Radicalization is unfortunately becoming a real issue in the country. According to the International Centre for Counter Terrorism in the Hague, in an April 2016 research paper about "The Foreign fighter Phenomenon in the European Union" (p. 44):
"By August 2015, at least 70 individuals from Finland had travelled to Syria/Iraq, with approximately one dozen having died abroad and around 35 believed to still be in the conflict zone... The majority... are 'home-grown', and they are either born in Finland or have lived there since childhood".
Seventy ISIS fighters from such a relatively small Muslim population is a relatively high number; the solution to that radicalization is most definitely not a Bahraini and Gulf state-funded mega-mosque in the Finnish capital. Finland would be wise to look at what the establishment of Saudi and Gulf state-funded mosques in the rest of Europe has already done to the continent in terms of Islamization and radicalization.


Helsinki, Finland (Image source: Mikko Paananen/Wikimedia Commons)
Judith Bergman is a writer, columnist, lawyer and political analyst.

[1] There are approximately 65,000 Muslims out of a population of 5.5 million people in Finland. The majority of Finland's Muslims are immigrants who came to Finland since the 1990s. In 2015, during the migrant crisis propelled by Angela Merkel's opening of Europe's borders, Finland received 32,000 asylum seekers. In 2013, there had been just 3,200 of them.

Saied Shoaaib : Defeating Extremist Islam - A Western Imperative

  • The infiltration of this ideology is reminiscent of the spread of communism and should be defeated similarly -- not with weapons, but by exposing its true nature and providing an alternative. The West first must abandon, however, the notion that radical Islam is an internal Muslim issue, any more than communism was a "Russian issue" that "the Russians" needed to solve.
  • In addition, the views of liberal Muslim scholars, who reject the whole premise of extremist, political Islam, should be supported and widely circulated.
  • Finally, imams in Western countries must be held to the same standard as members of other professions. They should be required to receive occupational licenses, based on criteria determined by the state, in conjunction with modern Muslims seeking a peaceful life and the ability to integrate into their societies without fear of repercussions at the hands of fundamentalists.
Many imams in the West -- citizens of the United States, Canada and other countries -- use their pulpits to promote practices that go against democratic values and ultimately lead to terrorism.

Some call on their flock to kill Jews, Christians and "infidel" Muslims who do not adhere either to the strictest interpretation of Islam. Others justify the marriage of grown men to nine-year-old girls. There are those, too, who defend the spousal "right" of husbands to rape their wives.

Contrary to some claims, the type of clerics who preach murder and sexual abuse in North American and European mosques do not suffer from poor socioeconomic conditions and are not mentally unbalanced. Rather, they are loyal followers of an interpretation of Islam that envisions the establishment of a worldwide caliphate governed by sharia law. They deeply believe that the only way to enter Allah's paradise is to live by the letter of the Quran and the Hadith (the words and deeds of the Prophet Muhammed).

It is from such imams, most of whom are graduates of renowned Islamic institutions in the Middle East and Asia, that Muslims in the West have been receiving guidance.

Key among these institutions is Al-Azhar, a Cairo-based Sunni center for higher learning, attended by students from all over the world. Its curriculum includes extremist content, such as tenets that killing "apostates" is a Divine obligation; that it is a Muslim's duty to humiliate female prisoners through sexual abuse; that adulterers should be stoned to death, and that Christians and Jews are the "enemy of God."


Many imams in the West are graduates of Cairo's Al-Azhar, a Sunni center for higher learning. Its curriculum includes extremist content, such as tenets that killing "apostates" is a Divine obligation; that it is a Muslim's duty to humiliate female prisoners through sexual abuse; that adulterers should be stoned to death, and that Christians and Jews are the "enemy of God." (Image source: Diego Delso/Wikimedia Commons)

Whenever confronted by critics in the West calling them to task for spreading such violent teachings, many imams respond by cloaking their real objectives, saying that the texts should be read in the context of the time that they were written, and by highlighting peaceful and tolerant Quranic verses. Other clerics -- those who do not know how to tailor their rhetoric to Western ears -- openly admit their religious ideology's true intentions.

The infiltration of this ideology is reminiscent of the spread of communism and should be defeated similarly -- not with weapons, but by exposing its true nature and providing an alternative. The West first must abandon, however, the notion that radical Islam is an internal Muslim issue, any more than communism was a "Russian issue" that "the Russians" needed to solve.

Islam and Muslims are part and parcel of Western societies, and Islamist terrorism is a global problem.

In addition, the views of liberal Muslim scholars, who reject the whole premise of extremist, political Islam, should be supported and widely circulated. Among these are prominent intellectuals -- such as the late Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd from Egypt; Mohammed Arkoun, an Algerian who died in France in 2010; the late Egyptian Supreme Court justice Muhammad Sa'id al-'Ashmawi; Egyptian talk-show host Islam Bahiri; and the late Sudanese theologian Mahmoud Muhammad Taha -- all of whom have provided evidence, based on knowledge of the Quran and Hadith, that the "caliphate" is merely a project to colonize more land, as all the old empires did, and that the hostility toward Jews connected to the Muhammed's battle with the Banu Qurayza in the 7th century should have ended long ago.

Muslim innovators abound in the West, as well, and should be the ones establishing mosques, educational institutions and media outlets, to provide followers with an alternative to political Islamism. Finally, imams in Western countries must be held to the same standard as members of other professions. They should be required to receive occupational licenses, based on criteria determined by the state, in conjunction with modern Muslims seeking a peaceful life and the ability to integrate into their societies without fear of repercussions at the hands of fundamentalists.
Saied Shoaaib is a Muslim writer and researcher, specializing in Islamic movements. He can be reached at: saiedshoaaib@gmail.com