Ozzone 4-18 > Are you ready for whatever the Lord expects of you? Are you sure?

 

When God calls us to a particular duty, remember, He will not leave it to us and go away. He will always be there with us and help us to accomplish His will. So, when the Lord gives you a menial task that you might think is beneath your dignity – He is there with you, ready to get to work. He washed the disciples’ feet!

Islam - Current Day - New Anti-Terrorism Bill in France; Terror Trio Arrested in Spain; Afghan Car-Bomb; Aussie Police Seek New Powers; Charges in Germany

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‘Facing threat that is more difficult to spot’: French PM presents new bill to combat Islamist terrorism

28 Apr, 2021 17:43

FILE PHOTO. ©  Reuters / Gonzalo Fuentes

France’s government plans to give its security services “more means” to fight terrorism and make law enforcement “more efficient” at doing so, PM Jean Castex said, promising that “fundamental” rights will still be respected.

“The Republic intends to give itself all the means to fight Islamist terrorism step by step,” Castex said on Wednesday, adding that stronger measures were necessary because the terrorist threat has become increasingly difficult to detect through traditional law enforcement tools.

Under the new plans, security services would be given extensive powers when it comes to monitoring various internet activities.

“The attack in Rambouillet, the assassination of the teacher or a heinous terrorist attack in Nice in November were… acts by isolated individuals, increasingly young and mostly unknown to the intelligence services,” the PM said, referring to the latest high-profile terrorist acts, including last week’s murder of a policewoman in a Paris suburb.

All the perpetrators in these cases were radicalized without necessarily having any direct links to established terrorist networks, Castex said, adding that surveillance should increase particularly on social networks.

Faced with this threat that is more difficult to spot, the State and Justice must equip themselves with strengthened means to detect, monitor and act [on that threat.]

French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin echoed those concerns, saying recent attacks could not be detected through regular means and police “continue to be blind [while] monitoring… telephone lines that no one uses anymore.”

Both the murderer of teacher Samuel Paty and those who attacked a church in Nice communicated through encrypted messaging or through Facebook, he said.

The government’s proposed bill would allow security services to collect computer data for two months instead of the one month currently allowed. Authorities could keep the data for up to five years. It is about “applying to the Internet what we apply to the telephone,” Darmanin said.

The new bill would amend the existing 2015 intelligence law and the 2017 law on internal security. Castex insisted it would not infringe upon “fundamental” human rights and is only intended to help make security services “more efficient” while respecting “fundamental legal principles.”

He also maintained that the bill, which was announced less than a week after the incident in Rambouillet, was the result of months of work and was not a hasty reaction to yet another terrorist attack. A final vote is expected on the bill “before the end of July.”

The announcement comes just a day after the government threatened to take punitive measures against former high-ranking military personnel who signed an open letter declaring the country is headed toward "civil war." The retired generals urged President Emmanuel Macron to save the nation from Islamism and the “suburban hordes” of immigrants.

The appeal was signed by around 20 retired generals along with “a hundred senior officers and more than a thousand soldiers,” the conservative ‘Valeurs Actuelles’ news magazine said. 

French Defense Minister Florence Parly accused the ex-generals of calling for “insurrection” and creating a “climate of division.”

The debate over Islamist radicalism was reignited in France following a series of high-profile attacks in late 2020 and mostly recently the murder of a policewoman by a Tunisian national, who was living in France and was radicalized by watching jihadist videos.

Spanish police arrest ‘terrorist’ trio suspected of encouraging attacks against France over Charlie Hebdo Mohammed cartoons

29 Apr, 2021 18:55

Spanish National Police officers at Atocha train station, Madrid, Spain October 5, 2020 ©  REUTERS / Sergio Perez

Police in Spain have arrested three people on suspicion of encouraging terrorist attacks against France after the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo republished cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed in September last year.

The EU’s law enforcement agency Europol said on Thursday it had helped Spanish police smash the so-called “terrorist cell” in the southern city of Granada.

In videos posted to social media, the suspects allegedly threatened to carry out revenge attacks against France and its citizens over the controversial caricatures, Europol said in a statement.

The trio had amassed 19,000 online followers between them, Europol said, which presented a “serious security concern."

A Europol expert assisted Spanish police in raids on homes and collected evidence, which will now be analyzed.

For many Muslims, visual depictions of the Prophet Mohammed are considered blasphemous.

In response to Charlie Hebdo’s initial publication of a series of controversial Mohammed cartoons in 2015, two Islamist gunmen stormed the magazine’s offices, killing 12 people.

The French outlet’s September 2020 republication of the original cartoons coincided with the start of the trial of 14 people believed to have aided the two attackers.

The cartoons’ republication sparked numerous protests across the Muslim world last year, including in Pakistan, Yemen, Iraq, Bangladesh, and other countries.

In recent weeks, anti-France protests have flared up again in Pakistan, led by the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan group, which has called for bans on French products due to French President Emmanuel Macron’s refusal to condemn the cartoons.

Have these countries condemned the attacks on Charlie Hebdo? Or any of the other massacres perpetrated by insane Muslims?

Car bomb kills at least 25, injures dozens in eastern Afghanistan

30 Apr, 2021 18:16

FILE PHOTO: An Afghan police officer keeps watch at a checkpoint. © Reuters / Omar Sobhani

A massive car bomb struck the main city of eastern Afghanistan's Logar province on Friday, killing at least 25 people and injuring scores more, local officials told the media.

The blast struck near what used to be the residence of the former provincial council leader in Pul-e Alam, but which has been repurposed for public use.

Provincial officials said that the driver of the bomb-laden truck had posed as a worker of an NGO looking to help locals, in order to gain access to the compound.

The explosion was so powerful that it caused the collapse of the building, killing at least 25 people, Hasib Stanekzai, head of Logar's provincial council, said. Around 60 people were injured, he added.

The Interior Ministry said that 30 people were killed or wounded in the attack, warning that the death toll could rise further.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the blast, but violence has been on the rise in Afghanistan in recent weeks, particularly in the wake of US President Joe Biden's announcement that American troops – deployed in the country for two decades – will withdraw from Afghanistan by September 11.

The new date pushes back the May 1 deadline which the administration of Biden's predecessor, Donald Trump, had agreed with the Taliban during peace talks in February 2020.

It's curious who would do things that might halt or delay the American withdrawal. It makes no sense for the Taliban, Al Qaeda, or Daesh to take such a risk. The Afghan government, on the other hand, may want to delay the American withdrawal, fearing any one of, or all three of the aforementioned groups. Then, there is always the possibility of Deep State not wanting the Americans to withdraw from any war. 

Logar Prov., AFG

Australian intelligence predicts terrorist attack ‘in next 12 months,’ police seek new powers to combat ‘extreme’ ideologies

30 Apr, 2021 18:16

Australian Federal Police officers stand near the check-in counters at the Sydney Airport Domestic terminal in Australia,

July 30, 2017. ©  REUTERS / David Gray

Australia’s Federal Police are requesting new powers that would make possession of “propaganda” and “terrorist” manifestos illegal to possess and share, as intelligence agencies predict a terrorist attack within 12 months.

Mike Burgess, the director general of the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), told a parliamentary intelligence committee that a terrorist attack in Australia is “probable” and that it’s anticipated to happen “in the next 12 months.” He said it could be either Islamist or nationalist in nature, local media reported.

Burgess also warned the committee that Australia’s youth is “being ensnared in these racist, supremacist and misogynist ideologies,” though concluded that “Sunni-based” extremism is still the intelligence agency’s “major” concern.

In light of Burgess’ warning, the Australian Federal Police (AFP) are now reportedly pushing for a change in law that would allow them to criminally punish Australians in possession of material deemed to be “propaganda” for terrorist organizations and ideologies.

AFP Deputy Commissioner Ian McCartney told the parliamentary committee that “certain aspects of current criminal laws are out of step with the community’s expectations,” and that more should be done to crack down on the radicalization of Australians by prohibiting possession and distribution of ‘terrorist’ materials.

“Outside of legitimate research, public interest reporting and other professional reasons, there are no circumstances where individuals should be accessing or sharing instructional terrorist manuals, propaganda magazines, and graphically violent images, videos and other content produced by terrorists,” McCartney argued.

He said police are currently “limited” in the actions they can take against “radicalized individuals” unless they’re actively planning an attack and also called for the “criminalization of the public display of flags and other extremist insignia.”

Just last year, however, the Law Council of Australia called on Parliament to cut back on some of the country’s anti-terrorism laws – including bans on travel to certain countries – warning they were too “broadly framed” and authoritarian.

Good grief!

Germany charges suspected Islamic State fundraiser who allegedly paid smugglers and helped free jailed fighter

30 Apr, 2021 15:07

A police officer checks commuters in cars arriving from Poland, at the German-Polish border crossing Stadtbruecke

(city bridge) amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Frankfurt (Oder), Germany, March 22, 2021.

©  REUTERS / Hannibal Hanschke

Prosecutors in Germany have charged an Iraqi immigrant who is suspected of being a member of Islamic State and funding the terrorist organization's activities abroad.

The suspect, identified only as Aymen A.-J, is also suspected of the "preparation of a serious act of violence that is dangerous to the state," the federal prosecutor's office said in a statement on Friday.

The suspect allegedly sent $12,000 to Syria and Lebanon between September and the end of last year.

Prosecutors said the cash was used to pay for the care of women in Syrian refugee camps, to fund IS smugglers and to free one of the group's fighters from prison.

After entering Germany from Iraq in 2016, he has allegedly been an IS sympathizer since 2018, before trying to join the group abroad early last year.

IS chiefs told him to postpone joining the group and he remained in Germany, where he played a "central role" in fundraising, according to prosecutors.

In January 2021, the suspect was detained at the German-Swiss border as he allegedly made his way to fight for IS in Syria or Africa, and has since been in custody.

On Thursday a federal judge ordered his pre-trial detention. No trial date was released.

Islam - This Day in History - The Armenian Genocide 1915 - 2021

The Armenian Genocide Forges On

by Raymond Ibrahim

April 24, 2021 at 5:00 am

*** "At the beginning of 1915 there were some two million Armenians within Turkey; today there are fewer than 60,000.... denial of the Armenian Genocide by successive regimes in Turkey has gone on from 1915 to the present." — The Genocide Education Project.

*** Not only has Turkey repeatedly denied culpability for the Armenian Genocide; it appears intent on reigniting it, most recently by helping Azerbaijan wage war on Armenia in the context of the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute, which again erupted into armed conflict in late 2020.

*** "Why has Turkey returned to the South Caucasus 100 years [after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire]? To continue the Armenian Genocide." — Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Facebook, October 1, 2020.

*** These mercenaries and their Azerbaijani partners, among other ISIS-like behavior, "tortured beyond recognition" an intellectually disabled 58-year-old Armenian woman by hacking off her ears, hands, and feet -- before murdering her. Her family was only able to identify her by her clothes.

*** Answering the question, "If you could get away with one thing, what would you do?" -- asked to random passersby on the streets of Turkey -- a woman recently replied on video: "What would I do? Behead 20 Armenians." She then looked directly at the camera and smiled while nodding her head.

*** Much of this genocidal hatred should be unsurprising: Turkish public school textbooks, as a recent study found, continue demonizing Armenians -- as well as Jews and Christians.

Armenian churches have been desecrated after coming under Azerbaijani control during and since the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute erupted into armed conflict in late 2020 -- despite promises from the Azerbaijani authorities to protect them. Pictured: The Ghazanchetsots (Holy Saviour) Cathedral in Shusha, Nagorno-Karabakh, on October 13, 2020, shortly after it was bombed. (Photo by Aris Messinis/AFP via Getty Images)

Today, April 24th, is Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day, marking 106 years since the start of the Armenian Genocide, when the Ottoman Turks massacred approximately 1.5 million Armenians during World War I.

Most objective historians who have examined the topic unequivocally agree that it was a deliberate, calculated genocide. According to the Genocide Education Project:

"More than one million Armenians perished as the result of execution, starvation, disease, the harsh environment, and physical abuse. A people who lived in eastern Turkey for nearly 3,000 years [more than double the amount of time the invading Islamic Turks had occupied Anatolia, now known as "Turkey"] lost its homeland and was profoundly decimated in the first large-scale genocide of the twentieth century. At the beginning of 1915 there were some two million Armenians within Turkey; today there are fewer than 60,000.

"Despite the vast amount of evidence that points to the historical reality of the Armenian Genocide, eyewitness accounts, official archives, photographic evidence, the reports of diplomats, and the testimony of survivors, denial of the Armenian Genocide by successive regimes in Turkey has gone on from 1915 to the present."

Not only has Turkey repeatedly denied culpability for the Armenian Genocide; it appears intent on reigniting it, most recently by helping Azerbaijan wage war on Armenia in the context of the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute, which again erupted into armed conflict in late 2020.

As Nikol Pashinyan, Armenia's prime minister, observed in October 2020: "Why has Turkey returned to the South Caucasus 100 years [after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire]? To continue the Armenian Genocide."

During this recent conflict, which did not concern it, Turkey sent sharia-enforcing "jihadist groups." According to French President Emmanuel Macron, they -- including the pro-Muslim Brotherhood Hamza Division were sent from Syria and Libya to terrorize and slaughter Armenians. The Hamza Division reportedly kept naked women in prison while operating in Syria.

These mercenaries and their Azerbaijani partners, among other ISIS-like behavior, "tortured beyond recognition" an intellectually disabled 58-year-old Armenian woman by hacking off her ears, hands, and feet -- before murdering her. Her family was only able to identify her by her clothes.

"Armenians," according to a December 2020 report, "are being brutalized" and have "lost territory to their jihadist neighbors before agreeing to a cease-fire enforced by Russia.... Prior to violating the so-called peace agreement, the Turkish Muslims of Azerbaijan did as Muhammad commanded in beheading Christians."

The report linked to a video of soldiers in camouflage overpowering a struggling, elderly Armenian man to the ground, before casually carving at his throat with a knife.

"Azerbaijan has accused Armenia of violating the peace deal first," the report continues, "but observers note the only provocation Muslims need to attack Armenians is their continued existence."

Anti-infidel rhetoric underscores this view. A captured terrorist confessed that he was "promised a monthly 2000 dollar payment for fighting against 'kafirs' in Artsakh, and an extra 100 dollar for each beheaded 'kafir.'" (Kafir, often translated as "infidel," is Arabic for non-Muslims who fail to submit to Islamic authority, which by default makes them enemies worthy of slavery or death.)

Armenian churches that came under Azerbaijani control have been desecrated -- despite promises from the Azerbaijani authorities to protect them. In one instance, a soldier -- it is unclear whether he was an Azeri or a jihadi mercenary from Syria or Iraq -- was videotaped standing on top of a church chapel, where the cross had been broken off, and triumphantly shouting "Allahu Akbar!" Azerbaijani forces also shelled and destroyed Holy Savior, an iconic Armenian cathedral which was "consecrated in 1888 but was damaged during the March 1920 massacre of Armenians of the city by Azerbaijanis and experienced a decades-long decline."

More recently, according to a March 29, 2021 report, during just two weeks, at least three Armenian churches in the Nagorno-Karabakh region were recently vandalized or destroyed by Azerbaijani forces -- even though a ceasefire had been declared in November. Video footage of the desecration of one of these churches shows Azerbaijani troops entering the Christian place of worship, and then laughing, mocking, kicking, and defacing Christian items inside it, including a fresco of the Last Supper. Turkey's flag appears on the Azerbaijani servicemen's uniforms, further implicating the Erdogan government of involvement. As they approach, one of the Muslim soldiers says, "Let's now enter their church, where I will perform namaz" -- a reference to Muslim prayers; when Muslims pray inside a non-Muslim temple, it immediately becomes a mosque.

In response to this video, Arman Tatoyan, an Armenian human rights activist, issued a statement:

"The President of Azerbaijan, and the country's authorities have been implementing a policy of hatred, enmity, ethnic cleansing and genocide against Armenia, citizens of Armenia and the Armenian people for years. The Turkish authorities have done the same or have openly encouraged the same policy."

As an example, he said that Azerbaijan's President Aliyev had proudly stated in early March that "the younger generation has grown up with hatred toward the enemy " -- meaning Armenians.

Such hate, a precursor to genocide, seems evident everywhere. One need only listen to a Turkish man rant in a video about how all Armenians are "dogs," and that any Armenians found in Turkey should be slaughtered:

"What is an Armenian doing in my country? Either the state expels them or we kill them. Why do we let them live?... We will slaughter them when the time comes.... This is Turkish soil. How are we Ottoman grandchildren?.... The people of Turkey... have honor, dignity, and Allah must cut the heads of the Armenians in Turkey. It is dishonorable for anyone to meet and not kill an Armenian... If we are human, let us do this—let us do it for Allah.... Everyone listening, if you love Allah, please spread this video of me to everyone..."

Answering the question, "If you could get away with one thing, what would you do?" -- asked to random passersby on the streets of Turkey -- a woman recently replied on video: "What would I do? Behead 20 Armenians." She then looked directly at the camera and smiled while nodding her head.

Much of this genocidal hatred should be unsurprising: Turkish public school textbooks, as a recent study found, continue demonizing Armenians -- as well as Jews and Christians.

If Turks, who are not affected by the Armenian/Azerbaijani conflict, feel this way, why it should be a shock that any number of Azerbaijanis do, too? "We [Azerbaijanis]," noted Nurlan Ibrahimov, head of the press service of Qarabag football club of Azerbaijan, "must kill all Armenians—children, women, the elderly. [We] need to kill [them] without [making a] distinction. No regrets, no compassion."

Today, therefore, marking the anniversary of the start of the Armenian Genocide, we would do well to remember not only what happened then, but what is clearly being primed to happen again.

Raymond Ibrahim, author of Sword and Scimitar, The Al Qaeda Reader, and Crucified Again, is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Gatestone Institute, a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center, and a Judith Rosen Friedman Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

Follow Raymond Ibrahim on Twitter and Facebook

Armenian Genocide - The Massacres of 1915 - Can it Happen Again?

Historian Unearths Evidence that Istanbul Directed Armenian Genocide

Where was God in the Armenian 'Genocide' by Ottoman Turks?

Islam - Current Day - History Gearing Up to Repeat the Very Worst of Itself

Erdogan's Ottoman Empire Ambitions Suffering from His Own Eroding Base

This may have been the first time I accused Erdogan of wanting to re-establish the Ottoman Empire with himself as Caliph. I still believe that is his goal. Miss Turkey Faces Prison for Anti-Erdogan Instagram Post

Islam - Current Day - Ex-French Generals Blast Islamism; 6 Islamists Arrested in Denmark; Journalists Missing/Murdered; Swiss Niqab Ban

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French defense minister threatens ‘sanctions’ against ex-generals behind open letter blasting Islamism and ‘suburban hordes’

27 Apr, 2021 12:09 

FILE PHOTO: French soldiers patrol the streets of Bretigny-sur-Orge, near Paris, France, November 2020.

© Benoit Tessier / Reuters

French Defense Minister Florence Parly has said that former high-ranking military personnel may be punished for signing a letter urging the president to stop the looming disintegration of the country and possible civil war.

The letter, which had caused a stir in the media, was published in the conservative ‘Valeurs Actuelles’ news magazine on April 21. The appeal was signed by around 20 retired generals along with “a hundred senior officers and more than a thousand soldiers,” the magazine said.

Striking an ominous tone, generals asked French President Emmanuel Macron and the government to save France from what they said was a creeping disintegration, and to defend the country against “Islamism and the hordes of the suburbs,” as well as against “masked individuals” that attack businesses and police. They also warned that “certain 'anti-racism’ and ‘decolonial theories'” sow divisions in society with the goal of starting a “race war,” and that the current political climate could ultimately lead to a civil war in France, unless something is urgently done to stop it.

Parly accused the former generals of “calling for a kind of insurrection or, at least, creating a climate of division.” She told France Info radio that the opinions expressed in the letter were “an insult launched at thousands of soldiers.”

Huh?

One doesn’t rub salt into wounds. When you are responsible, you don’t stir up divisions, though these cannot be denied. We mustn’t exaggerate them either, and we shouldn’t seek to make them bigger.

The minister argued that even retired military personnel were bound by the duty to refrain from voicing political opinions in public, and the actions of the letter’s signatories were unacceptable and irresponsible. Parly said she has directed the Chief of the Defense Staff to apply “sanctions” against the ex-officers. 

“The military statute, which is known to everyone, permits the military to have opinions, but limits their expression to the private sphere,” Parly said.

Like you said, Minister, it is known to everyone, and yet, these senior soldiers felt it was important enough to state it publicly. Apparently, it was necessary because you are not recognizing the real danger France is in. I would suggest you ask those retired soldiers what they would do to rectify the problem.

The leader of the right-wing National Rally party, Marine Le Pen, endorsed the message of the letter, saying that it was a duty of patriots to fight for the “salvation of the country.” She invited the authors to support her party and her candidacy in the 2022 presidential election. 

Parly has condemned Le Pen’s comments, saying that the Armed Forces must stay neutral in domestic affairs. “Wanting to politicize the military is an insult to their mission,” she wrote, in an op-ed in the newspaper Liberation, adding that politicization of the army will “weaken France.”

France is already weak. Refusing to admit that is your biggest problem.

The discussion over radicalism was reignited in France after a string of high-profile Islamic terrorist attacks last year. Last week, a Tunisian national, who was living in France and radicalized by watching jihadist videos, attacked a police station in Rambouillet near Paris and killed a female police employee.

Danish police arrest 6 men suspected of bankrolling and joining Islamic State

27 Apr, 2021 13:55

FILE PHOTO. Danish police in Copenhagen, Denmark ©  Reuters / Ritzau Scanpix

Police in Denmark have arrested six men, aged 27 to 35, on suspicion of financing the Islamic State terrorist group and aiding its activities in Syria.

Two of the suspects were detained in the cities of Aarhus and the capital Copenhagen after they traveled to Syria to join IS in the summer of 2014, police said in a statement on Tuesday.

One of that pair, a 29-year-old, was also said to have returned to Syria the following spring to work for the terrorist organization again.

Five of the suspects have been accused of financing terrorism, including the 29-year-old, who allegedly sent money to IS from Aarhus between 2013 and 2017.

Police said they believe the other four detainees acted as intermediaries by wiring the cash to IS at the man's request.

Five of the six men will attend a court hearing on Tuesday, where a judge will decide on their continued detention.

The arrests were carried out as part of an operation by the Danish Security and Intelligence Service (PET) in coordination with police in East Jutland and Copenhagen.

In March, PET released an assessment of Denmark's terrorist threat level, saying the risk "remains significant."

Militant Islamists continue to pose the primary terrorist threat to Denmark, PET said, particularly those who sympathize with – and are inspired by – IS and Al-Qaeda.

Two Spanish documentary makers killed in Burkina Faso, PM Sanchez confirms,

Irish journalist reported missing

27 Apr, 2021 15:38

FILE PHOTO. Police officer in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso ©  AFP / ISSOUF SANOGO

A pair of Spanish journalists have been killed in Burkina Faso, Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has said after they were reportedly kidnapped by terrorists while making a documentary about poaching in the African country.

"The worst news is confirmed. All our love for the family and friends of David Beriain and Roberto Fraile, murdered in Burkina Faso," Sanchez said in a tweet on Tuesday.

Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya earlier told reporters that her department was still waiting for official confirmation from Burkina Faso, but that two of the bodies found were "most likely" those of the Spaniards.

Terrorists reportedly kidnapped the pair, along with an Irish reporter, who is still missing, according to AFP. This has not been officially confirmed.

The three men were said to be on an anti-poaching patrol with soldiers and rangers in the Arli National Park in eastern Burkina Faso.

Their convoy reportedly came under attack by Islamist militants who apparently shot and wounded two foreigners and two soldiers.

Kidnappings are a common threat in the area, with "terrorists, bandits and jihadists" known to operate there, Gonzalez Laya said.

Swiss Ban on Full Veil Raises Questions and Riles Islamists

Hany Ghoraba

Algemeiner

A Swiss government building. Photo: The Federal Council of Switzerland.

In an effort to curtail extremism, Switzerland last month voted to ban women wearing the burqa or niqab (full veil). The national referendum passed March 7 with 52 percent of the vote. Under the new restriction, people cannot completely cover their face in public areas.

Exceptions may be allowed in places of worship.

Switzerland is the latest European country to impose restrictions on the full veil, joining France, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Bulgaria, and the Netherlands.

The referendum was pushed by the populist Swiss People’s Party (SVP), which argued that a vote for banning the veil was a step against extremism. It described the referendum as “a strong symbol against radical Islam.”

The Swiss Parliament’s lower house backed a face veil ban in 2016, following neighboring European countries such as France, as a curb on radicalism in the wake of terrorist attacks. But to become law, it needed voter approval.

Muslims represent just 5.2 percent of the Swiss population, according federal statistics. But Swiss officials are wary of rising levels of extremism in the country. Swiss police conducted raids against extremists in 2019. Switzerland’s intelligence service estimated that 92 jihadists have traveled from Switzerland to Iraq, Syria, and Somalia since 2013 to join terrorist groups.

Last November, a 28-year-old Swiss woman attacked two women in a Lugano department store with a knife, seriously injuring one. Officials described it as “a suspected terrorist-motivated attack.”

Islamist groups expressed frustration about the referendum.

“Today’s decision opens old wounds, further expands the principle of legal inequality, and sends a clear signal of exclusion to the Muslim minority,” stated the Islamic Central Council of Switzerland in a statement, adding that it would challenge the decision in court. It described the vote as “Islamophobically related.”

“Switzerland has voted to ban the niqab. In a land where barely 0.00001 % of its citizens wear a face-covering, there is no question that the entire public vote & discussion was yet another European attempt to ban an iconic symbol associated with Islam. It’s not about the niqab,” tweeted Islamic theologian and scholar Yasir Qadhi, insinuating that ban is an attack on Muslims, even those who do not wear the veil.

No, it is an attack against radicalized Muslims. Who else would choose to be invisible?

Turkish state media heavily criticized the ban as “Islamophobic.” Pakistani news outlet Dawn said the vote “helps propel the agenda of far-right parties in Europe, who see Muslims, people of colour and racial minorities as ‘outsiders’ trying to change the continent’s ‘pure’ culture.”

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)’s human rights board condemned the Swiss ban in a statement, saying it was “grossly discriminatory, disproportionate, contrary to ideals of pluralism and tolerance” and “violating international and regional human rights obligations.”

Spoken by The Organization of Islamic Cooperation!!!!

But some Swiss lawmakers defended the decision. “In Switzerland, our tradition is that you show your face. That is a sign of our basic freedoms,” said Wobmann.

Yet it’s not just Islamists who objected to the results of the referendum. “If the intention of this is in any way to protect women’s rights it fails abjectly,” said Cyrielle Huguenot, head of women’s rights at Amnesty International Switzerland. “Instead, this proposes to sanction women for their choice of clothing and in so doing undermines the freedoms Switzerland purports to uphold.”

So, Mrs Radical Islamist goes to the closet in the morning and decides which black full-length robe she is going to make herself invisible with today. "Let me see... the black one, or the black one, or maybe the black one, that looks real sporty!!!"

Other concerns came from Swiss tourism industry experts. “A burqa ban would damage our reputation as an open and tolerant tourism destination,” said Nicole Brändle Schlegel of HotellerieSuisse, an alliance of hoteliers and tourism professionals.

But the wearing of the niqab is associated with the spread of fundamentalist Islamist movements like Salafism or Wahabbism. Salafists believe that the physical appearance of a believer is an integral part of abiding by the tenets of the Islamic faith.

Yet despite his conservative stances on many issues, Al Azhar Grand Imam Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb — the highest authority in Sunni Islam — has described the niqab as optional.

“The women who wear a niqab must never say [she] is wearing it because it is required by (Islamic) Sharia. It is like wearing or taking off a ring,” al-Tayeb told Egypt’s Extra News TV.

In 2007, al-Tayeb said the “niqab is forbidden during prayer and forbidden for women during Hajj (pilgrimage).”

In Muslim majority countries where the niqab is worn by more women, male and female criminals can sometimes use the face coverings to conceal their identities.

North African bans on niqab

Morocco, which has a 99 percent Muslim population, banned the burqa and niqab in 2017, as a result of growing security concerns and to curb extremism. Algeria followed suit and banned wearing the niqab in government buildings in 2018. Tunisia banned the niqab in government buildings in 2019 after a suicide bombing in which a terrorist reportedly used a niqab as a disguise.

The niqab security threat is more profound in countries like Egypt, where many women wear it. However, the Egyptian parliament failed to approve a ban in 2018 citing public freedoms.

“Some of the terrorist attacks that happened in the past were carried out by people wearing the niqab,” said Mohamed Abu Hamed, a former Egyptian MP. He proposed an alternative bill banning the niqab in government intuitions, schools, and universities. The bill didn’t see the light of day but the niqab was banned for faculty members at Cairo and Ain Shams universities in 2020.

The fact that some Muslim-majority countries have taken similar actions should blunt some criticism of the Swiss referendum. Although the niqab is not widely worn in Switzerland, it remains a tool for extremists and poses security challenges. And influential Muslim scholars, including Al Azhar’s grand imam, describe it as optional for Muslim women.

Swiss voters see much of Europe grappling with the results of a laissez-faire attitude toward radical Islamist ideology at home. That likely influenced their decision.

The Investigative Project on Terrorism. Senior Fellow Hany Ghoraba is an Egyptian writer, political and counter-terrorism analyst at Al Ahram Weekly, author of Egypt’s Arab Spring: The Long and Winding Road to Democracy and a regular contributor to the BBC.

Military Madness: Worrying New Clues About the Origins of Covid

How scientists at Wuhan lab helped Chinese army

in secret project to find animal viruses

By IAN BIRRELL FOR THE MAIL ON SUNDAY

PUBLISHED: 17:01 EDT, 24 April 2021 | UPDATED: 06:42 EDT, 25 April 2021

Scientists studying bat diseases at China's maximum-security laboratory in Wuhan were engaged in a massive project to investigate animal viruses alongside leading military officials – despite their denials of any such links.

Documents obtained by The Mail on Sunday reveal that a nationwide scheme, directed by a leading state body, was launched nine years ago to discover new viruses and detect the 'dark matter' of biology involved in spreading diseases.

One leading Chinese scientist, who published the first genetic sequence of the Covid-19 virus in January last year, found 143 new diseases in the first three years of the project alone.

The fact that such a virus-detection project is led by both civilian and military scientists appears to confirm incendiary claims from the United States alleging collaboration between the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) and the country's 2.1 million-strong armed forces.

The scheme's five team leaders include Shi Zhengli, the WIV virologist nicknamed 'Bat Woman' for her trips to find samples in caves, and Cao Wuchun, a senior army officer and government adviser on bioterrorism.

Prof Shi denied the US allegations last month, saying: 'I don't know of any military work at the WIV. That info is incorrect.'

Yet Colonel Cao is listed on project reports as a researcher from the Academy of Military Medical Sciences of the People's Liberation Army, works closely with other military scientists and is director of the Military Biosafety Expert Committee.

Cao, an epidemiologist who studied at Cambridge University, even sits on the Wuhan Institute of Virology's advisory board. He was second-in-command of the military team sent into the city under Major General Chen Wei, the country's top biodefence expert, to respond to the new virus and develop a vaccine.

The US State Department also raised concerns over risky 'gain of function' experiments to manipulate coronaviruses at the Wuhan lab and suggested researchers fell sick with Covid-like symptoms weeks before the outbreak emerged more widely in the Chinese city.

Last month, Britain, the US and 12 other countries criticised Beijing for refusing to share key data and samples after a joint World Health Organisation and Chinese study into the pandemic's origins dismissed a lab leak as 'extremely unlikely'.

Filippa Lentzos, a biosecurity expert at King's College London, said the latest disclosures fitted 'the pattern of inconsistencies' coming from Beijing.

'They are still not being transparent with us,' she said. 'We have no hard data on the pandemic origins, whether it was a natural spill-over from animals or some kind of accidental research-related leak, yet we're unable to get straight answers and that simply does not inspire confidence.'

The documents obtained by The Mail on Sunday detail a major project called 'the discovery of animal-delivered pathogens carried by wild animals', which set out to find organisms that could infect humans and investigate their evolution. 

It was launched in 2012 and funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China. The project was led by Xu Jianguo, who boasted at a conference in 2019 that 'a giant network of infectious disease prevention and control is taking shape'.

The professor also headed the first expert group investigating Covid's emergence in Wuhan. He denied human transmission initially, despite evidence from hospitals, then insisted in mid-January 'this epidemic is limited and will end if there are no new cases next week'.

One review of his virus-hunting project admitted 'a large number of new viruses have been discovered, causing great concern in the international virology community'.

It added that if pathogens spread to humans and livestock, they could cause new infectious diseases 'posing a great threat to human health and life safety and may cause major economic losses, even affect social stability'.

An update in 2018 said that the scientific teams – who published many of their findings in international journals – had found four new pathogens and ten new bacteria while 'more than 1,640 new viruses were discovered using metagenomics technology'. Such research is based on extraction of genetic material from samples such as those collected by Prof Shi from bat faeces and blood in the cave networks of southern China.

Such extensive sampling led to Prof Shi's rapid revelation last year of RaTG13, the closest known relative to the new strain of coronavirus that causes Covid.

It was stored at the Wuhan lab, the biggest repository of bat coronaviruses in Asia.

Pictured: Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan, in China's central Hubei province, during a visit by members

of the World Health Organization (WHO) team investigating the origins of the COVID-19 coronavirus

It later emerged she changed its name from another virus identified in a previous paper, thus obscuring its link to three miners who died from a strange respiratory disease they caught clearing bat droppings.

Prof Shi also admitted that eight more unidentified SARS viruses had been collected in the mine. The institute took its database of virus samples offline in September 2019, just a few weeks before Covid cases exploded in Wuhan.

I'm sure that was a coincidence!

A comment was made on social media after Colonel Cao published a paper on a fatal tick bite, saying he and Prof Shi 'can always find a virus that has never been found in humans', adding: 'I suspect this is another so-called 'scientific research' made in the laboratory.'

In recent years, China's military has ramped up its hiring of scientists after President Xi Jinping said this was a key element in the nation's march for global supremacy.

Lianchao Han, a dissident who used to work for the Chinese government, said Cao's involvement raised suspicions that military researchers who are experts in coronaviruses might also be involved in bio-defence operations.

'Many have been working with Western research institutes for years to steal our know-hows but China still refuses to share critical information a year after the pandemic has killed over three million.'

David Asher, an expert on biological, chemical and nuclear proliferation, who led State Department inquiries into the origins of Covid-19, said: 'The Chinese have made it clear they see biotechnology as a big part of the future of hybrid warfare. The big question is whether their work in these fields is offensive or defensive.'

What 'defensive' weapon has never been used offensively? It's really hard for military leaders to resist using a new toy.

Islam - Current Day > Muslim Gets Away With Murdering Jewess in Paris; French Police Worker Murdered by Islamist; 14 y/o Orphan Tortured to Death in Egypt

French president seeks change to law after

Jewish woman’s killer spared trial

..

Macron says country determined to protect Jewish community, after court rules Sarah Halimi’s murderer not responsible for his actions due to being too high on marijuana at the time

By TOI STAFF and AGENCIES

19 April 2021, 8:56 am

French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace in Paris, December 1, 2020.

(Benoit Tessier/Pool/AFP)

French President Emanuel Macron expressed support on Sunday for the country’s Jewish community and its efforts to bring the killer of Sarah Halimi to trial, following a ruling by France’s highest court that Kobili Traore was not criminally responsible due to having smoked marijuana.

And he said he would seek a change to laws to prevent such a case from happening again.

In a rare and controversial critique of France’s justice system, Macron said that taking drugs and “going crazy” should not take away criminal responsibility.

Having criticized a lower court’s insanity finding in January last year, drawing a sharp riposte from the country’s top magistrates, Macron on Sunday expressed support for the battle to bring Traore to trial for the killing.

“It’s not for me to comment on a court decision, but I would like to express to the family, to the relatives of the victim, and to all our Jewish citizens who were waiting for a trial, my warm support and the Republic’s determination to protect them,” Macron told Le Figaro.

Macron said that France “does not judge citizens who are sick, we treat them… But deciding to take drugs and then ‘going crazy’ should not, in my opinion, take away your criminal responsibility.”

He added: “I would like Justice Minister [Eric Dupond-Moretti] to present a change in the law as soon as possible.”

Sarah Halimi, an Orthodox Jewish woman in her sixties, died in 2017 after being pushed out of the window of her Paris flat by neighbor Traore, who shouted “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great” in Arabic).

But in a Wednesday decision, the Court of Cassation’s Supreme Court of Appeals upheld rulings by lower tribunals that Traore cannot stand trial because he was too high on marijuana to be criminally responsible for his actions.

Traore, a heavy pot smoker, has been in psychiatric care since Halimi’s death. The court said he committed the killing after succumbing to a “delirious fit” and was thus not responsible for his actions.

Sarah Halimi was beaten before she was thrown off her Paris apartment building’s roof in April 2017. (Courtesy of the Halimi family)

An appeals court had said Traore, now in his early 30s, had anti-Semitic bias and that the killing was partly connected to it. But it also accepted the defense claims that Traore was too high to be tried for his actions and he was placed at a psychiatric facility.

All radical Muslims should be placed in psychiatric care.

Macron has previously said there was “a need for a trial” even if a judge then decided there was no criminal responsibility.

The court decision, which means that Traore cannot stand trial in any French court, provoked anger from anti-racism groups who say the verdict puts Jews at risk.

Stoking debate over a new strain of anti-Semitism among radicalized Muslim youths in predominantly immigrant neighborhoods, the handling of Halimi’s slaying has been a watershed event for many French Jews, who say it underlines the French state’s failures in dealing with anti-Semitism.

“This is an additional drama that adds to this tragedy,” the International League against Racism and Anti-Semitism (LICRA) said after the ruling.

“From now on in our country, you can torture and kill Jews with complete impunity,” added the president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France (CRIF), Francis Kalifat.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center’s director for international relations, Shimon Samuels, called the decision a “devastating blow,” which, he said, “potentially creates a precedent for all hate criminals to simply claim insanity or decide to smoke, snort or inject drugs or even get drunk before committing their crimes.”

French Jews have been repeatedly targeted by jihadists in recent years, most notably in 2012, when an Islamist gunman shot dead three children and a teacher at a Jewish school in the southern city of Toulouse and in 2015 when a pro-Islamic State radical gunned down four people at a Jewish supermarket in Paris.

Following Wednesday’s verdict, lawyers representing Halimi’s family said they intend to refer the case to the European Court of Human Rights.

“It’s a bad message for French Jewish citizens,” said the lawyer for Halimi’s brother, Muriel Ouaknine Melki.

French police administrative officer fatally stabbed,

suspect shot dead at the scene

23 Apr, 2021 13:28

© Bertrand GUAY / AFP

A French police administrative officer was stabbed at the local precinct in Rambouillet, in the Yvelines region. Armed officers shot and arrested the assailant, who later died from their injuries.

The incident occurred at approximately 2:20pm local time when the suspect lunged at the officer with a knife, mortally wounding her. Responding officers opened fire and managed to arrest the suspect at the scene.

French media report the 49-year-old administrative officer went into cardiac arrest at the scene after having her throat slit. The injured woman succumbed to multiple stab wounds moments later after receiving emergency treatment at the scene, according to media reports. 

Police sources later confirmed to BFMTV that the suspect had also died of their gunshot wounds. France's counterterrorism police force, the SDAT, has begun assessing the situation while Paris region president Valerie Pecresse said that terrorist motives could not be ruled out.

Despite some media reports to the contrary, police sources denied that the suspect, who was reportedly unknown to French intelligence services, shouted Islamist slogans during the attack. 

Media reports indicate the attacker holds Tunisian nationality. 

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin confirmed the incident in a tweet and said he was en route to the scene in the city of Rambouillet, home to some 26,000 people, located approximately 60km southwest of Paris. 

French Prime Minister Jean Castex arrived at the scene as well.

Orphan tortured to death over $4 in Egypt

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14-y/o boy was subjected to horrific torture for 120 minutes for demanding wages

Published:  April 25, 2021 13:06

Tawfiq Nasrallah, Senior News Editor, Gulf News

  

Dubai: A 14-year-old orphaned boy was tortured for two hours by his employer in Egypt simply because of demanding his daily wage of 50 Egyptian pounds ($3.80), local media reported. He died from the abuse.

The boy was said to be working at a poultry slaughterhouse for seven months before the crime took place.

According to initial investigations, Saleh Tamer was subjected to a horrific torture party for 120 minutes, which ended with his death inside the slaughterhouse located in the Mit Suhail village in the Sharqia governorate.

Police investigations also revealed that “the victim’s torture party began when he asked the slaughterhouse owners to give him his daily wage the previous day, saying that he can no longer continue working at the slaughterhouse because someone was harassing him and pressuring him throughout the day for continuous work without rest".

For that simple reason, the suspects (slaughterhouse owners) started beating and torturing the child with fire causing his health condition to deteriorate seriously, which prompted them to take him to a nearby clinic where doctors told them that the child had gone into a coma and must be taken very quickly to the hospital to save his life. However, he was declared dead upon arrival at Al Saadin Central Hospital in Minya Al Qamh.

According to Al Watan Newspaper, the forensic report revealed that the boy suffered from burns and bruises on different parts of his body, and that was clearly visible. Meanwhile, the owners of the slaughterhouse claimed that they found the boy’s body lying in front of the slaughterhouse. The defendants denied committing the crime before the Public Prosecution, although all available evidence shows that they were the killers.

Politics > French Polls Indicate Marine Le Pen's Far-Right Party May Challenge Macron's Centre-Right Party Next Year

Emmanuel Macron crisis: Le Pen surges as

French election panic sets in for president

EMMANUEL MACRON is facing an unexpectedly tight French election next year

after a new poll showed rival Marine Le Pen hot on his heels.

By JAMES BICKERTON

PUBLISHED: 07:00, Sat, Apr 24, 2021 

Marine Le Pen supporters are 'extremely mobilised' says expert.

A recent poll has put Ms Le Pen just a handful of points behind incumbent Mr Macron in the crucial second round of voting. Anger at the EU’s failed coronavirus rollout, immigration and terrorism have sparked a surge in the radical right candidate’s popularity.

Victory for Ms Le Pen would be a big blow for Brussels, as Ms Le Pen is fiercely eurosceptic and is vowing to strengthen France’s borders.

The Jean-Jaures Foundation, a French centre-left think tank, warned conservative voters who rejected Ms Le Pen in 2017 may vote for her this time.

Four years ago Mr Macron won the presidency by an impressive 66 percent to 34 percent. But a new poll has suggested the 2022 contest is likely to be much closer.

A Harris International Poll put Le Pen within eight points of Macron in the final round (Image: GETTY)

A Harris Interactive poll found Ms Le Pen will still lose to Mr Macron in the second round - but by a much smaller margin of 46 percent to 54 percent.

Half of left-wing French voters said they might not bother voting for Mr Macron to beat his far-right rival.

If conservative voters embrace Ms Le Pen and her National Rally party it would shatter the ‘republican front’ which has previously kept the far-right from power.

French presidential elections have two rounds with just the two most popular candidates going into the second-round run-off.

If Le Pen wins the election, what will she do about the Islamization/terrorism problems? Macron has taken some tentative steps in dealing with the issues; one would expect Le Pen to be less gentle.

Even if she loses, but closes the gap between the two parties, she will force Macron to do more than he has been willing to so far.