Islamist militancy group Hizbut Towhid in action in Bangladesh

Notorious Islamist militancy group, Hizbut Towhid [HT] has started open spread of hate speech through its own website www.tawheedprocation.com and established its distribution center of hatred materials at 31/32 P. K. Roy Road, Pustak Bhaban, bangla Bazar, Dhaka. The mentioned website, though claimed to be owned by the publication house of this notorious group, in reality, it is the official website of HT. Read more

World depressions lead to a rise in anti-Semitism. All over Europe, the evidence is around us

Denis MacShane

The periodic crises that have shaken world capitalism in the century and a half since Marx wrote Das Kapital are marked by a common political phenomenon. It is the rise of political anti-Semitism. Attacks on Jews and Jewishness constitute the canary in the coal mine that tells us something is going seriously wrong.

Last month a 32-year-old IT worker, Michael Booksatz, was beaten up in the streets of north London by two hooded men shouting about Palestinians. Jewish students at the London School of Economics – home to many brilliant Jews who fled Hitler’s Germany – are now frightened by anti-Jewish abuse from Islamist students. Graffiti such as “Kill the Jews” or “Jihad 4 Israel” appear close to synagogues in London.

The Metropolitan Police report four times as many anti-Jewish incidents in recent weeks as Islamaphobic events. The respected Community Security Trust, which records anti-Jewish attacks with scrupulous rigour, reports as many attacks on Jews – verbal, vandalism and some violent – in the first weeks of 2009 as in the first six months of last year.

As the world enters a new era of crisis, anti-Semitism is back. History, as ever, begins to repeat itself. The slumps and stock market fever expressed in Zola’s novel, L’Argent, or the populist anger against Wall Street at the end of the 19th century gave rise to the virulent anti-Semitic politics witnessed in France in connection with the Dreyfus case or the takeover of Vienna by openly anti-Semitic politicians. The Great Depression gave rise to the worst expressions of anti-Semitism ever seen, namely the politics that led to the Holocaust. But even in Britain the Duke of Wellington of the time was leader of a secret anti-Jewish organisation which had the initials PJ – Perish Judah – on its letterhead.

The economic crises of the 1970s led to a marked increase in the vote for the National Front in Britain and the openly anti-Semitic BNP, its successor extreme party, is doing very well in local elections – below the radar of the national opinion polls.

The distress and upset over the terrible pictures of children killed in Israel’s attacks on Hamas in Gaza have allowed anti-Israeli feelings to be more violently and vehemently expressed than ever before. Criticism of Israel is not anti-Semitic. But all anti-Semites hate the existence of a Jewish state and hiding behind code words such as anti-Zionism increases the density and viciousness of their anti-Jewish utterances.

In Italy, the streets of Milan are daubed with slogans urging Italians not to buy goods at Jewish shops – an echo of the Nazi slogan “Kauft Nicht Bei Juden”. In Germany, radio phone-ins are full of accusations that the bankers accused of being responsible for the current economic crisis are Jews. In anti-Israel demonstrations in Berlin, placards stating “It was a good idea to use gas” or “I’m anti-Semitic and that’s a good thing” were carried. Thus every Jew is made to feel as if they do not fully belong in the countries where they were born or the societies that they participate in.

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French state found responsible for deporting Jews

By VERENA VON DERSCHAU 

PARIS (AP) — France’s top judicial body on Monday recognized the French government’s responsibility for the deportation of Jews during World War II, the clearest such recognition of the state’s role in the Holocaust.

The Council of State found that the government of Nazi-occupied France at the time held the “responsibility” for deportations that led to anti-Semitic persecution.

The decision released Monday also found that the deportation had been “compensated for” since 1945, apparently ruling out any reparations for deportees or their families.

Thousands of Jews were deported from France to Nazi death camps during the occupation. After the war, subsequent French governments took decades to acknowledge any role by the collaborationist Vichy regime in the Holocaust.

A Paris court had sought the Council of State’s opinion on a request by the daughter of a deportee who died at Auschwitz for reparations from the French state. She was also asking for material and moral damages for her own personal suffering during and after the occupation.

The council left it up to the Paris court to rule on her request.

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“The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in the stars but in ourselves.”

When historians look back on our era and wonder how a relatively small group of Islamist radicals controlled the international agenda for great countries across the globe, they will ask why we failed to heed those words that William Shakespeare wrote four centuries earlier. Last week in Kolkata, India, police arrested the editor and publisher of the city’s most prestigious English-language daily for “hurting the religious feelings” of Muslims.

That’s right, we now live in an age where the state can muzzle press freedom because the newspaper hurt someone’s feelings. Ravindra Kumar and Anand Sinha of The Statesman were hauled before a judge on February 11 and charged under Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code which outlaws “deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings.” The law is unclear, as one might imagine when it comes to specific and objective criteria for determining one’s intentions. It appears that Section 295A trusts this Solomon-like task to whichever bureaucrat happens to take a fancy to pursuing a case. Read more

UK anti-Semitic attacks rise after Gaza conflict

LONDON (AP) – The number of anti-Semitic attacks on British Jews rose sharply after the start of the conflict in Gaza, a Jewish charity said Friday.
The London-based Community Security Trust, which monitors anti-Semitism and works to safeguard the Jewish community in Britain, said 250 anti-Semitic incidents were recorded in the four weeks after Dec. 27, when Israel launched attacks on Gaza to stop Hamas rocket attacks.

That compares to 40 incidents from the same period the year before.

Dave Rich, a spokesman for the trust, said Jews in Britain are unfairly seen as local representatives of Israel—a view that fuels some of the anti-Semitic attacks.

“This is racism,” he said. “And like all forms of racism, it is unacceptable.”

The trust said crimes included assaults, damage to Jewish property, threats, hate mail, verbal abuse and anti-Semitic graffiti.

Police figures echo this rise. London police have recorded about three times the number of anti-Semitic incidents from Dec. 27 to Feb. 3 as compared to the same period last year. Though some of that increase came from a change in the way the statistics were kept, the data still reflected a surge in incidents in the capital.

Around Europe, several attacks were reported against Jews and synagogues in France, Sweden and Belgium in the weeks after the Israeli offensive, Rich said.

The figures were released before an international conference Monday in London on tackling anti-Semitism.

Israel’s three-week offensive left nearly 1,300 Palestinians in Gaza dead, according to Gaza officials. Thirteen Israelis were killed, including three civilians.

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Arab Liberals: The Arab and Muslim World Condemns Human Rights Violations Only When Perpetrated by Non-Muslims

In response to the sweeping condemnation in the Arab and Muslim world of Israel’s actions in Gaza, and the calls to prosecute Israeli leaders for war crimes, liberal Arab writers have accused the Arabs and Muslims of hypocrisy. The liberal website www.elaph.com has published two articles in this vein, by Egyptian liberal Kamal Ghobrial and by Kuwaiti liberal Fahker Al-Sultan. Both writers point out that the Arab and Muslim world is quick to express outrage over atrocities and human rights violations when Arabs or Muslims are victimized by non-Muslims, but turns a blind eye – or even condones the violations – when the victims are non-Muslims, or when Muslims prosecute their own brothers, as happened in Saddam’s Iraq and is happening today in Darfur. The writers argue that this double standard stems from the problem of hatred for the other, and especially towards Jews. Al-Sultan emphasizes the role of the traditional Islamic mentality – and of political Islam, which exploits this mentality – in promoting inflexible xenophobic and antisemitic attitudes.

Following are excerpts from the two articles:
“According To These Courageous Jihadists, Only [Muslim] Blood Is Valuable, While the Blood Of Others Is Basically Worthless And Can Be Spilled Without A Qualm; More Than That, Spilling It Is A Kind Of Sacrifice Through Which One Can Attain Paradise”

Kamal Ghobrial wrote: “…[There are] courageous [heroes] who zealously [defend] human [values], especially when it comes to Muslim blood – for, according to these courageous jihadists, only [Muslim] blood is valuable, while the blood of others is basically worthless and can be spilled without a qualm. More than that, spilling it is a kind of sacrifice through which one can attain paradise.

“[I would like to remind] all these people… that [Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir] is accused of spilling the blood of his own Sunni Muslim people. The arm of justice has reached him in order to hold him to account for crimes perpetrated during his presidency against thousands of innocent people. [These crimes] outraged everyone – except, of course, the Arabs, who are outraged only in specific circumstances and in response to deliberate incitement.

“Will we witness demonstrations in the Muslim and Arab capitals and cities calling for international justice to be carried out and demanding that the accused [i.e. Bashir] be immediately turned over to the [international] court to receive the punishment he deserves…? Or will we see the opposite?

“[I believe that,] once we calm down from our emotional reaction [to the plight of] our children and brothers in Gaza, whose blood is being spilled… we will see the avenging angels of the [Arab] television networks, who support terrorism, make an [ideological] U-turn for the second time this year. They will drop the refrains about defending human rights, and rally to the defense of the accused [i.e. Bashir]. More than that… they will claim that the allegations against him are part of the global conspiracy against the Arabs and the Muslims.

“Why Is It That Offenses Against the Dignity Of Arabs And Muslims Are ‘Blatant And Obvious’ Only When the ‘Perpetrator’ Is Israel? Why This Racial Discrimination In Defending Human Rights?”

In his article, Fakher Al-Sultan accused traditional and political Islam, as well as its leaders, of encouraging hatred towards the other, and especially towards Jews. He too argued that it is the identity of the perpetrator that determines whether the Arab and Muslim world will condemn human rights violations or ignore (or even encourage) them.

He wrote: “The Summer 2006 Israel-Hizbullah war in Lebanon is a striking example that shows the need to [examine] the essence of a popular religious outlook [prevalent] among Arabs and Muslims – namely the tendency which was legitimized [by the religious principle] of rejecting all non-Muslims. [This tendency is part of] the traditional religious outlook of [various] branches [of Islam]. It is manifested in [the ideology of] political Islam, and is taken to extremes in the actions and policy of Hizbullah…

“The sweeping popular support enjoyed by Hizbullah [in 2006] – was it sincere and natural, or did it stem from the fact that the enemy was the state of Israel, ‘the racist religious Jewish [state]?’ Perhaps it had to do with the traditional religious outlook of political Islam – [that is,] with the way [in which political Islam] views other religions, especially the Israeli Jew?

“In fact… why are the Muslims and Arabs categorically interested in the fate of the Lebanese and Palestinians, but are not so intensely interested in the fate of other Arab and Muslim peoples, such as the Iraqis, Sudanese, Afghanis, Somalis and others, who have faced much more severe persecution, terrorism and military [violence]?…

“The traditional religious outlook, which is being manipulated by political [forces], has covertly granted categorical religious legitimacy to any struggle against the Jews or Israel. It has also infected the Arabs and Muslims with egomania, so that all backwardness and all killings are [automatically] blamed on the other – on the foreigner or the non-Muslim, and especially on the Jew.

“The [Arab] nations, other than the Lebanese and Palestinians, are not confronting the Israeli ‘enemy,’ but are fighting a domestic enemy. Consequently, the Arab and Muslim interest in their fate… is shamefully [negligible], and in most cases, [the reaction is complete] indifference…

“When Saddam Hussein invaded and devoured Kuwait in 1990, he deliberately evoked the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, claiming that the way to the liberation of Jerusalem passes through Kuwait… [He did] this because it was clear to him that the popular Muslim view, which is rooted in [the Muslims'] traditional historic-religious outlook, rests on a basic principle which intensifies the hostility towards the Jews and the state of Israel.

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Ex- Bangladesh Official: Hitler Should Have Killed All the Jews

by Nissan Ratzlav-Katz
(IsraelNN.com) A former senior official and newspaper editor from Bangladesh told a television audience last week that Adolph Hitler should have been more thorough when it came to the Jews. The TV host seconded the opinion.

As reported by the editor and publisher of the Weekly Blitz, peace activist Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury, Mohammad Asafuddowlah said, “My soul bleeds when I recall the recent atrocities against the people of Gaza. And if I was a young man, I would have gone to Gaza with a weapon to exterminate Israel.”

The talk show during which Asafuddowlah made his anti-Semitic remarks, Ekanto Shonglap (”Exclusive Dialogue”), is broadcast on Diganta Television.

“Diganta Television is continuing spreading religious hatred through its programs and most of the programs in the channel are anti-United States, anti-West and anti-Israel,” according to the Weekly Blitz’s Choudhury.

Choudhury has been imprisoned, beaten and faced the death penalty for his anti-Islamist activities in his home country, including as an outspoken proponent of contact with Israel and Israelis.

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