Islam: The Religion of Peace?

[TurQ]

Ahmet Hakan is a main stream religous commentator. He previously worked as an anchor for Kanal-7 which was also known as a religous channel. I know majority of of the religous people are sorry for this, religous affairs department also issued a condemination.

Hurriyet, Turkey
Feb 6 2006

If you confuse the minds of people in a country with statements like
"The Fener Greek Patriarchate will be ecumenical, and the goal of
these people is to set up a second Vatican in Istanbul......" And if
you provoke the masses with comments like "Turkey is on the verge
of being overwhelmed by missionaries," or "There are thousands of
churches which have been set up in apartments...." And if you spread
the feeling around the society that "Everyone is against us....the
only friends Turks have are other Turks....." And if you make gaffes
like saying "The blame lays entirely with those that have tried to
set up dialogues between religions....": Well, of course, the result
is what we have now. The seeds of enmity and strife have been planted.

And so a maniac has come out into the open, and, taking advantage
of the discord, has shot a priest in the back in Trabzon. But the
important thing here is not that maniac. The people we should look
at are those who have prepared the poisonous atmosphere that now
surrounds us. This atmosphere is so powerful. Just think, only 3
days ago, a variety of spiritual leaders in Turkey, including the
Armenian Patriarch, the head rabbi, and the Vatican's representative,
all issued a statement in the strongest language, condemning the
caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed which were printed in a Danish
and European newspapers. But clearly these statements did nothing to
help the atmosphere. It was a meaningful gesture, but it did not find
the resonance that it should have in our societ
y.

The winds of discord are that strong these days. And now, we have the
death of the priest in Trabzon. And today, we can openly say this:
It is those who laid the groundwork for the current psychological
atmosphere in Turkey who are responsible for the trigger of the gun
that shot Priest Sentore.

[Gavur]

Pakistan : Muslim Cleric Arrested In Murder Of Christian

18/01/2006

Court orders police to protect torture victim’s father from Islamic extremists.

Pervez Masih
January 18 (Compass) – Nearly 21 months after the murder of a Christian student in Pakistan’s Punjab region, police have arrested a Muslim cleric suspected of torturing the young man so that he would convert to Islam.

Umar Hayat was arrested last week under charges that he and two other Islamic seminary members in the town of Toba Tek Singh had tortured Javed Anjum for five days until the Christian “converted” to Islam. Another suspect, Maulvi Ghulam Rasool, was re-arrested in November after Pakistan’s Supreme Court revoked his bail.


Police officer Rana Habib ur-Rehman confirmed Hayat’s capture but refused to provide details of the arrest. According to one source in Toba Tek Singh speaking on condition of anonymity, Muslim clerics have been campaigning for Hayat’s release over the past week, visiting the police station and pressuring officers in charge of the case.


Judge Javed Iqbal Warraich ordered police protection for Anjum’s father, Pervez Masih, and his lawyer, after Masih filed a formal complaint that armed members of Rasool and Hayat’s madrassa (Islamic school) were harassing him at court hearings.


“The main object of these clerics is to harass the complainant [Masih] and me and thereby to force [us] to withdraw the case,” Masih’s lawyer, Khalil Tahir Sindhu, wrote in the January 7 petition for police security. Sindhu complained that the clerics had never been checked for weapons when entering the courtroom and that he felt “genuine apprehension” for his life “at the hands of these clerics.”


According to Sindhu, two constables have been assigned to accompany Masih and himself to and from court. Speaking from Toba Tek Singh after yesterday’s trial hearing, the lawyer confirmed that approximately 40 Muslim clerics and students from Rasool’s seminary had gathered once again outside the courthouse.


Though the madrassa members no longer physically or verbally threaten Masih and Sindhu, the prosecution continues to arrange for local Christian religious and political leaders to accompany them to the trial.


“I usually go with Mr. Khalil Tahir because there is always a danger,” Father James Paul, a Catholic priest from Faisalabad, told Compass as he returned with Sindhu from yesterday’s hearing. Ejaz Jacob Gill of the District Assembly, who accompanied Sindhu to a hearing on Saturday (January 14), agreed that Sindhu and Masih may still face problems from the Muslim clerics.


Deathbed Testimony

On Sunday (January 15) Masih appealed a court decision to reject his son’s deathbed testimony as part of the official evidence. A date for the appeal hearing before the provincial High Court in Lahore has yet to be set.



Javed Anjum at hospital
In the April 2004 statement made to police from his hospital bed, Anjum named Rasool as one of the men from the Jamia Hassan Bin Murtaza Madrassa who grabbed him when he stopped to get a drink from the school’s water tap.


The videotaped testimony tells how the school members beat Anjum, 19, and applied electric shocks to his body in an attempt to convert him to Islam. Following five days of torture, Anjum said the Islamic creed in the presence of his captors. Repetition of the creed in the presence of two Muslim witnesses is a valid form of conversion according to Islamic law, though Anjum later told relatives he had not renounced his Christian faith.


Madrassa students immediately turned Anjum over to police, claiming they had caught the young man trying to steal the school’s water pump. Suffering from 26 wounds, including a broken arm and fingers, fingernails ripped off, skin burns and serious injuries to his bladder and kidneys, Anjum was immediately committed to a local hospital.


The third-year commerce student died of his wounds in Faisalabad’s Allied Hospital on May 2, 2004. Hours later police arrested Rasool. After nine days of police interrogation, the madrassa guard and prayer leader named Mohammed Tayyab and Hayat as his accomplices.


Madrassa Linked with Outlaws

Authorities are holding both Hayat and Rasool in Jhang Sudr jail, 22 miles from Toba Tek Singh. Tayyab, a madrassa teacher, has been free on bail since December 2004.


Rasool’s madrassa has informal ties to the outlawed Islamic fundamentalist group Sipah-e-Sahaba, according to local sources in Toba Tek Singh who requested anonymity. The organization was one of five extremist groups banned by President Pervez Musharraf in January 2002 but has reportedly continued to function under other names.


After it was discovered that one of the July 7 London bombers had spent time studying at a Pakistani madrassa, President Musharraf promised to deport the approximately 1,400 foreign students studying in Islamic seminaries across the country. He also demanded that all 13,000 of Pakistan’s madrassas register by the end of the 2005.


But in recent weeks the government has backed down from its ultimatum, allowing foreign students to renew their visas and extending the deadline for madrassa registration. The government compromise came after many seminaries refused to remove foreigners.


Attempts to expel foreign students forcibly “could enrage the rest of our students, which would make it difficult to for us to control them effectively,” a leader of Pakistan’s madrassa coalition, the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris Deeniya, was quoted as saying on January 4 by the Daily Times.

[Gavur]

Bounty Offered for Murdering Cartoonists

From the desk of Hjörtur Gudmundsson on Sun, 2005-12-04 00:26
The Danish Foreign ministry has warned Danish citizens not to travel to Pakistan. The Pakistani religious party Jamaat-e-Islami and its youth branch have offered a bounty for anyone who murders the Danish illustators who drew cartoons of Muhammad for the Danish daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten. Last September the newspaper asked twelve cartoonists to draw the pictures to test whether there was freedom of expression in Denmark after a Danish author had complained that no-one was willing to illustrate his Muhammad book. Muslims regard it as blasphemy to depict the Prophet.

As a consequence the offices of Jyllands-Posten have to be protected by security guards after receiving bomb threats, and some cartoonists went into hiding after receiving death threats. Muslims and Muslim organizations, both in Denmark and abroad (including Pakistan), protested the publication of the pictures. In October ambassadors from eleven Muslim countries sent a letter to the Danish Prime Minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, demanding that he see to it that Jyllands-Posten apologize for the publication.

Rasmussen refused to discuss the matter since Denmark recognizes freedom of expression and freedom of the press. He said that those who felt offended by the pictures could take their case to the courts. The ambassadors did not settle for this argument and had a meeting with some Danish politicians in order to put pressure on Rasmussen. After the meeting it was announced that the Organisation of the Islamic Conference would take the matter into its hands. The organisation, representing 56 member states, subsequently sent a letter of protest to the Danish government.

The bounty now offered by the Jamaat-e-Islami for the murder of the cartoonists is 50,000 Danish crowns (6,725 euros). However, the party wrongly thinks that only one person drew all 12 pictures. The Danish ambassador in Pakistan, Bent Wigotski, said the Pakistani party had also demanded that all Danish diplomats should be expelled from Pakistan. Wigotski, however, stressed that there are no plans to evacuate the Danish Embassy in Islamabad, despite receiving hundreds of angry protest letters from Muslims.

Wigotski admitted that the situation was nevertheless serious. “They might want to get to the Danish illustrators, but if they cannot reach them, they could make do with a scapegoat,” he said. The embassy has warned that the scapegoat could be anybody and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has issued a travel advisory for Pakistan warning Danes not to visit the country. The ambassador of Pakistan in Denmark, Javed Qureshi, who was one of the 11 ambassadors who signed the letter to Rasmussen, denounced the death threats. “No Pakistani government would ever support such a thing, I’m sure that the current government will take action in the case. I can’t imagine that a bounty like that doesn’t violate Pakistani legislation,” he said.

[Gavur]

Police arrest suspect in priest's killing in Turkey

Главная / World
02/07/2006 10:58 Source:



Turkish police have arrested the suspected killer of an Italian Catholic priest, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported Tuesday.



Turkey







Andrea Santoro was shot twice in the back Sunday while praying in his church along the Black Sea coast. Witnesses say the killer screamed "Allahu Akbar," Arabic for "God is great," before firing two bullets into Santoro's back.

Turkey is a 99 percent Muslim country where thousands have protested the publication in European newspapers of provocative cartoons depicting Islam's most revered prophet as a terrorist. It wasn't clear if the killing was linked to the controversy.

Monsignor Luigi Padovese, the Apostolic Vicar of Anatolia, who presided over the memorial service for Santoro on Monday, refused to speculate on the killer's motives.

"But unfortunately," he said, "the event happened during these days. Maybe this person, because he was a fanatic, was incited by these reports on the news, and did this for revenge, did it against a Christian presence in Turkey."

Earlier in the day, Padovese spoke inside the Trabzon church as the Islamic call to prayer issued from outside, and recalled the 60-year-old priest's final moments, reports the AP.

[Gavur]

Police Detain Suspect for Killing Catholic Priest

By Cihan News Agency
Published: Tuesday, February 07, 2006
zaman.com


One suspect was captured on Tuesday in link with the killing of Catholic Priest Andrea Santoro.

The suspect, only known as Oguz, was detained on Tuesday.


Trabzon Chief Public Prosecution Office was expected to make statement on the event.


Catholic priest Andrea Santore, 55, who was based at the Trabzon Santa Maria Catholic Church was killed in an armed attack in the northern Turkish province of Trabzon on Sunday.


For further information please visit http://www.cihannews.com

[Gavur]

Turkey detains student over killing of priest

07 Feb 2006 08:33:49 GMT

Source: Reuters



ANKARA, Feb 7 (Reuters) - Turkish security forces detained a high school student on Tuesday in connection with the killing of an Italian Catholic priest which shocked the nation, the state Anatolian news agency said.

It said the student was carrying a 9 mm pistol when he was captured in the Black Sea city of Trabzon, where Andrea Santoro, 61, was gunned down on Sunday while praying.

"A 16-year-old person is in detention at the police headquarters," Anatolian quoted state prosecutor Burhan Cobanoglu as saying. It gave no further details.

The government has strongly condemned the killing of Santoro, which coincides with increased religious tension worldwide following the publication of cartoons in some European and other newspapers lampooning the Prophet Mohammad.

A Vatican embassy spokesman in Ankara said the gunman shouted "Allahu Akbar" (Arabic for "God is greatest") as he shot Santoro.

Pope Benedict expressed his sorrow at the killing and said he hoped it could help bring people of different religious faiths closer together.

The Vatican has joined Muslim countries, including Turkey, in condemning the cartoons of the Prophet, saying freedom of speech did not mean freedom to offend a person's religion.

Violent attacks on Christian clergy are virtually unheard of in Turkey, which views itself as a bridge between mainly Christian Europe and the predominantly Muslim Middle East.

Turkey, with a population of about 72 million, is overwhelmingly Muslim and has a tiny Christian population of just over 60,000.

Turkish newspapers said police had failed to provide Santoro with special protection even though he had received threats in the past, and they criticised the general security situation in the city.

Last year, a nationalist crowd in Trabzon almost lynched several left-wing students after mistaking them for supporters of Kurdish guerrillas.

In January, unknown gunmen riddled with bullets the cars of two prominent soccer players from the city's Trabzonspor football club. The two were uninjured. Media reports said the two had been victims of a local extortion racket.

[Gavur]

Muslim Militants Machine-gun Christian Family

Manila Times—Suspected Abu Sayyaf gunmen attacked a group of farm workers on the island of Sulu, killing at least five people, including an infant, and wounding four others, the military officials said on Friday.

Officials said the gunmen, clad in camouflage uniform, raided the farm early Friday morning in the remote village of Liang, Patikul. “Five people are confirmed dead and four others are also wounded in the attack,” said Brig. Gen. Alexander Aleo, the island’s military chief.

“Survivors of the carnage told military investigators that the attackers asked them if they were Christians and when they answered yes, the gunmen just opened fire,” Aleo told The Manila Times. …

[Gavur]

Turkish youths threaten to kill Catholic friar

10 Feb 2006 10:52:09 GMT

Source: Reuters

ISTANBUL, Feb 10 (Reuters) - A group of Turkish youths threatened to kill a Catholic friar, grabbing him by the throat and shouting "God is Greatest", just days after a Catholic priest was shot dead in Turkey, the friar said on Friday.

Martin Kmetec, a Franciscan friar from Slovenia, opened the door of his house on Thursday to find seven or eight angry men in their twenties.

"He took me by the throat and pulled me inside and said 'we're going to finish you off' ... he also said Allahu Akbar (Arabic for God is Greatest)," Kmetec told Reuters by telephone from his church in the province of Izmir.

Kmetec closed the door on the youths, who said they were nationalists and the group, after trying to break the door down, left.

A local police spokesman said they were investigating.

Turkey, a secular state with an overwhelming Muslim majority, was shocked last Sunday by the shooting of a 61-year-old Italian priest, Andrea Santoro, in his church.

A 16-year-old boy has been charged with the murder, which coincided with an international uproar over the publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad.

Turkey's government, which is under pressure from the European Union to improve minority religious rights, strongly condemned the shooting and invited Pope Benedict this week to visit.

[Gavur]

Pope asks Karzai to drop charges against convert

Sun Mar 26, 2006 7:12 AM IST











By Philip Pullella

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict has written to Afghan President Hamid Karzai asking that charges be dropped against a man facing a possible death sentence for converting from Islam to Christianity, the Vatican said on Saturday.

The appeal was sent in the pope's name by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Angelo Sodano, who told him that the pope's appeal was inspired by "profound human compassion" and by the "firm belief in the dignity of human life and by respect for every person's freedom of conscience and religion."

President George W. Bush and several other Western leaders have expressed grave concern at the threatened death penalty for Abdur Rahman, 40. Sharia (Islamic law), on which Afghan law is partly based, stipulates death for apostasy.

"I am certain, Mr President, that the dropping of the case against Mr Rahman would bestow great honour upon the Afghan people and would raise a chorus of admiration in the international community," the letter said.

The Afghan constitution says "no law can be contrary to the sacred religion of Islam" but also says it will abide by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which enshrines freedom of religion.

Sodano told Karzai in the letter that dropping charges "would then contribute in a most significant way to our common mission to foster mutual understanding and respect among the world's different religions and cultures."

International pressure on Afghanistan to respect Rahman's religious freedom and release him from jail has been met in Afghanistan by calls for him to be tried under Islamic law and executed, and a threat of rebellion if the government frees him.

The controversy threatens to drive a wedge between Afghanistan and the Western backers who secure and finance the country. Rahman's trial is due to start in a few days.

The case has sparked an outcry in North America and Europe and led to some calls for peacekeeping troops to be withdrawn.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Friday she had spoken to President Hamid Karzai about the issue.

U.S. forces have been battling Taliban insurgents since defeating their government in late 2001. The United States is Afghanistan's most important ally.

(with reporting by Robert Birsel in Kabul)

[Gavur]

Muhammad dies June 8, 632 A.D. in Medina

Muhammad dies June 8, 632 A.D. in Medina

In the third month of the eleventh year of Hijra, Muhammad fell sick and layed in the house of his wife Ayisha in Medina. The recent death of his infant son, Ibrahim weighed his spirits down, and the poison he had consumed at Khaibar still bothered him.

A little after midday of 8 June, 632, the 62 year old Muhammad stretched himself gently and was no more. Later in the night his followers dug his grave on the same spot where he breathed his last. They spread his red mantle on the bottom of the grave, and his body was lowered into it. The grave was made level with the floor. Muhammad's tomb is now close to the mosque of Medina. Six mosques have stood on the same site as the present one.

The so-called "Prophet of Peace" who the Qur'an (Koran) commanded to fight 26 battles, and who planned no less than 86 expeditions against innocent people (only the battle of the Ditch was defensive) was no more. He gave no prophecies and performed no miracles. Within a century after Muhammad's death, Muslim armies had reached as far as India in the east and Spain in the west. They gave two choices to the people they encountered; either convert to Islam or die.