In this mailing:
- Judith Bergman: Denmark: How to Deal with Integration?
- Andrew Ash: Latest Antics from the Israel-Bashing Industry
by Judith Bergman • August 20, 2019 at 5:00 am
How does a society deal with religious institutions that profess values which are the very opposite of the value system of the Western society in which they live?
"When I was in high school, there were around 50,000 people with a non-Western background in Denmark. Today, there are almost half a million. In one generation, our country has changed". — Lars Løkke Rasmussen, then prime minister of Denmark, January 1, 2019.
The Integration Barometer -- which measures the degree of assimilation in the municipality among young people with a non-Western background -- showed that almost one third of 18-29 year olds (31%) believe that "religious and cultural laws must be adhered to, even though they may be contrary to [Danish] law". The issue, then, is whether these young people believe that Islamic sharia law should take precedence over Danish law.... In addition, the number of youths who view democracy in a positive light has fallen from 86% in 2016 to 79% in 2018.
It recently came to light... that a committee under the government's Ministry of Church Affairs, which is responsible for formally approving mosques in Denmark, has been handing out approvals for them without knowing "whether they [the mosques] were ruled from abroad, whether women's rights were suppressed, or there were other problematic conditions". Formal approval of a mosque means that the mosque becomes eligible for tax benefits and is permitted to bring foreign preachers to Denmark on a special visa.
When the association behind the mosque [asked]... to be approved as a religious community, it had in its statutes a provision saying it operated under the supervision of Iran's 'Supreme Leader', Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. At first, this news was a matter of concern for the Ministry of Church Affairs, but then Ahlul Bait simply rewrote its statutes and the ministry gave its approval.
In his New Year's speech on January 1, 2019, Denmark's then prime minister, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, mentioned that religious parallel societies constitute a problem and that immigrants need to learn to "put secular laws over religious ones". (Photo by Rune Hellestad/Getty Images)
Earlier this year, in his New Year's speech, Denmark's prime minister at the time, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, mentioned that religious parallel societies constitute a problem and that immigrants need to learn to "put secular laws over religious ones". What, however, if, in the community involved, there seems no desire to do that? "When I was in high school", Rasmussen continued "there were around 50,000 people with a non-Western background in Denmark. Today, there are almost half a million. In one generation, our country has changed".
Continue Reading Article
by Andrew Ash • August 20, 2019 at 4:00 am
Rashida Tlaib had asked to go to "Palestine," which so far does not exist, on a trip arranged and co-sponsored by a Palestinian not-for-profit organization, Miftah, headed by longtime Israel-antagonist, Hanan Ashrawi. The group is described by Becket Adams in the Washington Examiner as "an exceptionally anti-Semitic group that praises Palestinian terrorists and claims Jews used the blood of Christians in the Jewish Passover. The organization also publishes Neo-Nazis and calls for the destruction of Israel." Miftah has also called female suicide bombers heroes.
"I have never felt more Palestinian, than I have felt in Congress", she defiantly declared to the Michigan Coalition For Human Rights in April 2019. That does seem a bit rich, coming from the same woman who has taken succour in tweeting that Senators who supported a pro-Israel bill "forget what country they represent."
She simply seems uninterested in any type of protest that does not involve either noisy eviction or arrest, or in which she cannot get attention or be regarded as a victim. It is hard not to wonder what she is doing for her constituents. Is the wish to bash Israel actually what keeps the good voters of Michigan awake at night? And is anti-Semitism now the accepted new face of the Democrat party?
"I have to tell you, we have to understand first, what is the BDS [boycott, divestment and sanctions] movement? It's an anti-Semitic, basically genocidal movement that wants to see the end of Israel. So make no mistake, these are not moderates coming to visit Israel. Israel per its 2017 law has a right to prohibit activists, especially those who want to see it wiped off the map, from coming in." – M. Zuhdi Jasser, Founder and President of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy.
US Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (left) had asked to go to "Palestine," which so far does not exist, on a trip arranged and co-sponsored by a Palestinian not-for-profit organization, Miftah, a group described in the Washington Examiner as "an exceptionally anti-Semitic group that praises Palestinian terrorists and claims Jews used the blood of Christians in the Jewish Passover." (Photo by Adam Bettcher/Getty Images)
US Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (D- Michigan) decided to pull the plug on the trip to Israel she was due to make, originally with her fellow "Squad" member, Ilhan Omar, after they both were invited on an official congressional trip but declined. Although both Tlaib, and the equally outspoken Ms Omar, had initially been refused entry because of their radical views promoting the obliteration of Israel by boycotting it, being boycotted back was not part of the plan, it would appear. Tlaib was finally granted permission on "humanitarian grounds", after an emotive plea to Israel's Interior Minister Aryeh Deri, in which she set out her reasons for wanting to visit her Palestinian grandmother in the West Bank. The newly-minted congresswoman then back-tracked and has now decided to cancel the trip altogether.
Continue Reading Article
|
|
|
|