Far-right Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders lost a legal bid Wednesday to stop his pending trial for inciting hatred and discrimination against Muslims.
“The attorney general is of the opinion that there are no grounds” for a further appeal, the Dutch Supreme Court said in a statement.
Lawyers for Wilders had sought to overturn a ruling by the Amsterdam Court of Appeals in January that he should be prosecuted for a series of public anti- Muslim statements, particularly for comparing Islam to Nazism.
Well, this is nothing that we can consider as surprising. But anyway it something truly interesting that they want this to go to trial. Mr. Wilders has stated:
“I am being prosecuted for saying about Islam what millions of Dutch think. Freedom of expression is at risk of being offered at the altar of Islam.”
The real reason (at least for me) of this trial is that he considers Islam as equal to Nazism. Whatever our special ideas on the subject, this process is judging the personal idea of someone about an ideology/religion. Of course, I count with a just trial (consider me an optimist), in which he can express his own reasons about this. But I don’t know if, being realistic, we can count with that just trial. I fear he is going to be fried.
Just notice that he is labelled as “far-right” everywhere you read about him. Even if he has no link with Nazi parties, with actual far-right parties, etc etc.
NOTE: I really can’t blog often now. I am truly busy, I am sorry for this but life is like it is. Thanks to you all for your interest.
On Dec 1st, 125 journalists were in prison because of their work and 45% of them actually works for Internet sites, according to the Comission for the Protection of Journalists (CPJ) in this year’s annual report. Written press’ journalists , editors and photographers are next with 53 cases in 2008, and the rest of the cases are radio and TV reporters.
According to the report, China is, for 10th year, the country with the highest number of journalists in prison. 24 of the 28 reporters imprisoned work for Internet sites and the list includes the blogger Hu Jia, who was sentenced to 3 years and a half in prison for making comments and interviews which were critical with the Communist Party. Cuba is situated in the second place, with 21 imprisoned, while Burma / Myanmar maintains 14 reporters in prison, five of them when they were trying to publish news and images of the places devastated by the Nargis. USA, who maintains photographer Ibrahim Jassam imprisoned with no accusation, is situated in the fifth place in the list of countries that jail journalists.
I have traslated that part because I wanted you to read what the public in Spain read normally. That mention to USA, without anyone to Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, for example, who detain bloggers and journalists in a normal basis is really unbelievable. Yes, USA is a democracy so it must do things well, but comparing it to China, Cuba or Burma, who are three of the worst dictatorships is just nonsense. For example, nowadays Iran has arrested with no charges and in an unknown location for days (though Iran has finally recognised they have her in the infamous Evin prison), US Freelance Journalist Roxana Saberi via FOXNews.com – American Freelance Journalist Arrested in Iran for Engaging in ‘Illegal’ Activities – Iran | Map | News:
An Iranian-American journalist, whose family has not heard from her for three weeks, was arrested for engaging in “illegal” activities because she continued to work after the government revoked her press credentials Iran said Monday.
Roxana Saberi moved to Iran six years ago and had previously reported for NPR, the BBC and FOX News.
“She called from an unknown place and said she’s been kept in detention,” her father Reza Saberi said about the Feb. 10 call. “She said that she had bought a bottle of wine and the person that sold it had reported it and then they came and arrested her.”
You see? No mention of this. AT ALL.
And looks like that Cuba has not changed, be Castro or not in charge of the country. Yes, the Government has changed but the methods haven’t. Yoani is a famous Cuban blogger who blogs at Generación Y and who has been censored and reprimanded in the past because of her acid comments on normal life in Cuba. Since yesterday, her bloglooks like this:
An education expert is warning that some American textbooks present a biased view of Islam and offer a sugarcoated picture of Islamic extremism, a trend that has parents worried about what’s being taught in public schools.
In numerous history textbooks, “key subjects like jihad, Islamic law, the status of women are whitewashed,” said Gilbert T. Sewall, director of the American Textbook Council, an independent group that reviews history books and other education materials.
Cindy Ross, the mother of a junior high school student in Marin County, Calif., said she couldn’t believe her eyes when she read her son’s textbook last school year.
“I was very shocked by what I saw, looking through the book,” she said — shocked at how Islam was portrayed in her son’s seventh grade history text.
“What did strike me was that all the other religions seemed to be lumped together, where there is an inordinate emphasis on Islam specifically,” Ross said.
Well, this is not stricking at all, specially after knowing that both the Catholic Church (Ohhh, Myyyy) and the Muslims have agreed to erase everything which portraits them in a bad light from history books.
Absolutely shameful. Hiding people’s defects is not the best way to promote peace and justice. It’s just the opposite. Inquisitions, witch hunting, etc have existed, whatever the textbook says.
(UPDATE): Always on Watch has more about the US textbooks whitewashing Islamic extremists.
There is an interesting article in The Guardian about the state of freedoms in UK. An excerpt:
Britain has such broadly drawn and elastic surveillance laws that Poole borough council could exploit them to spend two weeks spying on a family wrongly accused of lying on a school application form. The official spies reportedly made copious notes on the movements of the mother and her three children, whom they referred to as “targets”, and watched the family go home at night to establish where they were sleeping. And this is supposed to be modern Britain?
(…) Yes, fighting terrorism requires some restrictions. Yes, you can make a crime reduction case for some CCTV. But we have more CCTV, a larger DNA database and a more ambitious (and unworkable) National Identity Register scheme, as well as more police powers and more email snooping than any comparable liberal democracy. On top of which we have a bureaucracy so centralised and incompetent in managing this mass of data that it lost two computer discs containing the child benefit details of 25 million people.
(…) A couple of years ago I asked a very senior New Labour politician if his government had not got the balance between security and liberty wrong. “Well”, he replied, “one thing I can tell you is that if you ask the British people they will always choose more security.” And this is where the ball comes back to us. Since our leaders are now mainly followers – following the latest opinion poll, focus group or newspaper campaign – it’s up to us, the people, to change their view of what “the people” want.
I really want everyone to read it and to think about it. Are really Governments worrying about their citizens’ security or are they worrying only about their own security?
Some days ago I foundedthis post from UK Labour MEP Richard Corbett, that (I think) is not a very intelligent man, apart from being a liar. Apart from not letting his own voters (or readers) tell him clearly what do they think about his posts (comments and backlinks are disabled in his blog) he wrote this:
It is particularly sickening that UKIP and Mr Wilders are making themselves to be martyrs in this case, claiming that they are being denied the right to free speech. This is fatuous and they know it. In the same way that the likes of Abu Hamza have been arrested for inciting hatred and violence in Britain, so should Mr Wilders be barred from showing and then discussing a film that, in the words of Dutch Prime Minister Jens Balkenende, serves “no purpose other than to offend”.
the cleric told the court that he had been approached in 1997 by officers from MI5 who had indicated that his speeches did not break the law, but who had then modified that view in 2000.
Mr Hamza told the court: “I said, ‘My sermons, is it a problem?’ They said, ‘Well, it’s freedom of speech, you don’t have to worry as long as we don’t see blood on the streets.’
“Only in 2000 they said, ‘We think you are walking on a tightrope’. They said there were some things that they don’t like.”
The preacher said he was also questioned by Special Branch: “They told me they had been watching me since 1994. I asked them myself about being vocal. He said it’s freedom of speech.”
Referring frequently to a copy of the Koran in front of him, Hamza explained his views on the tenets of Islam, claiming that his antipathy for Jews extended only to those who “use Judaism to pass off other ideas such as Zionism, globalisation and certain issues in a way that is harmful to the Muslim nation”.
But there was another worse consequence of Government’s inaction during 25 years in that case: moderate Muslims from Hamza’s mosque denounced him as a rabid hater. But nothing was done about it:
Abdulkadir Barkatullah, one of the management committee ousted by Abu Hamza, said he and community representatives went to the police seven times to complain about assaults and extremist activities inside the mosque. No action was taken.
The Prime Minister had urged the Muslim community to do more about the scourge of extremism within its own ranks but, Barkatullah said, “When we did do precisely that with Abu Hamza, we were ignored.”
And that even when everyone told British Government he was a rabid hater preacher:
If those who raised the alarm at home were overlooked, then foreign intelligence agencies were discounted. Those of France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands all accused Abu Hamza of being the ringmaster of a terrorist operation. The French and the Algerians had spies inside the mosque, and were horrified at what they uncovered. Egypt wanted to swap a British prisoner for Abu Hamza. All shared their findings with Whitehall, but nothing happened.
Read it all.
So, what is really this reduction of freedoms for? Is it really for defending citizens? For fighting terrorism? Are we really sure?
The right-wing Dutch politician banned from visiting the UK over his anti-Islam views has been refused entry after arriving at Heathrow airport this afternoon.
Geert Wilders was presented with a letter that refused him entry to Britain after arriving at immigration.
After leaving the aircraft, Mr Wilders was taken into a side room to be interviewed, witnesses said.
Also Lord Ahmed, the one who first spoke against Fitna being viewed in British Parliament and later menaced with bringing 10.000 Muslims to prevent Wilders to enter the Parliament, has signed a letter with other extremist Muslims:
Lord Nazir Ahmed of Rotherham has joined forces with leading UK-based Islamists, including Mohammed Ali Harrath, convicted in absentia by a Tunisian court of terrorism-related offences, and Mohammed Sawalha, described in a US court as a former “Hamas leader in the West Bank”, says the Centre for Social Cohesion.
Hmm… and this one criticizes Wilders for being an “extremist who insults his religion”… Is this a joke?
Sadly, it isn’t… As Rob posted some days ago, this is not the first intelectual critical of Islam who is prevented to attend something to “prevent unrest” in the UK:
This would be in itself an absolutely unbelievable story. Yet, since I couldn’t say that I’ve never seen anything like this in our old, decadent Europe, I must admit that this is practically the rule, not the exception. Take the case, for example, of commentator and author Douglas Murray, who was due to chair “Islam or Liberalism: Which is the Way Forward?” at the London School of Economics on January 23, but the LSE asked him not to attend in the interest of “public safety” as his presence could provoke unrest … How sad!
The only difference I can see is that Wilders is an MP elected in other EU state, so this measure is even more striking… And I would say, that it has been deliberately taken to humiliate him.
(By the way, where is Mr. Cameron? Has he said something about this?).
Geert Wilders has a new website in English, where he has already posted about these news:
Wilders has denouced the British Government as “the biggest bunch of cowards in Europe. They are more Chamberlain than Churchill.I was invited by another politician (Lord Pearson of Rannoch). I am a democrat, I am serving freedom of speech. They are not only being nasty to me they are being nasty to freedom of speech.”
You cannot accept the rule of the kaffir. We have to rule ourselves and we have to rule the others… King, Queen, House of Commons: if you accept it, you are a part of it. If you don’t accept it, you have to dismantle it. So you being a Muslim, you have to fix a target. From that White House to this Black House, we know we have to dismantle it. Muslims must grow in strength, then take over… You are in a situation in which you have to live like a state-within-a-state – until you take over.
The International Free Press Society believes this court-ordered prosecution against Geert Wilders, a central figure in the fight against the Islamization of the West, amounts to a dangerous concession to the strictures of Islamic law, which prohibits all criticism of Islam, over Western traditions of, and rights to robust and unfettered debate. As such, it is tantamount to a surrender to totalitarian influences that undermine all Western freedoms. And as such, it must be resisted.
The same can be applied to this shameful deportation of Wilders from the UK.
Of course, according to the British cowards who came up with this decision, there are no Islamic jihadists in the UK who are trying to stir up religious hatred. Oh no, only Wilders is doing that.
Irony, that’s the best thing to combat these fools…
The UK ban-on-Wilders debacle has morphed into diplomatic “row” coverage of the ministerial back-and-forth between the Netherlands and the UK. Thankfully, the Netherlands government is strongly backing Wilders. (And, in order to think positive, I won’t even add “so far.”) On the side of the British angels (there still seem to be some) still upholding their invitation to Wilders, we have Lord Pearson and Baronness Cox, both Independence Party peers in the House of Lords. But look who’s vocally supporting the British government ban? Dear old Lord Ahmed–the same Lord Ahmed, who, as the London Sun reports today, recently invited an al-Qaeda-linked former detainee into Parliament.
You can see FITNA here (I can’t embed the video in this blog). Attention: the video contains hard images such as beheadings.
The accused Maskinongé terrorist created videos with titles such as Jihad Academy and Mujahideen Secrets using a souped-up computer in his basement apartment in the sleepy Quebec town.
Said Namouh engaged in hundreds of online conversations and produced videos praising violent attacks on U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. He lauded the kidnappers of a British journalist in Gaza and allegedly helped distribute ransom demands. He threatened future attacks in Germany and Austria. In a series of chats in August, 2007, Mr. Namouh planned a trip to Egypt and Germany for a mission involving a bomb attack. In one brief online comment, he proclaimed his expertise in explosives. His handler and alleged co-conspirator sent him $800, suggesting he buy a gun.
(…)
Mr. Namouh’s lawyer said his defence will rest on whether the videos, writings and wiretapped conversations can be defined as criminal behaviour. Defence lawyer Réné Duval said he will not contest much of the evidence presented in court yesterday, including hundreds of pages of intercepted conversations.
“The debate will be whether these activities can really be described as acts of terrorism under the law,” Mr. Duval said. “One of my arguments is going to be about freedom of speech.”
Do you really believe calling to slain infidels is “freedom of speech”? Oh, please, this is offending nobody, don’t be ridiculous… Those infidels are not strong enough…
So plotting to plant bombs, colaborating to kidnap people or distribute ransom money, menacing soldiers, etc. is freedom of speech (or can be). But denouncing that is “xenophobia”. Oh, please, don’t make me laugh soooo hard!!!
Spanish Minister for Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, Miguel Ángel Moratinos, interviewed himself yesterday (on Monday) with the President of the Iranian Parliament, Ali Larijani, to whom he offered Spanish Government’s cooperation to bring their foreign relations back to normal.
After referring both of them to the new age of relationships with USA, the Minister told Larijani, who was visiting Spain after the Security Conference in Munich, about the oportunity Iran has to play a constructive role in international relations ( ).
Lariyani called USA to begin “clearly and evidently” a true dialogue, while saying his country is not going to “negotiate by the sake of negotiating, but to arrive to a definitive conclusion“.
“Spain is ready to act as a bridge in building conference in relations between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the European Union by using all its potential,” Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero told visiting Iranian Majlis speaker Ali Larijani on Monday.
Zapatero also stressed that Madrid is fully prepared to develop constructive cooperation with the Iran in all areas.
The Spanish socialist leader also called for efforts to help stabilize Iraq and Afghanistan and launch an effective campaign against terrorism and drug trafficking.
The two sides also discussed bilateral ties including energy cooperation.
Spain will “welcome” any idea which would lead to “constructive dialogue” between Iran and the 27-nation European bloc, the prime minister noted.
Turning to Palestine, the Spanish prime minister said, “All should make efforts for Palestinian unity.”
For his part, Larijani said, “The return of calm to Palestine is mainly dependent on opening all border crossings into Gaza and involving all Palestinians groups in negotiations”. “No group should be excluded”… (No, not even Hamas, how playful this Iranian, eh? )
The verdict refers to defense arguments put forward by Shirin Ebadi, Mohammad Seifzadeh, Nasreen Sotudeh and Nemat Ahmadi (who represented the four bloggers individually) as “unconvincing defense by attorneys” and announces that in accordance with “defendants’ confessions” and “evidence presented in the case” the following verdicts are issued for the four defendants: first defendant Javad Gholam Tamimi is sentenced to 3 years and 3 months in prison and 10 lashes for “membership in illegal groups,” “treason against country,” “propaganda against regime” and “spreading lies;” second defendant Shahram Rafizadeh is sentenced to 9 months in prison and 20 lashes for “membership in illegal groups,” “propaganda against regime,” “spreading lies” and “disrupting public order;”third defendant Rouzbeh Mir Ebrahimi is sentenced to 2 years and 2 days in prison and 84 lashes for “membership in illegal groups,” “propaganda against regime,” “insulting supreme leader,” “spreading lies” and “disrupting public order;” and fourth defendant Omid Memarian is sentenced to 2.5 years in prison, 10 lashes and 500 thousand Tomans in fines for “membership in illegal groups,” “participation in illegal groups,” “propaganda against regime,” “spreading lies” and “possession of playing cards,” which the judge refers to as “gambling tools.”
Each fortnight I will be posting a poll on a very important subject. I am interested in knowing what the results are. And I believe all of you are going to be interested too.
“This is madness! Complete and utter insanity. According to Elsevier and Geenstijl (both NL) Geert Wilders has been denied access to the United Kingdom, for fear that his presence may threaten civil disorder and ‘civil harmony’. Wilders was on his way to attend the screening of Fitna in the House of Lords, after the first attempted was thwarted by ‘lord’ Ahmed threatening with a 10,000 strong crowd of islamites in the streets.”
‘Great Britain is sacrificing freedom of speech,’ said Wilders. ‘You would expect something like this to happen in countries like Saudi Arabia but not in Great Britain. This cowardly act by the British government is a disgrace.
If you want to know more about Geert Wilders’ process, take a look to Defend Geert Wilders. They are focused on his process. The last of their posts quotes him saying:
If convicted, Wilders faces a maximum sentence of two years in prison. Said the defendant: “I lost my freedom already four and a half years ago in October 2004, when my 24-hour police protection started because of threats by Muslims in Holland and abroad to kill me.”
I have heard from Muslims in this country that jihadists around the world have more than insulted traditional Muslim law by their fierce punishments of both non-Muslims and Muslims who have acted in speech or writing against jihadists’ reinterpretations of the Quran. Some of these protesters, exercising freedom of conscience, have been killed for their “blasphemy.”
Hmm, what BAD perspectives we have going down THIS terrible path of fear and absolute idiocy…
This afternoon Mr. Wilders received a letter from the British ambassador to the Netherlands saying that he is a “persona non grata” in the United Kingdom. The ambassador told Mr. Wilders that he is a threat to public security and public harmony because of the controversy created by Fitna (My note: actually the letter is much worse, because it says: “The Secretary of State is of the view that your presence in the UK would pose a genuine, present and sufficiently serious threat to one of the fundamental interests of society. The Secretary of State is satisfied that your statements about Muslims and their beliefs, as expressed in your film Fitna and elsewhere, would threaten community harmony and therefore public security in the UK“). Mr. Wilders intends to go to London anyway.”Let them arrest me in Heathrow,” he says.
In its exquisite concern for “visible minorities”, the agency ignores the fate of an invisible minority – intellectuals reduced to silence because they dared to criticise Islam. The freedom to say what one thinks about any religion – its clerics, practices, precepts and sartorial rules – is as much a part of the European heritage as giving voice to the oppressed. At the dawn of the 21st century, in a once enlightened Europe, Theo van Gogh was savagely murdered. Authors and politicians need police protection, have been forced into hiding, reduced to silence and deprived of their fundamental rights. For Robert Redeker, a former philosophy teacher at a lycée in Toulouse, the consequences of this thought control have been devastating.
Redeker has been in hiding ever since his op-ed article “Face aux intimidations islamistes, que doit faire le monde libre?” (How should the free world confront Islamist intimidation?), appeared in Le Figaro on 19 September 2006, two days after Pope Benedict XVI’s speech at Regensburg. The outrage provoked by the Pope’s observation on the relation between Islam and violence, wrote Redeker, was an attempt by this same Islam to stifle freedom of thought and expression, the most precious Western value, which did not exist in any Muslim country. Islam was trying to impose its rules on Europe, he added, citing, among others, prohibition of caricatures, pressure to allow girls to wear the hijab to school and accusations of Islamophobia.
(…)
Immediately after publication of this op-ed (ironically, such articles are called “libre opinion” in French), Redeker received credible death threats from Muslims and was forced into hiding. The support of a handful of courageous minds was outweighed by criticism from academic and journalist colleagues, teachers’ unions and public officials, who accused him of reckless insensitivity. Today, Redeker is still in hiding, under government protection.
Redeker explained to Standpoint his current situation: “I am a sort of political refugee within my country.” He has given up teaching, moved away from his home region and must be protected by two bodyguards when he goes to any city. His life has become a crippling exercise of perpetual precautions, but Redeker is not a cause célèbre in France.
(…) Who stands up for Robert Redeker today? Intellectuals such as Roger-Pol Droit, Claude Lanzmann and Pierre-André Taguieff. Certainly not his former colleagues. “Leftists and teachers’ unions would rather defend a terrorist convicted of murder like Cesare Battisti than defend me, a man in danger of being murdered by terrorists,” he says. (France agreed to extradite Battisti to Italy. He had lived in France for 20 years under the protection of a refuge policy established by President François Mitterrand and repealed by the Sarkozy government. But after a campaign led by Carla Bruni, he has since been granted asylum in Brazil.
Is it possible to speak freely about Islam today in France? No, replies Redeker, freedom of expression is under constant pressure from the fallacious notion of “Islamophobia”. The term, invented by Ayatollah Khomeini to stifle critics, equates the legitimate criticism of a religion and its ideology with racism. Reasonable people are frightened, he says, by Islamist ideology and barbaric practices. “It’s not a question of Islam as religious belief but as a coercive ideology that crushes millions of human beings under its implacable yoke.” Europeans justifiably fear the loss of freedoms won in bitter struggles over centuries; they fear the intrusion of religion in politics, jeopardising the separation of church and state.
Considering the circumstances leading to the present situation, it is something to examine carefully. I mean: he is not a guy from the MSM, nor a politician. He was just a school teacher and the establishment rejected him because his ideas didn’t fit in the tolerant rants a good teacher should give from time to time. He was not glamourous, just as Sarkozy marrying Carla Bruni, and he was saying inconvenient truths. Comparing Muhammad with Jesus to lately say that the first was a prohet of hate while the latter was a prophet of love, is something very dangerous, specially because it attacks the foundations of the multicultural ideology.
But just as in another cases of hunting down anti-Islamist types, the attacks are not directed towards the jihadists (whatever they are legal jihadists or killing jihadists), but towards the people who are denouncing those jihadists and their supporters. It’s killing the messenger or, more likely, understanding why the messenger is killed. In case he is killed.
Another aspect of this to mention is that role played by Carla Bruni: she had time to defend a convicted terrorist, but the Secular God forgive her if she had to defend Redeker. Hmm, speaking about European leftists (don’t forget she supported Royal in the past Presidential Elections…).
This fortnight’s poll: priorities in the fight against Islamism
Fareed Zakaria says we don't have to be very worried by the Talibans as they don't advocate Global Jihad. Do you agree? Vote in this fortnight's poll!!
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