Catholic area riots after Protestant marches in Northern Ireland
Police fired plastic bullets and water cannon at Catholic youths in Northern Ireland’s provincial capital Belfast on Tuesday after rioting erupted when a Protestant parade passed their estate. Sporadic violence erupted across the British-ruled province on the culmination of a season of parades by pro-British Protestants to mark a 17th-century military victory, a tradition many Catholics say is provocative.
Around 200 people threw bottles, slates and petrol bombs in the mainly Catholic Ardoyne area of Belfast after police moved in to prevent them confronting the passing Orange Order parade. Two cars were set on fire and dozens of rounds of plastic bullets were fired. Police said a number of officers were injured.
Most of the 500 or so parades across the province passed peacefully, but police reported rioting in Londonderry, Newry and Armagh as well as the Markets area in central Belfast.
Three decades of fighting between mostly Protestant loyalists who want Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom and Irish nationalists, mainly Catholics, who want it to be part of a united Ireland tore the province apart during a three-decade period known as the “Troubles.”
A 1998 peace agreement paved the way for a power-sharing government of loyalists and nationalists. Violence has subsided, but police say the threat from dissident groups opposed to the peace deal is higher than it has ever been since it was signed.
Marchers were marking King William of Orange’s victory over the Roman Catholic King James at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, which helped to secure Protestant supremacy in Ireland.
Bangladesh Islamists stage strike against dropping Allah from constitution
Police in Bangladesh Sunday fired tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse Islamist activists trying to enforce a nationwide strike over the removal of a Muslim phrase in the constitution, and witnesses said around 50 people were injured. The clashes erupted when thousands of bludgeon-carrying Islamists cut off a stretch of highway leading to the capital’s eastern suburbs with barricades. The protesters also damaged several cargo trucks before the police crackdown, and some 100 people were detained.
The strike, which began two days after the country emerged from a 48-hour stoppage enforced by the opposition, was called to protest a recent amendment to the constitution which dropped the words “absolute faith and trust in Allah.” The Islamists also want to scrap “secularism” as a state principle in the Muslim-majority country.
The strike, which was called for by 12 Islamist parties, was however, largely ignored by most people in Bangladesh, where businesses and transportation was operating as normal.
The strike was spearheaded by the Bangladesh Islami Andolon, one of a handful of small Islamist parties that have no representation in parliament but who back the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) of former prime minister Begum Khaleda Zia, who is trying to force early elections. The BNP lost to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League in the 2008 parliament polls and has since been trying to rally support of the Islamist and other groups. The two women have dominated the south Asian country’s often volatile politics for two decades and are likely to face off again in the next election due by end of 2013.
– by Anis Ahmed, via Police, Islamists clash in Bangladesh, dozens hurt | Top News | Reuters.
“Neither God, nor Master” film angers Tunisian Islamists
Six months after Tunisia’s uprising, religious tension is rising over the limits of freedom of expression, as Islamists challenge the dominance of liberals in what was once a citadel of Arab secularism. Last week several dozen men attacked a cinema in Tunis that had advertised a film publicly titled in French ‘Ni Dieu, Ni Maitre’ (No God, No Master) by Tunisian-French director Nadia El-Fani, an outspoken critic of political Islam.
Police later arrested 26 men, but Salafists — a purist trend within political Islam advocating a return to the ways of early Muslims — gathered outside the justice ministry two days later to demand their release, leading to scuffles with lawyers. Security forces were heavily deployed in central Tunis to stop protests by Salafists after Friday prayers last week.
Secular media and intellectuals have reacted with alarm, warning that freedoms in Tunisia — a bastion of secularism under 23 years of tough police rule by Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali — are in danger of being lost if Islamists across the spectrum of Islamist politics are not stopped. “This is a foretaste of what awaits us if firm measures are not taken against these sorcerers’ apprentices, since nothing will stop them attacking hotels, nightclubs or ordinary people sitting in a restaurant,” wrote Taieb Zahar in the French-language monthly Realites.
Tunisia was the launchpad for pro-democracy protest movements that have spread across North Africa and the Middle East since Ben Ali was forced from power in January. A slow transition to a democratic system is causing tension. An interim president and cabinet will not hold elections until October for a special assembly to write a new constitution that will allow for parliamentary and presidential polls at a later stage.
.
Daniel-in-lion’s-den moment for new Catholic archbishop of free-wheeling Berlin
Like Daniel in the lion’s den, Berlin’s new Catholic archbishop met the media on Tuesday to face accusations he was homophobic and far too conservative for such a prominent post in the free-wheeling German capital. Rainer Maria Woelki, a surprise choice for the high-profile post, professed respect for gays, denied membership in the staunchly conservative Opus Dei group and said he did not come to Berlin to point a censuring finger at non-Catholics.
Berlin’s gay community and liberal media reacted with dismay to his appointment last week, saying the Cologne-based prelate was “backwards-minded” and the wrong man for the job. But interest in the new prelate was so strong that the Catholic Church, a minority of about 390,000 in a 3.5 million population mostly indifferent or hostile to religion, had to switch the news conference to a larger hall at the last minute to accomodate over 100 journalists who turned out.
“We will meet with each other,” Woelki, 54, said when asked about the city’s active gay community. “I have respect and esteem for all people independent of heritage, skin colour and individual nature. I am open to all without reservations.” Describing himself simply as Catholic, he denied being a member of Opus Dei despite having done his doctorate at the group’s Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome. That part of his biography led to media reports over the weekend calling him “reactionary.”
“The Church is not a moral institution that goes around pointing its finger at people,” Woelki said. “The Church is for me a community of seekers and believers and the Church would like to help people find their hapiness in life.”
The left-wing daily Tageszeitung said it had expected the worst from Woelki’s premiere but concluded: “You can talk with the man of God. There will be a lot to talk about.” Berlin’s openly gay Mayor Klaus Wowereit seems to have eased the way for Woelki by warmly welcoming him to the city and promising to work closely with him. The two will host Pope Benedict when he visits the German capital in September.
During the last papal visit to Berlin in 1996, anarchists booed and streakers darted about in front of Pope John Paul’s popemobile as he made his way to the Brandenburg Gate.
Until his new assignment, Woelki was an auxiliary bishop in Cologne to Cardinal Joachim Meisner, an arch-conservative with close ties to German-born Pope Benedict. He was hardly known outside that western German city, where he was born. Woelki’s Opus Dei aademic credentials, link to Meisner and statements reaffirming the Church view that homosexual acts are sinful sparked off a storm in Berlin.
So we attack a person without even giving him a chance.Talk about intolerance from those who claim to be so tolerant of others!
What does he say that that Catholic Church hasn’t always taught?That sin is sin,be it adultery or homosexual acts.We were all given freewill by God so we can either try and follow His teachings or we can go our own way and see if we end up in hell.The choice is each individuals.But please don’t try and accuse this Bishop of “backward ways and intolerance”.The tone of this article and those contributing to it shows greater intolerance and backward ways!
I pray for the New Archbishop of Berlin.May he win many souls for Christ.
Israel targets top rabbis for anti-Arab incitement backing “King’s Doctrine”
Israeli police briefly detained a leading rabbi Sunday as part of a widening probe into a treatise suspected of inciting the murder of Arabs. The investigation has pitted authorities in the Jewish state against far-right West Bank settlers and has led to scuffles outside government institutions in Jerusalem and a sit-down protest that choked off the main highway to Tel Aviv.
Rabbi Yaacov Yosef was seized by detectives on his way back from morning prayers, witnesses said, in a tactic similar to the arrest last week of a senior West Bank rabbi whose followers responded with street protests. ”They commandeered the car and took it away, together with my dad, to an undisclosed destination,” Yosef’s son Yonatan told Israel Radio. The rabbi was freed after an hour, police said.
The clerics had ignored a police summons to be questioned over endorsements for “The King’s Doctrine,” a book written by a more obscure settler rabbi offering justifications from scripture for killing innocent gentiles during religious war. ”Revenge, including strikes on the blameless and on babies, is necessary and important in fighting and defeating evil,” read a passage excerpted on Israel’s top-rated television news.
Israeli security officials fear such edicts could fuel Jewish attacks designed to scupper the eviction of settlers from occupied land they regard as theirs by biblical birthright but where Palestinians, with international support, seek statehood.
A police spokesman said Yosef had been interrogated in connection with “incitement to racism and violence” before being let go. Dov Lior, chief rabbi for the hardcore settlement of Kiryat Arba, was similarly questioned and released last week.
The National Socialists also thought it was right and necessary to kill the blameless and babies. Remember? How do people reach the point where killing the innocent is part of their doctrine, part of their phylosophy for living a life of service?
Hizb ut-Tahrir urges Pakistanis to take to the streets for Islamic rule
Hizb ut-Tahrir, a global Islamist party banned in many Muslim states, said on Friday Pakistanis should take to the streets to call for Islamic rule and join a campaign to end subservience to Washington that was advancing “from Indonesia to Tunisia”. The party, which says it is non-violent but is accused by some analysts of seeking a coup in Islamabad, added that “powerful factions” in Pakistani society including the military should also take part, but violence had no place in its work.
Hizb ut-Tahrir won international attention when Pakistan’s army said on June 22 it was questioning four majors about alleged links to the party, following the arrest in May of a brigadier suspected of having such ties. Brigadier Ali Khan, whose lawyer has denied the allegations, was the highest-ranking serving officer arrested in a decade. The Pakistan army is under pressure to remove Islamist sympathisers in its ranks after U.S. forces found and killed Osama bin Laden in the garrison town of Abbottabad on May 2.
In an interview, party spokesman Taji Mustafa said the party sought to emulate the creation of the first Islamic state in what is now Saudi Arabia by “winning public opinion in favour of Islam” through discussions, marches and rallies.
The party worked “to motivate all sections of society to express their determined will, such that they take to the streets and demand the Islamic Caliphate system.”
The party and its goal of an Islamic ruler, or Caliph, who implements sharia law posed no threat to Pakistan, said Mustafa, based in Britain, where the party is not banned.
“The threat to Pakistan comes from Zardari, Kayani and Gilani who support drone strikes that kill their own citizens, and who collude with a U.S.-led war of terror,” he said, referring to the president, army chief and prime minister.
European Jewish groups vow to fight Dutch ritual slaughter ban
Two leading Jewish organizations in Europe vowed on Wednesday to fight a looming ban on ritual animal slaughter in the Netherlands approved by the lower house of the Dutch parliament in a bid to protect animal rights.
The European Jewish Congress (EJC) announced it was considering taking legal action to block the ban, which it said violated the freedom of religion enshrined in the European Convention of Human Rights.
The Conference of European Rabbis (CER) appealed to the Dutch Senate, which must approve the bill before it can become law, to block the ban that the lower house approved on Tuesday.
The bill by the small Animal Rights Party united both Jews and Muslims in protest because it would ban kosher and halal slaughter, which requires animals be conscious when killed.
European Union regulations say animals must be stunned before slaughter to minimize pain, but allow exceptions for the ancient religious traditions behind kosher and halal laws.
Animal Rights Party leader Marianne Thieme said she would also lobby Senate members. “I’m completely confident that I can remove any concerns that still exist,” she told the daily De Telegraaf. “This is absolutely not a religious issue.”
Sunni-Shi’ite sectarian divide widens after Bahrain unrest
Sectarian tension between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims has reached new heights in Bahrain after pro-democracy protests that the Sunni minority government crushed with martial law and foreign military forces. Inspired by the uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, Sunni and Shi’ite Bahrainis took to the streets in early February to demand political reforms in a country where the ruling Al Khalifa family appoints cabinet ministers and an upper house of parliament, neutering the powers of the elected assembly.
An idealistic movement began with slogans such as “No Sunni, No Shi’ite — Just Bahraini”, but now sectarian fear and anger are uppermost on this small island state where Saudi Arabia and Iran are playing out a proxy contest for regional supremacy. Sunnis and Shi’ites talk of friends lost and of a rift that once seemed manageable. Sunnis feel threatened, Shi’ites abused.
Fatima, a Shi’ite accountancy graduate, recalled past tensions when Shi’ites clashed with police and faced trials in the 1990s, but said the government response was harsher this time because the protest movement was so large and unexpected. “It hurts me. I have very close Sunni friends. People inter-married and had close personal relations,” she said. “Even if the government took a step back now, the Sunnis have been convinced that we are criminals.”
Shi’ites have long complained of discrimination in Bahrain, saying the government distributes jobs and housing on a pro-Sunni sectarian basis, to the extent of giving nationality to Sunnis from other countries to offset Shi’ite numbers. There are few Shi’ites in the army and their number in the state bureaucracy has steadily dwindled since independence from Britain in 1971, Shi’ites say. The government denies this.
.
The government controlled media has been working hard to fragment Bahraini society on a sectarian basis and to view opposition group as having a sectarian agenda.
The major liberal political society WAAD has had its headquarters ransacked/set on fire several times, and leading members have had their houses attacked by Molotov bombs. The liberal party leader Ebrahim Sharif, who is a Sunni and a major opposition personality has been one of the first people to be locked up since the government crack-down in March. Reports show that he is facing extreme torture in prison. Another Sunni opposition personality is Mohammed AlBuflasa who remains locked-up in jail and reportedly on hunger strike.
This is the game the Al-Khanifa will to play – they will fragment Bahraini society because they understand that unity is a major threat to their position as monarchs. They will corner the shia opposition al-Wefaq party to enter negotiations on their terms and conditions. Personalities that have power to unify the country such as Sharif and AlBuflasa will be locked up till negotiations end, and anyone who dares to call for unity will be crushed.
Protests in Bahrain’s Shi’ite neighbourhoods fall on deaf ears
In a poor district of Bahrain’s capital, a few hundred people marched through cramped, crumbling alleyways banging pans and screaming, “Down with the regime.” A mile (1.5 km) away, in the city centre, with its gleaming malls and office blocks, no one heard them.
A week after the tiny Gulf island kingdom repealed martial law, and despite the lingering presence of a few checkpoints, much of Manama seems almost back to normal. “Everything is quiet, there’s nothing wrong. I haven’t heard about any problems,” a man who gave his name as Khalifa said as he walked to a Starbucks coffee shop.
Not so in the Shi’ite neighbourhoods where protests first erupted in February, inspired by upheaval elsewhere in the Arab world that toppled longtime rulers in Egypt and Tunisia. “They’re saying that security has returned. Look at this, there is no security,” a protester said, ducking into a neighbour’s home as a sound grenade fired by police shrieked past.
Shi’ite residents say that if this is the new normal, tense days lie ahead. “I think we’ll remain in this unstable situation until there is some kind of political solution. It’s not going back to normal,” well-known activist Nabeel Rajab said.
Indian police break up hunger strike by yoga guru Swami Ramdev
Police swooped on India’s most famous yoga guru on Sunday, using teargas and batons to break up a fast against graft, risking more political headaches for scandal-tainted Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Swami Ramdev began his hunger strike with tens of thousands of followers at a tent in New Delhi on Saturday. Less than 24 hours into the fast, police detained him and flew him to near Haridwar in northern India, centre of his global yoga business.
Media said at least 30 people were injured in the pre-dawn raid at a tent where his followers, from poor villagers to foreign tourists and civil servants, had gathered. Some Ramdev supporters threw stones at police. “The permission was for a yoga camp for 5,000, not for 50,000 people for agitation. We have cancelled the permission and asked them to move out,” said Delhi police spokesman Rajan Bhagat.
Ramdev’s campaign was already an embarrassment for a Congress party-led coalition hit by graft scandals including allegations of kickbacks at the Commonwealth Games and a telecoms scam that may have cost the government up to $39 billion (24 billion pounds).
Ramdev, who turned an ancient spiritual tradition into a mass healing movement, runs a $40 million-a-year global yoga and health empire and says he can cure cancer. Critics say he is linked to a radical Hindu nationalist group.
“My hunger strike has not ended. I will continue fasting,” a defiant Ramdev, who plans to launch a political party to contest the 2014 general election, told a news conference from Haridwar, located in the foothills of the Himalayas.
-
Resident FaithWorld Expert
-
