Ocidente e Islão: duas Histórias paralelas e em competição, com vocação universalista

A versão islâmica

1. A “idade da trevas” (Antiguidade da Mesopotâmia e Pérsia)

2. O nascimento do Islão

3. O Califado: a procura da Unidade Universal

4. A fragmentação: a era dos sultanatos ou emiratos

5. A catástrofe: os mongóis e os cruzados

6. O renascimento: a era dos três impérios (turco-otomano, persa safávida e mogol)

7. A penetração no Oriente do Ocidente

8. Os movimentos de reforma

9. O triunfo dos modernistas seculares

10. A reação islamista e o revivalismo islâmico

A versão ocidental

1. A génese da civilização (Egipto e Mesopotâmia)

2. A Idade Clássica (Grécia e Roma).

3. A Idade Média/”idade das trevas” (a ascensão do Cristianismo)

4. O Renascimento (cultura clássica e reforma protestante)

5. O Iluminismo (razão, ciência)

6. Revoluções (liberal, democrática, industrial)

7. A ascensão do Estado-nação e as rivalidades nacionalistas/impérios

8. A I Guerra Mundial e a II Guerra Mundial

9. A Guerra-Fria (capitalismo-liberal versus socialismo-comunista)

10. O triunfo da democracia liberal-capitalista 

Livro ‘O Islão na Europa face ao Islão Global: Dinâmicas e Desafios‘

Lisboa: 25 de Junho às 18h30
no Grémio Literário, Rua Ivens, 37
Apresentação do livro pelo Dr. Figueiredo Lopes

Porto: 29 de Junho às 21h30 
na Fundação Engenheiro António de Almeida, Rua Tenente Valadim, 231-325
Apresentação do livro pelos jornalistas Carlos Magno e Ricardo Alexandre

Mais de 70 feridos noutra vaga de ataques aos cristãos do Egipto

Al menos setenta y ocho personas han resultado heridas en los últimos ataques sufridos por los cristianos coptos de Egipto en la noche del pasado sábado al domingo, según el ministerio de Salud egipcio. En un primer momento se informó también de dos muertos por arma de fuego, si bien parece que ambas se encuentran finalmente hospitalizadas, aunque en estado crítico.

Los heridos se produjeron cuando varios centenares de hombres atacaron a los manifestantes —en su mayoría cristianos, pero también algunos musulmanes— que, desde hace una semana, mantienen una acampada frente a la radiotelevisión egipcia en El Cairo, en la zona de Maspero, para protestar contra la indefensión que sufre la comunidad copta. Los motivos de los atacantes no están claros, si bien podría ser una represalia por un altercado sucedido un rato antes, cuando un motorista intentó atravesar de manera agresiva el cordón de seguridad establecido por los manifestantes, llegando a dispararles con una escopeta de perdigón. De acuerdo con algunos testimonios, el motorista habría sido atrapado por los jóvenes a cargo de la seguridad del campamento, y apaleado. [...]

Ver notícia no ABC 

Grandes donativos árabes a universidades britânicas levam a ensinamentos ‘hostis‘

Sir Howard Davies, the director of the London School of Economics, has at last done the honourable thing and resigned from the university’s governing council. The LSE’s shameless prostituting of its good name in return for Muammar Gaddafi’s blood money (as the Tory MP Robert Halfon has rightly called it) is as great a betrayal of the spirit of a university as there has ever been in Britain.

But while it will take the LSE quite some time to regain a seat at the table of respectability, it is not the only university that has reason to feel ashamed. The LSE is said to have received no more than £300,000 of the £1.5 million it was due from Libya.

Yet, on the most conservative estimate, other British universities have received hundreds of millions of pounds from Saudi and other Islamic sources – in the guise of philanthropic donations, but with the real intention of changing the intellectual climate of the United Kingdom.

Between 1995 and 2008, eight universities – Oxford, Cambridge, Durham, University College London, the LSE, Exeter, Dundee and City – accepted more than £233.5 million from Muslim rulers and those closely connected to them.

Much of the money has gone to Islamic study centres: the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies received £75 million from a dozen Middle Eastern rulers, including the late King Fahd of Saudi Arabia; one of the current king’s nephews, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, gave £8 million each to Cambridge and Edinburgh. Then there was the LSE’s own Centre for Middle Eastern Studies, which got £9 million from the United Arab Emirates; this week, a majority of the centre’s board was revealed to be pushing for a boycott of Israel. [...].

Ver notícia no Telegraph 

As universidades ocidentais e os donativos de países árabes: lições do escândalo Kadhafi na LSE

A donation of €1.78 million from the Gaddafi family and a PhD granted to one of the Libyan dictator's sons has put the London School of Economics in a pickle, just as a fresh study on EU universities highlights the problems of dwindling public funds for education.

The London School of Economics, one of the top-ranking universities in Europe, on Monday (21 February) acknowledged it had received a gift of €1.78 million from the Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation, chaired by Saif al Islam, one of the Libyan dictator's seven sons and a former graduate.

The university also admitted it had "delivered executive education programmes to Libyan officials", but said it had now decided to sever all those links "in view of the highly distressing news" about hundreds of protesters killed by armed forces.

"The school intends to continue its work on democratisation in north Africa funded from other sources unrelated to the Libyan authorities," it said in a statement published on its website.

Seen as one of the 'reformists' in the Gaddafi clan, Saif al Islam had spent four years at the LSE researching his PhD entitled "The Role of Civil Society in the Democratisation of Global Governance Institutions: From Soft Power to Collective Decision Making?"

But in a speech broadcast on Sunday on public television, the LSE graduate threatened demonstrators with "rivers of blood" and called them Western agents and drug addicts, warning about civil war, an Islamist take-over and the splitting of the country into a petro-rich east and a poor west.

One of his LSE mentors, David Held, a professor of political science, on Monday also dissociated himself from his former student.

"My support for Saif al Islam Gaddafi was always conditional on him resolving the dilemma that he faced in a progressive and democratic direction. The speech last night makes it abundantly clear that his commitment to transforming his country has been overwhelmed by the crisis he finds himself in. He tragically, but fatefully, made the wrong judgement," the professor said in an emailed statement. [...]


Ver notícia no EU Observer

Uma quantidade de disparates sobre o Egipto

"David Cameron has criticized ‘state multiculturalism' in his first speech as prime minister on radicalization and the causes of terrorism.
 "At a security conference in Munich, he argued the U.K. needed a stronger national identity to prevent people turning to all kinds of extremism. He also signaled a tougher stance on groups promoting Islamist extremism. ... As Mr. Cameron outlined his vision, he suggested there would be greater scrutiny of some Muslim groups which get public money but do little to tackle extremism".
 ‘Ministers should refuse to share platforms or engage with such groups, which should be denied access to public funds and barred from spreading their message in universities and prisons,' he argued. ‘Frankly, we need a lot less of the passive tolerance of recent years and much more active, muscular liberalism,' the prime minister said."
For those of us who have been calling for years for the United Kingdom and Europe to become "intolerant" of the radical Islamist threat to our culture, this is a thrilling and gratifying moment.
It is the obligation of both citizen and statesman to avoid both illusion and self-delusion when considering national threats. And so it is ironic that on the same weekend that the British government finally removes the scales from its eyes and looks straight-on at the mortal threat that aggressively asserted Islamist values pose to our civilization, in Egypt - at the constant hectoring of Washington voices - the remnants of the Mubarak government begins its halting, perhaps inevitable march toward the illusion of Egyptian democracy. [...]

Ver artigo no Rear Clear Politics

Ataque suicida no principal aeroporto de Moscovo

 President Dmitry Medvedev blamed lax security for a suicide bombing at Russia’s busiest airport that killed 35 people as investigators raced to find the organizers of the “terrorist attack.”

Medvedev told prosecutors to probe security personnel at Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport for possible negligence in allowing yesterday’s bombing and ordered increased vigilance at airports and train stations.

“There were obvious violations of security provisions,” Medvedev said on state television today, after delaying his departure to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Elena Galanova, a spokeswoman for Domodedovo, declined to comment on Medvedev’s remarks.

At least seven of the people killed were foreigners, including U.K. and German citizens, according to the Emergency Ministry’s website. Nine of the 35 bodies had yet to be identified as of 10 a.m. local time today, with another 110 people still in hospital, the ministry said.

The blast in the arrival hall of the largest air hub in eastern Europe was the second attack on the Russian capital in less than a year. Forty people died in twin subway bombings during morning rush hour last March. Doku Umarov, a militant from the southern Russian region of Chechnya, where government forces fought two wars against separatists between 1994 and 2000, claimed responsibility for those blasts. [...]

Ver notícia no Bloomberg

Atentado contra Igreja cristã copta em Alexandria agita o espectro de violência confessional

L'Egypte redoutait dimanche une aggravation des tensions confessionnelles après l'attentat qui a fait 21 morts devant une église copte d'Alexandrie, pour lequel les autorités privilégient la piste du terrorisme international et la mouvance d'Al-Qaïda.
Des traces de sang étaient toujours visibles dimanche matin sur la façade de l'église des Saints à Alexandrie, mais le calme semblait revenu après les affrontements de la veille entre jeunes chrétiens et policiers.
L'émotion restait toutefois vive parmi les fidèles, qui ont assisté à la messe dominicale en scandant "Ô croix, nous sommes prêts à nous sacrifier pour toi". Samedi soir, les funérailles des victimes coptes avaient rassemblé plus de 5.000 personnes dans le cimetière chrétien de la deuxième ville du pays.
La presse égyptienne de tous bords exhortait chrétiens et musulmans à faire bloc, craignant que ce massacre commis dans la nuit du Nouvel An ne provoque une escalade des tensions.

Ver notícia na France 24

Ataque suicidida em Estocolmo

At a Sunday morning press conference, Säpo said it had taken over the investigation into the nearly simultaneous bombings from the Stockholm police. The investigation will be overseen by chief prosecutor Tomas Linstrand.

"We are opening an investigation into a terrorist crime under Swedish laws," Anders Thornberg, head of Säpo's security department, told a press conference, a day after the explosions targeted shoppers in the Swedish capital.

Thornberg called the incident “very serious”, although he reiterated that Säpo had no plans to raise the threat level in Sweden as a result of the attack.

“We’re now working to assess whether similar events might take place. We can’t rule it out,” he said.

He added there is “no connection” to between Saturday's attack and a bomb threat investigation Gothenburg from early November, a probe which was subsequently dropped without any charges being filed.

Saturday's attack consisted of two explosions which occurred just minutes apart shortly before 5pm local time.

In the first blast, a car exploded, injuring two passers-by who were sent to hospital with minor injuries. Police say the vehicle was filled with cannisters of liquefied petroleum gas.

A second blast occurred just minutes later about 200 metres away, killing one man. An eye witness who arrived on the scene before police told the Dagens Nyheter (DN) newspaper it appeared something had exploded on the man's abdomen.

Ver notícia no The Local 

Leituras na revista Limes: o regresso do sultão à Turquia

Politicamente correcto silencia debate importante: o que aconteceu à liberdade de expressão?

Nothing is as it used to be. In this season of public outrage, the case of Thilo Sarrazin has grown far bigger than Sarrazin. It's much bigger than the man or the Islam-critical book he wrote.

The Sarrazin case is also a Merkel case, a case for his party, the center-left Social Democrats, and for the German political and media establishment. Sarrazin has become code for the outrage over how the politically correct branch of Germany's consensus-based society have dispatched their stewards to escort this unsettling heckler to the door. On their way, they seem to be trying to teach him a lesson, as well: "We will beat tolerance into you."

Sarrazin isn't telegenic and he often gets tangled up in statistics. When it comes to styling, he's at a loss - he is unkempt when he appears on the myriad talkshows that keep our entertainment society going. He slips on one banana peel of political correctness after another, opening himself to attack with his statements about genetics. But his findings on the failed integration of Turkish and Arab immigrants are beyond any doubt.

Sarrazin has been forced out of the Bundesbank. The SPD wants to kick him out of the party, too. Invitations previously extended to Sarrazin are being withdrawn. The culture page editors at the German weekly Die Zeit are crying foul and the editors at the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung are damning Sarrazin for passages he didn't even write.

Technicians of Exclusion

But what all these technicians of exclusion fail to see is that you cannot cast away the very thing that Sarrazin embodies: the anger of people who are sick and tired - after putting a long and arduous process of Enlightenment behind them - of being confronted with pre-Enlightenment elements that are returning to the center of our society. They are sick of being cursed or laughed at when they offer assistance with integration. And they are tired about reading about Islamist associations that have one degree of separation from terrorism, of honor killings, of death threats against cartoonists and filmmakers. They are horrified that "you Christian" has now become an insult on some school playgrounds. And they are angry that Western leaders are now being forced to fight for a woman in an Islamic country because she has been accused of adultery and is being threatened with stoning.

Strangely enough, a good number of our fellow Turkish citizens are more outraged by Sarrazin's book than they are about those things.

Should those Turkish immigrants fortunate enough to have exemplary careers not start exerting a bit of influence over their fellow immigrants and their neighborhoods, so that the Koran shows its gentler, more charitable face? Isn't it time for them to stand up and show their backing for plurality and freedom of expression?

That certainly wasn't the case recently when the Migration Board, an umbrella group for immigrant organizations in Berlin, spoke out successfully against a reading by Sarrazin during the International Literature Festival in the German capital. Bernd Scherer, who heads the House of World Cultures, the venue of the festival, buckled under the pressure and cancelled the event. Now the reading is to be held at another venue on Friday - under police protection. [...]

Ver artigo no Der Spiegel

Protestos contra Obama (foto do jornal Guardian)

Sharia no Reino Unido: ameaça a uma lei para todos e à igualdade de direitos

A new report by One Law for All has found Sharia Councils and Muslim Arbitration Tribunals to be in violation of UK law, public policy and human rights.

The report is being launched to coincide with a 20 June 2010 rally on the issue of Sharia law.

Based on an 8 March 2010 Seminar on Sharia Law, research, interviews, and One Law for All case files, the report has identified a number of problem areas:

- Sharia law’s civil code is arbitrary and discriminatory against women and children in particular. With the rise in the acceptance of Sharia courts, discrimination is being further institutionalised with some UK law firms additionally offering clients advice on Sharia law and the use of collaborative law.

- Sharia law is practiced in Britain primarily by Sharia Councils and Muslims Arbitration Tribunals. Both operate on religious principles and are harmful to women although Muslim Arbitration Tribunals are wrongly regarded as being of more concern because they operate as tribunals under the Arbitration Act 1996, making their rulings binding in law. [...]

Ver notícia em One Law For All

Imagens do ‘pacifismo‘ dos activistas do Mavi Marmara publicadas pelo jornal turco Hürriyet

Turkey's highest circulating newspaper Hurriyet on Sunday released photos of Israeli navy commandos who had been embroiled in the clash aboard the Gaza-bound Turkish aid ship Mavi Marmara last week.

The Israel Defense Forces released a video depicting the activists aboard the ship attacking the navy commandos. The activists argued that they had been attacked first. Nine activists were killed in the melee, and dozens, including Israeli soldiers, were hurt.

The photos published by Hurriyet on Sunday, under the headline "tears of a commando", Israeli soldiers are seen beaten and bleeding, being carried below deck by Turkish activists.

In the accompanying article, the paper reported that the photos had been censored and deleted by Israeli fighters aiming to prevent embarrassment for Israel and the IDF, but the activists were able to restore them. The paper further reported that in some of the photos, activists belonging to the IHH organization are seen caring for the wounded soldiers. [...]

Ver notícia no Haaretz

‘Duplo atentado suicida no metro de Moscovo‘ in The Moscow Times

Two female suicide attackers hit Moscow's metro in coordinated rush-hour attacks Monday morning that left at least 38 people dead and more than 70 injured.

Federal Security Service director Alexander Bortnikov said the bombs were filled with bolts and iron rods. Many of the injured were reported to be in grave condition, making it likely that the death toll would rise.

The attack was the deadliest in the city in six years and the first to involve a double attack on the metro, resembling tactics commonly used by al-Qaida Muslim extremists.

Officials were quick to blame insurgents from the predominantly Muslim North Caucasus. "Preliminary evidence suggests that the attacks were carried out by terrorist groups linked to the North Caucasus," Bortnikov said at an emergency Kremlin meeting chaired by President Dmitry Medvedev.

He said the remains of two women found at the sites of the attacks pointed to suicide bombers.

No one had claimed responsibility for the attacks by Monday evening.

An emotional Medvedev promised mourners at the Lubyanka metro station, the site of the first explosion, on Monday evening that those responsible for the attacks would be killed.
"We'll find them, and we'll eliminate them all, the same way we eliminated everyone who organized the Nevsky Express explosion," he said.

Past Metro Bombings
Aug. 31, 2004: A female suicide bomber blows herself up outside the Rizhskaya station, killing 10 people. A little-known Islamic group supporting Chechen rebels claims responsibility. The woman's identity was never confirmed.

Feb. 6, 2004: A suicide bomber from the North Caucasus sets off explosives during morning rush hour on a train traveling between the Avtozavodskaya and Paveletskaya stations, killing more than 40 people
and wounding more than 100.

Feb. 5, 2001: Explosives placed under a bench on the platform of the Belorusskaya station go off, wounding 15 people.

Jan. 1, 1998: A homemade bomb explodes in a vestibule of the Tretyakovskaya station, wounding three people.

June 11, 1996: A homemade bomb explodes on a train in a tunnel between the Tulskaya and Nagatinskaya stations, killing four people. [...]

Ver notícia no The Moscow Times

‘Como Kadhafi tem criado armadilhas à Suíça‘ in Tribune de Genève

Comment un régime autocratique comme celui du colonel Muammar Kadhafi parvient-il à déstabiliser une démocratie séculaire comme la Suisse et à semer la discorde entre les pays membres de l’Union européenne (UE)? C’est une des questions essentielles que pose la crise entre Berne et Tripoli. Personne n’aurait imaginé en été 2008 que l’arrestation du fils du «Frère Guide» aurait une portée européenne.

Plusieurs facteurs ont mené à l’impasse actuelle. Un choc culturel entre un régime autocratique à la logique clanique et une démocratie séculaire et paisible. Une Suisse divisée. Une guerre de succession à Tripoli.

Retour sur un fait divers qui s’est transformé en crise diplomatique internationale.

«Œil pour œil, dent pour dent!»
L’affaire Kadhafi n’a cessé de diviser les Suisses. Dès l’arrestation, le 15 juillet 2008, d’Hannibal et d’Aline Kadhafi, soupçonnés d’avoir maltraité des employés. Le couple est libéré sous caution deux jours plus tard. Les méthodes policières font d’emblée débat. Berne avait pourtant averti par courriel qu’étant donné les conséquences politiques éventuelles, les agents de police seraient bien inspirés de prendre «toutes les précautions d’usage lors de cette intervention». Ce qui ne fut pas fait, à en croire les conclusions du rapport du professeur Lucius Caflisch. Si aucun acte illégal n’a été commis, le couple a été traité de manière «inutilement humiliante» et le déploiement de 20 policiers est jugé «excessif». Alors que Berne admet que l’intervention aurait pu être plus nuancée, le Conseil d’Etat genevois refuse de s’excuser. Les classes politiques nationale et cantonale s’entre-déchirent. Berne et Genève se regardent en chien de faïence.

Le clan Kadhafi, pour sa part, fait front commun. Aicha, la sœur d’Hannibal, accourt à Genève et annonce le tarif: ce sera «œil pour œil, dent pour dent! Le plus injuste est celui qui a commencé!» [...]

Ver notícia no Tribune de Genève

Kadhafi: ‘Se a Suíça estivesse situada na nossa fronteira iríamos combate-la‘ in Le Temps

Extraits du discours de Mouammar Kadhafi à Benghazi diffusé sur Al-Jazira le 25 février 2010:

«Nous n’abandonnerons pas le djihad […] Le djihad est un devoir religieux et une [forme] d’autodéfense. C’est la défense de la religion, la lutte pour Allah, la défense du prophète Mahomet, du Coran, des mosquées, de la mosquée Al-Aqsa et de notre indépendance. Alors que le terrorisme, nous le rejetons tous. Nous rejetons également la confusion entre djihad et terrorisme. Cela doit être clair. Le terrorisme perpétré par Al-Qaida et par les escouades de la mort qu’Ayman Al-Zawahiri prétend diriger… est une forme de crime. C’est une maladie mentale […]

Quiconque détruit les mosquées d’Allah sous les yeux de musulmans mérite de voir lancé le djihad contre lui. Si la Suisse était située à notre frontière, nous la combattrions pour avoir détruit les mosquées d’Allah. Le djihad contre ceux qui détruisent les mosquées d’Allah et leurs minarets est le vrai djihad et non du terrorisme […]

Qu’est-ce que «mener le djihad avec ses biens et son âme»? […] C’est mener le djihad contre la Suisse, le sionisme et l’agression étrangère, avec ses biens si on ne peut le faire avec votre âme. Est-ce du terrorisme? Pas du tout.

Le [sens du mot] djihad doit être clair. Le combat sacré des Palestiniens, c’est du djihad. Ce n’est pas du terrorisme. De même que le ciel diffère de la terre, le combat des Palestiniens diffère du terrorisme […]

Tout musulman qui achète des produits suisses est un infidèle. Dites-le à tous les musulmans du monde […] La Suisse est un pays infidèle et immoral qui détruit les mosquées. Il faut déclarer le djihad contre la Suisse par tous les moyens possibles. Boycottez la Suisse, ses produits, ses avions, ses bateaux et ses ambassades. Boycottez cette communauté infidèle et immorale qui attaque les mosquées d’Allah […]

Ver notícia no Le Temps

‘A república do medo na Turquia‘ in Wall Street Journal

por Soner Cagaptay

Last week's arrests in Turkey of dozens of high-ranking military officers mark the country's latest step toward authoritarianism. Neither Europe nor the United States can afford to ignore Turkey's transformation.

Since coming to power in 2002, the ruling Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) and ultra-conservative Fethullah Gulen Movement have gained significant leverage over the police and media. Emulating Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, the AKP has made selective use of the legal code to effectively silence the country's two largest independent media groups.

Dogan, which owns about half of the media outlets in the country, faces a record $3.5 billion fine on delayed tax payments. Liberal media mogul Mehmet Emin Karamehmet has been sentenced to 12 years in jail on charges related to dealings at his bank for which he was earlier acquitted. Editors now think twice before running stories critical of the government.

Until recently, the judiciary and the military were able to keep government excesses in check. That apparent equilibrium between Islamists and secularists was shattered a few weeks ago, when Gulenist papers published a 5,000-page memo allegedly written by military officers planning a coup.

U.S. diplomats I have talked to and Turkish analysts say that if the military really had planned to overthrow the government, it would have hardly written it down in a detailed 5,000 page document. The idea that the military would bomb Istanbul's historic mosques and shoot down its own planes to precipitate such a coup—as the alleged memo describes—is simply outlandish. The military denies any plans for toppling the government and says much of the document is actually taken from a 2003 war game exercise. It says that the incriminating elements detailing the alleged coup were added to the document.

For the past two years, the Turkish military has been the target of illegal wiretaps and accusations that it is plotting against the government. The question is whether the military will tolerate the assault or strike back, as it has done in the past when it thought the secular nature of the state was threatened.

The Islamist government has also targeted Turkey's other secular bastion—the judiciary. Last month, a Gulenist prosecutor arrested a secular prosecutor in Erzincan. He was officially charged with belonging to an ultranationalist gang known as Ergenekon, which the Gulenists and AKP claim is trying to overthrow the government. Whether that's true or not, there is no doubt the arrest solved a lot of problems for the government. Before his arrest, the Erzincan prosecutor was investigating alleged connections between Gulenist fund raising and Chechen and Hamas terrorists. He was also looking into the armed activities of Ismailaga, a radical Islamist movement.

The Gulenists and the AKP are further targeting the courts by appointing a disproportionate number of Gulenist jurists, thus eroding the secular nature of the judiciary. And the courts seem to have been wiretapped as well. According to media reports, the police have bugged over 130 top judges and prosecutors, as well as the high court of appeals. This is not that hard to believe, given that the justice minister admitted in 2009 that the police have wiretapped 70,000 people.

What is the way forward for Turkey? A military coup isn't the answer and a court ban against the AKP would likely backfire, boosting the party's popularity. The next general elections are scheduled for 2011, but by that time the cards might be stacked too much in favor of the governing parties. That's why the West should press for elections that are free and democratic. The next elections won't be fair if the Turkish media are not independent and if Turks fear that they live in a police state that wiretaps its judiciary and citizens.

Hoping to win Ankara's support for tougher Iran sanctions and more troops in Afghanistan, the U.S. and Europe have so far been hesitant to criticize the AKP-led government. The "pragmatists" fail to realize that an illiberal and Islamist Turkey will be increasingly opposed to Western policies.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704187204575101820058883004.html

‘Geert Wilders vencedor nas eleições municipais holandesas‘ in NRC Handelsblad

In the first test of public opinion since the collapse of prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende's coalition government last month, Wilders's populist Party for Freedom (PVV) led in the city of Almere and was second in The Hague, the only two municipalities where Wilders chose to compete.

The fall of the Dutch cabinet and the upcoming campaign for parliamentary elections overshadowed Wednesday's municipal elections. The actual results for the nearly 400 municipal councils hardly seemed to matter. All interest was focused on the implications for the upcoming parliamentary race.

If voters had elected a new parliament on Wednesday, the PVV would have won between 24 and 27 seats in the 150 seat parliament. In one poll, it would be the largest single party.

That would make it tough for Balkenende's Christian democratic CDA to forge a strong coalition without Wilders. Months of talks between parties, and the resulting policy vacuum, could threaten a fragile economic recovery and cast doubt on the scope of planned budget cuts. Dutch coalition governments are usually made up of two or three parties, but polls show the next coalition will likely need four or more parties to reach a majority in parliament.

The popularity of Wilders, who compares Islam to fascism and the Koran to Adolf Hitler's book Mein Kampf, has dented the image of the Netherlands as a country that has often portrayed itself in the past as a bastion of tolerance.

"The leftist elite still believes in multi-culturalism, coddling criminals, a European super-state and high taxes," Wilders told cheering supporters at a rally in Almere after polling ended on Wednesday. "But the rest of the Netherlands thinks differently. That silent majority now has a voice," he said.

In Almere, the PVV won 21 percent of the vote to Labour's 18 percent, the preliminary results showed. In The Hague, the PVV had 8 seats -- second to Labour with 10 seats. After counting 93 percent of the votes, experts put turnout in the local elections at 56 percent.

Balkenende, now heading a caretaker government, saw his coalition collapse on February 20 after his centre-right CDA failed to persuade its Labour Party partners to extend the Netherlands' military mission in Uruzgan, Afghanistan. The 1,600 Dutch troops serving with Nato there are now likely to withdraw this year as planned.

Both CDA and Labour lost compared to the last local elections in 2006, but Labour appeared to have benefited from its stance over Afghanistan. "The Labour Party is back," party leader Wouter Bos told supporters. "We were declared dead and buried, but with our struggle, humility and ideals we have come back."

Besides Geert Wilders' party, the big winners in Wednesday's elections were right-wing liberals VVD and left-wing liberals D66.

http://www.nrc.nl/international/article2496799.ece/Geert_Wilders_is_major_winner_in_Dutch_polls

Islamistas radicais ‘infiltraram-se‘ no Partido Trabalhista britânico in Telegraph

The Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE) — which believes in jihad and sharia law, and wants to turn Britain and Europe into an Islamic state — has placed sympathisers in elected office and claims, correctly, to be able to achieve “mass mobilisation” of voters.

Speaking to The Sunday Telegraph, Jim Fitzpatrick, the Environment Minister, said the IFE had become, in effect, a secret party within Labour and other political parties.

“They are acting almost as an entryist organisation, placing people within the political parties, recruiting members to those political parties, trying to get individuals selected and elected so they can exercise political influence and power, whether it’s at local government level or national level,” he said.

“They are completely at odds with Labour’s programme, with our support for secularism.”

Mr Fitzpatrick, the MP for Poplar and Canning Town, said the IFE had infiltrated and “corrupted” his party in east London in the same way that the far-Left Militant Tendency did in the 1980s. Leaked Labour lists show a 110 per cent rise in party membership in one constituency in two years.

In a six-month investigation by this newspaper and Channel 4’s Dispatches, involving weeks of covert filming by the programme’s reporters:

• IFE activists boasted to the undercover reporters that they had already “consolidated … a lot of influence and power” over Tower Hamlets, a London borough council with a £1 billion budget.
• We have established that the group and its allies were awarded more than £10 million of taxpayers’ money, much of it from government funds designed to “prevent violent extremism”.
• IFE leaders were recorded expressing opposition to democracy, support for sharia law or mocking black people. The IFE organised meetings with extremists, including Taliban allies, a man named by the US government as an “unindicted co-conspirator” in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and a man under investigation by the FBI for his links to the September 11 attacks.
• Moderate Muslims in London told how the IFE and its allies were enforcing their hardline views on the rest of the local community, curbing behaviour they deemed “un-Islamic”. The owner of a dating agency received a threatening email from an IFE activist, warning her to close it.
• George Galloway, a London MP, admitted in recordings obtained by this newspaper that his surprise victory in the 2005 election owed more to the IFE “than it would be wise – for them – for me to say, adding that they played a “decisive role” in his triumph at the polls.

Mr Galloway now says they were one of many groups which supported his anti-war stance and had never sought to influence him.

The IFE has particularly close links to Tower Hamlets council. Seven serving and former councillors said Lutfur Rahman, the current council leader, gained his post with the group’s help.

Some said they were canvassed by a senior IFE official on his behalf. After Mr Rahman was elected, a man with close links to the group, Lutfur Ali, was appointed assistant chief executive of the council with responsibility for grant funding.

This was despite a chequered employment record, a misleading CV and a negative report from the headhunters appointed to consider the candidates. The council’s white chief executive was subsequently forced from his post.

Since Mr Rahman became leader, more council grants have been paid to a number of organisations which our investigation established are closely linked to the IFE.

Funding for other, secular groups was ended or cut. In the borough’s well-known Brick Lane area, council funds were switched from a largely secular heritage trail to a highly controversial “hijab sculpture”, angering many residents who accused the council of “religious triumphalism”.

Schools in Tower Hamlets are told by the council should close for the Muslim festival of Eid, even where most of their pupils are not Muslim.

Mr Rahman refused to deny that an IFE activist had canvassed councillors on his behalf. He said: “There are various people across Tower Hamlets who get excited, who get involved.”

He would not comment on concerns about infiltration, saying they were “party matters”. He said: “If you look at our flagship policies, like investing £20 million to tackle overcrowding, you can see that we are working for everyone.”

The IFE said it did not seek to influence the council and had not lobbied for Mr Rahman. “If anything, existing members of the Labour Party have joined the IFE, rather than the other way round,” it said.

The group insisted it was not a fundamentalist or extremist organisation and did not support violence.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/labour/7333420/Islamic-radicals-infiltrate-the-Labour-Party.html