Author: sheikyermami

“The UN must stop Israel from retaliating after we nuke the Jooozzz..!” cries the sinister midget Ahmadinejad.

By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer

Iran urged the U.N. Security Council to condemn Israel and demand that it stop threatening to use military force against the Islamic republic, according to a letter obtained Friday.

In the letter to council, Iran’s U.N. Ambassador Mohammad Khazee referred to comments on April 7 by Israel’s Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, who warned Tehran that any attack on the Jewish state would result in the “destruction of the Iranian nation.”

Israel’s U.N. Mission said it would have no comment on Khazee’s letter.

Exchanges between the two nations have grown increasingly bitter in recent years. Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said the Holocaust is a “myth” and called for Israel’s elimination.

The Iranian ambassador told the Security Council that Israel “has continued with its insolent, outrageous and unprovoked threats against the Islamic Republic of Iran” and in violation of the U.N. Charter.

“The inaction of the Security Council in this regard, has emboldened the said regime to pursue this dangerous course,” Khazee said.

He said the Security Council should condemn the statements and call on Israel to “cease and desist” from threatening to use force.

Khazee sent a similar letter to the council in late February demanding that Israel stop threatening military again against Iran’s nuclear program.

Iran insists its nuclear program is purely for civilian purposes. The United States, Israel and key European nations suspect its real aim is to produce atomic weapons.

* The Holocaust Declaration by Charles Krauthammer

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Islamic child abuse and indoctrination:

* A report in German. Even if you don’t speak the language you’ll understand the collective insanity and the mental baggage that comes with this indoctrination:

With thanks to Atlas Shrugs

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The situation in once Great Britain is clearly out of control:

Smith says monitoring 30 U.K. terrorism plots 

LONDON (Reuters) – British police and security agencies are currently monitoring 30 terrorism plots, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said in extracts of a newspaper interview released on Saturday.

“We now face a threat level that is severe. It’s not getting any less, it’s actually growing,” she said in an interview to be published in Sunday’s News of the World.

“We task the police and the security agencies with protecting us … There are 22,000 individuals they are monitoring. There are 200 networks. There are 30 active plots,” she said.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s Labour government is seeking to extend pre-charge detention of terrorism suspects to 42 days from the current 28-day limit.

But Smith faces a tough task steering the controversial provisions through parliament.

The Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties have both said they will vote against extended detention. Labour backbenchers are also threatening to rebel and vote down the clause in the Counter-Terrorism Bill.

“We can’t wait for an attack to succeed and then rush in new powers,” Smith said. “We’ve got to stay ahead.

“Because we now understand the scale of what is being plotted, the police have to step in earlier, which means they need more time to put evidence together.” 

Continued…

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And what could be worse than that?

Following are excerpts from an interview with Saudi cleric Muhammad Al-Munajid, which aired on Al-Majd TV on March 30, 2008.

Why are Islamic countries trying to destroy freedom of speech? Why, to protect Islam — at least in the view of Sheikh Muhammad Al-Munajid.

Muhammad Al-Munajid: Some of these heretics say: “Islam is not the private property of anyone.” So what do they want? They say: “No sect has a monopoly on Islam.” So what do they want? They say: “We want to issue rulings.” Someone who is ignorant, who does not know any Arabic, or who has no knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence wants to issue rulings?! They say: “We reinterpret the texts.” There is a very dangerous conspiracy against the religion of Islam in newspapers and in what these people say. A journalist, or one of those lowlifes, wants to… These people are a mixture of Western, local, and imported ideologies, but they want to express their views with regard to religious rulings. This is the prerogative of religious scholars, not of ignorant people, the prerogative of knowledgeable people, not of fools or heretics.
[…]
The problem is that they want to open a debate on whether Islam is true or not, and on whether Judaism and Christianity are false or not. In other words, they want to open up everything for debate. Now they want to open up all issues for debate. That’s it. It begins with freedom of thought, it continues with freedom of speech, and it ends up with freedom of belief. So where’s the conspiracy? They say: Let’s have freedom of thought in Islam. Well, what do they want? They say: I think, therefore I want to express my thoughts. I want to express myself, I want to talk and say, for example, that there are loopholes in Islam, or that Christianity is the truth. Then they will talk about freedom of belief, and say that anyone is entitled to believe in whatever he wants… If you want to become an apostate – go ahead. Fancy Buddhism? Leave Islam, and join Buddhism. No problem. That’s what freedom of belief is all about. They want freedom of everything. What they want is very dangerous.
[…]
Freedom of thought, within some constraints, is blessed. Islam calls for thinking, for interpretation, and for the use of the mind. But as for freedom of heresy, which allows anyone to criticize whatever he wants in Islam, saying, for example, that he does not like the punishment for apostasy, that he doesn’t like the punishment for drinking alcohol, or that he does not like the punishment of stoning adulterers – this is barbarism. They ask: Why should a thief have his hand chopped off? Some of them say that this is “too much.” Two-three much on you and your rotten mind. If you abolish this punishment, you will see the rise in thefts. On the other hand, people feel their property is secure because of this punishment.

* Disclaimer: No, we don’t sell the gnome in the right hand corner, don’t bother ordering…!

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* Keep quiet, bow and scrape, and all will be well. But if you dare to behave as if you are not subservient, you are committing a hostile act. “Qaradawi flays Pope’s ‘hostile act,’” from Gulf Timesvia JW

Qaradawi: Pope’s baptism of Muslim convert a “provocative and hostile act against Muslims”

PROMINENT scholar Sheikh Yousuf al-Qaradawi has denounced Pope Benedict’s baptism of a Muslim-born journalist during the last Easter Mass at the Vatican as a “provocative and hostile act against Muslims”.
Sheikh Qaradawi, who is the head of the International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) and the European Council for Fatwa and Research, said the public baptism of Majdi Allam has provoked Muslims around the world.

“We do not feel regret over the conversion of that person. He has been a Catholic for more than five years. He was always attacking Islam, the Qur’an and me. The problem is that he was baptised by the Pope in public and in front of satellite TV cameras. This is a hostile act against Islam,” he told Doha-based Al Jazeera television.

“It is not strange that Allam, who betrayed his country and supported Israel, left his religion. We know that he is an agent of Israel. He would not contribute to Islam if he were a Muslim,” he said.

Qaradawi said the public baptism has worsened relations between the Vatican and IUMS. “We were looking for a different approach from the Pope after his anti-Islam remarks two years ago. But the Pope’s baptism of a person who was known for his enmity to Islam and the Qur’an made us stick to our previous decision to suspend the IUMS relationship with the Vatican,” he told Al Jazeera.

The scholar also blamed the West for worsening relations with Islam. “We try to seek peace with the Vatican and the World Council of Churches but in vain. They keep provoking us by their hostility.”

* Right. If only the pope had enough sense to convert to Islam, then all would be well…

* Pope’s speech at University of Regensburg

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* Melanie Phillips take on the boneheadedness of British judges who refuse to deport terrorists because they could be ‘tortured’ if sent back. The reasoning one hears in these cases is that ‘treating them like terrorists makes us just like them’- and this irrational fear brought about a judiciary which has allowed its collective obsession with human rights law to destroy common sense.

How al Qaeda must be gloating. What would any sane country do if it discovered that living among it was Osama Bin Laden’s right-hand man, who was wanted by his own country on terrorism charges? It’s a fair bet that it would deport him to that country as fast as it could.

What does Britain do in those circumstances? Declare that extradition would be a breach of his human rights and prepare to release him from jail under indefinite house arrest, courtesy of the British taxpayer, to the tune of some £1,000 per month in welfare benefits.

This is the surreal situation following the Appeal Court judgment this week on Abu Qatada, who is currently in jail fighting deportation to his native Jordan where he was convicted in his absence on terrorist charges in both 1999 and 2000.

Read it all

UK terror plot: Sabeel Ahmed gets 18-month term

A slap on the wrist of brother Sabeel Ahmed:

Sabeel Ahmed, one of the accused in the botched London [Image] and Glasgow car bomb cases, was on Friday sentenced by a UK court to 18 months in prison

Earlier, Sabeel had admitted to charges of withholding information that could have prevented an act of terrorism.

The 26-year-old doctor from Bangalore admitted at the Old Bailey court house that he had failed to inform the police regarding the terrorist attack that would have been of ‘considerable assistance’.

Sabeel’s brother Kafeel Ahmed, who according to police smashed a car containing gas cylinders and detonators into the Glasgow airport, had died in a hospital of the severe burn injuries sustained in the failed bombing in June

Doctor admits Glasgow Airport attack charge
By Caroline Gammell

Musulmania: Picture of the Week

Lying Jihad Scum & the Suckers from Channel 4:

Moazzam Begg interview: ‘Two people were beaten to death’

* Heaven knows why Channel 4 provides a forum for these lying jihad rats…

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Turning everything upside down:

Rome: “an ambassador should not incite violence”

Egypt’s ambassador to Rome, Nevine Simaika, whines about the ‘tiny minority of extremists’ and accuses the Israeli envoy of ‘inciting hatred against Muslim immigrants who live and work peacefully in Europe’

* Interesting how a warning against Islamic mass-migration is twisted into ‘inciting hatred and violence’- this Egyptian ambassador sounds rather threatening: “don’t stop Islamic migration or we have to become violent…”

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The United Nations: Islam’s Gestapo

Journalist Caroline Glick wrote in her column in the Jewish World Review that the United Nations had violated its own Declaration of Human Rights, which guarantees freedom of expression, when it passed the March 28 resolution. Glick also pointed out that it was surprising when the UNHRC’s European members abstained from the vote, since they are such staunch supporters of the UN.

By abstaining, the European nations, those supposed bastions of human rights and free speech (especially when it comes to blaspheming Christianity), simply showed what moral cowards they truly are, putting their dhimmi status on display once more in failing to stand up to Islamic bullying.

Several countries that still have a backbone did speak out against this atrocious violation of human rights and freedom of expression. The United States, which does not have a seat on the 47-nation UNHRC but has observer status, did not stay silent. Warren Tichenor, America’s ambassador in Geneva, told the body: “The resolution seeks to impose restrictions on individuals rather than to emphasize the duty and responsibility of governments to guarantee, uphold, promote and protect human rights.”

More from Frontpage Mag

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A Canadian delegate supported Tichenor’s view with his statement: “The job of a special rapporteur is not to police the action of individuals.”

* Quote of the Day:

Iranian delegate to the U.N. “The very concept of human rights is a Judeo-Christian invention and inadmissible in Islam.”(1985) By Sa’id Raja’i”-Khorassani,

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A Call to Ban Building Mosques In Britain 

with thanks to Wolf Howling 

A very good article on the creeping Islamization of Britain. To stop building mosques and to strip Islamic radicals of citizenship and  to deport them would make sense. But don’t expect that any of that will happen anytime soon… 

“Infidels are never innocent” sez Anjem Chaudrey, “because they reject the RoP” 

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A senior Church of England member called yesterday for the building of mosques to be banned.

Alison Ruoff said more construction would lead to Islamic no go areas dominated by exclusively Muslim populations living under sharia law. Mrs Ruoff, a member of the General Synod, the Church’s parliament, added: “If we don’t watch out we will become an Islamic state. It’s that serious.”

Read it all. The article has some good background on that creepy little “Bunglawussi of the ancient rulings” from the MCB

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* There’s a sucker born every minute, but the minutes in Londonistan seem to breed suckers faster than the combined ummah islamiyah:

Who is the better Dhimmi?

Red Rat Ken Livingstone v/s Dhimmi Tory candidate Boris Johnson:

Boris Johnson today accused the Mayor of “demeaning” his office by suggesting Mr Johnson had smeared Islam after the London bombings.

The Tory candidate said he took “deep offence” at Ken Livingstone’s claim he had said the Koran was “inherently” violent.

However, the Mayor insisted Mr Johnson’s remarks – in contrast to his own rousing response to the 7 July attacks – showed his true reaction to the tragedy.

In the first radio hustings on LBC radio between the three main candidates, Mr Johnson insisted he would have issued “exactly the same” kind of remarks after the bombings, which killed 52 people, as Mr Livingstone had if he had been running the city at the time.

“What Londoners want in the event of a tragedy of that kind… is someone who will speak for the city and give a voice to our defiance and our unwillingness to submit to that kind of terror and kind of cowardly attack,” he said.

However, the Mayor claimed: “I know what Boris would have said because he wrote it in the Spectator the following week. Very different. I said this is a criminal act by a handful of men. It doesn’t define a faith or an ideology.

“What you said, Boris, was Islam was the problem… And the Koran is inherently violent. I actually made certain that we were looking at individuals. You smeared an entire faith.”

An audibly furious Mr Johnson responded: “Can I tell you what deep offence I take at that? I think you really traduce what I said.

“My view is that Islam is a religion of peace and indeed I am very proud to say I have Muslim ancestors.

“My great-grandfather knew the Koran off by heart, Ken Livingstone, and I really wish you would leave off these kinds of tactics, which demean this race and demean your office.”

* Yeah. Islam is a RoP and a race. Which race is that again?

Read it and weep!

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UN forum faults Britain over terror suspect rules

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA, April 10 (Reuters) – Britain was criticised by its allies and detractors at the U.N.’s main human rights forum on Thursday, over its treatment of terrorism suspects, prison inmates and racial minorities.

The UN is deeply in the Islamic pocket…

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* Actually, her name is not ‘Aisha’, her name is Nojoud Muhammed Nasser and her story is as sick as the cult into which she was born: the cult of Muhammad that allows child-brides to be wedded or sold off to older men, because that’s what the 54-year old prophet did in the 7th century.

Spencer comments:

The Qur’an even envisions the prospect of divorce for prepubescent girls. It stipulates a waiting period to determine whether or not the wife being divorced is pregnant: “If you are in doubt concerning those of your wives who have ceased menstruating, know that their waiting period shall be three months.” Then it goes on: “The same shall apply to those who have not yet menstruated” (Qur’an 65:4).

It’s good to know, however, that these men were arrested, although it is unclear on what grounds, and doubtful, I believe, that they will actually be prosecuted.

* Indeed. And if this girl doesn’t find a protector real quick her chances of staying alive are rather dim, because she brought ‘shame’ on the family, and that can only be remedied with an ‘honor killing’…

“8-year-old girl asks for divorce in court,” by Hamed Thabet in the Yemen Times:

SANA’A, April 9 – An eight-year-old girl decided last week to go the Sana’a West Court to prosecute her father, who forced her to marry a 30-year-old man.
Nojoud Muhammed Nasser arrived at court by herself on Wednesday, April 2, looking for a judge to handle her case against her father, Muhammed Nasser, who forced her two months ago to marry Faez Ali Thamer, a man 22 years her senior. The child also asked for a divorce, accusing her husband of sexual and domestic abuse.

According to Yemeni law, Nojoud cannot prosecute, as she is underage. However, court judge Muhammed Al-Qathi heard her complaint and subsequently ordered the arrests of both her father and husband.

“My father beat me and told me that I must marry this man, and if I did not, I would be raped and no law and no sheikh in this country would help me. I refused but I couldn’t stop the marriage,” Nojoud Nasser told the Yemen Times. “I asked and begged my mother, father, and aunt to help me to get divorced. They answered, ‘We can do nothing. If you want you can go to court by yourself.’ So this is what I have done,” she said.

Nasser said that she was exposed to sexual abuse and domestic violence by her husband. “He used to do bad things to me, and I had no idea as to what a marriage is. I would run from one room to another in order to escape, but in the end he would catch me and beat me and then continued to do what he wanted. I cried so much but no one listened to me. One day I ran away from him and came to the court and talked to them.”

“Whenever I wanted to play in the yard he beat me and asked me to go to the bedroom with him. This lasted for two months,” added Nasser. “He was too tough with me, and whenever I asked him for mercy, he beat me and slapped me and then used me. I just want to have a respectful life and divorce him.”…

Read it all

Iraqi Islamic scholar: Muhammad consummated his marriage with Aisha when she was nine, and there is no minimum age for marriage in Islamic law

Whenever you talk to the soldiers of Allah about Moe and little Aisha you are likely to be called ‘Islamophobe’ or, as in this case, a ‘criminal’ and ‘an enemy of Islam’. But the traditions of Muhammad that Muslims consider most reliable say that Aisha was nine when Muhammad consummated his marriage with her. This matters because Muhammad is the supreme example for conduct for Muslims — which leads to a situation in which child marriage is difficult to condemn and is even endorsed by Islamic jurists, such as this fellow.

“Iraqi Expert on Islamic Law Calls to Allow Young Girls to Get Married: In Islamic Countries, Girls Get Their Periods at the Age of 8-10. Westerners Criticize the Prophet Muhammad for Having Sex with His 9 Year Old Wife, But Allow Fornication with Underage Girls,” from MEMRITV

Following are excerpts from an interview with Dr. Abd Al-Hamid Al-‘Ubeidi, an Iraqi expert on Islamic law, which aired on Al-Rafidein TV on March 14, 2008:
Dr. Abd Al-Hamid Al-‘Ubeidi: There is no minimum marriage age for either men or women in Islamic law. The law in many countries permits girls to marry only from the age of 18. This is arbitrary legislation, not Islamic law. Why? Because there might be cases in which it is impossible to keep the girl [single] until the age of maturity.

[…]

Most of the time we act according to what is acceptable to most people, and indeed, most men do not marry a girl until she is of age. In some Islamic countries, the age of maturity can be 8 or 10 years. In Yemen, a girl might get her period at the age of 8. In cold countries, such as Russia, Belarus, Scandinavia, New Zealand, Canada, and so on, a girl might not reach maturity until she is 22 years old. She might not get her period until then. Therefore, the greatness of Islamic law is manifest in the fact that marriage is not just for pleasure. True, it is the basic objective for marriage, but there are some cases that require solutions.

[…]

Many criminals, the enemies of Islam, ask: “How could the Prophet Muhammad, at 52 years of age, marry ‘Aisha when she was only 8 years old, and consummate the marriage when she was 9 years old?” I say to them: People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. Why do you permit your young girls to fornicate? They consider it one of their liberties. Therefore, in these stupid countries, you rarely find girls aged 10 or 12 who are still virgins. They permit this. They have even legislated laws stating that if a girl is under the age of 18, and her girlfriend [sic] or whatever has had sex with her, she has the right to have an abortion. How can you permit the outcome without accepting the cause? Why do you allow your girls to have sex and say this is an individual liberty? It is okay to fornicate with girls there or force them to have sex, and so on, and they have the right to have an abortion. If you permit all this before the age [of 18], without a marriage contract and without any legal grounds – how come you forbid marriage?

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Pedophilia & Islam: Allowed by Allah; Practised & Patronized by Prophet Muhammad

ISLAMIC AUTHORITIES PROMOTE IT
There is no argument on this point among Islamic authorities whether shia or sunni. They all agree that a muslim man can have sex with baby girl.
This is what Imam Khomeini, the top shia authority says:

“A muslim man can have sexual pleasure with a little girl as young as a baby. But he should not penetrate her vaginally, however he can sodomize her”. (Tehriro vasyleh, fourth edition, Qom, Iran, 1990)
Here is what the the top sunni authority says (video on a Saudi website) about having sex with a one day old baby girl. (Go to “site video” and click on sex with a one day old girl)

PROPHET LOVED LITTLE GIRLS
Prophet had special feelings for cute little baby girls.
Ibn Ishaq: Suhayli, 2.79: In the riwaya of Yunus Ibn Ishaq recorded that the apostle saw Ummu’l-Fadl hen she was baby crawling before him and said, ‘If she grows up and I am still alive I will marry her.’ ( p. 311)
Muhammad saw Um Habiba the daughter of Abbas while she was fatim (age of nursing) and he said, “If she grows up while I am still alive, I will marry her.” (Musnad Ahmad, Number 25636)

Read it all

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Steven Emerson speaks truth to power:

Unless we are prepared to accept severe restrictions on free speech, legitimize terrorist groups, allow the introduction of Islamic law in the U.S., prohibit any criticism of Islam, and propose the destruction of Israel, nothing we do will satisfy the ‘grievances’ of the radical Islamic believers.

Emerson’s testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence:

Congress should require the lead agencies and departments in the Global War on Terrorism (most notably the FBI, CIA, and DHS) to fully and formally educate all counterterrorism personnel in the proclaimed Islamist ideology of al Qaeda the global Islamist movement. This ideology is easily accessible in Islamic religious texts and treatises such as Sayyid Qutb’s Milestones. This has not been instituted at any agency.

More than six years after 9/11, this is inexcusable.

Instead, U.S. actions have been counterproductive, empowering the Brotherhood at a time it could have challenged its ideology and the terrorist groups that it has spawned. Contact with government agencies effectively anoints the groups as gatekeepers to the Muslim-American community. This policy, which continues to this day despite the criminal connections of many of these organizations, can only end in disaster for the interest of the United States both domestically and abroad.

When considering this matter, it is important and instructive to consider the Danish cartoons controversy. With the exception of a handful of courageous news outlets, the American media refused to republish the cartoons, claiming that “respect for religious values” overrode the principle of free speech.

For everyone else, free speech, the bedrock of western civilization, was suddenly thrown out the window at the first sign that many in the Muslim world were offended and retaliatory violence was possible. The U.S. State Department denounced the publication of the cartoons as “unacceptable.”

This censorship and intimidation continues each day in a disturbingly growing volume. Critics of Islamism and extremism who have written books, spoken out, or published cartoons deemed “offensive” to Islam, have had their lives permanently changed – facing death threats and being forced underground or behind the protection of 24-hour security details. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the former Dutch parliamentarian and a friend of Theo Van Gogh (the Dutch filmmaker murdered for producing a film deemed “offensive” to Islam) has been forced to live under 24-hour protection and in hiding in her homeland and in the United States where she stayed for a year. Geert Wilders, another Dutch parliamentarian, produced a short film called “Fitna” that included images of the Quran being burned and has called for the banning of the Quran. For this admittedly offensive to some, but protected, transgression, Mr. Wilders has had to live in hiding under protection around the clock. His film was blocked by various websites, although anti-Christian and anti-Semitic films can be seen on YouTube and thousands of other sites routed through servers in the United States and Europe.

Source

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Seriously demented:

Mashad, 10 April (AKI) – A top Shia cleric in Iran has said that unveiled women are a serious danger to Iranian society as they cause men to be “transformed into beasts”.

“Women without the veil are a danger that the authorities underestimate,” said Hojatolislam Seyyed Ahmad Elmalhoda, a powerful cleric who leads the Friday prayers in Mashad, a site considered sacred for Shia Muslims as it houses the shrine of Imam Reza.

*  Islam causes very serious mental disorders:

“This situation is very serious in that if men see these bad women, they will turn into beasts, and then the whole of society will have to pay the consequences.”

According to the Shia cleric, women who do not respect conservative Islamic dress rules are “sources of all that is bad in society.”

“Respecting the chador (a long, black cloak that covers the arms and legs and is usually worn with a hijab) is the law of the state and the authorities must severely punish anyone who does not respect this law, in the same way that they punish thieves and murderers,” said Elmadhoda.

He is who is also a member of the Council of Experts – a powerful body of 86 senior clerics which elects, supervises and can dismiss the country’s supreme leader.

He was speaking to journalists who were reporting on president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s visit to the shrine of Imam Reza.

“A women who does not wear the entire veil is like a fire which burns anyone who comes into contact with her,” said Elmalhoda.

“Our youth, even those who are educated by families who believe and respect the words of the Prophet, when they come into contact with this fire [the women who are not properly veiled] they burn and become ash,” he said.

 AKI

Iran: President wants to ‘annihilate corrupt powers’

* That’s us, folks! 

Mashhad, 10 April(AKI) – Iran’s hardline president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Thursday his country’s objective was to destroy what he called corrupt western powers.

“Our objective is to annihilate all corrupt powers that dominate our planet today,” said Ahmadinejad.

He was speaking in the holy Shia city of Mashhad, located 850 kilometres east of the Iranian capital Tehran at an event where he met Senegalese president Abdoulaye Wade.

Ahmadinejad also “advised” western powers to repent or, “otherwise Iranians will hoist their flag on the roof of their buildings.”

“Our enemies do not fear the technological, economical and industrial aspects of our nuclear programme, but tremble at the thought of the Islamic republic sitting as equals with them at the same table,” he said.

The Last Porker is forced to pull the plug:

April 10 (Bloomberg) — Lazari Kozmaoglu, Istanbul’s last pork butcher, takes a break from a two-hour backgammon session to recall the days he spent slicing bacon instead of rolling dice.

Eight workers used to rush in and out of the cutting room, placing wrapped meat in refrigerators, Kozmaoglu, 63, recalls in his store in central Istanbul. Today the shop is down to its last two months of stock and attracts only a handful of customers.

Turkey’s Islamist-rooted government has clamped down on the pork industry since 2004, closing all but two of the country’s 25 pig farms and revoking slaughterhouse licenses. Kozmaoglu, unable to add to his meat supplies, spends most of his time shuffling paperwork as he seeks permission to reopen his abattoir.

“I don’t know what I can do if they don’t give it to me; this business is my life,” Kozmaoglu says as he watches a news bulletin on Greek television.

He’s one of about 2,000 ethnic Greeks remaining in Istanbul. Most Greeks left the city after Turkish mobs attacked their homes and workplaces in 1955.

TURKISH POGROM AGAINST THE GREEK POPULATION OF CONSTANTINOPLE 6-7 SEPTEMBER 1955
Others were expelled in 1964 after fighting between Greeks and Turks on Cyprus.

* Actually, that’s a lie: the Turkish army invaded Cyprus and the Greeks ran for their lives. The Turks were never held accountable for killing over 8.000 Greeks and raping countless women…

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