It was then that Bormann gained national notice, and a measure of criticism, for appearing in court in traditional Muslim clothing that left only her face showing and for asking one woman on the government team to consider dressing more modestly so her client could focus on the proceedings.

Bormann would not discuss reports of threats against her.

For her, the issue is a simple one of respecting the religious and cultural beliefs of a client. She said that since she was appointed to bin Attash’s case last year, she has always dressed conservatively out of deference to a client who believes he will violate a religious tenet if he looks at a woman who is immodestly dressed.

“My client has never seen my hair, has never seen my arms, has never seen my legs,” Bormann said in an interview Monday. “All of the defense counsel, all of the guards and everybody who works in Guantanamo Bay camp has seen me dressed like this. … I never thought in my wildest dreams that this would become an issue.”

“There is nothing provocative about what I did. This is a religious issue and a cultural issue for [some of these defendants],” Bormann said in the interview. “I want him to be able to fully concentrate on the proceedings at hand without any kind of interference or loss of focus.”

The course is called “Understanding the Threat to America.” And in it are hundreds of slides that claim to link the Muslim Civil Liberties Advocacy Organisation (CAIR) and other American Muslim groups to the Palestinian group Hamas.

It was taught to senior military officers at a base in the state of Virginia.

The US military is conducting a review of all material taught to its officers after the website Wired.com exposed another course teaching anti-Islam material.

One of the slides presented by Army Lieutenant Colonel Matthew Dooley says the model he is presenting presumes that the Geneva Conventions are “no longer relevant,” when fighting Muslims.

It goes on to say that historical precendents of Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki are applicable to “Mecca and Medina’s destruction.”

Dooley’s 31-page presentation entitled “So What Can We Do?” A Counter – Jihad Op Design Model, comes to some startling conclusions: “Given the factual basis of what “Islamists” say they seek to impose on the world, the United States has come to accept that radical “true Islam” is both a political and military enemy to free people throughout the world…. It is therefore time for the United States to make our true intentions clear. This barbaric ideology will no longer be tolerated. Islam must change or we will facilitate its self destruction.”

Both the courses obtained by Al Jazeera and Wired.com were voluntary courses and it is not clear if similar material has been taught in other military colleges.

Graham’s three-paragraph statement, released on the association’s website, noted that voters in his home state of North Carolina had approved a constitutional amendment that allows only heterosexual marriage. Overall, 38 states have adopted some kind of prohibition on gay marriage, and the president said that the states should be able to determine whether to accept homosexual unions.

As a senator and presidential candidate, Obama had said that he opposed gay marriage, but more recently said that his position was evolving.

“In changing his position from that of “Senator/candidate Obama, President Obama has, in my view, shaken his fist at the same God who created and defined marriage,” Graham said. “It grieves me that our president would now affirm same-sex marriage, though I believe it grieves God even more.

“The institution of marriage should not be defined by presidents or polls, governors or the media,” Graham continued. “The definition was set long ago and changing legislation or policy will never change God’s definition. This is a sad day for America. God help us.”

Graham, 59, has insinuated previously that he’s not a big fan of the president. On Feb. 21, on MSNBC’s  “Morning Joe” show, he was asked whether Obama was a Christian.

“I think you have to ask President Obama,” he said. Because Obama’s father was a Muslim, Graham added, “under Islamic law, the Muslim world sees Barack Obama as a Muslim.”

Elsewhere, Graham has called Islam “wicked and evil.”

In fact, one of the most striking aspects of Obama’s revelation on Wednesday (May 9) that he and his wife, Michelle, support marriage rights for gays and lesbians, is that he invoked their Christian faith to support his views. In past years, Obama — as many believers still do — had cited his religious beliefs to oppose gay marriage.

Obama told ABC News that he and the first lady “are both practicing Christians and obviously this position may be considered to put us at odds with the views of others but, you know, when we think about our faith, the thing at root that we think about is, not only Christ sacrificing himself on our behalf, but it’s also the Golden Rule, you know, treat others the way you would want to be treated.”

The Golden Rule template is also one that experts say will likely one day pave the way for greater acceptance of marginalized groups like Muslims, just as it did in past generations for Catholics and Jews. Mormons like Mitt Romney already seem to be benefiting, as their visibility grows and more Americans see them as living upstanding lives.

They also criticized the Obama administration for offering tepid responses to questions about whether it endorses such tactics.

Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., the first Muslim elected to Congress and one of the lawmakers who introduced the resolution, said he understood the political difficulties the White House faces in wading into a debate over racial profiling and national security.

“But transformational leadership is about standing up and doing the right thing,” he said.

Dozens of lawmakers have been asking the Justice Department for eight months to investigate the NYPD’s tactics and determine whether they are legal. Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, the top civil rights official at the department, has not answered questions about the matter. His spokeswoman has said attorneys are reviewing the requests to investigate.

Lawmakers introduced a resolution Thursday calling for an end to NYPD programs that infiltrated mosques and monitored even innocent conversations in cafes and bookstores. Muslim business owners were included in police files, even with no allegations of wrongdoing.

New York Post columnist Michael Goodwin appeared on Fox & Friends on Monday where he blasted Congressional Democrats for “voting to defund the New York police department” due to what he describes as a persistent narrative that the NYPD has been targeting and profiling Muslim citizens without probable cause. He says that this move by Democrats in the House runs counter to the narrative that President Barack Obama is building up ahead of the November election, which is that Democrats are tough on terrorism at home and abroad.

Niagara County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas ordered Sheree A. Sabater, 39, to four months of weekends in the County Jail and three years’ probation. Antoinette S. Ivey, 32, drew two months of weekends in jail and five years’ probation.

The 26-year-old Muslim victim, who was walking with her two children July 14 near the Tops Market on Portage Road in Niagara Falls, was wearing a head scarf at the time, police said.

“This woman and her two children were just minding their own business,” Farkas said. “These two drunk, high, out-of-control women, and I use that term loosely, pummeled her to the ground in front of her children.”

The victim said in a later Buffalo News interview that she heard one of the attackers say, “She’s Pakistani and I want to kill her.”

The nationality was just a lucky guess, Assistant District Attorney Cheryl L. Nichols said.

“I didn’t know who she was,” Ivey said in court.

Sabater said, “I feel foolish.”

The Senate approved the bill Friday on a 33-3 vote. The House had approved it, 120-0, earlier in the week. The measure goes next to Republican Gov. Sam Brownback, who hasn’t said whether he’ll sign or veto the measure.

The measure doesn’t specifically mention Shariah law, which broadly refers to codes within the Islamic legal system. Instead, it says that courts, administrative agencies or state tribunals can’t base rulings on any foreign law or legal system that would not grant the parties the same rights guaranteed by state and U.S. constitutions.

But several supporters specifically cited the potential use of Shariah law in Kansas as their concern. Though there are no known cases in which a Kansas judge has based a ruling on Islamic law, supporters of the bill cited a pending case in Sedgwick County in which a man seeking to divorce his wife has asked for property to be divided under a marriage contract in line with Shariah law.

Voters do better identifying Mitt Romney’s Mormon faith, according to a poll released Thursday (May 10) by the Public Religion Research Institute in partnership with Religion News Service. A slim majority of voters — 51 percent — knows the presumed Republican presidential nominee is Mormon.

Is there something insidious behind the belief, a concerted attack to link the president with a religion that’s considered alien — or worse — by some Americans?

“I think it’s more a lack of information than an attack on him,” said Al-Suwaij.

While Americans across the board get the president’s religion wrong, the religious group that most often thinks Obama is Muslim is white evangelical Protestants (24 percent). American unaffiliated with a religious group make the error least often: just 7 percent identify Obama as Muslim.

The poll also found that white evangelical Protestants, who were suspicious of Romney in the early GOP primaries, are warming up to Romney now that he’s the presumptive nominee. The poll also showed:

— Obama maintains a significant lead over Romney in a head-to-head matchup (47 to 38 percent).

— Sixteen percent of voters have yet to make up their minds about a presidential candidate. Among this group, Obama holds a slight edge (42 to 37 percent).

— More than 60 percent of white evangelical, white mainline Protestant and Republican voters know that Romney is Mormon. Less than half of Catholic and Democratic voters know this.

The poll, of 1,006 Americans surveyed between May 2 and 6, has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Mikel Williams questioned Department of Justice attorney Marcus Meeks during a hearing Thursday in a lawsuit brought by Abdullah al-Kidd against the federal government.

Al-Kidd, a U.S. citizen, sued former Attorney General John Ashcroft and other federal officials in 2005, after he was arrested and jailed as a material witness in a terrorism-related criminal case against another man. He contends his arrest was just a ruse to give the government time to investigate him for any potential wrongdoing. The federal government maintains its actions were constitutional.

The U.S. Supreme Court has already thrown out al-Kidd’s claims against Ashcroft and a few other defendants, and al-Kidd has prevailed in a claim against one prison and settled his claims against two other lockups. Now FBI agents Michael Gneckow and Scott Mace and the Department of Justice are asking the judge to throw out al-Kidd’s claims against them.

Combination between personality disorder and online expressions of right wing extremism can be deadly. Ulf Åsgård, a psychiatrist and expert on criminal profiling, clams that the trial against the suspected serial shooter in Malmö, Peter Mangs, demonstrates this point well. He also warns of more of such crimes to come. “You can only press a button and there it is, a deep culture of hatred. Persons who have a disorder are especially susceptible for the rampant propaganda out there”.

The trial against Peter Mangs begins on Monday and concerns three murders and up to 29 attempt of murder. For the victims and their families the trial is an opportunity to find out, why? Mangs denies the charges and does not talk much about the motive. However, both Ulf Åsgård and Daniel Poohl (chief editor of Expo Magazine – an anti-rasist organization (http://expo.se/2010/about-expo_3514.html)) are of the opinion that the attacks are marked by racist motives. One such sign is Mangs’ extensive reading of racist newspapers and online propaganda. Daniel Poohl says that “there is a grave risk with such an aggressive argumentative tone where people (e.g. immigrants) are targeted”. He also points out that Mangs’ hate is probably not produced by the strongly conspiratorial and racist sites he visited, but in all likelihood that such sites have only confirmed his beliefs.

Daniel argues that ”in order for someone to get stuck in the extremist ideas it is required that a person experiences an event which confirms his (racist) world view. Mangs told of his negative views of immigrants (started) when he was as young as five, when he was pushed. The websites give a person a pat on the shoulder (for enduring hardships with immigrants) and thereby risk to radicalize individuals who already have that world view”. He further describes the mood on the online right-wing forums as aggressive, uncompromising and inciting.  “When people discuss political opponents or immigrants the tone can be extremely hard and hateful, even with encouragements to murder and abuse. Clearly, the risks are higher of someone taking on the challenge (of doing so)”, he explains.

Ulf Åsgård claims that the hateful tone by itself does not lead to violence; however in combination with empathic personal disorder this can be dangerous. “For instance, even an ordinary individual can have opinions on parts of Islam without having to turn to violence for that. However, this type of perpetrator has particular fragility which makes propaganda easily absorbed”.

Does this mean that there is a risk of more of such deeds being committed the more of the propaganda is spread?

Åsgard answers, ”it is possible that the online propaganda has already caught those who are fragile and who turn to crime. All of them, however, have not committed those criminal acts yet, but they will.

Both Åsgard and Poohl draw parallels between Mangs and the Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik, who had written a large manuscript drawing heavily from the (extreme-right) online forums.

But there are differences between the two, Poohl argues: “Breivik sees himself as a part of a political struggle, as a soldier. Peter Mangs seems more of a lone wolf who wants to do away with the criminals and immigrants in the city where he lives”.

Signed: Andreas Rolfer

Meet which comes from animals that have been slaughtered without the prior stunning should be marked. This is the opinion of the Swedish Ministry for Rural Affairs (Department of Agriculture). The Swedish Radio reports that the Ministry will propose changing of the EU rules on animal slaughter on the next meeting of the EU ministers of agriculture next week.  The reason for such proposal is that many slaughterhouses in the EU member states misuse the judicial exemption which allows slaughter without prior stunning due to the religious regulations in primarily Islam and Judaism. These slaughterhouses produce far more meet (slaughtered without anesthesia) than there are consumers of such meet. According to the EU Commission report (Directorate General for Health and Consumer Protection) 75 percent of all meet produced within the EU comes from animals slaughtered without the prior stunning.

Cultural barriers often stop Muslim women from involving in sports. Muslim Women’s Sports Foundation (MWSF), with the support of FA has launched a new initiative to get the Muslim women to become more physically active and challenge gender related issues in the community.

While some Christian groups are joining in the Islamphobic discourse, Princess Badiya of Jordan was invited by Biblelands, a Christian charity to lecture in London’s St James’s Church about Muslim-Christian relations. In her lecture she pointed out the similarities between the two Abrahamic religions and called for more co-operation between the members of the two religions.

Finding Halal meat is one of the most problematic issues for European Muslims and they are increasingly becoming a target of animal welfare originations. Similar to Judaism, Islam decrees upon practicing Muslims to eat only the meat of animals slaughtered according to Islamic rituals. Anything other than this is not edible for Muslims, save for life threatening situations. However, slaughtering animals is considered to be inhumane by animal welfare organizations thus the issue becomes a matter of tension between Muslims and the host communities.

The French Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fishing published a report in 2008, on Religious Slaughter and the Welfare of Animals which was based upon scientific research including a French veterinary PhD. According to the report, if executed properly religious slaughter causes less trauma to the animal than the conventional ways of killing, thus it is more humane.

According to reports, a leading veterinarian, Professor Bill Reilly has recently criticised the rise in the number of animals slaughtered according to religious laws and suggested it should be either curbed or banned. This sparked a harsh reaction from the Muslim community who considered it an attempt to interfere with their religion.

This week eight men were convicted at Liverpool Crown Court for their involvement in the exploitation of underage girls in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. The members of the gang, who are of Pakistani origin, recruited vulnerable teenage girls as young as 13 years old to force into prostitution. Inevitably the event shocked the British public and the conviction of the gang members led the public to question why the society failed to protect these vulnerable teenagers.

Far-right groups such as British National Party (BNP) and English Defence League (EDL) took the opportunity to demonize the entire Muslims community for the crime. Muslim groups warned of an increase in hate attacks and abuse against Muslims across the UK.

Also, some of the Catholic media joined the far-right in their demonization campaign of Muslims and called on the media to blame the Muslim community for the crime.

When Al Qaeda contemplated the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11, the organization didn’t forget to include Canada in its plans. Al Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn mused the organization should reach out to a group of 30 to 50 select journalists and writers who would be candidates to receive “special media material” on the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

It was important, Gadahn stressed to Osama bin Laden and others in January 2011, that Al Qaeda not rely on Jihadi Internet forums, which he said were “repulsive to most of the Muslims,” or Al Jazeera. Instead, Gadahn wrote the group should target journalists in seven countries — the U.K., U.S. and Canada in the west, as well as Pakistan, Egypt, Jordan and Yemen. Among the journalists Gadahn favoured were Eric Margolis, a longtime columnist with the Toronto Sun, and Canadian author Gwynne Dyer, a syndicated columnist based in London.

A Toronto Islamic school’s teaching materials, which have prompted a police hate crimes investigation because of their portrayal of Jews, were originally published by Iranian organizations, records show. The passages of the East End Madrassah’s texts that drew the most widespread condemnation are excerpts from two books, including one published by the Al Balagh Foundation in Iran.

The other book, which contrasts Islam with “the Jews and the Nazis,” was published by the Mostazafan Foundation of New York, which the U.S. alleges was a front organization for the Iranian government.

Jewish community groups were disappointed to learn that materials from Iran had found their way into Canadian school texts. Neither the madrassa nor its parent organization, the Islamic Shia Ithna Asheri Jamaat, could be reached for comment. The East End Madrassa rents space every Sunday in a high school owned by the Toronto District School Board. The madrassa apologized to the Jewish community earlier this week and promised to review its teaching materials.

Two elderly Muslims were beaten up on their way to the mosque in the northern town of Amiens. The attack occurred when the two victims, ages 70 and 71, were on their way to morning prayers.  They were accosted by two men with short haircuts who said they were part of the extreme right.  The men were admitted to the hospital with injuries to their legs and ribs.

A poll by L’institut de sondages OpinionWay suggests that in the second round of voting in the French presidential elections on May 6^th, 93% of Muslims voted for President-elect Hollande. 59% of those polled voted for Hollande in the first round of voting.

“It is the mark of a true rejection of Nicolas Sarkozy,” said Julien Goarant, research director at Opinionway. Sarkozy’s attempts to woo Far-right voters and question the role of Islam (especially Halal meat) in France did not go unnoticed.

A poll for La Vie showed that 79 percent of practicing Catholics voted for Sarkozy, with Hollande cornering only 21 percent of their vote. But 70 percent of those considering themselves “without religion” went with Hollande, according to Le Figaro.

A report to the Dutch parliament from the advisory group on social development (RMO) has recommended the cessation of categorizing residents according to ethnicity and parental birth places, advising instead that only the birth place of the individual concerned be taken into record. The report advocates the elimination of terms such as niet-westerse allochtoon (non-western non-native) which signal heritage as ‘non-native’ for those with a parent born abroad. In response, integration minister Gerd Leers said that he favoured maintaining ethnic registration for the purposes of measuring the effect of government measures, such as interventions in employment and education.