The School of Management in Strasbourg will, for the first time in France, offer a university diploma in “Islamic Finance (a “bac +5”). The United Kingdom is the only other country to hold a similar program in Europe. Michel Kalika, the school’s director, explains that the diploma is “the reasonable result of a market analysis…
French authorities detained 80 “Islamic activists” suspected of links to terrorist recruitment cells in 2008, along with four leading figures of the Basque separatist group ETA, the interior minister said Monday. Interior Minister Michèle Alliot-Marie said in a New Year’s speech that 80 Islamic activists linked to alleged “cells for recruitment or training for jihad”…
According to Rotterdam council member Anita Fahmel, the Turkish Fethullah Gulen movement is an “Islamic fundamentalist” group, on the basis of her own study of the Turkish movement. Fahmel claims that the movement plays an important role in the Islamization of Turkey, and uses intimidation, discrimination, and oppression to manifest strength. Her conclusions are based…
Hanane Kaddour interviews Fadela Amara a year after the announcement of her plan “Espoir Banlieues.” Amara is Secretary of State for Urban Policies in the Conservative UMP government of French Prime Minister François Fillon. Amara responds to critiques that the goal of 4500 long-term work contracts for youths in the suburbs was not met (they…
Iraqi journalist Muntazer al-Zaidi, who made headlines after throwing his shoes at US president George W. Bush at a press conference in December, is planning to apply for political asylum in Switzerland. Al-Zaidi, who has been held in Iraq awaiting trial for the act, has reportedly suffered injuries to his eye, broken ribs, and internal…
