Dutch parliament member Samira Bouchibti has reacted to the release this month of Imhalal.com, a search engine which provides starred ratings of results according to their acceptability in Islamic law.
The PvdA (Dutch Labour Party) parliament member says that the new engine should not be used in schools, since it encourages discrimination of gays by filtering out search terms such as ‘homo’ and ‘gay’. She says young Muslims should also have access to information about sexuality and homosexuality. Bouchibti has asked the Minister of Education Ronald Plasterk (PvdA) to check whether ImHalal.com can be kept out of schools and other institutions which are funded by the government.
The site attracted more than 30,000 visitors in its first eight days, says Reza Sardeha of the AZS Media Group in the Netherlands. The developers explain that the search engine allows Muslims access to the internet in a safe and clean environment.
