Attacks on Jews in the UK reached record levels in 2009, according to figures compiled within the community.
The Community Security Trust (CST) said it had recorded 924 incidents over the year, 55% more than the previous high of 598 incidents in 2006.
The organisation, which monitors incidents against Jewish people and organisations, said the rise was linked to last year’s Gaza conflict.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown described the figures as “deeply troubling”.
When 17-year-old Anthony Turner was gunned down outside a city home early the morning of Nov. 1, 2009, siblings Emily Gibson, 14, and David Gibson, 17, knew they couldn’t stay silent anymore. Anthony had attended East High School with the Gibson siblings, and the home he died in front of belonged to someone they knew from the Cathedral Community Youth Group.
Emily, David and other members of the Cathedral Community Youth Group decided they had to do something to try to stop the violence that plagues their neighborhoods. With the help of Belinda Brasley, the Cathedral Community’s youth-ministry coordinator, the teens decided to hold a Teen Prayer for Peace, which took place at Sacred Heart Cathedral on the rainy evening of Jan. 24.
The lighting in the cathedral was dim that night, indicating the solemnity of the occasion. The mood of the approximately 50 people gathered there, however, was light. The teens and adults in the audience smiled as they murmured to one another before the event began.
Three US Marines are among at least 10 people killed in an attack on a convoy near a school in north-west Pakistan.
Police said around 70 people, including 63 school girls and another US soldier, were injured in the roadside bombing in Lower Dir, near the Afghan border.
The soldiers were believed to have been training Pakistan’s Frontier Corps in counter-insurgency against the Taliban.
The attack comes amid a major government offensive against Taliban militants in the area.
Malaysia’s simmering religious and racial conflicts could worsen after worshippers Wednesday found the severed heads of wild boars at two mosques, amid a dispute over whether Christians can use the term “Allah” as a translation for “God.”
Muslims consider pigs unclean, and leaving boar heads at a mosque is a potentially inflammatory insult, mirroring an incident last year when Muslim activists flung a severed cow head on a proposed site for a Hindu temple near Kuala Lumpur.
Wednesday’s incident is considered the most offensive case of sacrilege against a Muslim place of worship since a storm erupted over the use of the Arabic word “Allah.” It threatens to further upset this resource-rich, racially diverse country and complicate Prime Minister Najib Razak’s efforts to build a multiracial support base before national elections, which must be held by 2013.
Adding to tensions, the trial of opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim on sodomy charges–the second he has faced in little more than a decade–is scheduled to begin next week. Mr. Anwar leads a multiracial opposition alliance trying to replace Malaysia’s government after 57 years in power. Prosecutors accuse him of sodomizing a young male aide in 2008–an illegal act in Malaysia. Mr. Anwar, 62 years old, says the story was fabricated to destroy him.
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Read it all.
It should be noted that in Jos we are coming face to face in confrontation with Satan and the powers of hell, and only God can save us. There are, however, many Muslims who totally disagree with violence as a means of settling issues, and of course it is not in accordance with the gospel to use violence to settle issues either. What seems to be a recurring decimal is that over time, those who have in the past used violence to settle political issues, economic issues, social matters, intertribal disagreements, or any issue for that matter, now continue to use that same path of violence and cover it up with religion. We must pray against the powers of hell. We must also pray for our state government, our Houses of Assembly at state and federal levels and our law enforcement agents, that they may choose the path of truth and justice, and deal with crime by its proper name, so that no-one, no matter how high or low, no matter of what faith or creed, should be exempt from facing the law.
The national leadership should be lifted up to God, that they may rise beyond a concern for political success and seek to do good and right in all things for the benefit of all people. This is a most urgent prayer request, because Nigeria as a nation has a large and ever-increasing army of leaderless, lawless, unemployable, unemployed, demoralized, and near hopeless youth. This, to my prophetic mind, is the big security issue which the governments at local, state and federal levels are not taking seriously. For example, every crisis in Nigeria in the last ten years has been executed by this generation of young people. With each passing year, they perfect their skills, and when they run out of a supply of money””or when they become bored with any situation””then any opportunity for action gives them satisfaction. This army has no religion, but can choose to go under the name of religion to achieve its motives. They are uneducated, and so their values are totally different, as are their ways of handling weapons or choosing how issues are settled. Please pray for us.
The Anglican Archbishop of Jos has called for Muslims to hand back the bodies of any Christians shot in last week’s riots that he says could have been taken to the mosque in error.
The Most Rev Ben Kwashi said that Christians had been made the scapegoats for sectarian violence between Christians and Muslims that left nearly 500 people dead in the central Nigerian city. Those who took part in killings that nearly wiped out a village on the outskirts of Jos have yet to be found.
The Archbishop spoke to The Times as another Anglican bishop in Nigeria, the Right Rev Peter Imasuen of Benin City in southern Edo state, was ambushed and kidnapped shortly after arriving home from Sunday eucharist.
The Anglican bishop of the Diocese of Benin, Church of Nigeria, was abducted at gunpoint from his home Jan. 24 after returning from a service of Holy Eucharist at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in the nation’s southern state of Edo, according to news reports.
Archbishop of Benin Diocese, Anglican Communion and Edo State Chairman of the Christians Association of Nigeria (CAN), Bishop Peter Imasuen, was yesterday abducted by unknown gunmen.
Imasuen was abducted in front of his official residence, Bishop Court, at Iyaro area in Benin City, at about 12:30p.m. while returning from church service.
House Republicans were keen Wednesday to find out why a report titled “Protecting the Force: Lessons from Fort Hood” fails to discuss Islamic extremism as a possible motive for Maj. Nidal Hasan’s attack in November, which killed 13 and wounded 43.
Frustrated by the Department of Defense’s description of the Fort Hood rampage as an “incident” by an “alleged perpetrator,” several members of the House Armed Services Committee wondered if political correctness is besting common sense as the US tries to understand the nature and strategy of its enemies.
Nigerian authorities have relaxed the 24-hour curfew in the central city of Jos, where fighting between Muslims and Christians has left hundreds dead.
Army chief Lt Col Shekari Galadima said he was satisfied the violence which began on Sunday had been halted.
Officials said easing the curfew would allow people to find food and water and those displaced to return home.
Eyewitnesses say the army is patrolling the streets and people are wary about venturing too far.
Three days of Muslim-Christian clashes in the Nigerian city of Jos have left around 300 people dead, clerics and a paramedic said Tuesday, as troops were deployed to control the unrest.
Authorities placed the central city under a 24-hour curfew amid reports of continuing armed clashes, with terrified residents saying they could hear gunshots and smoke was billowing from parts of the Plateau State capital.
Nigeria’s Vice President Goodluck Jonathan sent in troops and ordered security chiefs to “proceed to Jos immediately to assess the situation and advise on further steps,” his office said.
All flights to the city were suspended, aviation sources said.
There’s a certain irony in the fact that Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak traveled to Saudi Arabia, of all places, within 24 hours of his administration’s threat to use draconian measures to quell religious violence. His absence during a crisis is a mistake, as is his government’s approach to it so far.
The “Allah” scandal is the most serious domestic challenge the Najib government has yet faced in its nine months in office. Since a High Court ruling two weeks ago allowed Christians to use the word “Allah” in their Malay-language publications, radical Islamists have capitalized on the fraught climate to intimidate Malaysians and push their agenda. Yesterday saw the 11th in a spate of incidents, with Molotov cocktails, bricks and stones hurled against churches, a convent school, and even a Sikh temple. Lawyers representing Christian plaintiffs have found their offices ransacked. No perpetrators have yet been caught.
So far, the ruling United Malays National Organization is trying to tramp down the violence in any way it can””except the right way, which is to abandon the hardline Islamism that has traditionally appealed to its political base….
Another Christian church has been attacked in Malaysia – the ninth such incident since Friday.
No one was injured in the attack on an evangelical Christian church, but buildings were damaged by what appear to have been home-made petrol bombs.
In another case a church was vandalised with black paint.
The attacks appear to have been triggered by a High Court ruling last month that overturned a government ban on non-Muslims using the word “Allah”.
The Archbishop of Sudan accused China on Monday of pursuing a damaging policy of economic gain in his country and urged Beijing to use its influence to help ease rising tension ahead of elections.
Archbishop Daniel Deng said Beijing, which imported $6.3 billion (3.9 billion pounds) of Sudanese crude oil in 2008, should try to help bring together parties at loggerheads over the full implementation of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement, including the delivery of credible elections.
“China is looking only for minerals, they are looking for economic benefit. That is all. That is damaging the country. They are not even making peace,” the Anglican archbishop said during a visit to Lambeth Palace in London.
The number of Malaysian Christian churches hit by firebombs and vandal attacks has reached six following a court decision last week to allow Christians to use the term “Allah” in Malay language publications.
A Molotov cocktail was hurled at the Anglican All Saints Church in Taiping town in Perak state early yesterday, said state police chief Zulkifli Abdullah. He said the building was not damaged, The Australian reports.
Would-be arsonists in mostly Muslim Malaysia struck at a convent school and a sixth church on Sunday while church and government leaders called for calm in a row over Christians’ use of the word “Allah” to refer to God.
Attackers firebombed three churches in the southeast Asian nation of Malaysia overnight, assaults that come amid widespread Muslim ire over a court ruling that allowed Christians to use the word Allah as a term for God.
Malaysian news reports said no casualties have been reported, and police have promised to step up security for churches and other places of worship.
But the acts stirred unease in the diverse society — where 60 percent of the people are Muslim, 19 percent are Buddhist, 9 percent are Christian and 6 percent are Hindu.
“We regret the irresponsible actions of certain extremist elements for the recent spate of firebombs thrown into church premises. These actions display their immaturity and intolerance toward others within a multi-racial society,” the National Evangelical Christian Fellowship of Malaysia said in a statement.
The French government wants to pass a new law banning, what it calls, “psychological violence” between married couples or partners living together.
However, there are concerns about how such a crime could be proved.
David Chazan reports from Paris.
It’s almost unimaginable.
Fifteen years ago, Rwandans killed nearly 1 million of their own.
Today, the country’s economy is starting to pick up steam. Tourism has become the top industry. Residents acknowledge the genocide, but go about their business. Some live doors away from the person who killed their family members.
Contradictions pervade Rwanda as the government tries to pull off ambitious plans to modernize the nation with an eco-friendly economy. This country, where a collection of Iowans is investing expertise, money and passion, appears poised to become one of Africa’s great success stories, but the view on the ground shows it won’t be easy.
US Special Envoy Lt Gen Scott Gration has also vowed to make saving the CPA a top priority of the Obama administration. However, the “inter-ethnic violence currently witnessed across much of Southern Sudan, the ongoing violence against civilians in Darfur, and the violent attacks on civilians being perpetrated by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in the south-west of the country,” was destabilizing the region, the church warned.
The escalation of violence “will make registration and voting in the elections and referendum very difficult,” the church warned. “The conclusion that is drawn is that this violence is intended to negatively affect the elections and referendum,” it concluded.
After a gun-wielding 14-year-old killed his son Jason at the local high school, Anglican minister Dale Lang led a memorial service and publicly prayed for the killer and his family.
That was 10 years ago, and to this day, the Taber, Alta., resident continues to share his story and message of forgiveness.
Lang was in Toronto Nov. 20 for a restorative justice conference to speak about forgiveness as a means to break a cycle of violence.
“If I was still angry at that young man for taking the life of my son, I would be doing more damage to my wife, to my family and to myself,” Lang said.
“If you stay in that anger for any length of time, it will become like a prison, a place that’s very difficult to leave. When we choose to forgive, we can make the choice even though sometimes it’s incredibly difficult and sometimes it will take a while to get to the path of forgiveness.”
We, the Provincial Standing Committee of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan (ECS), met in Rumbek, Lakes State between 23rd and 27th November 2009, at the generous hospitality of the Diocese of Rumbek and the Government of Lakes State. We wish to give our heartfelt thanks to the Rt. Rev. Alapayo Manyang Kuctiel, Bishop of Rumbek, and H.E. Lt. Gen. Daniel Awet Akot, Governor of Lakes State, for their hosting of this great meeting and their exemplary hospitality for the entire week of the meeting. It has been an excellent opportunity for discussing issues of Church governance, management and structure; the expansion of Christianity in the Sudan, and the state of our great nation today, which we now bring to your attention.
The peace process in Sudan has reached a critical point. With less than five months before National Elections and just over one year to the referendum on southern self-determination, the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) is on the brink of collapse due to contentions over the referendum law, the demarcation of the 1st January 1956 borders, and violence recently perpetrated by other armed groups. We, the Provincial Standing Committee of the ECS affirm our role to act urgently to support the implementation of the CPA: through our internal Church networks, our ecumenical and inter-faith partners within Sudan and our international partner support.
Pending a series of legislative, Army, and Defense Department investigations into the rampage, the Obama administration has resisted the “terror” label. And one new poll shows slightly more Americans agreeing that the Fort Hood shooting was a “killing spree” rather than “an act of terrorism.”
But some US lawmakers see the terrorism analogy as fundamentally important to the inquiry ”” not just into Hasan’s motivations, but to national security generally in the Fort Hood aftermath.
At Senate hearings this week, some witnesses testified that “political correctness” undermined efforts to pinpoint Hasan and neutralize him before the shooting.
The echoes of a possible high-powered rapid fire weapon resounded several blocks from the gruesome scene of a deadly drive-by shooting at a home on the corner of Girardeau and McDaniel streets in Walterboro that left three dead, including a toddler and six others were wounded.
According to Colleton County Coroner Richard Harvey, Shaniyah Burden, 20 months old, died, as a result, of multiple gun shot wounds and was pronounced at 10:18 p.m. at Colleton Medical Center. Charles Kitrell, 45, died of multiple gun shot wounds and was pronounced at 10:25 p.m. at the incident scene. Christopher Powell, 21, died of multiple gun shot wounds and was pronounced at the Medical University of South Carolina.
The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division and the Walterboro Public Safety Department are investigating the violent killing.
According to witnesses, a crowd was gathered outside of a home on McDaniel Street playing cards when a dark-colored vehicle drove by and fired several gunshots at the people. Community members quickly galvanized in response to the ailing victims and were able to transport a few victims, including the Little Miss Shaniyah Burden to the hospital.
Read it all and note especially the pictures. looking at the 20 month old does me in–KSH.
Anrae Hamlin was riding with his cousin in February when two men jumped into the street with guns blazing. Hamlin took one bullet in the leg and another in the foot. As he bled, one of his friends was being buried across town, just days after another shooting.
Hamlin, 20, said he took to carrying a gun for protection and considered exacting some street justice of his own. He said he eventually calmed down and got rid of the gun, deciding it was best to let the law handle things. But he remains cautious when he ventures out in rural Colleton County, aware that tensions always are simmering just below the surface.
“People around here are crazy,” Hamlin said, shaking his head. “People treat guns like water pistols. They don’t think about it taking someone’s life.”
Ruby Kittrell was getting ready for work Monday night when a staccato burst crackled through the air — Pop! Pop! Pop! — like a string of a firecrackers going off.
Kittrell’s front door swung open as she ran toward the noise. A young man stumbled in, crying that he had been shot. Then she heard her daughter Aleshia screaming from outside, calling her baby’s name.
Kittrell raced outside and found her 20-month-old granddaughter, Shaniyah Burden, lying in the dirt. She turned the girl over. A bullet had torn through the toddler’s head. She lay motionless.
Around them, eight others lay wounded and bleeding from a drive-by shooting outside Kittrell’s low-slung bungalow at the corner of Gerideau and McDaniel streets. Three of the victims, including Shaniyah, didn’t make it. They died before the night was over.
Horrifying–read it all. Today’s local paper has a front page follow up story: Authorities ‘saturate’ Walterboro streets after rash of deadly shootings–read it as well.
What a surprise — that someone who shouts “Allahu Akbar” (the “God is great” jihadist battle cry) as he is shooting up a room of American soldiers might have Islamist motives. It certainly was a surprise to the mainstream media, which spent the weekend after the Fort Hood massacre playing down Nidal Hasan’s religious beliefs.
Twenty-seven blissful years of Army life later, last Thursday Martin was at the Soldier Readiness Center getting his final check before deploying to Iraq. He says the first moment he knew something was wrong was when he felt a sudden sharp pain in his arm.
“Then when it hit in my arm, I grabbed my arm and I realized, I ain’t never been hit that hard,” he says. “I said, ‘Golly, this hurts.’
“And then I looked at my hand, my hand was just covered in blood, but I was laying on the floor, and the floor was covered with blood, and in mind, I said, ‘I got to get out of this building.”