New York, U.S.A. – The first worldwide counter-jihad initiative will begin August 4 with the First Annual Global Counter Jihad rally in Stockholm, Sweden. Representatives from Stop Islamization of Nations (SION), Stop Islamization of America (SIOA), Stop Islamisation of Europe (SIOE), the English Defense League (EDL), and allied groups will speak.

The Global Counter Jihad rally will feature the president of SION and executive director of SIOA, Pamela Geller, as well as SION Vice President and SIOA associate director Robert Spencer. Also speaking will be the EDL’s Tommy Robinson, SIOE’s Anders Gravers, and other worldwide leaders from official Stop Islamization and Defence League groups.

“The conference,” said Geller in a statement, “heralds the launch of a worldwide counter jihad alliance. Freedom fighters from Europe and America, as well as India, Israel, and other areas threatened by jihad, will at last be working together and forming a common defense of freedom and human rights.”

Stockholm was chosen for the Global Counter Jihad rally because of the actions of an Iraqi-born Swedish citizen, Taimour Abdulwahab al-Abdaly, who traveled to central Stockholm on December 11, 2010 in order to commit mass murder in revenge for Sweden’s “silence” over cartoons of Islam’s founder and the presence of Swedish troops in Afghanistan. Al-Abdaly succeeded only in killing himself, but his jihad plot is particularly noteworthy because he turned to jihad violence and hatred in England, at the Luton Islamic Centre.

EDL leader Tommy Robinson explained in a statement: “We are ashamed that the people of Stockholm had to suffer the horror of a terrorist attack in their city because we as a country have been unable to even truly acknowledge the extent of the threat posed by Islamic extremism, let alone combat it. We have a responsibility to ensure that our country can never again be the birthplace for terrorism. We owe that much to the people of Stockholm, to our friends in Europe and across the world, and to our children. This is why the English Defense League will be attending the First Annual Global Counter Jihad rally in Stockholm on August 4, along with Pamela Geller, Robert Spencer, and Anders Gravers.”

Robinson added: “We must also look at the other forms of extremism commonly associated with Islam, including but not limited to the oppression of Muslim women, the predominance of Muslim men in child grooming cases, and the seditious ideology of Sharia Law. Of course, we must always be careful to distinguish fair-minded criticism from simple prejudice. But that does not mean that we should equate disdain for Islam as an ideology (both political and theological) with hatred of individual Muslims. It is certainly true that there many decent Muslims – no one is questioning that. But that does not mean that the problems that give root to Islamic extremists can be understood in isolation from mainstream Islamic thought or practice.”

Security will be high, so as to prevent what has happened at previous free speech demonstrations inEurope: at one, the display of an innocuous cartoon of Muhammad resulted in devout Muslims rioting, attacking and stabbing police. “It is time to stand against this encroaching tyranny and defend free speech and free people,” stated Geller.

The First Annual Global Counter Jihad rally claims that they stand for several things. The freedom of speech – as opposed to Islamic prohibitions of “blasphemy” and “slander,” which are used effectively to quash honest discussion of jihad and Islamic supremacy. The freedom of conscience – as opposed to the Islamic death penalty for apostasy. They also claim to stand for the equality of rights of all people before the law – as opposed to Sharia’s institutionalized discrimination against women and non-Muslims.

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For years, women world-wide have been fighting for their rights and to have equality with their male counterparts. While some nations have progressed much more rapidly for the equality of women, other nations are still struggling to give women the rights and freedom that men have.

According to the dailybeast.com, “in the last year, Denmark elected a female prime minister, Brazil elected a female president and a female took the helm of the International Monetary Fund. In the last decade, Ethiopia passed the most progressive abortion laws in Africa to combat unsafe abortion rates and Mali passed a law that says women are not required to obey their husbands.

It seems the state of women’s rights and freedoms worldwide are perhaps better than ever before. But, large and sobering discrepancies remain. Women aren’t allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia, are subject to genital mutilation in Mali and are killed for honor in Pakistan.”

Another country, which is considered one of the worst to live in for women, is Turkey. Their rights are extremely limited. But for Turkish women, things might start looking up for those who have succumbed to inequality for decades. According to the United Press International (UPI), “the European Parliament (EP) recently adopted a report urging Turkey to follow up on its recent work toward securing gender equality and women’s rights.”

The report, written by Socialists & Democrats Member of European Parliament Emine Bozkurt, lays out a series of goals for Ankara, Turkey’s capitol, to accomplish by 2020 in raising the status of women to fully equal members of Turkish society as Brussels and Ankara seek to breathe life into the country’s stalled European Union (EU) accession bid.

Bozkurt, the EP’s rapporteur on women’s rights in Turkey, discussed the passage of the report and named it, “A 2020 Perspective for Women in Turkey” which is meant to ensure that the European Commission keeps the issue of women’s rights and domestic violence in the forefront of its efforts to promote a “positive agenda.” Also, the report “stresses that there can be no democracy without women and that women should be treated as individuals rather than just as family members or as mothers.”

While ministries are working toward gender equality in Turkey, many problems remain.

According to the report, Turkey’s new law against domestic violence “lacks a mechanism which immediately removes [alleged perpetrators] from the vicinity of the woman who has been subjected to violence.” Stefan Fule, the European Commissioner for Enlargement, believes Turkey still has a long way to go and that several inequalities still need to be addressed.

Fule says, “On women’s rights, every step needs to be taken to implement the recent law on violence against women, also, to improve the situation on the ground of women in Turkey as regards education, employment and political representation.”

Image Courtesy of  homeros / Shutterstock.com

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Bankruptcy attorney William Brewer, president of the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys (NACBA), which is the only national organization dedicated to serving the needs of consumer bankruptcy attorneys and protecting the rights of consumer debtors in bankruptcy, issued the following statement:

“The National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys has always favored a direct and unflinching examination of the bankruptcy process in America.  We believe in fair play and have no reservations whatsoever about having tough questions posed about the practices of debtors’ attorneys.  It is our view that bankruptcy is simply too important a process in the lives of Americans facing their darkest hours to allow any party – creditors, trustees or consumer legal advocates – to escape scrutiny.

That is why one of NACBA’s board members was a key player in the new study that examines the impact of ethnicity on bankruptcy filings.  We believe that this study is an important start – a much-needed first look – illuminating the path needed for further research.  If the necessary fuller research indicates that there is, indeed, an unfair disparity in how Americans are handled in bankruptcy, NACBA will be the first party in line to propose necessary changes remedy any such imbalance.

In the mean time, we believe it is important to underscore the findings of the researchers that there is no evidence that racism plays any part here.  We can vouch for the fact that bankruptcy attorneys, who deal each year with hundreds of thousands of American families of all races, colors and creeds, are in fact the first-line defenders for Americans who have been unemployed for long periods of time, crushed by crippling health care bills, trapped in the foreclosure crisis, or otherwise fallen on hard times.

Even without the more detailed research needed to resolve this issue, consumer bankruptcy attorneys have no intention of sitting by idly.  NACBA’s Board of Directors will address  this issue at its next and subsequent board meetings, for the purpose of recommending  any needed reforms, guidelines, or attorney practice changes that are warranted.  Additionally, we expect to explore it fully at our next membership meeting in April in San Antonio, TX, where a special panel and full-group discussion will be held.

It also is our intention to reach out to and confer with our many friends in organizations representing Americans of color.  We have spent many long years working closely with these organizations to ensure that bankruptcy is fairer.  They know who we are and what is in our hearts when it comes to fairness and equality for all Americans.

In short, we will simply not rest on this question until we know all the facts and until we have taken every possible step to remedy whatever imbalance may exist.”

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The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has called on Mayor Richard Meehan of Ocean City, Md., to reconsider his speaking invitation to retired Lieutenant General William G. “Jerry” Boykin, who believes that “[Islam] should not be protected under the First Amendment” and that there should be “no mosques in America.” Boykin is scheduled to speak at the Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast on January 26.

In a letter he emailed to Mayor Meehan, CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper wrote in part:

“We question the appropriateness of this choice for an official event, given Boykin’s long, shameful history of extreme and bigoted views. . . It will be a discredit to your office and a disservice to the citizens of Ocean City if such a man is allowed to spread his divisive falsehoods and prejudiced ideas at a government-sponsored function.

“We respectfully ask whether any taxpayer funds are being spent on this year’s Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast, and how your office plans to address the appearance of an official endorsement of Boykin’s extremist views. We ask that you reconsider inviting him, given that the biased ideas he espouses — though protected by the First Amendment — should be repudiated, not given a legitimizing platform.”

Boykin’s views came under scrutiny in 2003 when media reports revealed that in a public discussion of his efforts to capture a Muslim Somali warlord, Boykin said: “I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol.” Speaking in uniform, the general said America’s “spiritual enemy. . .will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus.”

Since then, Boykin has continued to openly attack Islam and portray Muslims as a “threat,” even stating that there can be no interfaith dialogue or cooperation between Muslims and Christians. In September 2011, Boykin declared on the radio show Focal Point that there should be “no mosques in America.”

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