Author: Staff Writer

Source: BBC News

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7267100.stm

The largest survey to date of Muslims worldwide suggests the vast majority want Western democracy and freedoms, but do not want them to be imposed.

The poll by Gallup of more than 50,000 Muslims in 35 nations found most wanted the West to instead focus on changing its negative view of Muslims and Islam.

The huge survey began following the 11...

Author: Suna Erdem

Source: The Times

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article3448827.ece

Turkey's highest religious authority is preparing to publish a groundbreaking guide to Islam for the modern world, putting the words of the Prophet Muhammad into context for a sweeping reinterpretation of the religion.

The Presidency of Religious Affairs in this Muslim, but strongly secular, country has commissioned a...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: The Age/AAP

[news.theage.com.au/brisbane-airport-defends-headgear-search/20080226-1uv1.html]

Brisbane Airport has defended the action of security officers when they demanded 13 Sikh community members remove their turbans and a woman take off her face veil.

The search on Saturday caused a bottleneck at a security checkpoint and delayed at least one international flight, The Courier-Mail newspaper reported.

Brisbane Airport spokesman Jim Carden said it was...

Author: Roger Hardy

Source: BBC News

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7264810.stm

The European Union has criticised the new penal code being drafted in Iran, particularly a section that imposes the death penalty for giving up Islam.

The EU said this section and other parts of the code violated Tehran's commitments under international human rights conventions.

Death for apostasy already exists in Iran under Sharia - or...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: Haaretz/DPA

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/957818.html

The Darul-Uloom Deoband in India, considered the most influential school for Islamic law in Asia, on Monday denounced terrorism as being against the teachings of Islam and said it was likely to impose a fatwa against it during a conference of clerics from India and abroad, media reports said.

The head of the powerful seminary, Maulana Marghoobur Rahman,...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: Reuters

http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCAL2587372420080225

Vowing "Revenge against Crusaders who attack the symbol of Islam," dozens of Jordanian Islamists burned the Danish flag on Monday to protest the reprinting of cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammad in Danish newspapers.

The Islamic Action Front, Jordan's main licensed opposition party and the political offshoot of the Muslim...

Author: Suleiman al-Khalidi

Source: Reuters

http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCAL2587372420080225

Vowing "Revenge against Crusaders who attack the symbol of Islam," dozens of Jordanian Islamists burned the Danish flag on Monday to protest the reprinting of cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammad in Danish newspapers.

The Islamic Action Front, Jordan's main licensed opposition party and the political offshoot of the Muslim...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: The Christian Science Monitor/AP and Agence France-Presse

http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0225/p04s03-wosc.html

Pakistan has ordered all Internet service providers to block the YouTube website for containing "blasphemous" content and material considered offensive to Islam, officials said Sunday.

An inter-ministerial committee has decided to block YouTube because it contained "blasphemous content, videos and...

Author: Don Lajoie

Source: Windsor Star

http://www.canada.com/windsorstar/news/story.html?id=4b8872a4-043c-435e-9e34-e6a92f7b4871

Hundreds of members of Windsor's Shiite Muslim community marched Sunday in the name of freedom and justice to mark the martyrdom of their founding religious leader, Imam Hussain, 1,400 years ago.

The procession, which began at the An-Noor Islamic School at 1480 Janette Ave....

Author: IMRAN GHORI

Source: The Press-Enterprise

http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_D_scarf26.3e7c803.html

A lawsuit accusing San Bernardino County of violating a Rialto Muslim woman's rights by forcing her to remove her headscarf was allowed to proceed by a federal judge Monday.

U.S. District Court Judge Virginia Phillips denied a motion by the county's attorneys seeking to have part of the...

Author: Ruth Gledhill

Source: The Times

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article3426682.ece

Muslim leaders from around the world will tomorrow issue a statement to the world's Jewish Community in "a call for positive and constructive action that aims to improve Muslim - Jewish relations."

In the letter, which has emerged from the Muslim-Jewish study centre at the Woolf Institute of Abrahamic Faiths in Cambridge,...

Author: Jonathan Wynne-Jones

Source: The Telegraph

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/24/nchurch124.xml

In his first interview since his controversial comments, Dr Michael Nazir-Ali vows not to be forced into silence.

The Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, who received death threats for airing his views on Islamic issues, has vowed that he will continue to speak out.

His claim that...

Author: LARRY MITCHELL

Source: ChicoER

http://www.chicoer.com/news/ci_8349753

Ishmael Khaldi hasn't done what was expected, but one day he will.

The expectation -- of his family and culture -- was that once he got an education, he'd return to his village in northern Israel, get married and raise a family.

Instead, Khaldi, 36, is still single and traveling the world as an Israeli diplomat.

He was in Chico Friday, speaking to a...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: Gulf Daily News

Author: AMBIKA AHUJA

Source: Fox News

Wire Service: AP

http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2008Feb23/0,4670,ThailandUnderSiege,00.html

The tea shop is abandoned. Rubber plantations stand untended. Soldiers constantly patrol the one-lane road leading into this Muslim village.

Rae Poh was once designated a "green zone" village, one of more than 1,600 such islands of peace amid the violence that...