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Latest Updates: the new mccarthyism RSS

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  johnpi 3:52 pm on December 19, 2009 | 0 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: conspiracy theories (24), Muslim persecution (19), Pakistan (570), pakistani american (2), persecution (17), the new mccarthyism

  Americans of Pakistani descent in Pakistan: Villianous agents and saboteurs working for the American government.

  Pakistan’s answer to Sarah Palin, a legislator with the right-wing PML-Q party named Marvi Memon, is sweeping up all US nationals into her accusation that ‘America is exporting terror to Pakistan.’ She makes the wild conspiracy theory claim that US nationals “caught planning terror attacks along with al-Qaeda” are somehow agents of the US government.

  Memon made the accusation on Monday and then demanded that the list of all 9,236 visas given to Americans in the last four months be handed up to the parliament for review. She also wants details for herself and her fellow pols “of where each US citizen was ’stationed’ and for what purpose.” It’s likely that the majority of those on that list will be Pakistani Americans who visited family or who have other established ties to the country.

  There can be little doubt that such a list will be used for Joe McCarthy-style demagoguery (“I have a list!“) as Memon and her like-minded politicians deputize themselves to police US nationals.

  So now in addition to concerns about facing unjust prejudice in America over their Pakistani background, Pakistani-Americans may now be put upon in Pakistan for their US background.

   

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  johnpi 10:16 am on November 20, 2009 | 1 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: anwar al-awlaki (25), ex-islamists (3), hizb-ut-tahrir (32), Inayat Bunglawala (4), islamism (44), Islamists (47), shiraz maher (5), the new mccarthyism

  Inayat Bunglawala says the Nidal Hasan attack and Hasan’s relationship with Anwar al-Awlaki are being used to press a new ‘witch-hunt’ against UK Islamic organizations and Muslim leaders.

  …it should be made clear that those same Muslim organizations that had in the past invited Al-Awlaki to the UK are horrified by his more recent extremism and are well aware of the damaging impact his views could now have on British Muslims. Following Al-Awlaki’s praise for the Fort Hood suspect, some of these UK Muslim organizations (including the Islamic Society of Britain and the Jam`iat Ihyaa’ Minhaaj Al-Sunnah) issued public statements disavowing his latest comments.

  However, this was not enough for the new McCarthyists. A group of them — including the Centre for Social Cohesion (whose director, Douglas Murray, advocated in 2006 that “conditions for Muslims in Europe must be made harder across the board”), Shiraz Maher from Policy Exchange, and the pro-Israel blog Harry’s Place — have not been slow in seeking to smear those Islamic organizations that had invited Al-Awlaki to the UK in the past.

  These new McCarthyists must be firmly resisted.

  Former Hizb ut-Tahrir member-turned-anti-’Islamism’ activist Shiraz Maher responds here.

   
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  johnpi 5:23 pm on October 23, 2009 | 0 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: 'Muslim spies' (12), islamophobia (228), the new mccarthyism, US congress (4)

  87-member congressional minority caucus: Muslim ‘intern spy’ hunt smacks of McCarthy era.

  Full statement:

  Four of our colleagues, Reps. John Shadegg (AZ), Paul Broun (GA), Trent Franks (AZ) and Sue Myrick (NC) recently requested that the House Sergeant at Arms to launch an investigation of the civil rights group CAIR, or Council on American-Islamic Relations, to determine whether it was placing staff and interns in key Congressional offices who they fear are acting as “spies.”
  This proposed investigation coincides with the launch of a book by Dave Gaubatz, an anti-Islamic activist and author of the book “Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld that’s Conspiring to Islamize America.” It features an introduction by Rep. Myrick, and was written after Gaubatz posed as an intern at CAIR in an effort to “infiltrate” the group.

  These charges smack of an America of sixty years ago where lists of “un-American” agitators were identified. We should be affirming the importance of diversity and tolerance for all interns and staff who serve in Congress without suspicion of being identified as “spies.”

  The idea that we should investigate Muslim interns as spies is a blow to the very principle of religious freedom that our founding fathers cherished so dearly. If anything, we should be encouraging all Americans to engage in the U.S. political process; to take part in, and to contribute to, the great democratic experiment that is America.

  We all have experienced the sting of discrimination and we know that there will be challenges ahead. But our message should be firm that the America we believe in welcomes people of all backgrounds to the U.S. Congress.

  We ask these charges be disavowed and we issue a hearty welcome to interns and staff of all creeds, color, ethnicities and sexual orientation.

   
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  thabet 8:34 am on August 8, 2008 | 3 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: islamophobia (228), jafis (22), oh my God it's a muslim (6), right-wing (96), the new mccarthyism, united states (578)

  In the United States a small but increasingly vocal group of people believe that members of the country’s Muslim community are working from within to turn America into an Islamic state. This group of right wing thinkers believe this so-called ‘Soft Jihad’ is being carried out in schools, universities and other institutions across the country and they want to put a stop to it. In Assignment, Pascale Harter travels to America to find out how this fear is finding a foothold in public opinion there and hears from some of those accused of being the ’soft jihadists’.

  Listen from the BBC World Service.