Is tolerance for each others’ beliefs too much to ask?
The Daily Star — After two years of legal wrangling, a 12,000-square-foot mosque opened Aug. 10 in Murfreesboro, Tenn., a city that has 104,000 people and 140 churches but only […]
Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, has died aged 82.
His family said they were “heartbroken” by his death and called him “a reluctant American hero who always believed he was just doing his job.” They said he died from […]
Family Tree of Languages Has Roots in Anatolia, Biologists Say
NY Times: Biologists using tools developed for drawing evolutionary family trees say that they have solved a longstanding problem in archaeology: the origin of the Indo-European family of languages. Multimedia […]
On foot, obey your signals and forget the cellphone
Source: Wheels.ca There have been 14 pedestrians killed in Toronto this year. Drivers must drive safely, but pedestrians need to behave responsibly, too. If you are walking and have the right-of-way, you need to think about what could happen to you if you are hit by a car. Keep […]
Lance Armstrong stripped of Tour de France titles by USADA
Source: CBC News The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency erased 14 years of Lance Armstrong’s career Friday — including his record seven Tour de France titles — and banned him for life from the sport that made him a hero to millions of cancer survivors after concluding he used banned substances. USADA said it […]
US weighs dire scenarios to secure Syria’s WMD
Credit: TOI WASHINGTON: US military planners are studying contingency plans for a potential mission in Syria without precedent — securing the regime’s chemical weapons in the midst of a raging civil war, officials and experts said. No military action is imminent at the moment, according to officials, but the Pentagon […]
Opinions – Why intruding on another Muslim country is ill-advised
By Henri J. Barkey, WASHINGTON POST Henri J. Barkey is a professor of international relations at Lehigh University. Calls for a U.S. military intervention in Syria have dominated the conversation in conventional and social media. Two simple and effective arguments are being advanced. The first, and most compelling, is that […]
British Columbia commissionaire suspended for allegedly posting anti-Muslim Facebook comments
A commissionaire who allegedly posted anti-Muslim comments on Facebook suggesting the Masjid AlIman Mosque on Quadra Street should be blasted with a rocket launcher has been suspended with pay, the Canadian Corps of Commissionaires said Monday. The controversial comments, posted Thursday by Facebook user Dan Speed on the I Love […]
Realpolitik blurs US red line on Syria
Credit: Asia Times. Weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) are back. It’s like we never left Dubya’s glory days. No, they didn’t find the non-existent Saddam stash on eBay. This is about the existent Bashar al-Assad’s. And it’s not WMDs as the pretext for an invasion and occupation, but WMDs as […]
Anti-Islam Ads Remixed in San Francisco and New York
NY Times Blog: As my colleague Benjamin Weiser reported last month, a federal judge in Manhattan ruled that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority had violated the First Amendment rights of a pro-Israel group […]
Machu Picchu: Peru unveils plans for new airport
Source: BBC Peru’s President Ollanta Humala has unveiled plans for a new airport near Cusco which he says will boost tourism to the Inca ruins of Machu Picchu and the […]
Spying on New York Muslims Yields No Leads
Peter Fedynsky August 22, 2012 VOA NEW YORK — A senior New York Police Department official says that spying on the city’s Muslim community has not yielded a single criminal lead. Some Muslim targets of surveillance feel vindicated. Surveillance of the Muslim community by the NYPD’s secret Demographics Unit for […]
The Future of Religious Minorities in the Muslim World
Imam Mohamed Magid President, Islamic Society of North America HUFFINGTON POST As an imam and as the president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), I know all too well the many challenges that American Muslims experience on a daily basis. We struggle for inclusion, for acceptance, and many […]
Top U.S. general’s aircraft damaged by rockets in Afghanistan
By Rob Taylor SWISSINFO.CH KABUL (Reuters) – Insurgents fired two rockets at the main NATO airbase in Afghanistan, damaging an aircraft used by U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Martin Dempsey, a NATO spokesman said on Tuesday. The general was not on board at the time. Dempsey arrived in the […]
Obama deeply concerned over Afghan ‘insider attacks’
Credit: ET There have been 32 insider attacks so far this year involving 36 shooters that have led to 40 coalition deaths. PHOTO: AFP/FILE WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama on Monday said the United States needed to do more to safeguard US troops after a spate of Afghan “insider” attacks that have […]
The Catholic Church in America: Earthly Concerns: A Financial Audit by The Economist
Source The Economist: The Economist estimates that annual spending by the church and entities owned by the church was around $170 billion in 2010 (the church does not release such figures). […]
Why Women, Children And Americans Are More Likely To Believe In God
Businessinsider.com: University College London professor emeritus of genetics Steve Jonesexplains why men, scientists, professors and the British are less likely to believe in God than women, children and Americans. Here in […]
Blasphemy-accused girl: US finds case ‘deeply disturbing’
Credit: ET Urges Pakistani government to protect religious minorities, women and girls. PHOTO: AFP/FILE WASHINGTION: US State Department says the case of an 11-year-old girl arrested in Pakistan on charges of blasphemy is “deeply disturbing.” According to a transcript of the press briefing, State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland said that they […]
Bargaining intensifies over Iran strike
Source: Asia Times. So heated and so public has become the debate over whether Israel would and should attack Iran in the fall that the editor-in-chief of the Israeli daily Ha’aretz remarked sarcastically in an editorial: “[Israeli Prime Minister] Benjamin Netanyahu and [Defense Minister] Ehud Barak deserve a medal for […]
Laughter is the Best Medicine: A School Teacher Arrested
A public school teacher was arrested today at John F. Kennedy International airport as she attempted to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a compass, a slide-rule and a calculator. Attorney General Eric Holder said he believes she is a member of the notorious Al-Gebra […]