Algerian Village Ousts Salafist Imam

ALL AFRICA: Algiers — Residents of the Tizi Ouzou town of Imzizou just rallied for the removal a controversial salafist imam.

Algerians from several surrounding villages joined in the protest at the Fréha government administration site on Thursday (July 11th), claiming that the imam did not abide by their traditions and was trying to impose salafist practices.

According to local resident Hadj Ibrahim, citizens were outraged because the imam "had refused to conduct the usual and traditional funeral ceremony when a villager died, on the pretext that it was a bida'a (innovation)".

"This imam was already known for his salafist ideology," Ibrahim added. "He tried to impose it on the villagers several times."

The authorities responded quickly to the civil protest. The Ministry of Religious Affairs issued an order for the imam to be transferred elsewhere. But this did not appease the villagers, who said the problem was bigger than just their town.

"We are appalled not by this imam but by salafist ideology, which poses a threat to our society." Imzizou resident Hadj Mansour told Magahrebia.

"What is not good for our village is bad for the whole of Algeria", Mansour said. » | Fidet Mansour | Thursday, July 18, 2013

How Tunisia is Turning Into a Salafist Battleground
THE ATLANTIC: An interview with a professor who was attacked for standing up for secularism.

After a trial lasting more than a year, on May 2 Habib Kazdaghli, dean of the faculty of letters, arts, and humanities at the University of Manouba, outside Tunis, was acquitted of charges that he slapped a veiled female student. He had faced a five-year jail term. Instead, the court found guilty the two women who had invaded Kazdaghli's office and thrown his books and papers on the floor. The women claimed to be protesting their suspension from the university for refusing to remove their full-face coverings, known as niqabs, during class lectures and exams.

The court sentenced the women to suspended four-month and two-month jail sentences for damaging property and interfering with a public servant carrying out his duties. Their lawyer said the women would appeal, and Tunisia's minister of higher education -- overruling Kazdaghli and setting him up for another round of conflict -- announced that veiled students would be allowed to take their final exams.

The Kazdaghli affair, a cause célèbre with more than 230,000 Google results, is part of a larger struggle for power in post-revolutionary Tunisia. After the uprising that toppled dictator Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011 -- sparking the onset of the Arab Spring -- the University of Manouba became a battleground between fundamentalist Muslims intent on turning Tunisia into an Islamic state and secular forces trying to maintain the country's existing constitutional rights and legal system.

Closed for almost two months in the spring of 2012, the University was rocked by strikes and pitched battles between progressive students and the ultra-conservative Sunni Muslims known as salafists. The lobby in Kazdaghli's building was turned into a prayer room. Protesters camped in front of his door for a month. "This was meant to intimidate me, but also to catch me in a kind of trap," says Kazdaghli. "You are not supposed to walk through a room where someone is praying." So every time he entered or left his office, Kazdaghli was demonstrating his lack of faith. » | Thomas A. Bass | Thursday, June 20, 2013

Intelligence Report: Number of Islamists in Germany Grows
SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: In its annual report on extremist activity in Germany, the country's domestic intelligence agency has identified a surge in support for Islamists and growth in the number of influential neo-Nazi music groups.

During the past year, Islamist organizations experienced a surge in support in Germany according to an annual report from the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution obtained by SPIEGEL in advance of its planned public release on Tuesday.

The report states that the number of members and supporters of groups like Milli Görüs, the largest Islamist organization in the country, or Hezbollah in Germany rose from 38,080 in 2011 to 42,550 last year.

The largest growth was seen among members and supporters of Salafists, which increased from 3,800 to 4,500, the government agency stated. Last year, German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich of the conservative Christian Social Union moved to ban three Salafist groups. » | dsl/SPIEGEL | Monday, June 10, 2013

Verwandt »

Tunisian Salafi Cleric Khamis Mejri Rejects Democracy and Praises Bin Laden | Hannibal TV (Tunisia) - December 2, 2012 - May 26, 2013

Tunisian Salafist Kamel Zarouq Talks about Future Conquest of Andalusia, Rome, and Jerusalem | The Internet - April 30, 2013

“Hijab or Hell,” Say Egypt Salafists in Alexandria
BIKYA NEWS: Egyptian female students are now faced with threats of “going to Hell” if they continue to wear pants at an Alexandria university, north of Cairo, the New Women Foundation reported, citing a news article published by al-Youm al-Saba’a online website.

Female students were surprised to see threatening literature calling on them to abandon the “manly” look and go back to a more “Islamic way of dress.”

Although the majority of Egyptian women wear the head scarf, ultra-conservatives still complain about women’s attire and try, at every available chance, to limit women’s freedom in the country.

“Know women that it is either the hijab or Hell. Why do you refuse your God’s orders?” read one pamphlet. » | Manar Ammar | Sunday, March 31, 2013

Salafism On Rise in North Africa: Algeria Moves to Stem Imported Religious Ideas
MIDDLE EAST ONLINE: Algerian authorities give all-clear for union of imams to protect country's moderate form of Islam from teachings of hardline Salafists.

Algerian authorities have given the all-clear for a union of imams to protect the country's traditionally moderate form of Islam from the teachings of hardline Salafists whose influence is on the rise in North Africa.

The move comes two months after an Al-Qaeda-linked attack on a desert gas plant, where 37 foreign hostages were killed during a siege and army rescue operation, and amid fears of jihadist groups gaining ground in neighbouring Tunisia.

The union's "mission will be to defend the material and moral rights of the imams and to act as a bulwark against imported religious ideas, Salafist or other," its secretary general Sheikh Djelloul Hadjimi said.

The preacher of El Ouarthilani mosque, in the Telemly district of the capital Algiers, welcomes his followers over tea and dates, some of them seeking a fatwa, or religious edict, others asking for advice or material assistance.

He says he is used to receiving people suffering from psychological afflictions, including young people who have tried to commit suicide.

But since the union was officially announced in mid-March, he has struggled to cope with his daily agenda and the phone hasn't stopped ringing.

Sheikh Hadjimi has said that the bulk of the union's work must be focused on Algiers, "where a large majority of the mosques are hostage to Salafist imams." » | Abdelhafid Daamache | ALGIERS | Sunday, March 31, 2013

Germany vs. Radical Islamists
GATESTONE INSTITUTE: More recently, Salafists have issued death threats against German politicians, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel. "The groups aim to change our society in an aggressive belligerent way so that democracy would be replaced by a Salafist system, and the rule of law replaced by Sharia law." — Hans-Peter Friedrich, Ministry of the Interior, Germany

Germany has banned three ultra-conservative Salafist Muslim groups which the Interior Ministry says want to overturn democracy and install a system based on Islamic Sharia law.

The ban, which took effect in the western German states of Hessen and North Rhine-Westphalia on March 13, comes amid Islamist death threats against German politicians -- and just days after German intelligence announced that the number of Salafists in Germany has jumped over the past year.

The Interior Ministry said that it had banned the groups "DawaFFM" and "Islamische Audios," as well as "An-Nussrah," which is part of the "Millatu Ibrahim" group that was outlawed in June 2012.

In an effort to enforce the ban, hundreds of German police officers raided the homes of radical Islamists in Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Gladbeck and Solingen, and seized computers, cellphones and electronic storage devices, as well as money, documents and Islamic propaganda videos in Arabic and in German.

German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said: "Salafism, as represented in the associations that were banned today, is incompatible with our free democratic order. The groups aim to change our society in an aggressive, belligerent way so that democracy would be replaced by a Salafist system, and the rule of law replaced by Sharia law."

Salafism is a branch of radical Islam based in Saudi Arabia that seeks to establish an Islamic empire (Caliphate) across the Middle East, North Africa and Europe -- and eventually the entire world. The Caliphate would be governed exclusively by Islamic Sharia law, which would apply both to Muslims and to non-Muslims.

Also known as Wahhabis, Salafists believe -- among other anti-Western doctrines -- that democracy must be destroyed and replaced with an Islamic form of government.

Hans-Georg Maaßen, the head of Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (BfV), told the German newsmagazine Focus on March 10 that the number of committed Salafists in Germany had grown to 4,500 in 2012, compared with 3,800 in 2011.

Although Salafists make up only a fraction of the estimated 4.3 million Muslims in Germany, authorities are concerned that most of those attracted to Salafi ideology are impressionable young Muslims who are especially susceptible to committing suicide attacks in the name of Islam. » | Soeren Kern | Friday, March 15, 2013

Related »

Murder Plot: Germany Cracks Down on Salafists
SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: Islamist extremist in Germany are under scrutiny once again after raids on members of Salafist groups coincided on Wednesday with the foiling of a suspected murder plot by individuals linked to the movement. One senior politician wants to make it easier to deport radicals.

Following police raids of Salafist groups on Wednesday in the German state of North-Rhine Westphalia, in addition to the foiling of an apparent Salafist plot to attack senior members of the regional, right-wing populist party Pro-NRW, German conservatives are demanding further action against the Islamist extremists.

Wolfgang Bosbach, a senior member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) and the party's domestic policy expert in parliament, would like to make it easier to deport religious extremists. "It is incomprehensible why the deportation law applies only to politically motivated perpetrators of violence and not for religiously motivated fanatics," he said in an interview with the daily Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung, published on Thursday.

Because many of the Salafists in question are also German citizens, he also demanded that more be done to investigate and, where necessary, prosecute extremists.

The call came a day after police arrested four Islamists who were allegedly planning an attack on Markus Beisicht, head of Pro-NRW, in Leverkusen. Two of those taken into custody were seized near Beisicht's home, where they were apparently performing reconnaissance in preparation for an assault. A third was arrested in Bonn, where police also found a firearm and explosive material. The fourth suspect was arrested in Essen. Three of the suspects hold German passports while the fourth is Albanian, according to the public prosecutor's office in Dortmund. » | cgh -- with wire reports | Thursday, March 14, 2013

Related »

Germany Bans Three Salafist Groups as Anti-democratic
THE STAR ONLINE: BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany on Wednesday banned three ultra-conservative Salafist Muslim groups which the Interior Ministry said wanted to overturn democracy and install a system based on sharia, or Islamic law.

The ban, which took effect in the western states of Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia in the early morning, is the latest step taken by German authorities who have increased surveillance of Salafists who espouse a radical version of Islam.

The ministry said it has banned the organisations "DawaFFM" and "Islamische Audios", as well as "An-Nussrah", which is part of the "Millatu Ibrahim" group that was outlawed in June.

Some 20 people were searched and assets belonging to the organisations were seized, said the ministry.

"Salafism, as represented in the associations that were banned today, is incompatible with our free democratic order," Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said in a statement. » | Reporting by Madeline Chambers; Editing by Kevin Liffey | Wednesday, March 13, 2013

DIE WELT: Großrazzia gegen Salafisten-Vereine: Hunderte Polizisten sind in Nordrhein-Westfalen und Hessen zu Razzien gegen Salafisten ausgerückt. Sie sollen das Vermögen zweier Vereine beschlagnahmen, die Innenminister Friedrich verboten hatte. » | AFP/dpa/jw/ff | Mittwoch, 13. März 2013

Violent Tide of Salafism Threatens the Arab Spring
THE OBSERVER: A series of repressive dictatorships have been brought down in north Africa, but the ensuing struggles for power have left a vacuum that has allowed the rise of an extremist movement that is gathering both force and supporters

Late last year, largely unnoticed in the west, Tunisia's president, Moncef Marzouki, gave an interview to Chatham House's The World Today. Commenting on a recent attack by Salafists – ultra-conservative Sunnis – on the US embassy in Tunis, he remarked in an unguarded moment: "We didn't realise how dangerous and violent these Salafists could be … They are a tiny minority within a tiny minority. They don't represent society or the state. They cannot be a real danger to society or government, but they can be very harmful to the image of the government."

It appears that Marzouki was wrong. Following the assassination of opposition leader Chokri Belaid last Wednesday – which plunged the country into its biggest crisis since the 2011 Jasmine Revolution – the destabilising threat of violent Islamist extremists has emerged as a pressing and dangerous issue.

Violent Salafists are one of two groups under suspicion for Belaid's murder. The other is the shadowy, so-called neighbourhood protection group known as the Leagues of the Protection of the Revolution, a small contingent that claims to be against remnants of the old regime, but which is accused of using thugs to stir clashes at opposition rallies and trade union gatherings.

The left accuses these groups of affiliation with the ruling moderate Islamist party, Ennahda, and say it has failed to root out the violence. The party denies any link or control to the groups. But it is the rise of Salafist-associated political violence that is causing the most concern in the region. Banned in Tunisia under the 23-year regime of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, which ruthlessly cracked down on all forms of Islamism, Salafists in Tunisia have become increasingly vocal since the 2011 revolution. » | Angelique Chrisafis, Patrick Kingsley and Peter Beaumont | Saturday, February 09, 2013

Daring to Believe - Tunisia

Egyptian Teacher 'Cut Hair of Schoolgirls Who Refused to Cover Heads'
THE GUARDIAN: Teacher in Luxor province accused of punishing two pupils for not wearing Muslim headscarf

A teacher in southern Egypt punished two 12-year-old schoolgirls for not wearing the Muslim headscarf by cutting their hair, the father of one girl said on Wednesday.

The governor of Luxor province – where the incident occurred – called the teacher's actions shameful and said she had been transferred to another school. But rights groups say that some Islamic conservatives have been emboldened by the success of groups like Muslim Brotherhood and the ultraconservative Salafi trend in parliamentary and presidential elections and have been increasingly brazen about forcing their standards on other Egyptians.

The incident follows a surge in legal cases against Egyptians, mostly Christians, who allegedly showed contempt for religion.

It also comes amid a fierce debate over how the role of religion will be defined in the country's new constitution. The preponderance of Islamists on the panel drafting the document has alarmed liberals and religious minorities. » | Associated Press in Luxor | Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Egypt’s Maria TV Pitches Strict Vision of Islam

THE WASHINGTON POST: CAIRO — Maria TV, a new Egyptian channel that solely features veiled women, might be the first in the industry without a makeup room.

The satellite television project debuted this summer, and the women who work for it say they hope their images on TV will empower like-minded women across the region who adhere to a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam known as Salafism.

But there is also a big role for men at the channel. Maria TV’s owner, Ahmed Abdallah, is a prominent Salafi preacher, well known in Egypt for his anti-Christian rhetoric. Abdallah and his son Islam, the channel’s chief executive, were arrested last month for burning a Bible during a protest outside the U.S. Embassy in Cairo on Sept. 11.

And while the women who work for Maria TV said they want to promote their belief that all Egyptian women should be covered, the channel also serves as a vehicle for what the CEO said was an effort to dim the influence of Christianity in the Muslim-majority region.

Those views would have met strong resistance during the rule of President Hosni Mubarak, who kept a tight lid on fundamentalist ideologies until his ouster in February 2011. But Islamists have perhaps reaped the most benefit from the country’s revolution, and with a new Islamist president, varying segments of society, including Salafis like Abdallah, are competing to define the role of religion in Egypt.

In September, a woman wearing a cream-colored head scarf read the midday news on state television, as officials here lifted a decades-old ban on veiled female presenters on state TV. » | Henry Shull | Wednesday, October 03, 2012

'Allah Is the Best': The Lives Of Salafists' Wives

SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: Salafist men wear beards, hand out copies of the Koran and cause headaches for Germany's domestic intelligence agency. But how do the women feel? SPIEGEL spends a weekend with two veiled women and learns about their vision of a perfect world.

Saliha and Reyhana stop at a kebab shop on the Bornheimer Strasse in the Bad Godesberg. "Can we pray here?" Saliha asks.

"Sure, okay," says an employee.

The two women walk into the shop and unroll a makeshift prayer rug on the floor. The employee continues putting away chairs. It's 9 p.m., and he wants to close. Saliha uses the compass on her iPhone to determine the direction of Mecca.

It points in the direction behind the kebab shop, where the ICE high-speed trains pass through Bonn. The two women kneel down on the floor to pray. They are wearing gloves and the niqab, a veil with narrow slits for the eyes. Cars pass by in the darkness outside. For the people out there, these women are the brides of terrorists.

The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), Germany's domestic intelligence agency, is paying close attention to the men in their Sunni fundamentalist movement, who have come to be known as Salafists, and who they view as a threat to peace and stability in Germany. Salafists aim to emulate the Prophet Muhammad in how they live their lives. They live in a world governed by the laws of Allah, not the rules of Western society. » | Özlem Gezer and Barbara Hardinghaus | Thursday, September 27, 2012

Wahhabi Vandalism Reaches Timbuktu
GATESTONE INSTITUTE: Now the extremist rage has reached sub-Saharan Africa.

At the beginning of July, Ansar Al-Dine (Volunteers of Faith), a Wahhabi Islamist group previously allied with Tuareg (a Berber group) rebels in Timbuktu, Mali, began systematically demolishing centuries-old Sufi shrines and mosques.

Timbuktu is known as the "City of 333 Muslim Saints," and has been the depository of hundreds of thousands of manuscripts and documents in libraries and private collections.

In 1988, the United Nations added the three main mosques in the city, and 16 cemeteries and mausoleums, to its World Heritage registry.

Wahhabi ideology, however – the official interpretation of Islam in Saudi Arabia – is destructive of Islamic heritage. Wahhabi doctrine holds that the preservation of sacred funeral monuments and prayers at them are a dilution of Islamic monotheism and a prohibited form of idol worship.

In Saudi Arabia, Islamic heritage, including houses and mosques associated with the prophet Muhammad, have been destroyed or damaged.

Elsewhere, Wahhabi devastation was mainly seen in raids on Shia holy sites in Iraq during eighteenth and nineteenth-century Wahhabi forays into that country, as well as in the recent Iraq war. Fundamentalist assaults on Sufi sanctuaries then spread in Pakistan. Wahhabi violence against Sufi installations also appeared in the Muslim Balkans. With the political changes in Egypt and Libya, Sufi shrines have been targeted by so-called "Salafis" (a cover term for Wahhabis).

Now the extremist rage has reached sub-Saharan Africa. » | Irfan Al-Alawi | Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Germany: "Radical Salafism Is Like a Hard Drug"
GATESTONE INSTITUTE: In an effort to improve their image, the Salafists have removed from their "information booths" all literature about the role of women in Islam or the supremacy of Islamic Sharia law over democracy. The German translation of the Koran has edited out many of the verses which call on Muslims to make war on non-believers.

German authorities have launched a major crackdown on radical Islamists suspected of plotting against the state.

The move reflects mounting concern in Germany over the growing assertiveness of Salafist Muslims, who openly state that they want to establish Islamic Sharia law in the country and across Europe.

In nation-wide raids on June 14, over 1,000 German police searched about 70 Salafist homes, apartments, mosques and meeting places in seven of Germany's 16 states in search of evidence that would enable the German government to outlaw some of the dozens of Islamist groups operating in the country.

German authorities believe the Salafists, who trace their roots to Saudi Arabia, want to create a Sunni Islamic Caliphate (Islamic Empire) opposed to Western democracy; and that some within the group support martyrdom and the use of violence, and are also fuelling militancy among German's socially alienated Muslim youth.

Announcing the crackdown, Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said he had banned a Salafist group called Millatu Ibrahim, based in the western city of Solingen. "The Millatu Ibrahim group works against our constitutional order," he said, "and against understanding between peoples." Among other things, Millatu Ibrahim teaches its followers to reject German law and to follow Islamic Sharia law, and that "the unbelievers are the enemy." » | Soeren Kern | Tuesday, June 19, 2012

The World from Berlin: Banning Salafists 'Won't Solve Social Problems'
SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: German authorities carried out a major crackdown on radical Salafist Muslims on Thursday, raiding properties and banning an organization. German media commentators welcome the moves but warn that bans aren't enough to change how extremists think.

The debate on Salafists, members of a fundamentalist strain of Islam who are suspected of having close ties to Islamist extremists, has been raging in Germany for months. Following a number of recent violent incidents, including the stabbing of police officers in Bonn, there have been growing calls for the government to act.

On Thursday, it did just that. In an operation involving 1,000 officers, authorities raided Salafist facilities in seven German states. They also banned one of the most important Salafist groups in the country, the Millatu Ibrahim.

"The organization acts in opposition to the idea of constitutional order and multicultural understanding," German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said on Thursday. He added that the group promotes violence in its "fight against the existing constitutional order."

The German government considers Salafists to be particularly dangerous and prone to violence, primarily because of their single-minded goal of establishing Sharia in Germany and their rejection of Western values. They have been in the headlines all spring, initially because of their drive to attract new members by handing out free copies of the Koran in major German cities. But it was their violent response to a campaign in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia that landed them in the spotlight of justice officials.

In early May, the Islamophobic mini-party Pro-NRW launched a campaign to display anti-Islam caricatures in front of mosques and other Muslim facilities in North Rhine-Westphalia ahead of elections in the state. Counter-demonstrations in both Solingen and Bonn turned violent, with Salafists attacking police with rocks, sticks and even knives. In Bonn, 29 police were injured, two of them landing in the hospital with stab wounds.

On Friday, German commentators welcome the action but warn that more needs to be done. » | David Gordon Smith | Friday, June 15, 2012

Related here, here, here, here, and here

British Suspected Islamic Terrorist Arrested in Germany
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: A major German security operation targeted "dangerous" Islamist extremists in dawn raids by 850 police officers on 70 mosques, schools and homes across Germany.

Hans-Peter Friedrich, Germany's interior minister, banned one Salafist network, Millatu Ibrahim, for "working against our constitutional order and against understanding between peoples".

He also announced an investigation into two other networks, Dawa FFM and "The True Religion", with a view to a seeking additional bans.

"We are ready to defend freedom and fundamental rights in this country and I hope this is understood by those who are of a different opinion," he said.

The Daily Telegraph understands that the raids followed a discussion of the risk posed by a pan-European network of Salafist Islamists at an EU meeting of interior ministers, including Theresa May, the Home Secretary, last week.

Last month, the G6 group of interior ministers from the EU's biggest countries met in Munich to discuss "suspicious patterns of movement". » | Bruno Waterfield, Berlin | Thursday, June 14, 2012

Verbunden »

Islamismus in Deutschland: Innenminister Friedrich verbietet Salafistenverein
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Die deutschen Behörden greifen hart gegen Islamisten durch. Innenminister Friedrich hat erstmals einen salafistischen Verein verboten, weitere Gruppen sind im Visier der Ermittler. Wichtige Protagonisten der Szene verlieren damit eine bedeutende Propagandaplattform.

Berlin - Salafisten in Deutschland haben bei ihrem Vorhaben, neue Anhänger zu gewinnen, eine bedeutende Plattform verloren. Am Donnerstag hat Innenminister Hans-Peter Friedrich (CSU) einen wichtigen salafistischen Verein verboten. Es handelt sich um das Netzwerk "Millatu Ibrahim" - es ist das erste Mal, dass ein salafistischer Verein zwangsaufgelöst wird. Gegen zwei weitere salafistische Gruppierungen, "Dawa FFM" und "Die Wahre Religion", wurden vereinsrechtliche Ermittlungsverfahren eingeleitet. Zuvor hatten Ermittler eine Großrazzia gegen die drei Vereine durchgeführt. Es ist die größte Aktion gegen Salafisten in der [Bundesrepublik ?][.]

Die Organisation "Millatu Ibrahim" richtet sich "gegen den Gedanken der verfassungsrechtlichen Ordnung und der Völkerverständigung", sagte Friedrich. Laut dem Innenministerium rufe "Millatu Ibrahim" zum Kampf "gegen unsere freiheitlich demokratische Grundordnung" auf.

"Die aggressiv kämpferische Grundhaltung der Vereinigung manifestiert sich in der Beförderung und Inkaufnahme strafrechtswidrigen Verhaltens, einschließlich des Einsatzes von Gewalt als Mittel im Kampf gegen die bestehende verfassungsgemäße Ordnung" ", sagte Friedrich. Dies belegten exemplarisch die gewaltsamen Ausschreitungen Anfang Mai 2012 in Solingen und Bonn. "Millatu Ibrahim hat diese in sogenannten Kampfvideos legitimiert und zu weiteren Gewalttaten aufgerufen", erklärte der Innenminister. Die Organisation werde nun aufgelöst, ihr Vermögen beschlagnahmt. » | Von Anna Reimann | Donnerstag, 14. Juni 2012


REUTERS.COM: German police raid scores of radical Islamists' homes: About 1,000 police raided scores of buildings across Germany on Thursday in a clampdown on radical Salafist Islamists suspected of plotting against the state. ¶ German officials fear the Salafists, who trace their roots to Saudi Arabiaand want to establish Sharia (Islamic) law in Europe, are fuelling militancy among a small minority of socially alienated young Muslims in Germany. ¶ Announcing the crackdown, Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said he had banned one of the Salafists' groups called the Millatu Ibrahim and said the raids may unearth evidence that would allow the outlawing of two other associations. » | Sabine Siebold | BERLIN | Thursday, June 14, 2012