Currently, Islamic associations are advertising for the annual Zakat donation at the beginning of Ramadan, especially on the internet. In Germany – similar to Christians at Christmas – many millions of euros are donated every year, also to associations like “Islamic Relief”, which are close to Hamas and terror. The worrying thing: According to the Koran, one-eighth of zakat necessarily goes to the ” warriors of Allah” and the worldwide jihad.

Zakat or “purification” is one of the five pillars of Islam, which includes the pilgrimage to Mecca and daily prayer. According to it, every believing Muslim must donate 2.5 per cent of his or her wealth held over a year. According to the ninth sura of the Koran At-Tauba, zakat alms go ” to the poor, the needy, those who care for them, and those whose hearts are to be won, to slaves and debtors, to the Way of Allah and the Son of the Way.”

In 2004, after the September 11 attacks that originated in Germany, US Treasury Secretary John Snow warned Muslims not to participate in possible criminal donations: “If you donate during Ramadan, we encourage them to find out beforehand about the activities of the organisations they are benefiting so that their donation is not misappropriated for dastardly purposes.” Since 2002, at the request of the Islamic community, the US Treasury Department has issued guidelines for charities on how to comply with anti-terror laws.

“Islamic Relief is the largest Islamic charity in the world, with annual donations of about $240 million worldwide in 2014, about $80 million of which came from government funds, according to the Middle East Forum.”

“Islamic Relief Germany (IR-D) advertises on its website for the annual Zakat donation: Of the 22 million euros that “Islamic Relief Germany” collected in donations in 2019, more than 3.5 million euros went to Ramadan and the Kurban festival of sacrifice, according to the website.

Critics describe “Islamic Relief” as an affiliate organisation of the Muslim Brotherhood. In Israel and the United Arab Emirates, it is banned as a terrorist organisation because of alleged links to Hamas.

According to Social Democratic Party (SPD) Islam expert Sigrid Herrmann-Marschall, “Aktion Deutschland Hilft” donated more than 2.5 million euros to “Islamic Relief Deutschland” in 2019, supported by ARD and ZDF. After revelations by PI-NEWS, the newspaper Jüdische Rundschau and Die Welt about the links between Islamic Relief and terror, “Aktion Deutschland Hilft” had to suspend its cooperation in September 2020.

“According to the traditional interpretation of the Koran, one eighth of the zakat must go to the warriors of Allah, so it is used for jihad. This rule is not known to most people and poses a problem,” says the critic of Islam Irfan Peci. “A strictly devout Muslim has no choice at all here, at most about whether to define jihad militarily or spiritually. Organisations such as Islamic Relief Germany, which are said to be close to terror and anti-Semitism, urgently need to ensure 100 per cent transparency in the use of German donations and be checked by the security authorities so that no money is used for jihad.

Currently, IR-D is again collecting money in Germany as part of Ramadan, when many devout Muslims make their annual Zakat donation. We wrote to Islamic Relief Germany asking how IR-D distributes Zakat in relation to the Ninth Sura, and whether there was any evidence of the use of Zakat 2020 for Fisabilillah.

Köseli claims in his reply that “Fisabilillah” only has the meaning “in the way of Allah”. However, the term “Al-Jihad fi Sabilillah” (Fighting for Allah) is at the heart of jihadist propaganda, as shown by nashids such as the infamous “Fisabilillah” by IS rapper Denis Cuspert aka Deso Dogg or “Abu Tahla Al-Almani”, which reads:

Come to slaughter
Eliminate kuffar
Bombs fall on us
That strengthens our faith.
Black masked men
Faith sharp as knives
Heads are rolling
Slaughtering for Allah
Faces are mutilated
blood splattered walls
the terror is here…

To you enemies of Allah, where are your troops?
we can’t wait for you, destroy them Allah,
let us triumph over them, take from us in honour,
Take of our blood, FISABILILLAH!

http://www.pi-news.net/2021/04/sammelt-islam-organisation-im-ramadan-fuer-den-heiligen-krieg/

The social network Facebook has blocked the account of the French Moselle city Bitsch (In French: Bitche) and declared the move to be a violation of the applicable terms of use. According to media reports, it was because of the name of the city.

The word “Bitche” sounded thus probably a bit too much like the English swear word “Bitch”, a derogatory term for women. The site is said to have been blocked on March 19.

Only after reports of the Facebook suspension spread, the social network quickly restored the Ville de Bitche page. The tech giant blamed their algorithm.

The mayor, Benoît Kieffer, said in a post: “The name of our town seems to suffer from a bad interpretation … the most astonishing thing is that Facebook took so long to correct this. The president/director general of Facebook France has just contacted me personally to tell me the Ville de Bitche page is published again and to apologise for the inconvenience caused.”

The city administration reportedly appealed and tried to contact Facebook in various ways. It even got a new Facebook account – with the name “Mairie 57230” after her zip code . The account was only activated again after weeks.

The neighboring municipality of Rohrbach-lès-Bitche also decided to change their name on Facebook as a precautionary measure. Now it is called “Ville de Rohrbach”.

https://freewestmedia.com/2021/04/17/facebook-bans-the-french-city-for-weeks-because-the-name-sounds-like-a-swear-word/

Because of an incident in the run-up to the Easter service in the Nidda town church (photo above), the State Security Service is investigating three as yet unknown perpetrators. They had allegedly drunkenly insulted churchgoers and shouted Islamic slogans. Although a police patrol arrived during the service, the perpetrators have not yet been identified.

Contrary to widespread belief, Easter, not Christmas, is the most important festival in Christianity. In this context, the Easter services on early Sunday morning have an outstanding significance. For the second year in a row, it is made difficult for the congregations to celebrate this most important service of the year.

In Nidda, it was at least possible for a limited number of churchgoers who had registered in advance to attend the beginning of Easter morning together in the church. But while the preparations were still underway, three young men apparently disturbed them so massively that the effects also overshadowed the service and the following hours.

First, according to a press release from the church congregation, two confirmation candidates who came to the church with their relatives noticed the three men who had come from the street Schlossgasse and settled down by the fountain. Shortly afterwards, they insulted another person attending the service.

Apparently, the young men were attracted to the upcoming service by the arriving visitors and the illuminated church, the congregation describes the further events. Two of them entered the church through the side entrance. They pointed their mobile phones at the worshippers and apparently filmed them. They also had bottles, presumably containing alcohol, with them.

Pastor Hanne Allmansberger asked the young men to leave the church because they were neither registered for the service, as Allmansberger explained to them, nor were they wearing a face mask. But instead of following the request, the disruptors repeatedly shouted “There is only one God, and that is Allah” and “Allah is the greatest”. They apparently continued to record the event.

Only when Pastor Allmansberger again energetically asked them to leave the church and in the meantime other visitors also got up and went to the side entrance through which the young men had come in, did they leave the church again. Together with the third young man who had been waiting outside the door, they left.

The children and young people in particular perceived the situation as threatening, the church congregation reported. But adult participants in the service were also very shocked by the incident. “The Easter Vigil service was overshadowed by the events, and the shock at the cross-border, inappropriate and threatening behaviour of the young men continued for some time. Fortunately, the service itself, as well as the other Easter services, passed without incident.” However, there were concerns that the troublemakers would come back later, perhaps during the service which started at 6am. Therefore, a visitor informed the police, who also arrived during the service. The press office of the Central Hesse police confirmed the incident and that the State Security Service had started an investigation into disturbance of the practice of religion. Witnesses are currently being questioned.

Mayor Hans-Peter Seum explained that he had not been informed about the incident by the police or the municipality so far. The Nidda police station had confirmed the events to him on request. The Protestant parish emphasises “that Christianity demands and also lives tolerance towards other religions. This must also be expected from people who belong to another religious community.”

https://www.wetterauer-zeitung.de/wetterau/nidda-ort1184448/stoerer-im-ostergottesdienst-90456695.html

Further proof of the increasingly lucrative migrant rescue business and ties between so-called human rights charities and organized people smuggling gangs has been revealed by Italian prosecutors. On March 1, Italian police have launched an investigation against the Italian based NGO Mediterranea Saving Humans (MSH), accusing them of charging large amounts of money for taking 27 boat migrants on board from the Danish-registered ship Maersk Etienne.

According to the Ragusa public prosecutor’s statement, the people smuggling NGO had violated the law by aiding illegal immigration and acted against the maritime navigation code. The rescue ship Mare Jonio allegedly demanded €10,000 from the Danish ship for each passenger taken from onboard their vessel. The Maersk tanker had earlier picked up 27 illegal migrants floating in a boat, and the Maersk tanker’s owners would have been charged a total of €270,000 if they had agreed to these terms. Eventually, the sum of €125,000 was transferred by Maersk onto the NGO’s bank account.

The African migrants have been kept in makeshift conditions on the tanker for 38 days due to the fact that Maltese authorities refused to allow the ship to dock in any of their ports. After agreeing to pay the roughly €4,630 per migrant, the tanker’s temporary passengers were allowed to board the Italian ship. The NGO vessel then proceeded to the Sicilian port of Pozzallo, where all 27 migrants disembarked.

Although MSH has not denied that a large sum was received after the passenger transfer from the Maersk ship, the NGO has issued a statement complaining about the Italian prosecutor’s bias, stating that “Ragusa’s public prosecutor has made public his personal crusade against NGOs many times…  And, Mediterranea will not stop because of this sad and predictable attack. Mediterranea will continue to be at sea where the crimes of slaughter, torture, rape, and persecution are carried out.”

The Danish shipping giant Maersk have also defended its actions, saying that “at no time before or during the operation was any financial compensation or support discussed or agreed. Months after the rescue operation, Maersk met with representatives from Mediterranena to thank them for their humanitarian assistance. Following this meeting, we decided to make a contribution to Mediterranea to cover some of the costs they endured as a result of the operation. This was done in the amount of €125,000 euros and with the full support of Maersk Tankers’ management.”

This, however, is not what the Italian authorities’ investigation has found so far. According to them, the migrant smuggling NGO was motivated by profit when picking up illegal African immigrants from the commercial ship. They also allege that Beppe Caccia, a board member of the NGO, called a Danish phone number four times between Sept. 8 and Sept. 10. Furthermore, the pro-migration organization’s co-founder, Luca Casarini, was charged as far back as 2019 with promoting illegal migration.

Over a 1,000 people have died in the Mediterranean in 2020, roughly three people a day. This is largely a result of them being abandoned mid-sea by people smugglers. Organized criminal gangs are often tracking migrant rescue NGO ships and abandoning their human cargo in their vicinity.

The European Fundamental Rights Agency (RFA) has documented nine new legal proceedings against civil rescue ships, that adds up to 50 such proceedings since 2018. As the report indicates, there is a constant flow of new NGO ships venturing out to sea to pick up illegal migrants. Jail sentences for such illegal activities are virtually non-existent, and as the example of German migrant rescue boat captain Carola Rackete shows — who in 2019 had rammed an Italian coastguard ship with her own boat — perpetrators of even the most brazen violations can continue with illegal activities with near impunity.

The RFA report also alludes to the fact that the only means that authorities are currently able to use to fight back and stop NGO ships from ferrying a constant stream of migrants to European ports are simple administrative, technical or safety-related obstructions that keep these ships at port, at least temporarily.

https://rmx.news/article/article/ngo-rescue-ship-caught-demanding-10-000-per-migrant

Water brand Evian created a storm after its social media post sparked a backlash for apparently offending Muslims observing Ramadan.

On Tuesday, when the faithful were marking the start of a month-long fast between the hours of sunrise and sunset, the Danone subsidiary brand posted a message on its French Twitter page that read: “Retweet if you have already drunk a litre of Evian today.”

The message generated an angry response from some users who found it thoughtless and insensitive. “Worst timing,” wrote one person, responding to the post that was retweeted more than 5,000 times in one day.

“There are millions of us fasting in France, right?” another said. There are more than five million Muslims living in France, the second-largest religious group in the country.

Users asked why the mineral water brand decided on the tweet that day, with some accusing Evian of racism and religious insensitivity.

However, other users defended the brand, pointing out how it posts regular statements and questions about water consumption on its Twitter feed.

Journalist Mathieu Slama criticises the apology of mineral water producer Évian to users in the French daily “Le Figaro”.

The confrontation, but also the way Évian reacted, says a lot about the “state of our public debate” and about “our collective failure in the face of the religiosity and entrism of the Muslim religion”, says Slama.

First of all, corporate brands, like politicians, would now be subject to ever-increasing pressure from minorities and would adapt their communication as a result. When they apologised, all these brands believed they were playing politics, “when in fact they were submitting to the market logic of pandering to communitarian sensibilities in order to protect their business”. This is because a dispute over communitarian issues can have a strong financial impact: “Therefore, brands want to prove themselves progressive and ‘woke’, even if this leads to defending ideas that are dangerous from a democratic point of view”. Évian has apologised because they got scared in the face of a possible boycott by Muslims”.

Moreover, according to Le Figaro, this confrontation shows us how much France is threatened by an Islamist entrism “that denies almost all the traditional values of our culture. In the name of the respect owed to a religion, we would have to renounce certain freedoms. In the name of this respect, we would have to accept limits to freedom, we would have to satisfy certain sensitivities”. After all, Évian had been accused of “lacking consideration for a community and practically committing blasphemy by disregarding the great importance of Ramadan for practising Muslims”. In other words, this meant “requiring Évian – and other brands or institutions – to take into account the religious specificities of a community in their communications. How could one not see in such an instruction an extremely dangerous bias for our democracy?” Therefore, France should “under no circumstances give in to the demands of these new puritans”.

In addition, one can see in this debate “the increasing rise in France of an Anglo-Saxon concept of freedom of expression, in which it is linked to the consideration of this or that minority. This is called ‘cancel culture’, which presupposes the banning of any expression that might offend a community or a minority”. Évian had posted an apology tweet “out of fear of calls for boycotts” and because the company did not want to harm “its responsible and progressive corporate image”. But this “Cancel Culture”, Slama continues, “this product of an Anglo-Saxon puritanical and intolerant culture, is destroying careers and companies the more it gains influence. One must not give in to this new intolerance and now more than ever proactively defend the values on which our society is based”.

Évian previous tweets never attracted this level of attention, with most barely surpassing double digits in retweets or likes.

A few hours after the message was posted the brand apologised, calling the original post clumsy. Evian said the tweet was not meant to cause offence.

https://www.die-tagespost.de/politik/aktuell/frankreich-warum-ein-tweet-von-evian-zum-politikum-wurde;art315,217501