News and Analysis (4/16/14)

“The New York Police Department has abandoned a secretive program that dispatched plainclothes detectives into Muslim neighborhoods to eavesdrop on conversations and built detailed files on where people ate, prayed and shopped”:

“With an 11-month-old state of emergency in three northeastern states failing to bring relief, the attacks are increasing calls for President Goodluck Jonathan to rethink his strategy in confronting the biggest threat to the security of Africa’s most populous nation”:

MPAC officials “said the Boston attack, which killed three people and injured 264, had highlighted the need for Muslim communities to intervene more effectively with troubled youths…. ‘The path to violence can be stopped, reversed and prevented with the right kind of support,’ said Alejandro Beutel, …who developed the council’s plan”:

The government justifies its attempt to control the madrassas as means of modernizing the curriculum, but in “Darul Uloom’s computer lab, nearly 350 students use dozens of old desktop computers for classes on how to type, or surf the web. By contrast, only 39 percent of government schools in Pakistan have electricity”:

A “sinister genre of direct action has developed around symbolically and physically imposing pork products on Muslims. The French ‘anti-white racism’ group Bloc Identitaire has occupied mosques and tried to organise a march to kick back against the ‘racist refusal’ of Muslims to eat pork”:

“The court, in the coastal northern city of Alexandria, ordered military-installed authorities on Tuesday to reject the candidacies from members of the group, which has swept all elections since the 2011 revolution” …

… in the meantime, “communities who are not part of the ongoing power struggle between Islamists and the military are being left to fix their own problems”:

“Largely in protest over Washington’s reluctance to get involved militarily in Syria, he reportedly told European diplomats in October that Saudi Arabia would be scaling back its co-operation with the CIA over arming and training rebel groups seeking to topple President Bashar al-Assad”:

President Rouhani declares, “We will prove to the world through these negotiations that what has been said about Iran is a lie. Iran has never pursued nuclear weapons and never will”  …

… and a senior official says that “Iran expects to get a fifth installment this week of previously blocked overseas funds, … a payment that would confirm Iranian compliance with a landmark deal with world powers to curb its nuclear program”:

“Boycotting is the main form of protest against an election that 77-year-old President Abdelaziz Bouteflika is expected to win despite his glaring absence, because powerful institutions of the state are firmly wedded to maintaining Algeria’s status quo”:

“The report reveals high numbers are getting information from unofficial ‘disseminators’, individuals not affiliated to any militant group. It identifies spiritual authorities who fighters look to for guidance. ‘This is the most socially mediated conflict in history”:

 


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