From AP, with thanks to Twostellas:
PARIS - Ten suspected Islamic militants, including one of Osama bin Laden's alleged associates, went on trial Wednesday in connection with the millennium plot to attack the Christmas market in the eastern French city of Strasbourg.Eight of the suspects were on hand for the trial at the Paris criminal court. Another is detained in Britain while one who had been released pending trial did not appear in court. All are Algerians or French-Algerians.
The trial is expected to last three months.
Four of the suspects allegedly trained in the use of arms and explosives in al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan in the 1990s.
All are suspected of involvement, to varying degrees, in a plan to attack the market on New Year's Eve 2000. The well-known market is set up around the city cathedral during the Christmas period and becomes a major gathering place.
Interesting. Will France make itself an even bigger target, or will they give these guys an out? I shall be curious to see how this one goes.
All that sniveling, groveling and ass kissing...and first france goes and forces muslim women to go out with naked hair (wonder if muslim men get randy in the shampoo isle with all that naked hair pictured on the bottles...I mean really, hair is nice when taken care of, but hardly arousing) and now they are holding 'innocent' muslim brothers in their prisons...yep all that ass licking right down the drain.
USAgirl, remember, it was not women's scarves debated in France (no one forces women in France to go out with naked hair), but female children's scarves and only at school. That makes your point more edgy: even children's hair is too arousing for Muslim men to be seen (in my neighborhood, that includes girls 2-3 years of age).
Anyway, it is good to see that France is doing something to stop the terrorists. Hope there won't be much whining about "harrassing foreigners" this time.
The dhimmi French must be outraged that their Muslim masters would violate their protected status - after all they've done to screw the United States and Israel, one would think the Arabs would be more grateful than to attempt to blow up a market full of Christmas revelers. Maybe it was all that public display of Christianity that set them off (?).
. . . "while one who had been released pending trial did not appear in court."
That was sure a smart move, to release a alleged, suspected jihadist pending trial. I wonder whether he was released on his "own recognizance" or had to post a bond? I am not conversant with French jurisprudence, but if is there is such a thing as bail in la belle France, I know a bounty hunter who goes all over to retrieve fugitives. His methods of capture are something that I wish on every jihadist fugitive.
"Muslims who honor tolerance and human dignity -- and who are willing to place themselves at risk to defend those values for all faiths and races."
Okay? So, in what sense are muslims supposed to "honor tolerance," which is a modern term having no direct correlation to any islamic tenets, in either the hadiths, or the koran; and whose definition of "human dignity" are they supposed to refer?
You are pleading for inconsistencies in a-priori beliefs which can not realistically come to be, unless you fabricate a "substitute islam" and keep your fingers crossed that muslims are somehow convinced to dump the old religion for the new.
This might work for some denominations of Christianity i.e. "New Age" Christianity and the like; but I doubt you will meet with similar success in dealing with islam.
If you are praying for conversion to something other than islam, that might be one thing. But I fail to see what other rational objective is obtainable for your stated objectives.