Recently in Russia Category

We're constantly told, including by the VOA itself, from which comes the report below, that the Islam represented by people like Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki and Tamerlan Tsarnaev is a misunderstanding of the true Religion of Peace. Yet this misunderstanding of Islam seems to be shockingly widespread among Muslims. How is it that so many Muslims, often including Muslim clerics, misunderstand their peaceful religion in exactly the same way? Why don't mosques and Islamic schools have any programs to teach Muslims to understand Islam properly and avoid this omnipresent misunderstanding?

"Russia Detains 140 Suspected Islamic Extremists," from VOA News, April 27:

Russian authorities have detained 140 people suspected of ties to Islamic extremism at a mosque in Moscow.

Russian state media quoted a Russian Federal Security Service statement as saying those detained Friday included more than 30 citizens of other countries. But the statement did not specify which nations.

The detentions reportedly involve people suspected of involvement with extremist groups. Russia's Interfax news agency says the operation was aimed at identifying people wanted for terrorist and extremist crimes.

Interfax reports the FSB statement said law enforcement officials believe the prayer house in southern Moscow where the detentions occurred was often visited by people who later converted to radicalism, joined militant groups in the North Caucasus and participated in terrorist acts in Russia.

Media reports did not say whether any charges have been filed.

The detentions come after two ethnically Chechen brothers were identified by U.S. authorities as suspects in the deadly April 15 Boston Marathon bombings.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has used the bombings in Boston as an opportunity to call for greater cooperation with the United States in fighting terrorism.

He said Thursday the attack proved that his policy on the restive North Caucasus region was correct and the West was wrong, as he put it, in supporting the militants in Chechnya....

Yep.

Even if the Russians had been specific, why should the FBI have done anything? They've been taught for two years now that jihad is a peaceful spiritual struggle, a noble and beautiful thing. To have acted on this would have been "Islamophobic."

"Russia caught Tamerlan Tsarnaev and mother on wiretap discussing jihad," by Eileen Sullivan and Matt Apuzzo for the Associated Press, April 27 (thanks to Kenneth):

WASHINGTON (AP) — Russian authorities secretly recorded a telephone conversation in 2011 in which one of the Boston bombing suspects vaguely discussed jihad with his mother, officials said Saturday, days after the U.S. government finally received details about the call.

In another conversation, the mother of now-dead bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev was recorded talking to someone in southern Russia who is under FBI investigation in an unrelated case, officials said.

The conversations are significant because, had they been revealed earlier, they might have been enough evidence for the FBI to initiate a more thorough investigation of the Tsarnaev family.

As it was, Russian authorities told the FBI only that they had concerns that Tamerlan and his mother were religious extremists. With no additional information, the FBI conducted a limited inquiry and closed the case in June 2011....

In the past week, Russian authorities turned over to the United States information it had on Tamerlan and his mother, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva. The Tsarnaevs are ethnic Chechens who emigrated from southern Russia to the Boston area over the past 11 years.

Even had the FBI received the information from the Russian wiretaps earlier, it’s not clear that the government could have prevented the attack....

Indeed not. Politically correct Keystone Kops who are forbidden to study Islam and jihad in connection with terrorism are unlikely to have been able to do anything effective against an Islamic jihadist.

What are peaceful Muslims in the West doing to disabuse Muslims like these of the idea that killing non-Muslims is a good and meritorious act? Why, nothing. "Russia kills militants suspected of Christmas attack plan," from Reuters, January 6 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian security forces in a restive North Caucasus province on Sunday killed three militants suspected of planning attacks on church services during the Russian Orthodox Christmas holiday, authorities said.

Security forces tried to stop a van in the Kabardino-Balkaria province on Sunday but its occupants opened fire and were killed in the ensuing battle, during which the vehicle caught fire, the National Anti-Terrorism Committee said in a statement.

It said that explosives, guns and ammunition were found in the van and that the men who were killed had been planning attacks on churches during services marking Russian Orthodox Christmas, which is on Monday.

The statement gave no evidence to support that suspicion and the account could not be verified.

Deadly exchanges of gunfire between police and suspected militants at road checkpoints are common in Russia's North Caucasus, a string of provinces hit by an Islamist insurgency rooted in two separatist wars in Chechnya.

Kabardino-Balkaria, west of Chechnya, is mostly Muslim but has a sizable Christian minority....

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Russian police free child hostage, kill seven militants in Dagestan," from Reuters, December 29 (thanks to David):

(Reuters) - Russian security forces killed seven militants and freed a 6-year-old girl taken hostage in the restive Dagestan region of Russia's volatile North Caucasus on Saturday, a national anti-terrorism committee official told Interfax news agency.

The incident took place in an apartment building in the provincial capital of Makhachkala, according to the Interfax report. The militants broke through a wall, entered an apartment and took the girl hostage, according to the report....

The Interfax report identified the leader of the militants involved in the incident as Gadzhimurat Dolgatov and said he was among the seven killed. The report said those killed had previously served sentences for crimes including murder, extortion, theft and robbery.

During the incident, the militants opened fire and threw a grenade at the special forces personnel while trying to flee, but no security forces were hurt, Interfax reported.

Rebels who say they are fighting for an Islamic state in the strip of North Caucasus provinces often target police and security forces as well as government officials and mainstream Muslim leaders in attacks.

Rights activists say the insurgency is also driven by poverty and anger at the heavy-handed tactics of the Russian security forces.

Of course. "Rights activists" always ascribe jihad activity to the alleged wrongdoing of the non-Muslim party.

"Insurgents seeking to establish an Islamic state claimed responsibility for an attack that killed 27 people on a Moscow-St Petersburg train in 2009, a suicide bombing that killed 37 at Moscow's busiest airport in 2011 and bombings on the Moscow metro that killed 40 in 2010." That makes the death toll 104, but apparently that wasn't enough blood and murder for their bloodthirsty god. "Russia jails four over plot to bomb high-speed train," from Reuters, December 10 (thanks to Holly):

MOSCOW (Reuters) - A Russian court jailed four alleged Islamist militants on Monday for plotting to bomb a high-speed train between Moscow and St Petersburg last year.

Moscow City Court handed prison terms of 15 to 18 years to Islam Khamzhuyev, Fail Nevlyutov, Mansur Umayev and Mansur Edilbiyev, natives of Russia's troubled North Caucasus region.

Prosecutors said they had tried to attack the Sapsan train in summer 2011, state news agency Itar-tass reported. A lawyer for the accused said the defense would appeal....

Insurgents seeking to establish an Islamic state claimed responsibility for an attack that killed 27 people on a Moscow-St Petersburg train in 2009, a suicide bombing that killed 37 at Moscow's busiest airport in 2011 and bombings on the Moscow metro that killed 40 in 2010.

Earlier this year, Russia jailed 10 people - four of them for life - for the 2009 bombing on the Moscow-St Petersburg line.

"The bombs were supposed to be set off on Moscow's Red Square on New Year's Eve, when it is packed with celebrating crowds, investigators said." In order to maximize the blood and death demanded by Ilyas Saidov's bloodthirsty god.

"Russia jails New Year terror plotter for 15 years," from AFP, November 28 (thanks to Maxwell):

MOSCOW - A Russian court on Wednesday sentenced a suspected Islamist militant to 15 years in a penal colony for participating in a failed plot to stage twin suicide bombings in Moscow on New Year's Eve in 2010.

The Moscow City Court found Ilyas Saidov guilty on several counts of banditry, terrorism, weapons smuggling and murder, including bringing two bombs to the capital to be used by two female suicide bombers in an attack, the Investigative Committee said.

Russian security services revealed the existence of the plot in early 2011, saying it was only avoided because one of the suicide bombers accidentally blew herself up on the outskirts of the city, where the women rented a house on the grounds of a shooting club.

When the first bomber, Zavzhat Daudova, set the bomb off, destroying the building and killing herself, the second female, Zeinap Suyunova, fled Moscow and was later arrested in southern Russia.

Suyunova was sentenced to 10 years in prison in May....

Saidov, a native of the volatile North Caucasus region of Dagestan, was also convicted of crimes preceding the Moscow plot, including killing a top police officer in Dagestan and train bombing, the Investigative Committee said.

Prosecutors had not sought a life sentence for Saidov only because he signed an agreement to help the investigation, a representative of the Prosecutor General said in televised remarks.

Investigators said that Saidov was the one who brought the suicide belts from Dagestan on a bus, hiding them in two gas boilers.

The bombs were supposed to be set off on Moscow's Red Square on New Year's Eve, when it is packed with celebrating crowds, investigators said.

Saidov is the fifth suspect convicted for participating in the Moscow bombing plot, with six more awaiting trial, investigators said....

Aminat Kurbanova's conversion to Islam was fatal for her and seven others. The official dogma in the West is that those who do violence in the name of Islam misunderstand its peaceful teachings. Yet no Muslim organization anywhere in the West has any program to teach against the understanding of Islam that led Aminat Kurbanova to commit mass murder. What's more, she probably chose to murder Sheikh Said Atsayev and those with him because he preached against violent Islam -- which fact is not an encouragement for Muslim reformers.

"Russian Islamic convert kissed her daughter goodbye and blew herself up at cleric's home," by Mark Duell for the Daily Mail, November 19:

Brought up as an Orthodox Christian by her mother, Aminat Kurbanova looked a picture of happiness at her wedding nine years ago - marrying the man with whom she had fallen in love at drama school.

But she converted to Islam in 2007 and three months ago walked into the house of a Muslim cleric in Dagestan, Russia, wearing a 3lb bomb, and blew herself up - killing eight people including her.

Once a stage actress, the 29-year-old mother had transformed into a Muslim suicide bomber. The blast shocked Russia but her mother Vera Saprighina insists she was ‘a kind person, not a monster’.

Of course.

Kurbanova was brought up in Makhachkala, Dagestan, and gained top marks at the city’s arts and drama college - where she met her future husband Marat Kurbanov, reported the Sunday Times.

The couple married in 2003 and she gave birth to a daughter, Malika, two years later. In 2006 the couple were introduced to Islam by Marat’s brother Rustam - and Kurbanov converted a year later.

‘She said she had finally found the right religion for her,’ her mother Vera Saprighina told the Sunday Times. ‘Before long, both left the theatre because dancing and acting are considered un-Islamic.’

But Rustam was killed in a police house raid on suspected militants in 2008. It shocked the couple. Marat left home, never to come back, and is thought to have joined militants to avenge the death.

However 12 months later, Marat also died when police opened fire on a car that did not stop at a checkpoint - and Kurbanova ‘often said she wished she had died with him’, Ms Saprighina stated....

Kurbanova started to earn money as an Islamic dress seamstress and became more religious. She began to be watched by security services, who allegedly searched her flat and questioned her after the death of her husband....

Kurbanova walked into the home of Sheikh Said Atsayev, 74, after kissing her daughter goodbye and blew herself up with a steel-bolt bomb, killing seven others - including the cleric himself and a 12-year-old boy who was there with his father....

At least 12 religious leaders have been killed over the last two years in Dagestan - allegedly by militants angry that they are too friendly with the authorities. Atsayev could have been targeted because he spoke against violent Islam....

Now wait a minute. Didn't the Vast Majority of Peaceful Muslims at those mosques rise up and cast these miscreants out?

"Russian police detain members of banned Islamic group," from Reuters, November 12 (thanks to Benedict):

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian police have arrested six members of a banned Islamic group on suspicion of recruiting followers in Moscow mosques and possessing weapons, the Interior Ministry said on Monday....

The Interior Ministry said the detainees were members of the Islamic Revival Party, which was designated as an international terrorist group by Russia's Supreme Court and banned.

Police searching places where the detainees were staying found nine hand grenades and other weapons and ammunition, as well as extremist literature.

It a statement the ministry said leaders and members of the group had been "conducting active recruiting at mosques in Moscow and also distributing extremist literature and drawing other people into illegal activity."...

Attacks on government-backed Muslim leaders in the Volga River province of Tatarstan in July added to fears of a spread of Islamist violence.

Rights activists say the violence is fuelled in part of heavy-handed police tactics and intolerance for religious beliefs outside the mainstream.

Yeah, that's it. It's all the non-Muslims' fault, as always.

Jihad spreading in the North Caucasus. "Police Official Gunned Down in Russia’s Dagestan," from RIA Novosti, November 5 (thanks to Maxwell):

MOSCOW/MAKHACHKALA, November 5 (RIA Novosti) - A Police official was killed on Monday in Makhachkala, the capital of Russia’s North Caucasus republic of Dagestan, the Interior Ministry said.

Lt. Col. Valery Aidayev, head of the district Criminal Investigation Department, was shot dead by an unidentified assailant, the ministry said.

Police have mounted a citywide manhunt for the assailants but no suspects have been detained yet.

The Islamist insurgency, once confined largely to Chechnya, has spread in recent years across the North Caucasus. Attacks on security forces, police and civilians are also reported regularly in the neighboring republics of Ingushetia, Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria.

Why we don't see more genuine Muslim reformers -- not that Kalimulla Ibragimov seems to have been much of one, anyway: "Russia Caucasus: Imam shot dead in Derbent, Dagestan," from the BBC, October 30 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Attackers have shot dead an imam and two of his male relations, as they drove to a mosque in the Russian North Caucasus region of Dagestan.

They were shot on their way to morning prayers, close to the imam's home in the Caspian Sea town of Derbent, law enforcement sources told reporters.

The cleric was named as Kalimulla Ibragimov, 49, who is said to have delivered sermons calling for peace.

Islamists have been blamed for attacks on moderate Muslims in the region.

Dagestan, a mainly Muslim region, has been gripped by an Islamist insurgency since 1999, when militants backed by fighters from neighbouring Chechnya launched an offensive against Russian control.

Three imams have been shot dead in the region since March, the Russian news website utro.ru reports.

Mr Ibragimov is said by Russian media to have been a "Salafist", a term used for Islamic radicals. Nonetheless, according to utro.ru, he "often gave sermons and made appeals for peace and Muslim unity"....

They are adherents of Sharia who want to establish an Islamic state: "Russia is fighting a simmering Islamist insurgency in the Caucasus, mostly in Dagestan and Ingushetia, which see regular attacks that officials blame on militants seeking to establish an Islamic state across the Russian Caucasus."

"Bomb in Russian Caucasus kills six police," from AFP, August 19 (thanks to David):

Six policemen died in the volatile Russian Caucasus region of Ingushetia early Sunday after a bomb went off at the funeral of a colleague, Russian news agencies reported.

"As the policemen entered the yard of the house where the funeral was taking place, a powerful blast went off. As a result of the explosion, six policemen died on the spot and there are many wounded," a spokesman for the regional Investigative Committee told the Interfax news agency....

The funeral was for a fellow officer killed in a shooting on Saturday evening in the Malgobek district in the north of the region, Interfax reported.

The explosion came hours after masked gunmen opened fire in a mosque in Dagestan on Saturday evening as worshippers celebrated the end of Ramadan, wounding eight and leaving an explosive device that was later deactivated.

Russia is fighting a simmering Islamist insurgency in the Caucasus, mostly in Dagestan and Ingushetia, which see regular attacks that officials blame on militants seeking to establish an Islamic state across the Russian Caucasus.

Sharia in action: toe the line, or else. Why we don't see more Muslim reformers: "Claim of Responsibility in Russia Attack," by David M. Herszenhorn in the New York Times, August 4 (thanks to all who sent this in):

MOSCOW — A self-described guerrilla fighter urging strict adherence to Islamic law has claimed responsibility for the killing last month of one Muslim leader and the attempted murder of another, in Tatarstan, a region in central Russia that prides itself on a tradition of religious tolerance.

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“On July 19, 2012, on my orders an operation was conducted against the enemies of Allah,” the guerrilla fighter, who identified himself as Muhammad, emir of the mujahedeen of Tatarstan, said in a video posted on an Islamist Internet site that focuses on the predominantly Muslim Caucasus region, including Chechnya.

In the video, he is shown sitting in the woods, with an automatic rifle propped against one knee. He specifically named the victims of the attack last month: Valiulla Yakupov, the cleric in charge of Islamic education in Tatarstan, who was shot and killed outside his home in Kazan, the regional capital; and Ildus Faizov, the chief mufti in the region, who survived a car-bomb attack less than an hour later.

“All praise Allah,” the jihadist, Muhammad, said in the video. “We believe the operation was a success.” He also warned of further violence against Muslim leaders who do not adhere to Shariah, the strict legal code of Islam based on the Koran.

“If any of the imams do not want or cannot carry out the points established by Shariah, they should leave their posts,” he said. “That way, you will be protected from the mujahedeen.”

Investigators in Tatarstan, who had already detained at least six people as part of the investigation into the attacks, released photographs on Saturday of two suspects whom they described as “extremely dangerous.” The men were identified as Robert R. Valeev, 35, and Rais R. Mingaleev, 36. “These people organized the killing,” officials said.

Mr. Valeev bears a resemblance to the man in the video, though the man in the photo is cleanshaven while the man on video has a beard.

The motive of the attacks appeared to be efforts by the two Muslim leaders to combat the spread of radical Islam in the region....

More Misunderstanders of Islam and Ramadan sow mayhem in the name of Allah in Tatarstan. "Fight over Islam, money and power brings violence to Volga," by Thomas Grove for Reuters, July 27 (thanks to Maxwell):

KAZAN, RUSSIA - Not far from glitzy boulevards where an oil boom has sent up stadiums and high-rises overlooking the Volga River, women in headscarves wander through Islamic bookstores selling pamphlets on the institution of sharia in Russia.

Kazan, capital of Russia's mainly-Muslim Tatarstan region, has long had an image as a showcase of religious tolerance. But that reputation was shattered last week by car bomb and shooting attacks carried out only hours before the start of the holy month of Ramadan.

On the wall outside the bookshop, a flyer in the local Tatar language calls Muslims to unite against the region's top religious leader, Mufti Ildus Faizov, who was wounded in the attacks which also killed his deputy.

"Things will only get worse here and Muslims will be the ones who suffer the most," said Anisa Karabayeva, 43, her face framed by a white hijab, or traditional headscarf.

We see that the victimhood game is played even in Tatarstan.

"Will there be more bombs? Probably," she says flatly, standing in front of a display case stocked with Korans and prayer rugs.

The attacks came against a background of anger among many Muslims who complain that the authorities in Tatarstan are restricting Islam in the name of fighting radicalism. It is a dispute that also involves a struggle for money and influence in the increasingly prosperous oil-producing region....

"Today Islam is growing strongly in Kazan... But there are different sects and movements that you simply cannot control," said Ramil Mingarayev, an imam at the al Marjani Mosque.

"We try to fight radicals, we have tried to clean our city of them, but there are hidden mosques, where they gather and distribute forbidden literature, in basements and in the forests."

Some of those fears arise from threats made by North Caucasus militants far away. Russia's most wanted man, Chechen Islamist guerrilla leader Doku Umarov, called for an uprising among Russia's Muslims last year, mentioning Tatarstan by name.

"I want to appeal to the Muslim brothers who live on Russian-occupied Muslim land... I call on you to destroy the enemies of Allah wherever you are. I call on you to destroy them where your hand reaches and to open fronts of jihad," he said in a video posted on insurgency-affiliated website Kavkaz Centre.

SELLING TOURS

Since becoming head of the Tatarstan branch of the Russian state's Spiritual Directorate of Muslims in April last year, Faizov has been praised by Kremlin authorities for what they say are measures to clamp down on radical sentiment and encourage traditional forms of Islamic practice seen as more moderate....

"It's good we have the authorities. Without them there would be chaos," said Zakhid Anovarov, a burly 20-year-old student with a thin black beard.

"But it's not a just system because it's a man-made system. If we were governed by shariah, then life would be better, more just," he said of the Islamic law code....

Zarifa Kamilova came to Kazan in 2004 to escape the aftermath of the second Chechen War in her hometown of Grozny, where federal forces had toppled a separatist government.

Like other Chechens in Kazan, she was drawn to its Muslim majority and the possibility to find work. But she says she fears pressure by the authorities will marginalize Muslims, leading more and more of them to radicalism.

"I have already taken five books off my shelves this year because they were considered too radical," she said, referring to an ever-expanding list of literature outlawed by Russia's Justice Ministry. She and other Muslims say they have felt increasing pressure since Faizov assumed his post.

"This alone is turning normal people into radicals. It's not that more people are becoming radical it's that their definition is encompassing more and more people," she said....

TAKEN IN THE NIGHT

In his battle with radical Islam, perhaps none of Faizov's efforts were as divisive as his demand that imams of all mosques undergo a course in traditional Hanafi Islam, the movement traditionally associated with Tatarstan.

In December, angry Muslims stormed the main mosque in the town of Almetevsk, 270 km (170 miles) and for hours refused to let local religious authorities enter. The confrontation was eventually defused by Faizov, but resentment still burns.

Near Almetevsk, in the village of Novoye Nadyrovo where roosters and chickens wander freely along gravel paths, authorities removed the local imam, Ilnar Kharisov, from his post a few months ago. Friends say he was detained on Friday night, the day after the explosions in Kazan....

"They've taken all the good imams away and they've replaced them with clowns in their places and they protect them there with police. People are very unhappy here," said a neighbour of Kharisov who gave his name only as Ramil.

What's that, Ramil? Clowns, you say? Reza Aslan is now an imam in Tatarstan?

Two more illustrations of why we don't see more genuine Muslim reformers. "Top Muslim cleric shot dead in Russian province of Tatarstan; another wounded in car bomb," from the Associated Press, July 19 (thanks to David):

MOSCOW — A top Muslim cleric in Russia’s Tatarstan province was shot dead and another wounded by a car bomb in two separate attacks apparently related to the priests’ criticism of radical Islamists, investigators said Thursday.

They were not "priests." They were imams. But of course this is AP, which calls both pro-Sharia hardliners and pro-freedom anti-Sharia activists "conservatives."

Russia’s Investigative Committee said that Valiulla Yakupov, the deputy to the Muslim province’s chief mufti, was gunned down Thursday on the way out of his house in Tatarstan’s regional capital, Kazan.

Chief mufti Ildus Faizov was wounded in the leg after an explosive device ripped through his vehicle in central Kazan, Tatarstan investigator Eduard Abdullin told The Associated Press.

Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin told Russian news agencies that his agency is looking into the clerics’ professional activity as a possible cause of the attacks.

Both clerics were known as critics of radical Islamist groups that advocate a strict version of Islam known as Salafism. Faizov was also criticized by media in Tatarstan for allegedly profiting on tours he organized for Muslim pilgrims.

The rise of Salafism in this Volga River province has been fueled by the influx of Muslim clerics from Chechnya and other predominantly Muslim provinces of Russia’s Caucasus region where radical Islamists have for years been involved in a violent confrontation with secular authorities....

Why we don't see more Muslim reformers. "Religious Leader Killed in Russia's Dagestan," from RIA Novosti, June 29 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

An imam has been killed in a mosque in Russia's southern Dagestan region, police said on Friday.

The four masked assailants also killed another man and set the mosque on fire, before fleeing the scene in a stolen car.

The imam, Magomedkamil Gamzatov, was well-known for his rejection of "any form of violence and openly condemned the extremist insurgency," the National Anti-Terror Committee said in a statement....

This article contains this appalling statement: "Such statements could not but stir the Muslim community." The West is completely losing the idea that one's reactions are one's own responsibility, and that the only people to blame for violent thuggery are the thugs themselves. This is a massive capitulation to violent Islamic intimidation and a retreat from the principle of freedom of speech, which involves the societal agreement that one will not respond to being offended with violence or attempts to shut the offender down. Freedom of speech is our foremost bulwark against tyranny, and tyranny is coming.

"'Allah's enemy!' Radio host slash-attacked for anti-Islam rant on air," from Russia Today, May 29 (thanks to Pamela Geller):

A radio host has been hospitalized after being cut 15 times by an unidentified criminal. Two weeks ago the journalist ventured to criticize the founder of Islam, the Prophet Mohammed, on air.

RT, like the rest of the mainstream media, assumes that we are all Muslims now and all acknowledge Muhammad as a prophet.

­Sergey Aslanyan, 46, was brought to Moscow’s hospital with numerous non-penetrating knife wounds to the chest, neck and arm.

According to the police report, on late Monday evening an unknown man called to Aslanyan’s flat over the building intercom and called him outside for a talk. When the journalist stepped out of the entranceway he was knocked over the head with a heavy object, after which the assailant brought the knife into play.

Aslanyan claimed that the attacker was shouting “you are Allah's enemy!” while slashing at the victim.

Police say the abuser was a slim man of about 30, while according to some witnesses there were several attackers....

Still, Izvestia newspaper made a guess that the attack could be linked to recent statements made by the journalist in a radio show. While discussing religion in general he made some “from zero to hero” remarks towards the Prophet Mohammed.

“The Prophet Mohammed, as we know, was not a religious figure. He was a businessman, but after getting considerable financial support built plans as to how to get to the top,” Aslanyan disclosed. He also said that the Prophet “rewrote the Bible” so that “now everyone would know the Prophet Mohammed was not a market shopkeeper, but an outstanding political figure.”

According to Aslanyan, the idea of Islam was a “business project from the very beginning,” and turned out to be successful due to “handsome financing.” Besides that, the journalist, who was an external expert at this radio show, speculated that the Prophet had some sort of sexual disorder.

Reportedly, the journalist later apologized on air for the harsh statements he had made, but that did not change public opinion much.

Such statements could not but stir the Muslim community. There was a widespread angry reaction on the Islamic internet forums.

Outrageous capitulation to thuggery.

Muslims from the Republic of Tatarstan, where Islam is the dominant religion, wrote a letter to the Prosecutor General’s office saying Aslanyan’s statements had insulted them.

“These insults wound our religious feelings and come into conflict with Russian legislature, because they unleash ethnic discord and interreligious hatred,” insists Imam Seijarfar Lutfullin.

Despite being disappointed with the journalist’s position, representatives of the Muslim clergy of Tatarstan refused to have anything to do with the assault on the journalist.

“Islam does not recognize the resort to force – for this there are authorities and courts,” the spokesperson of the Clerical Administration of the Republic of Tatarstan told Izvestia....

Funny how so many Muslims misunderstand the idea that "Islam does not recognize the resort to force."

As bad as the RT article is, this one from the Guardian is even worse: "Russian journalist attacked in Moscow," by Miriam Elder in the Guardian, May 29 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A Russian journalist is in hospital after being lured out of his home and stabbed 20 times late on Monday night in the latest attack on a member of the press.

Sergei Aslanyan, 46, works for Radio Mayak and spent 10 years as a presenter on Echo Moskvy, Russia's leading liberal radio station.

Police sources said Aslanyan received a call from an unknown number just before midnight, inviting him outside for a chat. After leaving his home in southern Moscow, he was stabbed repeatedly in the chest, neck and arms by a man, or several men, wielding a knife.

"The victim has been hospitalised, his life is not in danger," a police source told the Itar-Tass news agency.

Police have opened an investigation into the attack.

The Izvestiya newspaper suggested the attack could have been linked to a recent radio appearance during which Aslanyan insulted the prophet Muhammad.

The programme prompted an angry response among some Muslims, with an imam in the eastern city of Kazan asking prosecutors to investigate the journalist.

Others linked the attack to Aslanyan's reporting on Russia's auto industry and corrupt traffic police....

Although the article does acknowledge that the attackers may have been Muslims, it also suggests an alternate explanation, and completely ignores the cry of "You are Allah's enemy."

That's the mainstream media for you.

More Islamophobia in the Caucasus. "Explosions in Dagestan Kill 13, Wound More Than 120," from The Moscow Times, May 4 (thanks to David):

Two explosions went off at a traffic post in Makhachkala late Thursday, killing at least 13 people and wounding more than 120 in what police have unequivocally ruled a terrorist attack.

A suicide bomber heading out of Makhachkala, the regional capital of the North Caucasus republic of Dagestan, detonated the first explosive at the Alaska-30 traffic station around 10:20 p.m. The exact sequence of events is unclear, with one version of the story that the terrorists rammed the checkpoint building with their car and setting off the explosions, and another that they detonated the bomb after police became suspicious of the vehicle and decided to check it as it was leaving the city.

As first responders began to arrive on the scene about twenty minutes later, a second more powerful explosive was detonated in a Gazel, a type of van commonly used for public transport, which was already parked near the station.

Police said the first explosion was equivalent to 30 kg of TNT, while the second was equivalent to 50 kg. The National Anti-Terrorism Committee said the bombs were improvised explosive devices stuffed with construction dowels three to five cm long.

The explosions were powerful enough to send the engine of the first car, a Lada Priora, 200 meters from the scene of the explosion, and at least 20 nearby cars caught fire, Interfax reported. Investigators have also found fragments of bodies that could belong to the attackers, including a man’s foot and pieces of a female body, police source told Interfax.

At least 13 have died so far. Seven of those who died were policemen, and three were emergency responders. An additional 122 people were injured, with at least 63 of the 87 victims in the hospital in critical or highly critical condition. The other injured victims have already been released from the hospital....

Armed conflicts between militants and security forces are frequent in the republics of the North Caucasus. In early March, a female suicide bomber blew herself up at a traffic post about 40 kilometers south of Makhachkala, killing five cops.

Do U.S. authorities really think this sort of thing cannot and will not happen here? In fact, it is coming quickly. "Muslim lawyer pledges to 'cover Russia in blood,'" from IANS, April 25 (thanks to Stephen Gash):

Police in the Russian capital said on Wednesday they will examine a video in which a prominent Muslim lawyer pledges to "cover Russia in blood" if the authorities refuse to establish courts to implement Islamic law.

"May be you are foreigners here, and this is our home. We will set our rules, whether you want this or not," Dagir Khasavov, a lawyer and aide to an upper house committee chairman, said in an interview with the REN TV channel.

"Any attempts to stop this will result in blood. We will turn the city (Moscow) into a second dead sea," he was quoted as saying.

Russian Chief Mufti Talgat Tadzhuddin condemned Khasavov's statement.

Geidar Dzhemal, head of an influential group called Islamic Committee, said there might have been a "misunderstanding".

A misunderstanding! Of course! These guys are always so hard to understand!

You guessed it: actually the bandit mastermind was a Muslim imam who was killed in a police shootout. Shades of Luqman Abdullah. How many Christian ministers or priests, and how many Jewish rabbis, have been killed in shootouts with the police lately?

"Muslim crime band leader who robbed companies to finance religious sect, arrested," by Anastassia Berseneva for Gazeta, March 29 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Police arrested the supposed bandit leader whose gang attacked the storage facility in Khimki, Moscow oblast, and were shot down in a skirmish with police. According to a police source, the leader is Ramzan Shaikhayev, 40, better known as Abdulla, born in thr [sic] Chechen-Ingush Soviet republic.

On February 29, Bandits attempted to rob a storage facility in Khimki, a town north-west of Moscow. There were eight men in Abdulla's gang, five from Dagestan, one from Chelyabinsk oblast, one from Turkmenistan. Five men were killed in Khimki, the other three were arrested.

Tho criminals who were arrested during the police siege, gave Shaikhayev up. They told the police that he lived in the city of Oryol and operatives had to lure him to Moscow and catch him as he exited the train.

Shaikhayev was a religious leader, adept of Takfir wal-Hijra, an Egyptian Muslim extremist organization, prohibited by Russia's Higher court.

Shaikhayev founded his band to rob companies. "He needed the money to finance illegal insurgent bands." His gang was pretty well armed: police confiscated a Kalashnikov assault rifle, two gas pistols modified to shoot live ammo, three home-made silencers, a grenade and knives, Moscow oblast police department spokesman said.

They rented a room in Northern Moscow. Their neighbours complained to the police that they were frightened by large, grim-looking non-Slavs, but the police inspector didn't come. Now there's an internal investigation in Koptevo district police dept., because weapons and wahhabi literature were later found in this room when it was searched.

With Chechnya and the Caucasus always simmering with jihad, and Beslan, and jihad attacks and plots in Moscow and everywhere, Russian authorities are waking up to the possibility that religious texts can incite people to violence. And so they're considering banning...the Bhagavad Gita. No kidding.

The Lok Sabha is the lower house of Parliament in India.

"Lok Sabha storm as Russian court decides whether to ban Bhagavad Gita," from NDTV, December 19 (thanks to HJS):

Moscow: The Lok Sabha was adjourned this morning over protests against the demand for a ban on the Bhagavad Gita in a Russian court.

In a Siberian court, state prosecutors have petitioned that the Gita, distributed locally by ISKCON members, is "extremist" literature. The court in Siberia's Tomsk city is scheduled to deliver its verdict today....

Earlier today, Congress MP Milind Deora tweeted, "Absurd to suggest the Bhagwad Gita is even remotely pro-violence! Hope Russian Courts appreciate its intrinsic appeal in a pluralistic India."

The case, which has been going on in Tomsk court since June this year, seeks to get a Russian translation of Bhagvad Gita As It Is written by AC Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the founder of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), on the Hindu religious text banned in Russia and declaring it as a literature spreading "social discord", apart from rendering its distribution on Russian soil illegal....

The prosecutor's case also seeks to ban the preaching of Prabhupada and ISKCON's religious beliefs, claiming these were "extremist" in nature and preached "hatred" of other religious beliefs.

"They have not just tried to get the Bhagvad Gita banned, but also brand our religious beliefs and preachings as extremist," Das said....