Recently in Sudan Category

"The meeting discussed the need to reinforce the message of mosques in society and to urge worshipers to fulfil [sic] the virtue of jihad and martyrdom" -- martyrdom, that is, meaning murdering Infidels and getting killed in the process.

"Sudan urges mosques’ imams to call for jihad against rebels," from the Sudan Tribune, May 11 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

May 10, 2013 (KHARTOUM) - Sudan’s High Committee for Mobilisation and Alert has held a meeting with mosque imams to discuss the implications of the recent attacks in South and North Kordofan states by the rebel Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF) and to call for jihad (holy war).

The meeting discussed the need to reinforce the message of mosques in society and to urge worshipers to fulfil [sic] the virtue of jihad and martyrdom, as well as fighting the enemies who they say terrorised the peaceful residents at Um Rawaba, Abu Kershola, and Um Brimbita.

The spokesperson for the Popular Defence Forces (PDF), Mohamed Ahmed Haj Majid, warned against the actions of the SRF which he said aims to disrupt national unity and break up the country, calling on imams to encourage people to engage in jihad and to fight in the name of Allah.

Meanwhile, the mayor of Khartoum locality, Omer Nimir, has stressed the importance of mosques and imams in shaping public opinion, urging imams to appeal to people donate money, food and clothing for the victims of what he called the “insidious” attacks on North and South Kordofan.

On Wednesday, Sudan’s national assembly decided to suspend its sessions for a week in order to enable MPs to travel to their constituencies and lead a mobilisation campaign in support of the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) in its ongoing battle with rebel groups which have stepped up their military activities recently.

In a rare attack last month, SRF rebels swept through the city of Um Rawaba in North Kordofan, before withdrawing later on the same day.

In the past, fighting between the rebels and SAF has largely been limited to Darfur, South Kordofan and Blue Nile states bordering South Sudan, which seceded from Sudan in 2011.

North Kordofan, which includes Um Rawaba and forms part of Sudan’s commercial heartland, is a hub for the country’s agriculture, livestock and gum Arabic industries.

SAF now has it eyes on reclaiming Abu-Kershola district in South Kordofan which was overrun by rebels during last month’s assault.

Officials in Khartoum say that they have completely surrounded the area and pledged not to stop until they recapture Kauda which is the stronghold of the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) in South Kordofan.

Muslim persecution of Christians grows more common by the day. And the world continues to yawn. "Sudan: 'Sudan Security Systematically Targeting Nuba Christians' - Report," from Radio Dabanga, March 14 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

South Kordofan — "According to HUDO's observation, it is clear that the systematic campaign of the government [of Sudan] is part of a plan targeting the native Nubians. Even the timing is arranged to destroy all institutions that gather Nubians either religious or social as the beginning of implementing the Univision (single Islamic Arabian), denial of Nubian Christians' religion rights and Nuba people's rights to practice their culture or social activities.

This was clear when the government security found no charges to issue against the innocent Nubian church leaders and they began accusing them of Christianization and accessing funds from outside Sudan in illegal ways", says the Human Rights and Development Organization (HUDO).

In the second part of its report HUDO describes the arbitrary arrests, the systematic targeting and the reasons it believes are behind these incidents against the Nuba people. The information provided is based on the agency's own observations on the ground, but also on local reports and on information gathered from various sources....

Since the beginning of this year, Sudanese authorities began systematically targeting different Nuba language and cultural centers, including those of Nuba Christians, the report indicated.

These centers, according to the agency, are outlined below:

- Kuku institute for Nuba language and heritages located in Omdurman: closed on 16 January 2013 by government security authorities (NISS). Its manager was arrested and his laptop and mobile phone were confiscated together with the institute's certificate of registration and other documents. The manager was released under the condition that he reports to the NISS office every morning.

- NINU center for languages and computer science -member of the UNESCO Clubs Union: closed by security authorities on 16 January 2013 without any reason. Note: the UNESCO Clubs Union has different centers working across Sudan and all carry out uniformly certified work. None of them was closed down apart from the NINU center.

- Evangelical Cultural Center library in Khartoum: closed on 18 February 2013 by the NISS. Books, media tools and documents belonging to the library were confiscated. Three people were arrested, including a priest. None of them were yet released.

- Gideon Theological College (GTC) in Omdurman: raided on 24 February 2013 by the NISS. Three Nuba Christians were arrested and released under the condition they report to the NISS office on a daily basis.

- Fellowship of Christian University Students (FCUS) office: raided by NISS on 24 February 2013. Two executive members were arrested; one was released under the condition he reports to the NISS office on a daily basis. The other remains under arrest. On the same day, NISS also raided the FCUS-guest house in another area in Khartoum and confiscated a car belonging to it....

"There's really no such thing as just Sharia, it's not one monolithic Continuum - Sharia is understood in thousands of different ways over the 1,500 years in which multiple and competing schools of law have tried to construct some kind of civic penal and family law code that would abide by Islamic values and principles, it's understood in many different ways..." -- Reza Aslan

Not really:

"The only reward of those who make war upon Allah and His messenger and strive after corruption in the land will be that they will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet on alternate sides cut off, or will be expelled out of the land. Such will be their degradation in the world, and in the Hereafter theirs will be an awful doom." -- Qur'an 5:33

"Sudan man's foot, hand 'amputated' by court order," from AFP, February 28:

Government doctors in Sudan amputated a man's hand and foot to carry out a sentence for robbery, rights groups said on Wednesday, describing the extremely rare punishment as a form of torture.

The amputation of Adam Al Muthna's right hand and left foot took place by court order at the interior ministry's Al Rebat hospital in Khartoum on February 14, the rights groups said, citing "reliable sources."

Muthna, 30, was convicted of armed robbery related to an attack on a truck carrying passengers, said a statement issued by New York-based Human Rights Watch, also on behalf of the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies, London-based REDRESS and US-based Physicians for Human Rights.

"Cross amputation is a form of state-sponsored torture," said Vincent Iacopino, senior medical adviser at Physicians for Human Rights.

Sentences of amputation have previously been handed down under Islamic sharia law, whose introduction in 1983 sparked a devastating 22-year civil war.

But since 2001 there have been no known cases of such sentences being carried out, the rights groups said.

The Sudanese authorities "routinely" order flogging penalties and last year issued two sentences of death by stoning for adultery, although the capital punishment was later overturned, they added.

Over at FrontPage Magazine (via RaymondIbrahim.com), I discuss how the road to Sharia Egypt has taken is akin to the Sudanese pattern, which culminated in genocide for all who reject Sharia:

The current tensions in Egypt between the Muslim Brotherhood-led government and a fragmented populace that includes large segments of people who oppose the Islamization of Egypt—the moderates, secularists, and Christians who recently demonstrated in mass at Tahrir Square and even besieged the presidential palace—is all too familiar. One need only look to Egypt's immediate neighbor, Sudan, and its bloody history, to know where the former may be headed.

The civil war in Sudan, which saw the deaths of millions, was fundamentally a byproduct of an Islamist regime trying to push Sharia law on large groups of Sudanese—Muslim, Christian, and polytheist—who refused to be governed by Allah's law, who refused to be Islamized. Although paying lip-service to pluralism and equality in the early years, by 1992, the Islamist government of Khartoum declared a formal jihad on the south and the Nuba, citing a fatwa by Sudan's Muslim authorities which declared that "An insurgent who was previously a Muslim is now an apostate; and a non-Muslim is a non-believer standing as a bulwark against the spread of Islam, and Islam has granted the freedom of killing both of them."

In other words, Khartoum decreed that: 1) It is simply trying to do Allah's will by instituting Islamic Sharia law; 2) Any Sudanese who objects—including Muslims—is obviously an infidel; 3) All such infidels must be eliminated. Accordingly, countless people were butchered, raped, and enslaved—all things legitimate once an Islamic states declares a jihad. While South Sudan recently ceded, the Nuba Mountains in the north is still continuously being bombarded.

Now consider how the above pattern—false promises of religious freedom, followed by a Sharia push and a declaration that all who oppose it, including Muslims, are infidels and apostates to be killed—is precisely what has been going on directly to the north of Sudan, in Egypt.

First, although Muhammad Morsi repeatedly promised that he would be a president who represents "all Egyptians" during presidential elections, mere months after coming to power, he showed that his true loyalty—which should have been obvious from the start, considering that he is a Muslim Brotherhood leader—was to Sharia and Islamization.

Even so, Egyptians did not forget that Morsi, during presidential elections, had said the following in a video interview:

The Egyptian people are awake and alert—Muslims and Christians; and they know that, whoever comes [to become Egypt's president], and does not respect the rule of law and the Constitution, the people will go against him. I want the people immediately to go against me, if I ever do not respect the law and Constitution...

Conversion away from Islam is forbidden on pain of death. Muhammad said: "Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him" (Bukhari 9.84.57). The death penalty for apostasy is part of Islamic law according to all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence. Yet Muslim spokesmen such as Harris Zafar, Mustafa Akyol, Salam al-Marayati, M. Cherif Bassiouni, and Ali Eteraz (among many others) have assured us that Islam doesn't punish apostasy. I expect that Zafar, Akyol, al-Marayati, Bassiouni, and Eteraz will immediately be jetting over to Khartoum to explain to the Sudanese authorities that they are getting Islam all wrong, wrong, wrong.

"Two Sudan Coptic priests arrested after 'baptism,'” from AFP, December 19 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Two priests from the Coptic Orthodox Church in Sudan have been arrested after the religious conversion of a Muslim in the Islamist-run state, church sources said.

"I understand there was someone from the Arab origin that accepted Christ and was baptized by them," leading to their arrest within the past few days, one religious leader told AFP.

Other religious sources confirmed the incident but Khartoum's Coptic Bishop Elia was not immediately able to comment.

Under the 23-year Islamist regime of President Omar al-Bashir, Sudan's minority Copts have not experienced the violence suffered by their brethren in Egypt, where sectarian attacks surged after an uprising overthrew president Hosni Mubarak in February 2011 and saw Islamists rise to power.

But a little-known group calling itself Al-Qaeda in the Nilien States sent a statement to Sudanese journalists on Tuesday threatening violence against Copts unless the woman who converted and was "kidnapped" by the Christians is returned.

"The Prophet wrote the (marriage contract) with 'Aisha while she was six years old and consummated his marriage with her while she was nine years old and she remained with him for nine years (i.e. till his death)." -- Bukhari 7.62.88

Muslims take this seriously and imitate Muhammad in this. Article 1041 of the Civil Code of the Islamic Republic of Iran states that girls can be engaged before the age of nine, and married at nine: "Marriage before puberty (nine full lunar years for girls) is prohibited. Marriage contracted before reaching puberty with the permission of the guardian is valid provided that the interests of the ward are duly observed."

The Ayatollah Khomeini himself married a ten-year-old girl when he was twenty-eight. Khomeini called marriage to a prepubescent girl "a divine blessing," and advised the faithful: "Do your best to ensure that your daughters do not see their first blood in your house."

The Qur'an also It allows for marriage to pre-pubescent girls, stipulating that Islamic divorce procedures “shall apply to those who have not yet menstruated” (65:4).

Thus this should come as no surprise to anyone -- except those who have bought the deceptive line of Islamic supremacists in the West, that Aisha was actually nineteen, etc.

"NGO decries endorsement of girl child marriage by Sudan’s state-controlled clerics," from the Sudan Tribune, October 22 (thanks to Lachlan):

October 22, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – The head of Sudan’s main clerical authority, the Religious Scholars Committee (RSC), has publicly advocated girl child marriage, drawing the ire of women activists rights who called for an immediate ban against the practice.

According to the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA ), a local NGO, RSC’s chairman Mohamed Osman Salih, made his endorsement of girl child marriage in the Sudanese capital Khartoum on 17 October during a debate organized by the United Nation Fund for Population (UNFPA) in collaboration with the Sudanese Ministry of Religious Guidance on Girl’s Child Marriage.

SIHA reported that Salih argued that girl child marriage is an appreciative matter in Islam and has many advantages including the prospect of being able to produce many offspring.

The NGO recalled that in 2009 the RSC issued a Fatwa endorsing female circumcision despite much lobbying by activists to ban the harmful practice.

SIHA further criticized the fact that the Sudanese government has failed to amend the laws that allow girl child marriage, referring to the Sudan Personal Status Act of 1991 which contains an article allowing for the marriage of girls as young as 10.

“As women activists, women’s human rights defenders and community leaders across the Horn of Africa, we are saddened by the lack of progress Sudan is demonstrating and the lack of will to amend and revise the country’s laws and legislations towards respecting the human rights and dignity of women and girls” SIHA’s statement reads.

SIHA called on the Sudanese government to conform the country’s personal laws with international obligations and to immediately ban and criminalize the granting of marriage licenses for girls under the age of 18.

It also called for abolishing all legislation that seeks to undermine and violate women’s human rights.

Don't they know that jihad has nothing to do with fighting hot wars, and that Sharia is benign and fully compatible with Western principles of human rights? Imam Rauf, call your office! "Islamist lobby group threatens 'Jihad' against Sudan government over constitution," from the Sudan Tribune, September 25 (thanks to Wimpy):

September 25, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – A coalition of Sudanese Islamist groups has threatened to declare Jihad against the government if it refuses their demands a constitution based on Islamic Shari’a law.

The threat by the Islamic Constitution Front (ICF), a group of Islamist political parties and individuals lobbying the government to create an Islamic constitution, comes after the country’s president Omer Al-Bashir announced on 13 July the formation of a committee comprising unidentified “religious scholars and experts in law, politics and economic” tasked to draft a permanent constitution for the predominantly Muslim country following the secession of the mainly Christian South Sudan in 2011.

ICF’s Chairman Al-Sadiq Abduall Abdel Majid declared, in a statement released on Tuesday, their group’s rejection to the constitution committee and demanded that the government holds a plebiscite on the process of constitution-creation.

In the same statement, ICF’s Secretary-General Nasir Al-Sayed threatened that they might resort to “Jihad” against the government by mobilizing the public to protest in demand of an Islamic constitution.

Al-Sayed also slammed the constitution-drafting committee, describing it as a group of non-achieving technocrats who lack the qualifications to “determine the fate of millions of Muslims”.

This is not first time that the ICF has attempted to bully the government over the Islamic constitution issue. It previously threatened to depose President Al-Bashir if the government fails to act on their demands.

ICF’s statement stressed that the government has no excuse to use for wriggling out of the Islamic constitution, after the secession of South Sudan whose population is largely Christian although many practice traditional African beliefs. The ICF claim that 97% of Sudanese are Muslim, although it is unclear what date this figure is based on.

The group further accused the government of trying to circumvent their demands for an Islamic constitution in order to ingratiate itself with the West and respond to pressure from foreign investment corporations.

ICF is composed of several Islamist group and individuals mostly representing Salafist groups and individuals and far-right political parties such as the Just Peace Forum (JPF) led by President Al-Bashir’s uncle Al-Tayyeb Mustafa.

Al-Bashir, himself an Islamist, has already made several statements confirming that Sudan’s upcoming constitution will reflect the country’s Islamic and Arab identity....

Friday prayers have let out, and you know what that means: time for rage, hate and violence.

"Sudan protesters set fire to German embassy," from Reuters, September 14 (thanks to Twostellas):

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudanese demonstrators broke into the German embassy in Khartoum on Friday, raising an Islamic flag and setting the building on fire in a protest against a film that demeaned the Prophet Mohammad, witnesses said.

Police had earlier fired tear gas to try to disperse some 5,000 protesters who had ringed the German embassy and nearby British mission. But a Reuters witness said policemen just stood by when the crowd forced its way into Germany's mission.

Demonstrators hoisted a black Islamic flag saying in white letters "there is no God but God and Mohammed is his prophet". They smashed windows, cameras and furniture in the building and then started a fire, witnesses said.

Firefighters arrived to put out the flames.

Employees of Germany's embassy were safe "for the moment", Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said in Berlin. He also told Khartoum's envoy to Berlin that Sudan must protect diplomatic missions on its soil, a foreign ministry statement said.

It was unclear why the two European embassies were singled out since the film, which has outraged Muslims, was made in the United States, and U.S. diplomatic missions have been attacked by Islamist protesters in a number of Arab countries.

But Sudan has criticized Germany for allowing a protest last month by right-wing activists carrying a caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad and for Chancellor Angela Merkel giving an award in 2010 to a Danish cartoonist who depicted the Prophet in 2005, triggering demonstrations across the Islamic world....

He has been waging jihad against the Christians of South Sudan and the non-Arab Muslims of Darfur, but he has the support of the Arab League and OIC, so he is just fine by the UN.

"Genocidal Sudanese regime's appointment to UN human rights council all but certain, watchdog says," by Joshua Rhett Miller for FoxNews.com, August 8 (thanks to Benedict):

The election of a Sudanese warlord accused of genocide to the United Nations Human Rights Council is now virtually guaranteed, since he has the full backing of the world body's African delegation.

The International Criminal Court has issued a warrant for Omar Al-Bashir -- its first ever for a sitting head of state -- for crimes against humanity he allegedly committed in Darfur. Yet, his regime is set to take its place on the panel, in the latest bizarre appointment to make a mockery of the UN's human rights credibility, according to critics.

It's like putting “Jack the Ripper in charge of a women’s shelter,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch.

Neuer's Geneva-based group is calling on UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay to denounce election of the war-torn North African nation to the 47-member body. Sudan is not technically on the panel, but its election is a certainty because only five African nations are vying for the continent's five seats. ...

Why this was done was apparently not disclosed, but it doesn't look as if American interests were very high on the priority list -- as is so often the case with this Administration. "Bin Laden's ex-cook freed from Guantanamo: Sudan," from AFP, July 11 (thanks to Block Ness):

The former cook of slain Al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden returned to his native Sudan early Wednesday, the foreign ministry said, after his release from the US detention centre at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Ibrahim al-Qosi "is already in Khartoum since early this morning" after his arrival on a United States military aircraft, Foreign Ministry spokesman Al-Obeid Meruh told AFP.

"He is a free man," Meruh said.

Court documents in August 2010 showed that Qosi's 14-year sentence would be suspended this month and that he would be returned to Sudan....

Under a plea deal, Qosi, 50, admitted in July 2010 to providing support to terrorism and conspiracy. Details of the plea deal were not released at the time.

He had been held at the US-run Guantanamo prison since 2002.

Qosi acknowledged under oath that he had backed Al-Qaeda since 1996 and had followed bin Laden to Afghanistan, where he worked as a cook at a compound in Jalalabad and also served as a bookkeeper and logistics chief....

Meruh said there had been "some sort of communication between American authorities and Sudanese authorities" over the Qosi case, and a team from the United States visited Sudan last month to finalise details.

"They said they are going to release him," Meruh said.

Bin Laden lived in Sudan for about five years until he was forced to leave in 1996.

The United States imposed sanctions on Sudan in 1997, partly for its support of international terrorism.

In the West, we get these smooth lies from deceptive Islamic supremacists: "There's really no such thing as just Sharia, it's not one monolithic Continuum - Sharia is understood in thousands of different ways over the 1,500 years in which multiple and competing schools of law have tried to construct some kind of civic penal and family law code that would abide by Islamic values and principles, it's understood in many different ways..." -- Reza Aslan

But in Sudan and other Muslim countries, everyone seems to know exactly what Sharia is and what it involves: stonings, amputations, the death penalty for apostasy, the subjugation of women, the oppression of non-Muslims, etc. That's why this Reuters story starts talking about stonings -- everyone knows they are part of Sharia despite the best efforts of deceivers like Aslan. That's also why Bashir has to assure non-Muslims that Sharia is just. He addresses fears of Sharia coming to Sudan not by saying "We're going to implement a benign, expansive, human-rights-respecting version of Sharia" but by telling people that they shouldn't fear Sharia, because it is just. He takes for granted that his audience knows exactly what Sharia is, and that he is referring to the same thing that they have in mind.

So is Boy Reza lying, or is he just stupid? The jury is still out.

"Sudan constitution to be '100 percent Islamic': Bashir," from Reuters, July 8 (thanks to all who sent this in):

(Reuters) - President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said on Saturday Sudan's next constitution would be "100 percent Islamic" to set an example for neighbouring countries, some of which have seen religious parties gain power after popular uprisings.

The secession of mostly non-Muslim South Sudan a year ago sparked predictions that Sudan, which hosted former al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in the 1990s, would start implementing Islamic law more strictly.

In a speech to leaders of the mystical Islamic Sufi tradition in Khartoum, Bashir suggested Sudan's new, post-secession constitution could help guide the region's political transformation.

"We want to present a constitution that serves as a template to those around us. And our template is clear, a 100 percent Islamic constitution, without communism or secularism or Western (influences)," said Bashir.

"And we tell non-Muslims, nothing will preserve your rights except for Islamic sharia because it is just," he said....

Well, that's a relief!

Following the 1989 coup that brought Bashir to power, Sudan introduced laws that took sharia as their main source.

Already, floggings are a common punishment in Sudan for crimes like drinking alcohol and adultery.

Sentences of stoning are rare, although in May a Sudanese woman was sentenced to death by stoning for adultery, sparking condemnation from human rights lawyers. Similar sentences in the past have not been carried out....

Of course. The Zionists are everywhere. Everywhere. Check under the bed, Bashir! "Sudan blames Zionist-American plot for unrest," from Reuters, July 2 (thanks to Elder of Ziyon):

KHARTOUM (Reuters) -- Sudan accused unnamed "Zionist institutions" on Sunday of fanning anti-government protests as it tries to snuff out disturbances which echo Arab Spring unrest elsewhere.

For two weeks, anti-austerity protesters have been calling for the resignation of the government of President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, one of Africa's longest serving leaders.

Sudan lost three-quarters of its oil revenue after South Sudan gained independence last year, forcing the government to impose cuts that have hit Sudanese who were already grappling with soaring inflation and a weakening currency.

"Zionist institutions inside the United States and elsewhere... are exploiting the latest economic decisions to destabilize the security and political situation," the state-linked Sudanese Media Centre quoted presidential assistant Nafie Ali Nafie as saying.

Nafie said the government had evidence of collusion between rebel groups in Darfur, politicians in arch-foe South Sudan and Zionist institutions in the United States to sabotage Sudan. He did not present the evidence....

What a surprise!

Imam Rauf should be jetting to Khartoum any minute now, to explain to Sudanese officials how they are misunderstanding Sharia, which is utterly benign and compatible with Western notions of human rights.

"Young woman sentenced to death by stoning in Sudan," by Alexander Dziadosz for Reuters, May 31 (thanks to Wimpy):

(Reuters) - A Sudanese woman, believed to be around 20, has been sentenced to be stoned to death for adultery, and is being held near Khartoum, shackled in prison with her baby son, rights groups and lawyers said on Thursday.

Campaigners condemned the ruling, saying it violated international standards and raised concerns that Sudan might start applying sharia, or Islamic law, more strictly following the secession of mostly non-Muslim South Sudan last year.

The woman, Intisar Sharif Abdalla, was sentenced by the Ombada criminal court on April 22, court documents seen by Reuters showed.

Two lawyers assigned to her case, who declined to be named, said they were launching an appeal adding Abdalla appeared to be under severe psychological strain.

"She's in dire need of a psychiatrist because she appears to be in a state of shock from the social and family pressures she's under," one lawyer said.

Abdalla was illiterate and did not have a lawyer or interpreter in the courtroom, although Arabic is not her native language, the lawyers and activists added.

Arabic is the main language in the overwhelmingly Muslim nation, though a wide range of smaller languages are also spoken, particularly in tribal areas. It was unclear where Abdalla came from.

Officials in Sudan's justice and information ministries said they could not immediately comment on the case when Reuters contacted them by phone.

Abdalla's exact age has not been confirmed, but activists said she was believed to be around 20, although some reports indicated she could be younger....

In 2010, the case of Lubna Hussein, a Sudanese U.N. official, sparked international furor when she was sentenced to flogging for wearing trousers.

Fahima Hashim, a women's rights activist following Abdalla's case, said sentences were often inconsistent in Sudan because the legal system gave authority to judges to decide punishments. Previous stoning sentences had not been carried out, she said.

Hashim called for the reform of articles in Sudan's criminal code which she said harm women's rights, including one used in Abdalla's case.

As long as this articles remained unchanged, execution by stoning would not be out of the question, she said. "It's a threat. It could happen."

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Muslim mob torches Khartoum church," by Mohamed Saeed for the Associated Press, April 22 (thanks to Tom):

KHARTOUM, Sudan (AP) — A Muslim mob has set ablaze a Catholic church frequented by Southern Sudanese in the capital Khartoum, witnesses and media reports said on Sunday.

The church in Khartoum's Al-Jiraif district was built on a disputed plot of land but the Saturday night incident appeared to be part of the fallout from ongoing hostilities between Sudan and South Sudan over control of an oil town on their ill-defined border....

The witnesses and several newspapers said a mob of several hundreds shouting insults at southerners torched the church. Fire engines could not put out the fire, they added.

One newspaper, Al-Sahafah, said the church was part of a complex that included a school and dormitories. Ethiopian refugees living in the Sudanese capital also used the church....

The South's declaration of independence from the pro-Sharia, Islamic supremacist North always did seem too good to be true: it seemed inconceivable that the jihadis of the North would allow the kuffar to go in peace. And so here we are.

"Sudan President Declares War On South Sudan," from Ya Libnan, April 19 (thanks to Pamela Geller):

Sudan’s president, Omar al-Bashir, Thursday declared war on South Sudan, vowing to topple its government.

The move comes after Sudan’s parliament passed a resolution branding South Sudan’s ruling party an enemy that “must be fought until it is defeated.”

Sudan and South Sudan are embroiled in the worst clashes along their poorly defined border since the secession of the South last summer. The United Nations Security Council is considering sanctions on both countries in an attempt to end the violence, and demanded South Sudanese forces withdraw from their occupation of the 60,000-barrels-a-day oil field Heglig oil field. Both countries continue to ignore calls to end the fighting.

On a visit Thursday to the oil-rich, restive border state of South Kordofan, Bashir rallied his troops, which are now engaged on three fronts with South Sudan.

“Heglig isn’t the end, it is the beginning, and we shall go all the way to [South Sudanese capital] Juba,” Bashir told a rally.

South Sudan’s army spokesman, Col. Philip Aguer, dismissed Bashir’s threat, saying that the South’s army would keep Sudan’s aggression at bay.

“If they didn’t defeat us when we were a green army, how will they defeat us now,” he said....

Bashir accuses the South of implementing the agenda of foreign countries which backed its secession bid, at the expense of its own people....

But no worries. Everyone knows that Sharia is benign and fully compatible with freedom and humane values. The Sudanese government is just misunderstanding it. "Southern Sudanese Christians Fear Forced Repatriation," from Compass Direct News, April 6:

JUBA, South Sudan, April 6 (CDN) — Christians from South Sudan who have until Easter Sunday (April 8) to try to become citizens of Sudan or be deported fear authorities will use the occasion to rid the country of Christianity, church leaders said.

More than 500,000 citizens of southern ethnic origin who have been living in Sudan for decades – some of them born there – will be considered foreigners after Sunday. Human rights organizations have called on Khartoum to grant them more time to either leave or apply for citizenship.

Christian leaders expressed concern that local media such as the daily Al Intibaha newspaper have been stoking hatred against predominantly Christian southern Sudanese, describing them as “cancer cells in the body of Sudan, the land of the Arab and Islam,” and calling on the government to deport them.

“The local media are becoming very hostile toward us who are still in the north,” one Christian told Compass by phone on condition of anonymity.

Gov. Ahmad Abbass of Sennar state in central Sudan vowed to deport southern Sudanese from his state “without regret,” according to Alsahafa, an Arabic daily. Banners have appeared in Khartoum streets calling on the government and Muslims in general to harass and expel southern Sudanese, some of whom are also Muslims.

“Why are they still here? The government should expel them from the country,” one banner asserts....

As Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has pledged to base the new Sudan more deeply on sharia (Islamic law), ethnic southerners are faced with a difficult choice, Elizabeth Kendal writes in the Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin.

“The message essentially is this: Submit to sharia or get out,” she writes. “Churches may well be targeted immediately and aggressively, starting 9 April. All across the Sudan, churches have been emptying as ethnic southerners – including those born and raised in the north – flee south. This could eventually become a pretext for closing them.”

At the same time, police have been mistreating some of the more than 113,000 southern Sudanese who are living in open spaces in Khartoum after having fled conflict in South Sudan. Officers have removed their make-shift housing, including temporary latrines, according to Jovana Luka, deputy chairperson of the Relief and Rehabilitation Commission in South Sudan, who recently returned from Khartoum....

But remember, it is the non-Muslim free West that has the problem with tolerance. Keep repeating that to yourself enough times, and even if you don't come to believe it, at least it will lull you to sleep. "Sudan’s Aerial Bombing Aims at Churches in Nuba Mountains," from Compass Direct News, March 30 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

JUBA, South Sudan, March 30 (CDN) — After Khartoum denied that it had bombed civilians earlier this month, Sudanese aerial strikes last week were aimed at church buildings and schools in Kauda, South Kordofan state, a humanitarian aid worker said.

Antonov airplanes dropped bombs on Thursday and Friday (March 22 and 23), destroying some houses and cattle near the church buildings and schools but causing no casualties, he said.

Humanitarian agencies consider the Islamic government’s targeting of civilians in the Nuba Mountains, which has a large Christian population, an “ethnic cleansing” against non-Arab peoples in the multi-ethnic state, with the added incentive of ridding the area of Christians, he said.

Churches in the Nuba Mountains are holding worship services very early in the morning and late in the evening in order to avoid aerial bombardments that target their churches, he said. Most of the bombings take place during daytime, when visibility is better for pilots of the Russian-made Antonov planes.

Khartoum is actively recruiting more security personnel and sending them to South Kordofan to help kill or arrest Nuba civilians, including Christians, sources said. Islamic government officials consider the various Nuba ethnicities as enemies or “infidels” in their campaign to clear the region of non-Arab races and Christianity.

“These people are doing everything possible to make sure they get rid of Christianity from the Nuba Mountains – churches and church schools are the targets of both the Sudanese Armed Forces and its militias,” the aid worker aid, although mosques have also been targeted.

The Sudanese government has razed 10 church buildings and 17 mosques since fighting broke out last June, according to a report released on March 16 by the Arry Organization for Human Rights and Development. The South Kordofan-based organization reported that the Sudanese Armed Forces and allied militias have destroyed 73 villages and 48 schools....

A racist and Islamic supremacist purge in the making, in line with Sudanese president Bashir's plans for the intensified imposition of Sharia and cultural and linguistic Arabization: "Sudanese people in the north with any parents, grandparents or great grandparents born in the South Sudan or belong to any southern ethnic group are considered that country's nationals."

"South Sudanese face deadline to leave the north," by Frederick Nzwili for ENI News, March 7 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

(ENInews). Sudanese Christians who have barely a month to leave the north or risk being treated as foreigners are starting to move, but Christian leaders are concerned that the 8 April deadline set by Islamic-majority Sudan is unrealistic.

"We are very concerned. Moving is not easy ... people have children in school. They have homes ... It is almost impossible," Roman Catholic Bishop Daniel Adwok, the Khartoum archdiocese auxiliary told ENInews in a telephone interview on 7 March.

Sudan in February announced the deadline for the former citizens it had stripped of nationality after South Sudan's January 2011 vote to secede. The ultimatum will affect an estimated 500,000-700,000 people, who are mainly Christians of southern origin that still live in the north.

Many of them fled north during the long civil war fought between the Government of Sudan and the former rebels, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement. They have lived there for decades together with children who were born there. Few have ties with South Sudan.

The people are desperate to move, according to reports, following the deadline and increasing tensions between the two nations over oil wealth. The tensions started escalating in January after the north allegedly started taking crude oil from the landlocked south, which it was exporting through a pipeline to Port Sudan on the Red Sea.

"We want the rights of these people addressed by the two parliaments. Everyone has a right to choose where they want to live. It is a human right," said Adwok.

Sudan amended its laws after the south's independence to say that Sudanese people automatically lose citizenship when they acquire by right or by other means the citizenship of South Sudan. Sudanese people in the north with any parents, grandparents or great grandparents born in the South Sudan or belong to any southern ethnic group are considered that country's nationals.

"That's the official deadline, but we don't know how the Khartoum regime will react," said John Ashworth, an advisor of the Sudan Ecumenical Forum.

Some church leaders fear increased persecution of Christians in the north or even forced repatriation for those who may want to stay. "The fears have been there from the beginning. There could be some form of harassment, and that could intensify after that date, but for forceful removal, it is hard to ascertain," said the Rev. Don Bosco Ochieng, a Roman Catholic priest in the Rumbek diocese.

Aid agencies are calling for the extension of the deadline, warning that it will create a logistical and humanitarian catastrophe.

The opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi has threatened Bashir with an "Arab Spring"-type revolution, but it is clear that such a revolution would reshuffle the deck, but would not change the cards where governance is concerned. Bashir has already announced his own intentions to impose more Sharia, as well as a plan of cultural and linguistic Arabization,

"Sudan: Islamists Warn Bashir Over Shariah Constitution," from AllAfrica, February 28 (thanks to Twostellas):

Khartoum — A coalition of radical Islamic groups in Sudan has threatened to unseat the country's President Omer Al-Bashir if he failed to heed demands for a constitution based on Shariah laws.

Sudan's far-right and Islamist groups have been lobbying to have the country's 2005 Transitional Constitution replaced with an Islamic one after the mainly-Christian South Sudan seceded in July last year.

To that end, they formed the Islamic Constitution Front (ICF) and proposed the Draft Constitution of Sudan, which is based entirely on Shariah law and, according to a report earlier this month, prohibits the appointment of women in the judiciary.

On Tuesday, the ICF held its foundation conference in the capital Khartoum, and the coalition members who include the Salafi Ansar Al-Suna, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Just Peace Forum (JPF), signed its founding statement which called for applying Shariah laws.

The conference, which was attended by a host of political parties, saw some ICF representatives boldly warning the government and president Al-Bashir against an uprising by Islamists if their proposed constitution is not adopted.

Addressing the opening session, the ICF member and Imam of the Grand Mosque in Khartoum, Shaykh Kamal Riziq, regretted the fact that it was them who took the initiative to propose the Islamic constitution rather than the government itself.

He went on to warn that the government was now facing a choice between adopting their constitution and leaving.

"I find no qualms in telling the government that it should either rule by Islam or go unregrettably" he declared.

Omer Hadra, another ICF's member and representative of the Khattmiya religious sect, took it a step further, threatening to topple president Al-Bashir if he does not approve the draft constitution.

"We will submit this Islamic constitution to you [Al-Bashir] and if you fail to apply it, I swear to God we will have you overthrown," Hadra said.

The leader of the far-right JPF, Al-Tayyib Mustafa, pointed out that Muslims now make up 97 percent of Sudan's population and all of them want to apply Shariah.

Mustafa, who happens to be a close relative of Al-Bashir, added that Sudan's new homogenous reality had ended the debate on ethnic and religious diversity.

The ICF's secretary-general, Shaykh Al-Sadiq Abdella Abdel-Majid, vowed that they would have a strong word with the government should it fail to apply what he termed as God's rules. He warned that they would not compromise on Shariah no matter the challenges and obstacles.

Al-Bashir, an Islamist himself, is unlikely to feel threatened by the warnings. He was, after all, faster than the radical Islamists themselves in declaring the intention to transform Sudan into an entirely Islamic state.

No, not that kind of Party of Allah. At least not until after "martyrdom." The name change would be but one more sign of the intensified emphasis on Sharia in Khartoum. Whether or not they intend to allude to their hoodlum friends in Lebanon, they would call themselves the "Party of Allah" to cast themselves as the sole party with the right to rule, basing their legitimacy on the implementation of Sharia. "Sudan’s ruling party considers to change its name to Hizbollah - official," from the Sudan Tribune, February 15:

February 15, 2012 (KHARTOUM) — Karam Allah Abbas, governor of Gadaref state and head of the National Congress Party (NCP) in the eastern Sudan province disclosed that there is a trend within the ruling party to change its name to Hizbollah (Party of God).

The governor who was speaking on Tuesday before the members of his new government after the swearing-in ceremony said such change of name means to confirm the NCP’s adherence to the implementation of the Islamic law, Sharia, in Sudan.

Since the secession of South Sudan and the end of the interim period provided in the 2005 peace agreement with the former rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), President Omer al-Bashir reiterated several times his commitment to establish an Islamic state in the country.

Some factions within the ruling party and the Sudanese Islamic movement press the government to found a state rooted in the Islamic law and call to ignore any compromise with the opposition or rebel groups over this issue.

Recently memorandums were circulated by Sudanese Islamists in Khartoum calling to reform the party and to establish an Islamic state in the Sudan. However, the members of the Islamic movement clearly diverge on how to ensure its implementation and the role of the party in this regard.

Karam Allah called on the opposition parties "to sit under a tree" with the government and to give up what he called "the whims of the soul and the private agendas" to determine the future of the country.

The governor underscored that the parties should further negotiate their participation in a national government led by President Bashir. He pointed out that this government should include the regular forces (army and police).

The outcome of the talks with the opposition should serve to define the objectives of the interim period which should be followed by general elections, he emphasized.

Among the three main opposition political forces, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) has already joined a coalition government led by the ruling NCP. The Uma National Party (UNP) of Sadiq al-Mahdi and the Popular Congress Party (PCP) of Hassan al-Turabi refuse to join the ruling party are pose some conditions.

There are no political talks with the armed rebel groups in Blue Nile, Darfur, and South Kordofan who demand a secular state and say determined to topple the NCP regime.