Christian Woman Meriam Ibrahim Re-Arrested In Sudan After Being Released

Was amazed to read in the paper this morning that Meriam Ibrahim, the Sudanese Christian woman who was sentenced to death for apostasy, had been released.  World outrage usually relegates victims of barbaric Shariah law to years languishing in jail, like Asia Bibi, the Christian Pakistani woman who was imprisoned in 2010 after being sentenced to death for blasphemy.

It turns out Ibrahim was re-arrested at the Khartoum airport along with the rest of her family.

About 40 security agents detained Mrs Ibrahim - along with her husband, Daniel Wani and two children - at the airport, the sources said.

A top Sudanese official has told the BBC she would be freed "soon".

Abdullahi Alzareg from the ministry of foreign affairs told the BBC's Newshour programme that Mrs Ibrahim had been arrested because she did not have the correct travel documents.

Although she is Sudanese, she was using emergency South Sudanese papers with a US visa, he said.

She would be asked to get a passport and exit visa on her release, he added.

It appears the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) was not happy with the appeal court's decision.


The rest here.

"Execute her" Demands Brother Of Sudanese Christian Convert

It appears the Sudanese woman who has been sentenced to death for apostasy was turned in by her own brother who believes she "should be executed" if she doesn't convert back to Islam.

Al-Samani al-Hadi told CNN that he handed his sister over to the authorities because his family are “Muslim people,” and that she should “repent.”

“It's one of two; if she repents and returns to our Islamic faith and to the embrace of our family then we are her family and she is ours,” he said.

“But if she refuses she should be executed,” he said.

Meriam Yehya Ibrahim was born to an Ethiopian Orthodox Christian mum and a Sudanese Muslim father. After the dad abandoned the family, Meriam was raised as a Christian. She is also married to a southern Sudanese Christian man who happens to be a U.S. citizen.

Proving just how unfair Islam is, Muslim men are allowed to marry women of any faith, on the other hand Muslim woman are only allowed to marry Muslims.

Response from the U.S. State Department: "deeply disturbed."

Christian Sudanese Woman Sentenced To Death For Apostasy

27-year-old Meriam Yehya Ibrahim was raised a Christian, but because her father (who abandoned the family when Meriam was a kid) happens to be Muslim, she is considered a Muslim as well. Meriam, who is 8 months pregnant and married to a Christian, has now been convicted of adultery and apostasy, and was sentenced to death by a Sudanese court. She's to get 100 lashes for good measure, for the adultery.

Ibrahim's lawyer Haram Othman told CNN that her legal team will appeal the verdict within 15 days.

According to the rights group Amnesty International, she was convicted of adultery because her marriage to a Christian man was considered void under Sharia law. She was sentenced to 100 lashes for the second crime.

"The verdict is contrary to commitments Sudan has made in its own Constitution and commitments made under regional and international law; Meriam has been convicted solely on account of her religious convictions and personal status," said Katherine Perks with the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies.

"The fact that a woman could be sentenced to death for her religious choice, and to flogging for being married to a man of an allegedly different religion, is abhorrent and should never be even considered," Manar Idriss, Amnesty International's Sudan researcher, said in a statement.

" 'Adultery' and 'apostasy' are acts which should not be considered crimes at all, let alone meet the international standard of 'most serious crimes' in relation to the death penalty. It is a flagrant breach of international human rights law," the researcher said.

Ibrahim is eight months pregnant and is in custody with her 20-month-old son, according to Amnesty International, which considers her a prisoner of conscience.

This is Islam and Sharia for you.

More here.

Saudi Blogger Gets 7 Years and 600 Lashes for Insulting Islam

According to Human Rights Watch, Saudi liberal blogger Raef Badawi- who faced possible death for apostasy- will get 7 years in jail and 600 lashes instead for insulting Islam. They couldn't get him on apostasy because he proved he is still a Muslim. I'm sure those who were bucking for apostasy charges are all sorely disappointed.

The charges against Badawi were based solely on his peaceful exercise of his right to free expression, Human Rights Watch said. Badawi established his online platform in 2008, to encourage debate on religious and political matters in Saudi Arabia. He has been detained in Jeddah’s Buraiman prison since his arrest on June 17, 2012.

[snip] 

“This incredibly harsh sentence for a peaceful blogger makes a mockery of Saudi Arabia’s claims that it supports reform and religious dialogue,” said Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “A man who wanted to discuss religion has already been locked up for a year and now faces 600 lashes and seven years in prison.”

[snip]

Abu al-Khair said that the judge sentenced Badawi to five years in prison for insulting Islam and violating provisions of Saudi Arabia’s 2007 anti-cybercrime law through his liberal website, affirming that liberalism is akin to unbelief. The judge ordered the closure of the website and added two years to Badawi’s sentence for insulting both Islam and Saudi Arabia’s Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, or religious police, in comments during television interviews.

[snip]

Saudi authorities have long harassed Badawi for debating religious issues. In March 2008, authorities arrested Badawi and questioned him about his website, but released him a day later. In May 2008, Badawi was formally charged with “setting up an electronic site that insults Islam” and he left the country. He returned when prosecutors apparently decided to drop the charges, he told Human Rights Watch. In 2009, the authorities barred Badawi from traveling abroad and froze his business interests, depriving him of a source of income, he told Human Rights Watch.

On March 18, 2012, the well-known cleric Sheikh Abdulrahman al-Barrak issued a religious ruling declaring Badawi an “unbeliever… and apostate who must be tried and sentenced according to what his words require.” Al-Barrak claimed that Badawi had said “that Muslims, Jews, Christians, and atheists are all equal,” and that even if these were not Badawi’s own opinions but “an account of the words of others, this is not allowed unless accompanied by a repudiation” of such words.

Fearing a backlash, his wife and four kids left the Kingdom. Hope he does the same thing when he's released.

Shariah Will Dominate The World- Says Ordinary Brit

In a series of videos where individuals were given an opportunity to discuss "What does Shariah Law have to offer Britain", Abu Usamah, an ordinary Brit living in London believes that Shariah will dominate the world. He ends his few minutes with:

"Shariah is the answer for the people of Britain, it is the way forward for the whole world."

Not to be confused with American-born radical cleric Abu Usamah who is an Imam in Birmingham, England, the same one who said of apostasy:

And then finally the hadith ‘baddala deenahu, faqtuhulu’, ‘Whoever changes his religion then kill him.’ ‘Whoever changes his religion then kill him’. That’s not talking about the Yahudi [Jew] who changes his religion from Yahudia [Judaism] to Nasrani [Christianity]. It’s not talking about the Christian who changes his religion from Christianity to Judaism. It’s not talking about the Magian [Zoroastrian] who changes his religion from a Magian to being a person who doesn’t believe in Allah at all. This is talking about the Muslim man or woman who changes their religion from Islam to anything else, kill them in the Islamic state because he has made a form of shirk and that he has legislated for himself what Allah (swt) said was haram. And it’s haram for him to change his religion. So the Muslim who changes his religion, the penalty for that is death because he said it was halal.”

But they might as well be the same. They have the same end goals.

Saudi Rights Activist Faces Beheading For Apostasy- Action Alert

Saudi rights activist Raef Badawi faces losing his head for "apostasy" after he was arrested in Jeddah in June for no specific reason other than the fact that he is one of the co-founders (along with female rights activist Suad al-Shammari) of the Saudi Liberal Network, an organization that was advocating "a day of liberalism" on May 7. A conference was cancelled after authorities told the group that it was inadvisable. We all know what that means.

Badawi and the other activists essentially want to do away with "the influence of religion on public life in Saudi Arabia" which is not- technically- apostasy, but certainly enough to anger clerics in that ultra-conservative country.

The judge in the lower court felt he "could not give a verdict in a case of apostasy," hence the referral to the higher court.

There is a petition demanding his freedom, if you care to sign it.

Saudis Consider New Laws To Combat Insulting Islam

I was under the impression that Saudi Arabia already had serious blasphemy laws. After all, the Kingdom is ruled by Sharia, and blasphemy in Islam is considered apostasy, and the sentence for apostasy is death. But according to a recent Reuters article, Saudis are only now considering criminalizing insulting Islam. I assume they just want to bring social media (like Twitter and Facebook) into the mix, possibly in response to the blaspheming 23-year-old journalist/blogger Hamza Kashgari's posts on Twitter in February of this year.
Kashgari wrote on Twitter:

"I have loved things about you and I have hated things about you and there is a lot I don't understand about you." [then added] "I will not pray for you."

There were calls for his head by top Islamic clerics (and others), and he was eventually tracked down by Interpol (yes, Interpol!) in Malaysia and sent back to Saudi Arabia.  In some countries, repenting (which Kashgari did) can save your hide, but he was still extradited, and is awaiting trial.

But with these new regulations  it won't just be criticism of Mohammed that could get you in to major trouble,  it will also include other Muslim notables and clerics from way back when, and punishment could be very "severe."

"Within the next two months the Shura Council will reveal the outcome of study on the regulations to combat the criticism of the basic tenets of Islamic sharia."

"The (regulations) are important at the present time because violations over social networks on the Internet have been observed in the past months,"

Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi-style Islam is one of the stricter versions of Islam and the sentence for blasphemy is death.

Although Saudi Arabia every once in while takes a tiny, positive step towards reform, it then takes  giant steps backwards. The youth in that country (and apparently there are many) will need to take things into their own hands before the Kingdom turns into another Iran.

Analyst Jamal Khashoggi says it best:

"I would rather have this law discussed by the public first. It should not only be debated by the Shura, it should be debated in newspapers first because it can be misused."

"I don't want anything to affect my freedom and we don't want Saudi Arabia to be another Iran."

What Happens To Christian Converts In Tunisia-

I don't recommend watching this video. It is horrifying at best.  I'm not actually sure why I am posting it, other than in hopes that someone stumbling upon my blog who is still in denial about the true nature of radical Islam might finally be convinced that it's an abomination.

This is what happens to  ex-Muslim, Christian converts in Tunisia.  This aired on Egyptian TV.

[NOTE: a reader below has informed me that the man was not a Christian convert, but a Shia Muslim and that this did not take place in Tunisia but in Syria. However no-one seems to know definitively who the victim was, where it took place, and who the animals who beheaded him were. Bottom line, Shias, Ahmadis and Ishmailis are also considered infidels and, regardless of what religion the person was, the fact that anyone could do this to another human being in the name of religion, is sickening.]

[2nd NOTE: Canadian Michael Coren of Sun News, also discusses this video. And there are references to the Muslim prayers that are chanted as being anti-Christian. So it is more than likely he was Christian.]

It is one of the most horrific things I have ever seen in my life.  It aired on  liberal talk show host Tawfiq Okasha's "Egypt Today".  He too seems disgusted by the whole thing. 

If  you do decide to watch, you are forewarned!!