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Rome, Jun 25, 2008 / 07:41 pm (CNA).- Auxiliary Bishop Shlemon Warduni of Baghdad warned this week that there is an effort underway “to rid the Middle East of Christians.” According to the bishop, “The war has destroyed everything and even the tradition of coexistence.  One-third of Christians have fled the country because of threats, abuse and violence.”

The Italian news agency SIR is reporting that the bishop made his comments in an address to the scientific committee of the Oasis International Study and Research Center, which is meeting in Amman, Jordan, to discuss the situation in Iraq.  Bishop Shlemon also mentioned the “kidnapping of men of the Church, like the 16 priests that were kidnapped, some of which were killed, like Archbishop Faraj Rahho of Mosul.”

Despite all this, he continued, “God is the source of freedom and truth, and bearing witness to Christ does not mean being a fanatic.  Our churches have taken in many during the war, with no distinction of ethnicity or faith. The same is true of our schools and ecclesial institutions.  And this allows us to get know our Muslim friends,” he said.

However, the bishop continued, we should not forget that “our young people have no hope, they are not accepted. A fleeing Iraqi is taboo. The situation right now is unbearable as well because of the difficulties of daily life: little water, electricity and high prices.  Ironically we have all this oil but we are poor.”

By Habib Toumi, Bureau Chief
Published: July 02, 2008, 00:08

Manama: A Bahraini minister has warned against politicising religion, saying the rise of religious extremism would have disastrous consequences.

"It is very important religion is not politicised and everyone can worship in any manner they like. Religion is for God and the country is for all people. There are moderates and there are some extremists, even though in Bahrain they are not a phenomenon," Shaikh Khalid Bin Ahmad Bin Salman Al Khalifa, Minister of the Royal Court said.

"Fanatics and takfiriyoon [people who consider those who have ideologies different than theirs as unbelievers] must not be tolerated because they represent ideology terrorism that we staunchly reject," he said in an interview published on Tuesday by the Al Hayat daily.

www.timesonline.co.uk

West Bank torturers funded by Britain

Millions of pounds of British government money is going to Palestinian security forces which use methods of torture including hanging prisoners by their feet and putting them in “stress” positions for hours at a time.

Evidence to be published next month in a report by Human Rights Watch was corroborated last week in interviews by The Sunday Times with victims in the West Bank, ruled by President Mahmoud Abbas’s western-backed Palestinian Authority.

Prisoners who have emerged from Palestinian Authority jails – many of whom have never been charged with any offence or even seen a lawyer – said they had been subjected to mock executions, kicked, punched and beaten with sticks, plastic pipes and hoses.

The disclosures came at the end of a week in which a Berlin conference of 40 donor nations, including Britain, pledged £121m over the next three years to bolster the Palestinian security forces and judicial system in the West Bank.

Of this total, about £20m will come from Britain, which is already committed to spending £2.7m on the training of Palestinian security forces this year. A British brigadier based in the West Bank city of Ramallah is involved in the training. Britain has set aside a further £4.5m for reform, civil justice and public prosecution over the next three years.

A total of £4 billion overall has been promised to the government of Abbas, who is the commander-in-chief of the Palestinian security forces.

Western support for Abbas’s security forces is part of a strategy to isolate Hamas fundamentalists who seized control of Gaza last year.

However, many of those detained on suspicion of links to Hamas described a form of torture called “shabah” in Arabic – being forced to hold stress positions for prolonged periods.

Some have been made to stand with one leg and one arm raised for hours. Others have had to sit on the edge of a chair with their hands tied to their feet.

Amar al-Masri, 43, a Nablus businessman who is married to Kholoud al-Masri, an elected Hamas municipal official, has been held since last month in al-Jenid prison in Nablus. Last Thursday, his son Abdullah, 13, crossed off day 54 on a calendar on the family’s refrigerator.

“What is shocking me is that no charge has been addressed against my husband,” Kholoud said last week, sitting in her home in Nablus, a hijab (head-scarf) covering her hair.

“He is in a Palestinian jail, but we don’t know why.” She has been allowed to visit him only once.

“He said he was hung by his two legs by a rope connected to the ceiling,” Kholoud said. The prisoner’s lawyer said he had seen puffy wrists and legs that supported the testimony, as well as scabs on his legs and hands.

A former prisoner, interviewed at a coffee shop near his third-floor flat in Nablus after he was released at the end of a 50-day spell in prison, described similar experiences.

“They arrested me on fantasy charges that I had rockets,” said the 29-year-old law student, who did not want his name used out of fear the security forces would come after him.

“They tied my hands behind my back, and the rope was connected to a pipe,” he said. “They would stress the rope every 20 seconds. They said if they did it more I would be paralysed.”

He was eventually released without charge. “They [the security forces] told me, ‘You have been steadfast under torture so we have decided you are clean. We will not bother you again.’ ” The Palestinian Authority denied using torture in detention centres. “They are prisoners. We do not give them chocolate and roses,” said Akram Rajoub, head of preventive security in Nablus. “But I can assure you that we don’t use torture methods or shabah methods.”

The Foreign Office expressed concern at the Human Rights Watch revelations.

“The UK is concerned to hear reports of human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories,” a spokesman said. “We are committed to reforming the Palestinian security sector.”

British officials confirmed that the aid money pledged last week would be going to the West Bank security forces, which locals said were engaged in a crackdown on their political opponents in Hamas.

Although Hamas, a conservative Islamic party, was elected to power in January 2006, it has been largely shunned by the West because it refuses to recognise Israel or renounce violence.

Palestinian territory is virtually divided by internal disputes; Hamas’s writ runs in Gaza, while Abbas has appointed an emergency government composed mostly of officials from his Fatah party in the West Bank.

A spokesman for the Department for International Development, which administers the funds paid to the Palestinian Authority, confirmed that money was going to West Bank security forces but said some of it would be used to root out abuses.

“People are aware of irregularities in their behaviour . . . and that’s why we are investing in making them a more professional outfit and a more accountable police force,” the department said.

Human Rights Watch last week called for the aid going to the Palestinian Authority security forces to be made conditional on effective efforts to reduce arbitrary arrests and torture and on improving the system of justice.

Obama to Meet His Fans in Europe

By Gregor Peter Schmitz in Palo Alto, California www.spiegel.de

Barack Obama, the man most Europeans would like to see elected the next US president, plans to visit Berlin, Paris and London soon. The Democratic candidate is looking for statesmanlike images to boost his campaign and German politicians will be hoping some of his popularity rubs off on them.

According to the study "Imams in Germany," up to 20 percent of preachers belong to the more conservative, fundamentalist strand of Islam. The study also discovered that only one fifth of imam's possess academic qualifications.

The research is the work of a Duisburg social scientist, Rauf Ceylan, the son of Turkish immigrants. To conduct the study he attended religious services in mosques and carried out interviews with Muslim preachers.

According to Ceylan, the religious groups running mosques in Germany were mainly interested in their preachers correctly reciting the Koran. "An examination of the content of the holy book," he said was "not the primary goal."

Ceylan also found that many imams were susceptible to "superficial interpretations" of the Koran, because they lacked a proper academic education. It was not uncommon, Ceylan said, for these lay preachers to be drawn from the ranks of extremists.

Among the preachers who do have an academic qualification, the majority are employed in mosques run by a Turkish umbrella organization, DITIB. According to the study, these elite preachers are the only imams who are in a position to help members of their congregations to integrate.

However, these imams only come to Germany for four years. In the abscence of any exchange of knowledge between those preachers who have considerable experience of Germany and the newcomers, new imams have to start from scratch, the study concluded.