Word: somali
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...Netherlands Islam is "an extremely backward religion," according to an important new voice on the Dutch political scene. These words clearly echo those of slain right-wing leader Pim Fortuyn, who also used the word backward in reference to Islam. But the speaker today is Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali refugee and former Muslim who's a sure bet to become an M.P. for the liberal VVD party in January's elections. "Millions of Muslim women all over the world are oppressed in the name of Islam," she says from VVD party headquarters in the Hague, as her bodyguards wait...
Consider Ayaan Hirsi Alis, a Muslim Somali refugee turned Dutch political activist. Before death threats convinced her to flee the country, she made her name documenting a culture of forced marriages and sexual abuse in the Netherlands’ Muslim immigrant population and railing against the orthodoxy of multiculturalism that refused to pass judgment on practices she unapologetically labeled “backward.” Alis is not affiliated with a right-wing party and the Dutch are famously tolerant people who put up with everything. Neither Alis nor her country fit the usual profile of claustrophobic bigots...
Your story on how Somali immigrants are moving into Lewiston, Maine, described some of the resulting tensions in the town [LETTER FROM MAINE, Oct. 28]. The problems that the town had absorbing 1,100 Somalis showed a good reason to support an immigration time-out. The era of Ellis Island is past. Today's immigrants are coming to the third most populous nation in the world. America is unable to absorb any more immigrants. What's more, some of these people represent a groundswell of cultural change that their homelands obviously need. Enabling them to emigrate will only prolong...
Tensions first flared at Lewiston High School when nearly 80 new Somali students showed up for the first day of class last fall. More than 100 students, up from 20 the previous year, enrolled in English-as-a-second-language classes. Rumors spread that the Somalis, who are mainly Muslims, were washing their feet in the school water fountain before they prayed. Then fights broke out in the cafeteria between natives and newcomers. Friends told Mohamed's daughter Hibat, 14, that their parents wanted the Somalis to go back home...
Earlier this month, Mayor Laurier Raymond issued an open letter to the Somali elders urging them to stop the flow of migrants. "The Somali community must exercise some discipline and reduce the stress on our limited finances and our generosity," he wrote. "Now we need breathing room." The Somali leaders, in turn, accused the mayor of being a bigot. The spat made headlines around the world and prompted Somalis abroad to check in on their friends in Lewiston...