The Tampa Bay Times on Mar 15 reported that Anti-Islam Senate Bill SB 1360 died in the Senate. Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), America’s largest Muslim Civil Liberties Advocacy Organisation, monitored the session until the last minute and has confirmed that this is true and the Senate closed without passing SB 1360. “This is a great success not only for the Muslim community, but for all Americans who believe in...

Dozens of civilians were killed in cold blood in the Syrian city of Homs, opposition activists and Syrian state media said on Mar 12 although they disputed responsibility for what both sides called a massacre.

The carnage in Homs, as well as a military assault on the north-western city of Idlib, coincided with a weekend peace mission by UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, who left Damascus on Mar 11 without agreement on a truce or humanitarian access. &l...

An Afghan youth on Mar 11 recounted the terrifying scene in his home as a lone US soldier moved stealthily through it during a killing spree, then crouched down and shot his father in the thigh as he stepped out of the bedroom. The soldier, now in US custody, is accused of killing 16 Afghan civilians in their homes in the middle of the night between Saturday and Sunday and then burning some of their corpses. Afghan President Hamid Karzai said nine of those killed were childre...

At least 500 Egyptians have taken the first step to run for president, a sign of the excitement generated by the country’s first presidential elections in which the outcome is in doubt, election officials said on Mar 13. They said the 500 have obtained applications to officially declare their candidacy for the vote, which follows last year’s ouster of longtime leader Hosni Mubarak. Besides known presidential hopefuls who have been seriously campaigning, the applicants included a w...

Syrian activists on Mar 15 said they were sickened by e-mails which appeared to show Assad and his wife shopping for pop music and luxury items while the country descended into bloodshed. “He was downloading iTunes songs while his army was shelling us. His wife was buying expensive things from Amazon, that makes me feel sick,” an activist Rami in Homs was cited as saying.

A new massacre report and a refugee exodus to Turkey marked the first anniversary of the Syrian uprisi...

Egypt’s new Parliament, in its first legislative act since convening in January, passed a law on Mar 12 increasing by more than threefold the proposed compensation to families of protesters killed in the country’s popular uprising. The new Parliament was elected in the wake of the revolt that overthrew Hosni Mubarak in February 2011, after thirty years of his iron-fist rule. The Muslim Brotherhood, banned during his rule, won more than 43 per cent of seats. The law proposed on Mar...