DEARBORN MAN SUES WAL-MART, ALLEGING DISCRIMINATION - TOPDoug Guthrie, Detroit News, 12/18/08
A Dearborn man has sued Wal-Mart for $12 million, claiming the merchandising giant fired him because he complained about discriminatory harassment he suffered on the job at the hands of fellow employees and supervisors.
The lawsuit filed today in Wayne County Circuit Court by Louay N. Kezy, 42, alleges the company allowed anti-Muslim and anti-Arab bias and taunting at the Dearborn Wal-Mart. Kezy worked in the stock department from the time the store opened last March until Aug. 14, when he was fired after filing a written complaint with managers. . .
Kezy was born in Iraq but is a naturalized U.S. citizen. He immigrated 28 years ago and speaks fluent English, said his lawyer. He doesn't wear traditional Arab clothing or headwear, but his physical appearance clearly identifies his ethnicity, said Ayad.
"They demeaned him, harassed him, called him names. They accused him of being a terrorist," Ayad said. "Supervisors ordered him to do jobs that were unrelated to his duties. They allowed a joke, a game to continue where co-workers would toss a ball near him and pretend it was a grenade, a bomb.
"Wal-Mart allowed this hostile environment to continue and they fired him when he complained," Ayad said.
Kezy's income from the Wal-Mart job supported his wife and children. He has been unemployed since his firing, his lawyer said.
Dawud Walid, executive director of The Council on American-Islamic Relations, said: "Unfortunately, this kind of thing is not as rare as the general public might think. There is quite a bit of discrimination against Arabs and Muslims in Dearborn, even though there is a large population there." (MORE)
SEE ALSO:
CAIR: AN EMPLOYER’S GUIDE TO ISLAMIC RELIGIOUS PRACTICES - TOP
Click here to view the guide.
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CAIR: INSTANT EDITORIAL: ANTI-MUSLIM JUDGE SHOULD BE SANCTIONED - TOPDeron Snyder, News-Press, 12/17/08
Georgia law doesn’t permit or prohibit head scarves in courts, leaving the matter to the discretion of the judge.
I can understand someone being asked to take off their baseball cap.
But arresting a Muslim woman for refusing to take off her head scarf — which would violate her religion — is indefensible.
The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations has urged federal authorities to investigate the arrest of Lisa Valentine in Douglasville, as well as similar incidents elsewhere in Georgia.
The same judge in Valentine’s case removed a woman and her 14-year-old daughter from the courtroom because they were wearing Muslim head scarves.
His religious intolerance shouldn’t be tolerated.
SEE ALSO:
CAIR: GEORGIA JUDGE JAILS MUSLIM WOMAN FOR WEARING HEADSCARF TO COURT - TOPDaniel Nasaw, Guardian, 12/18/08
A city judge in Georgia has in the past eight days barred two Muslim women wearing Islamic headscarves from entering his courtroom, jailing one, and prompting an inquiry from the civil rights office at the US department of justice.
Judge Keith Rollins of Douglasville, Georgia, yesterday ordered Lisa Valentine, 41, to jail after she refused to remove her scarf before entering the courtroom, citing rules governing appropriate dress. Last week, Sabreen Abdulrahmaan was forced to leave Rollins's court before her son's probation hearing because she would not remove her scarf.
"It's a religious right," Valentine said. "It's our constitutional right that we can have our religious practices, no matter if it's a courtroom or not. He's supposed to be handing out justice, not taking away civil rights."
Valentine said she sought to accompany her nephew to a traffic hearing yesterday but was told by a court security officer that she could not enter the courtroom with her headscarf on. She said she refused to remove it and turned to leave, saying, "This is bullshit".
Security officers handcuffed her and brought her before Rollins, who sentenced her to 10 days in jail when she declined to defend her actions at the security checkpoint, her husband Omar Hall said. Valentine, an insurance underwriter, was forced to take off the scarf and don an orange jumpsuit, chained and put aboard a jail bus with men and women.
"It felt like I was naked, because that's how I feel without my hijab," Valentine said. "You could have taken off my clothes and it would have felt the same way."
Her husband phoned an Islamic civil rights organisation and sought an attorney, and she was released without explanation after about seven hours.
"Judge Keith Rollins has inexplicably, blatantly usurped our innate human rights as American citizens," Hall said.
Douglasville police told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that Valentine was jailed for violating a policy barring headgear in the court. Neither court officials nor the police department returned calls seeking comment. Reached by the Associated Press, Rollins declined to comment on Valentine's case.
"It's an issue of religious freedom, it's an issue of access to the American legal system," said Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Washington-based Islamic civil rights advocacy group, which advised Valentine and Hall on the case. "There are all kinds of implications that you can take form this troubling incident." . . .
"What if you're a Jewish man wearing a skull cap? What if you're a Catholic nun wearing a habit?" Hooper asked. "All would be denied access to this judge's courtroom. We need to know what's going here and why this has apparently been going on for so long." (MORE)
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VIDEO: GEORGIA MUSLIM ARRESTED OVER SCARF - TOP
A head scarf lands a Muslim woman in jail after she refuses to remove it during a hearing.
Click here to watch the video.
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VIDEO - CAIR: MUSLIM WOMAN JAILED FOR NOT REMOVING HEAD SCARF - TOP
Click here to watch the video.
The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations urged federal authorities to investigate the incident as well as others in Georgia.
"I just felt stripped of my civil, my human rights," Valentine told The Associated Press on Wednesday from her home, after she said she was unexpectedly released once CAIR got involved.
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GA. WOMAN JAILED OVER HEAD SCARF - TOPJudge jails Muslim woman for refusing to remove her headscarf in courtDionne Walker, Associated Press, 12/17/08
A Muslim woman arrested for refusing to take off her head scarf at a courthouse security checkpoint said Wednesday that she felt her human and civil rights were violated. A judge ordered Lisa Valentine, 40, to serve 10 days in jail for contempt of court, said police in Douglasville, a city of about 20,000 people on Atlanta's west suburban outskirts.
Valentine violated a court policy that prohibits people from wearing any headgear in court, police said after they arrested her Tuesday.
Kelley Jackson, a spokeswoman for Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker, said state law doesn't permit or prohibit head scarfs. (MORE)
-----ADL RESPONDS TO CAIR’S CALL TO REPUDIATE ANTI-MUSLIM COLUMNIST - TOPADL, 12/17/08
Letters to the EditorFive Towns Jewish Times
To the Editor:
We were shocked by Lawrence Kulak's suggestion that Jews should kill innocent Muslim civilians to counter Islamic terrorism ("The Appropriate Response to Islamic Terror," Dec. 12).
Regardless of one's views on terrorism, to even entertain the notion of responding in kind is morally reprehensible and appalling. It is unfair to hold innocent Muslims responsible for the radical views of an extreme minority.
In the Jewish tradition, words have consequences. In this case, Kulak's words crossed the line.
Sincerely,Anti-Defamation League
-----GOODE RIDDANCE? ELLISON’S QURAN CHALLENGER FINALLY CONCEDES IN VIRGINIA - TOPAndy Birkey, Minnesota Independent, 12/17/08
Rep. Virgil Goode, best known for his anti-Muslim statements made after Rep. Keith Ellison was elected the first Muslim to Congress, officially conceded on Wednesday in the very close race in Virginia’s 5th Congressional District.
After a recount, Democrat Tom Perriello defeated the Republican by 727 votes in a district that was overwhelmingly Republican. It was the last undecided House race of the 2008 election, and Perriello’s win puts the Democrats’ gains in the House at 21 seats.
In December 2006, Goode wrote a letter to constituents referencing Ellison’s decision to take his oath of office on the Quran and then wrote, “[T]here will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran. We need to stop illegal immigration totally and reduce legal immigration and end the diversity visas policy pushed hard by President Clinton and allowing many persons from the Middle East to come to this country.”
-----MUSEUM OF TOLERANCE - TOPMunira Syeda, Jewish Journal, 12/17/08I find it appalling that the Simon Wiesenthal Center, which previously said that it would not build on a site were it known that it was a cemetery, continues to build a Center for Human Dignity, despite more than 150 skeletons being dug up at the cemetery under the center's supervision ("Protests Over Jerusalem Museum of Tolerance Spread," Dec. 12). And the claim about Muslims being silent for the past 50 years is just plain wrong. Israel imposed martial law from 1949 to 1966. During that time, any signs of nationalism among Palestinians were crushed. But Muslims in Israel did legally oppose the designation of waqf land as absentee property in the 1960s, lobbied to rebuild and maintain the Ma'manullah graves after the 1967 War, protested the desecration of the graves in the '70s and '80s, and have been opposing the building of the Center for Human Dignity on the cemetery land.This issue is not about politics or victory. It is about respect and fair treatment of the living and dead -- something taught in both Judaism and Islam. Munira SyedaCommunications CoordinatorCAIR-Greater Los Angeles Area
-----CAIR-CHICAGO: IMMIGRATION RAIDS INHUMANE - TOPNicholas Short, Chicago Sun Times, 12/17/08
Thank you for allowing Interfaith Worker Justice to speak out against immigration raids. The December 13 editorial, "U.S. must stop workplace raids, enact immigration reform," was right to point out how inhumane, unnecessary, and potentially dangerous it is for the government to initiate these raids. It is understandable that the U.S. government wants to ensure that its country is secure, but that is not an excuse to strip the dignity and civil rights of those who just want to find better opportunities for themselves and their families. I look forward to reading more editorials that tackle this issue.
Nicholas Short, CAIR-Chicago Intern