Similar ideas of training imams to have European values have already been floated in Germany and France amid fears of foreign influence. However, there are questions about how such a model would work in practice as religious authorities could be reluctant about being trained by secular governments.

Michel’s proposal was immediately met with skepticism.

The proposal comes ahead of a videoconference on Tuesday between German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen as well as Michel and Kurz, who plan to discuss European answers to the threat of terrorism. The European Council president also demanded that the EU crack down on foreign funding for religious organizations “that mobilize to stir up hatred.” In addition, EU legislative proposals expected next month should contribute to removing radical messages on the internet, Michel said.

Source: The Politico

Burqas and niqabs will be prohibited in selected professions as part of the legislation, which will not come into effect until being approved by the Bundesrat state parliament.

Thomas de Maiziere, the German interior minister, argued that the ban was compatible with integration as debate continues over the arrival of more than a million asylum seekers in the country. “Integration also means that we should make clear and impart our values and where the boundaries of our tolerance towards other cultures lie,” he said.  “The draft law we have agreed on makes an important contribution to that.”

Some right-wing politicians have called for a full ban on the burqa in public, which has been imposed in France and Belgium, but Mr de Maiziere said the move would be incompatible with Germany’s constitution.

The new law will require government employees to show their faces, as well as giving authorities the power to check women’s identities in elections.

It was opposed by politicians from the left-wing Die Linke and Die Grünen parties, who dismissed the legislation as a “purely symbolic policy” pandering to the right-wing Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) ahead of September’s elections.

Critics argued that burqa-wearing soldiers and officials do not actually exist, making the new rules redundant, and said they will worsen tensions.

Angela Merkel announced her support for the move in December, saying full-face veils were “not acceptable in Germany” and calling them to be banned “wherever it is legally possible”.

Source: The Independent

Germany’s Deputy Finance Minister Jens Spahn called last month for an “Islam law” that would make imams’ sermons “transparent,” saying that the authorities “had to know what happens in mosques.” He argued that imams should preach in German and that “imported imams lead to social disintegration.” Spahn, who also proposed an official registry for mosques, is a member of the executive committee of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s ruling Christian Democratic Union party. Other senior Merkel allies like Julia Kloeckner have joined the push for an Islam law, though a Merkel spokesman said this month that such a law is “not now” on the agenda.

In Italy, Islam isn’t officially recognized as a religion, even though it has an estimated 1.6 million adherents in the country. (The Italian Constitution requires non-Catholic faith groups to sign an accord or “intesa”  in order to be formally recognized, after which the groups gain the right  to take days off for holidays, to have their religious marriages acknowledged by the state, and so on.) However, in February, the Interior Ministry agreed to “facilitate the path” toward official recognition in an unprecedented arrangement titled the “National Pact for an Italian Islam.” But the government wanted something in exchange: Muslim organizations had to agree to a registry of their imams, and to a requirement that the imams sermonize in Italian. Interior Minister Marco Minniti described the document as a safeguard “against any form of violence and terrorism.” …

Considering that fundamentalist recruiters don’t need to speak in Arabic to be extremely successful at what they do, it’s not clear how clamping down on Arabic-language sermons would represent a viable counterterrorism strategy. After all, Anwar al-Awlaki, the al-Qaeda propagandist and cleric, gave many recorded sermons in English. In the U.K., prominent preachers like Anjem Choudary, Abu Hamza al-Masri, and Omar Bakri Muhammad likewise delivered their messages in English before they were convicted for supporting terrorism.

Source: The Atlantic

Seeking to boost support for the chancellor’s conservatives, senior Merkel ally Julia Kloeckner stoked the integration debate at the weekend by calling for stricter rules for Islamic preachers and a ban on foreign funding of mosques. Merkel’s spokesman Steffen Seibert dismissed the idea, which Kloeckner – who is deputy leader of the chancellor’s Christian Democrats (CDU) – and other senior party members want to enshrine in an Islam law.

While stopping short of calling for an Islam law, Merkel said in her weekly podcast on Saturday that refugees in Germany must respect tolerance, openness and freedom of religion. The message backed up a less compromising tone on integrating migrants that Merkel set at a CDU party conference in December, when she called for a ban on full-face Muslim veils “wherever legally possible”…

Source: Reuters

As the world grapples with the impact of President Trump’s Muslim ban, Pope Francis stressed that no religion is terrorist, adding that the claimed “Muslim terrorism” does not exist. “Christian terrorism does not exist, Jewish terrorism does not exist, and Muslim terrorism does not exist,” the pontiff said in a welcome letter read aloud at a meeting of grassroots political movements in California, Daily Mail reported on Saturday, February 18.

Pope Francis insisted in the letter to the conference in Modesto that there are “violent individuals in all peoples and religions”. Insisting that he was not talking about someone in particular, his speech is likely to be interpreted as a critique of President Trump’s immigration policy. “Intolerant generalizations” would only make these people stronger because they feed on hate and xenophobia, the Pope added.

“Do not classify others in order to see who is a neighbor and who is not,” the pope said. “You can become neighbor to whomever you meet in need, and you will do so if you have compassion in your heart.” The session on racism was attended by more than 600 clergy and social justice activists. The comments come as German Chancellor Angela Merkel stressed on Saturday, February 18, that the Islamic faith is not the cause of terrorism. Merkel also urged members of the Muslim clergy to fight back against a “false” interpretation of the religion, which leads some to unjustifiably perpetrate acts of violence in its name.

Source: AboutIslam.net

“The phenomenon of Islamist terrorism, of IS, is not a phenomenon that came to us with the refugees,” Merkel said at an election campaign event for her Christian Democrats in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern ahead of a regional vote on Sept. 4.

Merkel said many people had traveled from Germany to Syria for training with Islamist militants. In June Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said a total of more than 800 were believed to have gone to Syria and Iraq.

“This group has worried us for several years,” she said at the event in Neustrelitz, a town 100 km (60 miles) north of Berlin. Merkel’s popularity has suffered in the wake of the attacks and 52 percent of Germans think her migrant policy is bad, a poll published last week showed. The influx of migrants, many of whom are Muslim, has boosted support for the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD), which is expected to perform well in elections in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Berlin. “We have said clearly that an Islam that works and lives on the basis of the constitution … belongs to Germany,” Merkel said. She added that a type of Islam that did not stick to the constitution or accept equal rights for women had no place in the country.

Source: Reuters