Pope urged to share common ground

When 138 senior Muslim scholars and clergy tried to establish the common ground between Islam and Christianity last year, they said the very peace of the world hung on the outcome.
On Tuesday, a high-ranking delegation is beginning a rare visit to Rome in an effort to persuade the Pope to endorse what they say are the shared origins and values of the world's two biggest religions.

Their letter, A Common Word, cited passages from the Koran which the scholars said showed that Christianity and Islam worship the same God, and require their respective followers to show each other particular friendship.

The document examined fundamental doctrine and stressed what it said were key similarities - such as the belief in one God and the requirement for believers to "love their neighbours as themselves".

Significantly the letter acknowledged that the Prophet Muhammad was told only the same truths that had already been revealed to Jewish and Christian prophets, including Jesus himself.

After a year using the Islamic principle of seeking consensus, the letter has developed into a "manifesto" and is backed by almost 300 leaders from Sunni, Shi'ite, Sufi and other Muslim traditions

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7706977.stm

Catholics, Muslims open landmark talks at Vatican

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Senior Vatican and Islamic scholars launched their first Catholic-Muslim Forum on Tuesday to improve relations between the world's two largest faiths by discussing what unites and divides them.

The three-day meeting comes two years after Pope Benedict angered the Muslim world with a speech implying Islam was violent and irrational. In response, 138 Muslim scholars invited Christian churches to a new dialogue to foster mutual respect through a better understanding of each other's beliefs.

In their manifesto, "A Common Word," the Muslims argued that both faiths shared the core principles of love of God and neighbor. The talks focus on what this means for the religions and how it can foster harmony between them.
The meeting, including an audience with Pope Benedict, is the group's third conference with Christians after talks with United States Protestants in July and Anglicans last month.

Delegation leaders Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran and Bosnian Grand Mufti Mustafa Ceric opened the session with a moment of silence so delegations, each comprising 28 members and advisers, could say their own prayers for its success.
"It was a very cordial atmosphere," one delegate said.

Tauran, head of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, told the French Catholic daily La Croix on Monday that the Forum "represents a new chapter in a long history" of often strained relations.

He said discussing theology was difficult because of different understandings of God. The closed meeting started with a Catholic official spelling out the Christian teaching that humans can only approach God through Jesus Christ.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE49T54420081104

World hopes for a 'less arrogant America'

BERLIN (AP) — A world weary of eight years of George W. Bush was riveted Tuesday by the drama unfolding in the United States. Many were inspired by Barack Obama's focus on hope, or simply relieved that — whoever wins — the current administration is coming to an end.
From Berlin's Brandenburg Gate to the small town of Obama, Japan, the world gears up to celebrate a fresh start for America.

In Germany, where more than 200,000 flocked to see Obama this summer as he moved to burnish his foreign policy credentials during a trip to the Middle East and Europe, the election dominated television ticker crawls, newspaper headlines and Web sites.

Hundreds of thousands prepared to party through the night to watch the outcome of an election having an impact far beyond America's shores. Among the more irreverent festivities planned in Paris: a "Goodbye George" party to bid farewell to Bush.

"Like many French people, I would like Obama to win because it would really be a sign of change," said Vanessa Doubine, shopping Tuesday on the Champs-Elysees. "I deeply hope for America's image that it will be Obama."

Obama-mania was evident not only across Europe, where millions geared up for all-night vigils, but even in much of the Islamic world, where Muslims expressed hope that the Democrat would seek compromise rather than confrontation.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hcP263mnrp14UnYYg6FUUBSo4EnwD9483UKO0

Baptist church in Florida again offends Muslims with message

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (ABP) -- A Baptist church in Florida is once again creating tension with its Muslim neighbors over a marquee message.
A sign posted outside First Conservative Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Fla., reads, "God loves you, Allah hates."
A local television station interviewed a Muslim woman who said she took offense. "What have I done?" asked the woman, who is not identified. "What have I done to deserve that kind of hatred in my neighborhood?" She said she was driving by the church with her children when the sign caught her attention. "The thing that bothers me so much is that this is in my neighborhood, where I live with my children," she said. "To know that people that feel this way are in my neighborhood is scary."

It isn't the first time the independent Baptist church has grabbed attention with its marquee, which is updated regularly to confront passersby with messages about doctrinal, social or world-religion issues.
"We find it an integral part of communicating the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ," Pastor Gene Youngblood says on a website, Truthsthatfree.com.

In 2005 the church made news by posting a sign that read "Islam is evil and believes in murder, Surah 9-29" contrasted with, "Jesus teaches peace, Matt. 5-9." In 2003 local Muslims were upset when the church sign read "Jesus forbade murder Matthew 26-52 Muhammad approved murder Surah 8-65." 

Youngblood says on his website that he loves Muslims and would like to see many of them accept Christ, but the sign's purpose is to warn people of "false teachers" and "untruth from theologically unsound doctrine."

Since displaying the sign, he said, the church has received threats and vandalism but added, "We stand firmly on our First Amendment right: The freedom of speech is fundamental to American liberty."
Fawad Mansoori, president of the Jacksonville chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said Muslims also cherish the idea of free speech, but signs like this misrepresent facts and demonize fellow Americans.


http://www.abpnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3612&Itemid=53

American Muslims quick to congratulate Obama

WASHINGTON - The largest U.S. Islamic civil rights group was among the first to congratulate President-Elect Democrat Barack Obama, a man who some opponents tried to portray as a Muslim because of the childhood years he spent in Indonesia.
“President-elect Obama’s victory sends the unmistakable message that America is a nation that offers equal opportunity to people of all backgrounds,” the Council on American Islamic Relations said in a statement just minutes after Obama’s victory speech in Chicago.

Nihad Awad, executive director of the group, said they hoped to offer the Obama administration some support and advice.
“We look forward to having the opportunity to work with the Obama administration in protecting the civil rights of all Americans, projecting an accurate image of America in the Muslim world and playing a positive role in securing our nation,” Awad said.
Obama, who will be the first black U.S. president and whose middle name is Hussein, is a Christian. But throughout the campaign, false rumors circulated on the Internet that he was Muslim and therefore not a suitable candidate for the White House.
Son of a Kenyan father and white American mother, Obama spent part of his childhood in largely Muslim Indonesia.
More than 20 million copies of a film called “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West” were included as advertising supplements in newspapers across the country, many in battleground states.

http://blogs.reuters.com/trail08/2008/11/05/american-muslims-quick-to-congratulate-obama/

Ecumenical Church Body Accuses Radical Islam DVD of Misleading Viewers

The National Council of Churches (NCC)’s Interfaith Relations Commission says the DVD, “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West,” has the effect of “fanning the sparks of mistrust, bigotry and hatred that undermine the very foundations of a multi-religious democracy.”

“We are deeply troubled by the apparent intent of a film that presents a barrage of violent images, pieced together with the voices of commentators who move from speaking of ‘radical Islam’ to impugning Islam and Muslims more generally and presenting fear-mongering parallels between today's extremist terrorists and the Nazis,” the commission expressed in a statement released late last week.

“[T]he content of this film has no useful analysis of terrorism beyond a shallow, monolithic, clash-of-civilizations theme that suggests that the only two responses to ‘radical Islam’ are war or appeasement,” it added.
Since its re-release one week after the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in America, “Obsession” has drawn intense national attention, particularly for the distribution of 28 million copies several weeks ago through more than 70 mainstream newspapers, including The New York Times.

The DVD features an hour of actual footage from Arabic TV rarely seen in the West, interviews with former terrorists, as well as undercover footage showing suicide bomber initiations, the indoctrination of young children into hate and violence, secret jihad meetings and public celebrations of 9/11.

http://www.christianpost.com/article/20081104/ecumenical-church-body-accuses-radical-islam-dvd-of-misleading-viewers.htm

Obama Appeal in Muslim World May Tone Down Militants

Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Hala Mustafa's friends in Cairo were so thrilled by the prospect of a Barack Obama presidency that they told her to stop wearing red, to avoid looking as if she had adopted the Republican Party colors of John McCain. Arabs are very excited,'' said Mustafa, editor of Democracy Review, an Egyptian quarterly. People are imagining that he is a Muslim like them and that he is going to bring a new America that is friendly.''

Obama's race, Islamic family roots and promise of change give him an opening to blunt militancy rooted in decades of white colonial rule and sharpened by the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. Exploiting that chance won't be simple, given that the Democratic senator from Illinois isn't a Muslim, pledged to continue strongly supporting Israel and refused to rule out pursuing extremists in Pakistan.


http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601080&sid=atANv9kjFAsY&refer=asia

Religious leaders to discuss right of Christians to build churches in Muslim countries

The unprecedented Catholic-Muslim forum has been convened to rebuild bridges between the two faiths after Pope Benedict XVI caused outrage by linking Islam with violence during a speech in 2006.

The Pope had to apologise for the speech in Regensburg, Germany, after quoting a medieval text which attacked some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammed and implied that Islam was inherently violent.
His remarks, which he said were taken out of context and did not represent his opinion, sparked violence in Muslim countries.
The Muslim delegation arrived for the three day forum on Monday and will meet the Pontiff on Thursday.

The leader of the Catholic delegation, Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, said Muslims were allowed to build mosques in Christian countries so it was only right that Islamic nations should reciprocate by allowing the construction of churches.

"If Muslims have places of worship in Europe then it is normal that the reverse should be true in societies where Muslims are the majority," Cardinal Tauran told the French Catholic newspaper La Croix.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/3379792/Religious-leaders-to-discuss-right-of-Christians-to-build-churches-in-Muslim-countries.html

French magazine banned over Islam cover

ALGIERS, Algeria (AP) — Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco have banned this week's issue of L'Express International, a French newsmagazine, saying its cover story titled "The Jesus-Muhammad Shock" offended Islam. The title is the same as a book by one of the magazine's chief editors. The newsweekly L'Express said on its website that the series of articles comparing Christianity and Islam was inspired by a meeting this week in Rome between Christian and Muslim scholars, which aims to "help the dialogue between Islam and Christianity."

L'Express said it did not understand the ban on its international edition in North African countries, particularly because of the pains it took to adhere to Islamic norms. The magazine covered the face of Islam's prophet, Muhammad, with a white veil in side-by-side cover portraits of Jesus and Muhammad, in line with Islamic law. The French edition of the magazine leaves the face uncovered.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-11-05-islam-magazine_N.htm

Muslim-Catholic forum begins in Rome

Yesterday leading Vatican and Muslim scholars gathered for the first the Catholic-Muslim Forum, a new initiative founded to improve relations between Christianity and Islam. The aim of the three-day seminar, which ends tomorrow, is to discuss points of unity and division in Roman Catholicism and Islam. Interfaith relations hit an impasse two years ago following a speech by Pope Benedict XVI in which he cited a Byzantine emperor whose words appeared to imply that Islam was a violent, irrational religion. In response, 138 Muslim scholars wrote a letter inviting the Christian community to new dialogue. Their statement, “A Common Word”, argued that both Christianity and Islam share common principles, such as love of God and neighbour.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article5088716.ece

Catholics and Muslims Pledge to Improve Links

VATICAN CITY — Catholic and Muslim leaders worked on Thursday to deflate suspicion between their two faiths, pledging at a high-level seminar here to work together to condemn terrorism, protect religious freedom and fight poverty.

The meeting came a year after 138 Muslim leaders wrote a letter to Pope Benedict XVI after he offended many Muslims by quoting a Byzantine emperor who called some teachings of the Prophet Muhammad “evil and inhuman.” In turn, top Vatican officials have worried about freedom of worship in majority-Muslim countries, as well as immigration that is turning Europe, which they define as a Christian continent, increasingly Muslim.

But on Thursday both sides said they hoped that the seminar would open a new and much-improved chapter in Catholic-Muslim relations, as the two groups said they might establish a committee that could ease tensions in any future crisis between the two religions.

“Let us resolve to overcome past prejudices and to correct the often distorted images of the other, which even today can create difficulties in our relations,” Benedict told the Muslim delegation. He called the gathering “a clear sign of our mutual esteem and our desire to listen respectfully to one another.”

Addressing the pope on behalf of the Muslim delegation, Seyyed Hossein Nasr of Iran, a professor of Islamic studies at George Washington University in Washington, said that throughout history, “various political forces” of both Christians and Muslims had carried out violence.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/07/world/europe/07pope.html?hp

Muslims drawn to Obama

Barack Hussein Obama's victory didn't just belie the so-called Bradley effect for black candidates. Experts say it also defied an "Osama effect"—opposition efforts to sway voters by connecting Obama to radical Islam. 



In fact, experts say the scare tactic mobilized record numbers of American Muslim voters and others to forgive Obama's slights of the Muslim community and choose him as the nation's next president.

"It was perfectly all right to call him Muslim, to call him Arab, because that was a smear that we haven't said as a nation: 'That's not OK,' " said Jen'nan Ghazal Read, an associate professor of sociology at Duke University. "Maybe [Obama's election] will bring that to the fore. It's not OK to say Muslims are not American. They are as American as anyone else."

That was evident in Tuesday's voting patterns. Preliminary results of a survey by the American Muslim Task Force for Civil Rights and Elections suggest about 90 percent of Muslims voted for Obama, while only 2 percent chose John McCain. Preliminary Gallup polls reflect similar numbers. 


http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-muslim-voter-07-nov07,0,3497724.story

Catholics and Muslims to fight terror and defend faith

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Catholic and Muslim leaders at unprecedented Vatican meetings vowed on Thursday to jointly combat violence committed in God's name, to defend religious freedom and to foster equal rights for minority faith groups.
After three days of meetings, the 58 scholars and leaders -- 29 from each faith -- issued a joint declaration that also appealed for respect for religious figures and symbols.

The meetings came two years after the pope gave a speech hinting Islam was violent and irrational, sparking angry protests in the Middle East. The Muslim participants formed a group to challenge that and seek better mutual understanding.
The joint manifesto, A Common Word, called for dialogue based on shared principles of love of God and neighbor.

"We profess that Catholics and Muslims are called to be instruments of love and harmony among believers, and for humanity as a whole, renouncing any oppression, aggressive violence and terrorism, especially that committed in the name of religion, and upholding the principle of justice for all," said the statement describing the talks as "warm and convivial."

http://www.reuters.com/article/inDepthNews/idUSTRE49T54420081106

Islam and Obama

For the past few months, not a day went by without the words "Muslim" and "Obama" being mentioned in the same sentence. From the divisive shouts and jeers at McCain rallies to the Op-Ed pages of The New York Times to an interview with Colin Powell on NBC's "Meet the Press," Muslims—or at least the mention of them—have been more prevalent this campaign year than "Joe the Plumber."

But beyond the use of the term Muslim as a pejorative, and accusations by the far right that Obama was himself a secret follower of the Quran, what did real Muslim-Americans think of the Chicago senator? And how did they vote? The American Muslim Task Force on Civil Rights and Elections released a poll today of over 600 Muslims from more than 10 states, including Florida and Pennsylvania, and it revealed that 89 percent of respondents voted for Obama, while only 2 percent voted for McCain. It also indicated that 95 percent of Muslims polled cast a ballot in this year's presidential election—the highest turnout in a U.S. election ever—and 14 percent of those were first-time voters.

The Gallup Center for Muslim studies estimates that U.S. Muslims favored Obama in greater numbers than did Hispanics (67 percent of whom voted for Obama) and nearly matched that of African-Americans, 93 percent of whom voted for Obama. More than two thirds who were polled said the economy was the most important issue affecting their decision on Nov. 4th, while 16 percent said the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan informed their vote—numbers that put Muslims roughly on a par with the general population.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/168062

Peace Be Upon Us

It was a rough election season for American Arabs and Muslims. The McCain-Palin ticket shamelessly amplified the Internet smear that Barak Obama is a crypto-Islamic fanatic who fraternizes with terrorists. Obama responded by insisting, persuasively, on his credentials as an observant Christian. But in the process, he did little to point out the inherent bigotry in the Republican strategy Colin Powell, during his televised endorsement of Obama, eloquently challenged the assumption that Arabs and Muslims deserve to be held at arm's length. But the former secretary of state couldn't single-handedly do much to change the perception of these groups as a political liability.

Jonathan Curiel intends his book Al' America as an antidote to the fear. Ignorance, unsurprisingly, lies at the heart of it. Start with basic demographics: Most Arab-Americans are Christian, not Muslim, and most American Muslims are not Arab. Private surveys show that the largest segment of the American Muslim population -- about one-third -- traces its roots to South Asia, primarily Pakistan and India. Arabs make up only about a quarter of the Muslims in this country; African Americans, mostly converts and their children, another fifth.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/06/AR2008110602810.html

Islam's other half

There is a growing movement among Muslims, especially women, away from the inherited patriarchal Islam toward an egalitarian Islam. The move is occurring in both older Muslim societies and in the newer Muslim communities in the west. Female scholars have been talking for two decades now about the gender equality they find in Qur'an. Activists use these egalitarian readings to push for new practices within families and societies, and to support reform of Muslim family laws. This combination of intellectual and activist work undertaken in diverse parts of the globe has been called Islamic feminism.

Islamic feminism rejects the dichotomy between east and west, and between secular and religious. These dichotomies were nurtured by colonialism and later politicised by Islamists as rigid and implacably adversarial identities. Islamic feminism insists upon the separation of religion and state, resolutely upholding the notion of a secular state. Secular here is not tantamount to un-religious or anti-religious. The secular state typically guarantees freedom of religion. When persons identify themselves as secular or secularist this does not per se mean that they are not religious or anti-religious.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2008/nov/09/islam-women

Toughest of jobs: 3 seek to be Jerusalem mayor

JERUSALEM (AP) — A rabbi, a high-tech investor and a Russian tycoon accused of arms trafficking are vying to be mayor of Jerusalem, the city at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The winner of Tuesday's election takes charge of a troubled piece of land that is being fought over with messianic passion — and sitting on the fault line of just about every divide Israel has: Arab and Jew, religious and secular, rich and poor, young and old. The fate of the city, claimed as a capital by both Israel and the Palestinians, could prove the deal-breaker in fragile peace talks.

A third of Jerusalem's 750,000 residents are Arab, but every candidate in the election is Jewish — and none wants to cede any part of the city to a future Palestinian state.

Few Palestinians vote in municipal elections: That would be seen as recognizing Israel's sovereignty over the city whose Arab sector it captured in the 1967 Mideast war.

Taking part in the vote is "haram" — forbidden by Islamic law, Sheikh Mohammed Hussein, Jerusalem's top Muslim cleric, declared last week. And Rafiq Husseini, chief of staff to the Palestinian president, went even further, saying those who participate in the campaign would be "punished."
One Arab candidate entered the race for a second time, only to withdraw and become an adviser to the only Jewish candidate courting the Arab vote, Moscow-born Arcadi Gaydamak, who is on trial in absentia in France, on charges of organizing arms sales to Angola.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5itpH69XzbL_ou3GSA5Z39BK4KFlAD94B22500

Pope to Muslims: Religious Persecution Unacceptable

While the three days of Christian-Muslim dialogue focused on encouraging better relations between the world’s two largest religions, the head of the one billion-member Catholic Church stated Friday that individuals should have the right to practice their own faith without persecution.

“The discrimination and violence which even today religious people experience throughout the world and the often violent persecutions to which they are subject, represent unacceptable and unjustifiable acts, all the more grave and deplorable when they are carried out in the name of God” the pontiff said, according to BBC.
Tariq Ramadan, a senior research fellow at the University of Oxford who participated in the summit, said he thought Benedict’s points were “fair.”

“No Muslim should avoid speaking about this,” he said, according to Religion News Service. Last week’s historic Catholic-Muslim meeting was the first of its kind and brought together 48 leading scholars and leaders of both religions. The official theme of the meeting was “Love of God, Love of Neighbor.”

During the Nov. 4-6, meeting, the pope apologized to Muslims for his remarks in the 2006 speech in Germany that referenced a medieval scholar who described Islam as “evil and inhuman” and spreading the faith by violence. The comment had sparked a wave of violence in Muslim-majority countries around the world.

http://www.christianpost.com/article/20081109/pope-to-muslims-religious-persecution-unacceptable.htm'

Indian Muslims condemn terror

The ruling or fatwa was issued earlier this year by an Islamic seminary. It said that Islam rejected all kinds of bloodshed and the killing of innocents for selfish and politically motivated gains. This is the first time the Islamic scholars have come together to give their backing to the measure.

The fatwa was issued in May this year by the religious school, Darul Uloom Deoband. Coming from one of the most respected Islamic theological schools in the region, the fatwa is significant, correspondents say. Abdul Hameed Nomani, one of the organisers of the conference, which was attended by more than 6,000 Islamic scholars, said: "Some people are involved in terrorist activities in the name of Islam and some are defaming Islam by involvement in terrorist activities.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7719059.stm

Farrakhan hails Obama's win, but warns of racial tensions

CHICAGO (AFP) — Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, on Sunday hailed president-elect Barack Obama as a God-given leader with extraordinary vision, but warned of the racial animosity stirred up by his victory.

Farrakhan said that Senator Obama's presidential candidacy had inspired a "oneness of spirit" -- a kind of popular excitement not seen since Robert F. Kennedy ran for the White House in 1968. But he said the country remained "divided and polarized," and pointed to evidence of racial tensions in the wake of Obama's historic election victory earlier this week.

"Many of the voters that voted for Senator McCain were older Americans, and most reside below the Mason-Dixon line where racial attitudes and traditions die hard," he told a congregation of about 1,200 people at Mosque Maryam on Chicago's South Side.

The Mason-Dixon line is regarded as the boundary between free and slave states before the Civil War. Senator John McCain, the defeated Republican presidential candidate, gave a gracious concession speech on Tuesday but it had not assuaged "the pain of loss and frustration and disappointment to those who felt great pain at Obama's rise," Farrakhan said. "We can change laws, but it's difficult to change attitudes," he said. The 75-year-old preacher, clad in a scarlet robes and a matching fez, cited news reports that said gun sales had surged since Obama's electoral victory, and told of how fights had broken out in some schools, with white students chanting "white power," while blacks students chanted "black power."


http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gd0Jj3GjTv_wMBRDHyqIPNzKXA0Q

Muslims' free speech 'threatened'

The UK-based Centre for Social Cohesion highlighted the cases of 27 writers, including Sir Salman Rushdie, activists, politicians and artists.

The centre said they had suffered violence and intimidation for criticising Islam or seeking reform.
It said governments had a duty to ensure free speech for all citizens.

The report - Victims of Intimidation: Freedom of Speech within Europe's Muslim Communities - said official failure to offer victims the protection they needed had left "significant numbers" of Muslims unable to express themselves.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7718715.stm

Interfaith unity urged on campus

The Coexistence Trust will address tensions created on campuses by the Middle East conflict. It aims to highlight similarities in the histories of the two communities and encourage unity in the face of the prejudice that both have suffered. The tour will visit London, Birmingham, Leeds, Oxford and Cambridge.

Led by Labour peer Lord Mitchell and shadow minister for community cohesion Baroness Warsi, the tour begins on Monday at the London School of Economics. The BBC's religious affairs correspondent Robert Pigott said tensions between Jewish and Muslim students had emerged in the form of hostile message on internet sites and inflammatory posters on campuses

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/7705413.stm

America's outcast Muslims

Marc Maron finds American Muslims unhappy with the abuse their religion is receiving in this presidential campaign Link to this video American Muslims have been called the "outcasts" of this presidential election. Muslims themselves have told the media that Islam is being treated as "political leprosy", a "scarlet letter", or the "kiss of death". In Pittsburgh, a city with a large Muslim population, the Guardian team heard sentiments like these when we attended a lecture by the writer and political analyst Raeed Tayeh titled Are Americans Obsessed with Islam?, followed by a panel discussion involving local community leaders and advocates.

One of the few comprehensive surveys (pdf) of Muslim voters in the United States was produced two years ago by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). While they are a diverse community, American Muslims overall tend to be young, well educated, professional, middle-class, and family-oriented, and differ in their degree of religious observance. Muslims are also somewhat more likely than Americans in general to vote regularly, fly the US flag and do volunteer work.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/uselectionroadtrip/2008/nov/03/uselections2008-pennsylvania