Articles

In this guest contribution for Tagesspiegel about the Islamist terror attack on a night club in Orlando on 12th June, EFD Programme Director Ahmad Mansour writes about the necessity of being allowed to criticise religion. “The tabooing of sexual issues is a problem in all patriarchic societies, also in Muslim ones” says Mansour as he pleads for a reform within Islam regarding sexuality, violence, authority, homophobia and anti-Semitism....

The Orlando shooting, which saw the massacre of 50 homosexuals, has re-opened the debate on the relationship between Isis and Islam, homosexuals and Islam and many other questions. EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo, professor of geopolitics in the Islamic world, has much to say about this incident....

EFD Senior Fellow Dr. Valentina Colombo comments the recent encounter between the Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and the Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser al-Missned, second of three wives of the former Emir of Qatar Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo comments on the imminent release of a new documentary produced by the Al Jazeera Documentary Channel on the Crusades. The aim is to present this period from an Arab perspective, as the Director of the channel, Ahmed Mahfouz, explains....

EFD Senior Policy Advisor Alexander Ritzmann writes about Hezbollah’s status within Germany and the EU after the group’s recent classification as a terrorist organisation by the League of the Arab States. The European Member States should send a clear signal by jointly banning Hezbollah, Ritzmann argues, thus prompting the group to change its behaviour....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo writes about the recent investments of the Qatar Charity directed towards Islamic centres in various cities in the north of Italy....

EFD Fellow Tehmina Kazi voices her opinion regarding the use of niqabis in the UK and the political and ideological dilemmas that comes with banning the use of such garments....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo writes about the arrival of Tariq Ramadan to Milan, schedule for June 3....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo writes about the recent events that lead to the arrest of four people in the Italian city of Lecco, accused of plotting a terror attack in Italy. Two of the four individuals had direct ties to the Islamic State....

In this article, published in the German Council on Foreign Relations’ IP magazine, EFD Senior Policy Advisor Alexander Ritzmann argues that exposing the downright falsehoods of the propaganda of the so-called “Islamic State” (Isis) through targeted counter narratives will obstruct their recruiting efforts....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo writes about the recent visit of the King of Saudi Arabia to Egypt, which resulted in a series of investment agreements between the two countries....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo is quoted in the well-known Italian newspaper Il Giorno on the recent decision of the Italian Democratic Party (PD) to candidate as councilor Sumaya Abdel Qader for the upcoming municipal elections of Milan...

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo compares two Muslim female candidates for the center-left in Milan's local elections, namely Maryan Ismail e Sumaya Abdel Qader....

EFD Senior Fellow Bakary Sambe is mentioned in an article published by Sud Quotiden on the relationship between media and terrorism. According to Sambe journalists should use a more accurate terminology when referring to the threat of terrorism in order to avoid creating panic among readers....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo once more writes about the extreme Islamic preacher, Tareq al- Suwaidan, after Italian authorities have denied him from entering Italy for his tour scheduled this May....

Tehmina Kazi, Fellow at the European Foundation for Democracy and director of the British Muslims for Secular Democracy, comments on the latest Charlie Hebdo article concerning the Brussels Attacks of March 22nd....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo is mentioned by the Corriere dell'Alto Adige on the dispute regarding Tareq al-Suwaidan's entry in Italy, scheduled for this May. "We cannot permit that such characters are able to enter freely to spread hatred in a moment like this. It is unacceptable that the training of the Italian imams is left to people such as Suwaidan (..)"....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo once more writes about the extremist imam Tareq al-Suwaidan, this time to inform her public that he will no longer be touring Italy as was scheduled for this May. This has been confirmed by the Italian foreign minister, Angelino Alfano....

EFD Senior Fellow Dr. Valentina Colombo helps clarify all the ambiguities surrounding the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood, with the Municipal elections of Milan just about to end, where the favored Democratic Party listed Sumaya Abdel Qader as one of its nominees....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo once more offers a detailed analysis of Tareq Suwaidan, who is scheduled to be in Italy starting this May for a series of conferences and events....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo gives a detailed description of Tareq Mouhammed al-Saleh al-Suwaidan, a very controversial and influential Islamic preacher who will be touring in Italy this May....

EFD Fellow Tehmnina Kazi elaborates on the murder of Asad Shah, a British Muslim killed for belonging to the Ahmadiyya community, considered heretic....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo comments on the denunciations deriving from the different political Islamic organisations in Europe of the terror attacks occurred on March 22 in Brussels, which have left more that 30 people killed....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo comments on the terrorist attacks that occurred in Brussels on 22nd March, analysing the political and social factors that lay behind them....

Following the decision of the Council for the Arab States of the Gulf to label Hezbollah (a Shiite Islamist military and political Lebanese group) as a terrorist organization, EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo tries to give a definition of the word “terrorism” and argues that the Council’s decision is primarily a political one....

Following her article on the murder of the Italian researcher Giulio Regeni, EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo publishes another opinion piece on the issue....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo comments the words of Ali Abu Shwaima, head of the Islamic Centre of the Lombardy region in Italy. Abu Shaima was reported saying that Islamic women can “ride a Cadillac, a Mercedes, but not a bicycle”, words that have been heavily criticised in Italy....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo comments on the rejection by the Italian Constitutional Court of the regional law regulating the construction of new places of worship from an administrative and urban point of view, in Lombardy....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo writes about the project "Aisha", launch in the Italian city of Milan, which aims to eradicate violence and discrimination against women, in particular Muslim women. Although the initiative seems to have good intentions, Colombo can't help pointing out the legacies between some of the organizations behind the project and Muslim Brotherhood. It is therefore imperative to understand who is behind such project and...

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo writes about "Aisha", a project denouncing violence and discrimination against women, promoted by the "Coordinamento delle Associazioni Islamiche di Milano Monza e Brianza (CAIM)", an Italian Islamic organisation ideologically linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, and coordinated by Sumaya Abdel Qader, head of the department Youth & Students of the Federation of Islamic organisations in Europe....

EFD Fellow Anna Borshchevskaya discusses the necessity of implementing safe zones in Syria and why failure to do so will increase the humanitarian disaster while at the same time threaten both regional and European stability....

EFD Senior Fellow Magnus Norell writes about the Swedish government's decision not to recognise an independent Western Sahara (or rather the Polisario movement). Among the issues discussed, he examines what has prevented the Swedish administration from recognising the independence of Western Sahara to date and what are the implications of Sweden's decision....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo comments on France’s and Belgium’s recent behaviour towards some Islamic preachers who maintain a radical views....

EFD Senior Fellow Valentina Colombo comments on the heinous assassination of Giulio Regeni, an Italian researcher tortured and murdered in Cairo by unknown persons....

EFD Senior Fellow Magnus Norell writes about the ongoing Geneva III talks, convened in a desperate attempt to negotiate an end to the five-year conflict in Syria. He suggests however that the talks were destined for failure before they ever started, due to, among other reasons, competing interests which ultimately led to the failures of the previous two Geneva talks....

EFD Fellow Tehmina Kazi comments on the abuses and attacks to secular and progressive activists within the Muslim communities....