British Charity Finances Terrorism

The United States claims that Yusuf Islam/Cat Stevens has donated to a British charity that it accuses of "financing terrorism, including Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda and the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas", from The Telegraph. The Islamic Relief Agency (ISRA), based in Birmingham, England, claims that it provides aid for orphanages and water wells in countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. The U.S. claims instead that they have "provided hundreds of thousands of dollars to Osama bin Laden", much of it donated by Cat Stevens.

The Telegraph has also discovered that Yusuf Islam, the singer formerly known as Cat Stevens who was refused entry to America last September because his name was on a security watch list, has previously donated thousands of pounds to the Birmingham charity. The reason for his exclusion has never been publicly revealed, but last night American officials indicated that the entertainer's funding of the ISRA was one of the reasons for him being banned. Mr Islam has always denied financing terrorism.

Meanwhile, Muslim ex-pop star Cat Stevens wins libel damages from British papers. Mr. Islam, responding to the attacks of September 11th, said: "The Koran equates the murder of one innocent person with the murder of the whole of humanity." However, he did not tell us the Koran's definition of "innocent person". Can a Jew or Christian be an "innocent". How about an athiest? How about a homosexual? If you do not know the answers, you should read your Koran! Here is the table of contents to the Koran, where you can click on a chapter and read it: The Holy Qur'an. Here is another: The Koran. Here is yet another, The Noble Qur'an. This one scroll down a little as each chapter of the Koran is a link, and each chapter has three different English translations. Here is yet another English translation, Holy Qur'an