Allah's Willing Executioners

The Maine Supreme Court unanimously upheld a custody order on Monday giving a father veto power over a mother’s decisions to take their daughter to church or read her the Bible, largely barring the child’s religious upbringing.

As covered last year by LifeSiteNews, the dispute is between Emily Bickford and Matthew Bradeen, the unmarried, separated parents of a 13-year-old girl. The father maintains that their daughter has displayed panic attacks since the mother started taking her to Calvary Chapel of Portland, stemming from fears that the rapture is drawing near and her father and sister will not make it to Heaven.

He produced a witness whose assessment of Calvary Chapel’s sermons claimed that they were potentially psychologically harmful, prompting the court to transfer full control of the child’s religious upbringing from Bickford to Bradeen.

Represented by Liberty Counsel, Bickford – whose child has not been abused or neglected, and whose parental fitness has not otherwise been disputed – said that this assessment offers nowhere near a sufficient basis for such a significant intrusion on a parent’s right to direct her child’s religious upbringing.

“Calvary Chapel is not a cult,” said Liberty Counsel’s Mat Staver, noting that the father’s witness to that effect, Dr. Janja Lalich, is a so-called “expert on cults” but had no actual psychological credentials. “This custody order banning Emily Bickford from taking her child to a Christian church because of its biblical teachings violates the First Amendment. The breadth of this court order is breathtaking because it even prohibits contact with the Bible, religious literature, or religious philosophy. The custody order cannot prohibit Bickford from taking her daughter to church. The implications of this order pose a serious threat to religious freedom.”

But Maine’s highest court has now upheld the custody order, finding the mother’s “argument is without merit” and arguing that an “allocation of parental authority between two parents does not implicate the individual constitutional rights of either of them.”

“Bickford’s subjective beliefs did not preclude the court from finding that Bradeen is, in fact, better suited to make medical decisions, and the court neither violated the Constitution nor abused its discretion in allocating medical decision-making to Bradeen,” the justices concluded, without dissent.

In response, Liberty Counsel says that it will appeal the case to the United States Supreme Court.

“This opinion rejects the First Amendment right of a fit parent to raise her child consistent with her Christian faith,” responded Staver. “Nothing [in religious service or study] for nearly two years. And somehow the Maine Supreme Court thinks this court order does not violate her rights as a fit parent and her Free Exercise rights under the First Amendment.”

“This disappointing opinion from the Maine Supreme Court prohibits Bickford from taking her child to a Christian church because the child’s father objects to its biblical teachings.” he declared. “Depriving one parent their right to instill their religious views into their child and granting sole authority to the other parent fails to give proper protection to parental rights and religious freedom under the First Amendment. The implications of this opinion pose a serious threat to religious freedom.”

Authorities in Maine display a pattern of hostility to the rights of conservative and religious residents. The state is under federal investigation for allegedly coercing health providers into covering abortions, and another mother has petitioned the Supreme Court over a public school helping hide her child’s gender “transition” from her.

lifesitenews

Thousands of protesters have spilled onto the streets of cities across Spain amid fury at Pedro Sanchez’s handling of the Ceuta migrant catastrophe.

Demonstrations were held across the country on Wednesday, with protesters calling on the Spanish Prime Minister to resign over his response to the crisis.

The rallies were called by a host of city councils across Spain, as well as opposition parties Partido Popular (PP) and Vox.

More than 50,000 people attended the demonstration in Madrid, where PP leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo addressed the crowds.

He said: “A Spanish city has been invaded, occupied and, unfortunately, this happened with the knowledge of the Government of Spain.”

Meanwhile, Vox leader Santiago Abascal accused Mr Sanchez of being “at the service, like a lackey, of the Moroccan regime”.

The protests come after more than 72,000 people stormed the border of the North African enclave from Morocco last month, with local residents branding the influx “an invasion”.

Although the majority of the migrants have since been returned, thousands remain in the enclave in makeshift camps, some of which have been torched by furious locals as unrest grips the territory.

Opposition parties have accused the socialist leader of abandoning residents of Ceuta, where sexual assaults have reportedly been occurring daily since the influx.

Almost daily protests have been taking place in Ceuta, with another demonstration organised in the enclave on Wednesday as rallies spread across Spain.

Locals could be heard chanting “Ceuta is not for sale, Ceuta must be defended” as they marched through the streets.

On Wednesday, a report compiled by Spanish police accused Moroccan authorities of showing “total permissiveness” as hordes of migrants stormed the border.

Mr Sanchez had previously insisted that officials in the North African country were not to blame for the unprecedented influx.

The Spanish Government approved plans earlier this year to give legal status to half a million undocumented migrants.

Mr Sanchez said in April that the plan was both “an act of justice” and a necessity for the country.

Amid the widespread demonstrations, Spain’s far-left Government has accused its critics of exploiting the crisis for their own political benefit.

Territorial Policy Minister Angel Victor Torres told radio station RNE: “This is not about defending Ceuta and the Ceutans, it is about attacking the Government.”

Counter-protesters also attended rallies in several Spanish cities, with left-wing demonstrators condemning what they claimed were “racist and Islamophobic persecutions and attacks” against migrants who broke into Ceuta.

As protesters spilled onto the streets, Donald Trump warned that “Spain will be a ruined country” and branded the scenes in Ceuta an “outrage” in an exclusive interview with GB News.

The US President also said Britain was facing its own migrant crisis, although one less visible than the influx seen in Ceuta.

“Hopefully other countries like the UK – where you have your own problems – but it’s not as visible as that,” the President told the People’s Channel.

“You know, you don’t have thousands of people just bum rushing your country. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

gbnews

Before a pivotal election that could potentially result in a state government ruled exclusively by the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, a case of potential postal vote fraud is raising concerns.

A 74-year-old nephew of a 95-year-old resident with severe dementia has filed a criminal complaint after discovering that postal voting documents were requested and a ballot cast in her name at a Dessau retirement home – despite staff first telling him the papers had been destroyed. The case is now being reported in Welt, one of Germany’s largest newspapers.

The case involves the Marthahaus senior residence and centers on whether postal votes from residents who cannot meaningfully participate are being handled properly. The nephew, who acts as his aunt’s legal representative, said he routinely receives every letter and document sent to her, including advertising. When the postal voting materials for the Saxony-Anhalt state election never arrived, he asked the home’s director where these documents were located.

Last Thursday, the director directed him to a female staff member who was not on duty until the next day. On Friday, that employee stated she had collected the election documents sent to residents “and shredded” them, without consulting relatives or authorized representatives.

That account did not hold up. When the nephew inquired at the municipal election office, officials confirmed that postal voting documents had been requested on Aug. 10 using his aunt’s date of birth and that a vote had already been recorded. Staff showed him the application bearing his aunt’s “scribbled” signature. Data-protection rules prevented them from disclosing which party was marked.

The nephew described the home’s alleged actions as a “scandal.” He and his wife first noticed problems during the February 2025 federal election; during the current state-election campaign they again encountered “inconsistencies” and this time pursued them. The complaint against persons unknown has been obtained by reporters.

The Marthahaus did not answer written questions from the Ostdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung and declined to comment when reached by telephone. City officials confirmed they were aware of the incident but provided no further details.

A second, still-unreported case has surfaced in Naumburg, according to German newspaper Junge Freiheit. A woman there said she “did not see any election documents for my mother.”

Her mother is “unable to give her own name.” She asked: “Who will vote for her and according to what criteria?”

The allegations come days before voters in Saxony-Anhalt go to the polls and add to the existing debate over how postal ballots are processed in care facilities, where many residents have limited capacity to express a political preference independently. Investigations will determine whether the documented vote was cast with proper authorization or constituted an unauthorized exercise of another person’s vote.

AfD would ban postal voting

One of the parties most opposed to postal voting is the AfD, which has argued that it is prone to fraud, especially in retirement homes. AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla has previously called for an end to mail-in ballots. He discussed his concerns about this form of voting during a conference with top AfD officials in 2024.

“It is also the task of the opposition to always doubt what a government is doing or what happened in an election. That is also a legitimate right and that is a good thing. And I just really want to point out, and we will also question this, for example, the entire security for the legal storage of ballot boxes, some of which are not stored in a legally secure manner, where in some cases only one person or two have access to these ballot boxes,” he said.

🇩🇪 JUST IN: "I would ban postal voting."

Germany's AfD party is calling for an end to mass mail-in ballots for elections.

Party co-leader @Tino_Chrupalla points out suspicious activity in the elections in Saxony and Thuringia in this new @RMXnews video. pic.twitter.com/tKydzaqaVj

— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) September 4, 2024

He went on to say that postal voting has been a concern in other elections and that these issues keep coming up. However, he also pointed to a problem plaguing other countries like the United States, which instituted mass mail-in ballots in the wake of the Covid-19 crisis, which has involved activists entering retirement homes and potentially manipulating vulnerable elderly voters.

In the case of Germany, Chrupalla stated, “We have also seen this in old and other election campaigns, such as the current campaigning in retirement and nursing homes, especially when the CDU and SPD campaign in these old people’s homes, which are run by Diakonie or Caritas, or go in and out there, and the AfD does not even get access to present their programs to the elderly. These are also things of influence that are not democratic in my opinion.”

Notably, both Diakonie and Caritas are run by the Protestant and Catholic churches, both of which have come out against the AfD, including expelling members of the party from the Church and calling for Germans to vote against them.

Chrupalla is calling for an end to postal voting, saying: “Personally, I would ban postal voting again. It has only been introduced as an exception or initiated in the Federal Republic of Germany. It is not the rule, it should not become the rule and it is not regulated by law in such a way that it is made the rule.”

rmx

The United Nations wants the United Kingdom to transform its streets, monuments, and school curricula as part of a ‘reparations’ policy for its historical involvement in the African slave trade.

The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) adopted its new General Recommendation No. 40 on August 25, devoted to “reparatory justice” for colonialism, the trafficking of enslaved Africans, and racialized slavery.

Among the proposed measures is a reshaping of the monumental landscape of former slave-trading countries.

According to documents reported by The Telegraph, the experts believe that public spaces should “honour the contributions of people of African descent” and acknowledge the abuses committed by those who participated in or benefited from slavery. In practice, this could mean new statues, works of art, memorials, or the dedication of public spaces. 

CERD is composed of independent experts, and its recommendations, which are obviously not binding, interpret the obligations arising from the Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The committee calls for textbooks and school curricula to be reviewed to ensure what it considers an “accurate” interpretation of the transatlantic slave trade and its consequences, to combat what it describes as misinformation about its present-day effects, and to promote policies against xenophobia, hate speech, and ideologies of racial superiority. It also urges political leaders to explain to the public the importance of reparatory justice. 

The recommendation comes five months after the General Assembly approved, by 123 votes in favour, three against, and 52 abstentions, a Ghana-sponsored resolution backed by the African Union that declared the trafficking of Africans and their racialized enslavement “the gravest crime against humanity.” The United Kingdom and every EU member state abstained.

London explained at the time that it did not question the gravity of slavery, but rejected establishing a “hierarchy of historical atrocities” and argued that there is no legal obligation today to pay compensation for actions that did not constitute a violation of the international law in force when they were committed. 

A selective historical memory

The problem lies in what the new framework does not address.

CERD’s recommendation is specifically constructed around the enslavement of Africans—both across the Atlantic and through “other routes”—and its consequences for people of African descent. It establishes no equivalent reparatory programme for European populations who were also captured, sold, and enslaved for centuries in North Africa and the Ottoman world.

This was not a marginal episode. Academic historiography extensively documents the enslavement of Europeans in the Barbary states of Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli and within the Ottoman system. A study published by Cambridge University Press cites an estimate of around 1.25 million captives, predominantly Europeans, taken by Barbary corsairs between 1530 and 1780. 

Oxford University Press has also published a study specifically examining the thousands of Britons captured and enslaved in North Africa between 1580 and 1750, where they were used as labourers, galley slaves, or held until a ransom was paid.

europeanconservative

Luca, Stelios, and Firas discuss the festival for cultural enrichment.

London’s Metropolitan Police force again attempted to downplay the criminality and violence of the multicultural Notting Hill Carnival, claiming that the street festival passed “largely without incident”, despite a record number of arrests and a man drowning to death.

According to initial estimates from Scotland Yard, there were 636 arrests over the course of the two-day Afro-Caribbean event, a figure that will likely continue to rise. People were arrested for various offences, including sexual assaults, stabbings, and attacks on emergency workers.

The 636 arrests this year easily surpassed last year’s record of 528. According to the Met, 242 arrests were made on Sunday and 394 on Monday. The record came despite the Met having banned over 300 people from attending.

Over the course of Sunday and Monday, stop and search operations resulted in 62 weapons being seized, including a handgun. This comes despite the festival organisers deploying metal detectors at the entrances and police seizing dozens of weapons such as so-called zombie knives prior to the Carnival.

Tragically, a man believed to have been in his 20s also lost his life Monday afternoon after fleeing from police. The man had entered into the water of canals near Meanwhile Gardens, where he apparently drowned despite efforts by police to perform CPR.

Regardless of the death or the record number of arrests, the Metropolitan Police declared that the Carnival had “passed largely without incident with a significant proactive policing operation ensuring the minority who posed a risk to the safety of the majority were deterred or intervened against.”

Commander Claire Smart, who led the policing operation for Notting Hill Carnival, said: “This is the second year now that we have seen a marked difference in the prevalence of serious violence at Carnival.

“This is the result of not just proactive policing and a determined effort to target our efforts on those posing the greatest risk of harm, but of a collaborative partnership approach to the delivery of the whole event.

“The progress by Notting Hill Carnival Ltd in stepping into so many of the event management and crowd safety roles previously performed by the police cannot be understated. They have delivered a challenging event well and in doing so have allowed us to focus our resources on our core role of tackling crime.”

The attempts to downplay the criminality associated with the Carnival did not go over well on social media, with many mocking the Met for its stance.

Political commentator Paul Embery said of the police’s response: “Pyongyang levels of propaganda going on here. If this had been any other event – say a football match or patriotic rally or anti-war demo – we wouldn’t have heard the last of it. The establishment would have denounced such a crime-fest full-throatedly and demanded sanctions against the organisers.”

breitbart

Vincent Bolloré has filed a criminal complaint against several Paris judges, accusing them of criminal association over the collapse of a 2021 plea bargain in the Togo ports corruption case.

The filing was made on May 21, 2026, and later reported by French daily Le Monde, which published a detailed account on August 31.

The complaint rests on article 450-1 of the French penal code, which covers criminal association.

The French billionaire, whose group spans logistics and conservative media including CNews, Europe 1 and Le Journal du dimanche, alleges “criminal association”, “obstruction of the course of justice”, “abuse of authority” and “breach of integrity”.

The complaint names, among others, judge Isabelle Prévost-Desprez and Stéphane Noël, then president of the Paris judicial court.

Bolloré’s lawyers, Céline Astolfe, Pierre Cornut-Gentille and Jean Veil, said the 2021 hearing did “irreparable” harm to his presumption of innocence and that concerted manoeuvres altered “the normal course of justice”.

They described the refusal to approve the plea deal as a “premeditated plan”.

The dispute goes back to February 26, 2021. Investigators allege that Havas, then a Bolloré subsidiary, supplied cut-price advice to Faure Gnassingbé’s 2010 Togolese presidential campaign in return for favourable terms at the port of Lomé. Gnassingbé has held power in Togo since 2005.

The National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF) and Bolloré SE agreed a public-interest judicial convention (convention judiciaire d’intérêt public, or CJIP), a settlement comparable to a deferred prosecution agreement: The company paid a €12 million fine and accepted a compliance programme, without an admission of guilt. Separately, Bolloré and two executives, Gilles Alix and Jean-Philippe Dorent, accepted a negotiated procedure and a €375,000 fine each.

Prévost-Desprez approved the company settlement but refused to homologate the individual deals, calling the penalty “unsuitable given the circumstances of the offence and the personality of the perpetrator”. The men were sent back for a public trial.

Noël had been due to preside and stood down two days beforehand. He belonged to the influence club Le Siècle, as does Bolloré’s son Yannick; he cited the risk of an appearance of partiality.

The defence said his replacement by Prévost-Desprez was “irregular” and the result of “pressure”, and that the bench was chosen “deliberately” so the deal with the PNF would fail.

Prévost-Desprez was first vice-president of the Paris judicial court at the time, a rank that allowed her to sit in place of the president when he was unable to do so, Le Monde reported. The judges named in the complaint have not commented on it.

They also cited later remarks by Prévost-Desprez at a conference, when she said approving the negotiated sentence would have been “almost contempt of court”.

Jean-François Bohnert, who then headed the PNF, rejected the claim of a guaranteed outcome. “As a matter of principle, one never gives an assurance, written or verbal, as to the result of a judicial procedure,” he told Le Monde.

He said that the prosecution may express a hope that a deal will be validated; the sitting judge always decides.

Bolloré wants the Paris court recused and the 2021 hearing investigated.

Success could delay the trial now listed for December 7-17 at the Paris judicial court.

A similar bid failed on July 29, when the Court of Cassation dismissed an application of “legitimate suspicion” based, Le Monde reported, on analogous arguments. That application was lodged on May 28, a week after the criminal complaint, and was heard behind closed doors. Bolloré and his lawyers stayed away from a preparatory hearing the same day, Agence France-Presse reported.

Prosecutors have previously described successive defence applications in the case as delaying tactics. “It is urgent to judge these facts, even if the defence does everything to prevent us,” deputy financial prosecutor Jean-Christophe Michard said in May, noting the earliest allegations dated back 17 years.

The underlying charges, bribery of a foreign public official in Togo and related breach of trust offences, have not been tried on the merits. They cover port operations between 2009 and 2011, and investigating judges ordered the case to trial in mid-March. Bolloré, 74, faces up to 10 years in prison, according to a judicial source cited by Agence France-Presse.

Bolloré’s lawyers say the commercial dealings were normal and that he did not know of them.

brusselssignal

The Alternative for Germany has reached a record high of 43 percent in the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt for the first time in an Insa poll, which was commissioned by Nius newspaper.

The same poll found that the Christian Democrats (CDU) would receive 22 percent, the Left Party 12 percent, and the Social Democrats (SPD) 7 percent. The Green Party would receive 5 percent, allowing it to cross the threshold to enter parliament.

Other parties would not have enough votes to enter, including the BSW at 4 percent and the FDP at 3 percent.

While the polling results put the AfD in first place by a wide margin, it also would not be enough for the AfD to win a clear majority in the state parliament.

While 43 percent of voters said they would back the AfD, another 5 percent of voters said they could imagine voting for the party.

If the Greens come under the 5 percent mark, the AfD may still have a chance to secure an absolute majority even with only 43 percent of the vote.

rmx

Dame Maureen Lipman has branded actor Gerard McCarthy “cowardly” for walking away from their shared Soho Theatre production without confronting her in person.

The 80-year-old Bafta-nominated actress dismissed Mr McCarthy’s Instagram announcement as “virtue-signalling” and urged him to “grow up.”

“I am asking for him to have the courage to face me and tell me what he thinks it is I should do, or think, or say,” she said.

Ms Lipman insisted she had no intention of imposing her beliefs on anyone. “He has to wake up and smell the grass. I have worked with actors for 60 years who often don’t share my politics. I don’t ask them, and they don’t ask me,” she added.

Mr McCarthy, best recognised for appearances in the BBC’s The Fall and Call the Midwife, had been due to perform alongside Ms Lipman in Stan Zimmerman’s Right Before I Go, which opens at the Soho Theatre on September 5.

The Northern Irish actor revealed his withdrawal in a social media post last week. “Because of views she has publicly and repeatedly expressed regarding Israel and Palestine, I did not feel comfortable personally promoting her involvement,” he wrote on Instagram.

Sieh dir diesen Beitrag auf Instagram an

Ein Beitrag geteilt von Gerard McCarthy (@gerard_mccarthy)

He stressed that he neither sought to have Ms Lipman removed from the cast nor expected fellow performers to follow his lead. A subsequent exchange with the play’s creator, Zimmerman, apparently cemented his resolve to depart.

Mr McCarthy has not been publicly outspoken on Middle Eastern affairs.

Mr McCarthy has not been publicly outspoken on Middle Eastern affairs.

She characterised herself as “simply a working woman of a certain age who believes that the state of Israel should be allowed to exist,” adding: “I am an actor, not a politician.

“There is very little I can do to influence Bibi Netanyahu, nor would I want to.”

Ms Lipman has faced sustained hostility from pro-Palestine campaigners during her recent theatre work.

Performances of Allegra in Aberdeen and Glasgow drew pickets, while the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign published an image depicting the Jewish actress with devil horns and a pitchfork, prompting a Police Scotland investigation into a potentially antisemitic social media post.

She has also needed to hire private security for touring dates owing to threats and abuse.

Several public figures rallied behind Mr McCarthy’s decision. Actors Dan Buckley, River Medway, and Star Wars: Andor’s Denise Gough voiced support on Instagram, as did comedian Luisa Omielan.

Writer and performer Robin Ince praised McCarthy’s stance, saying: “You will embolden others.” RuPaul’s Drag Race UK star Divina DeCampo called Mr Lipman’s positions “abhorrent.”

GB News has contacted Mr McCarthy’s representatives for a comment.

gbnews

Trans actress Iz Hesketh has become the second performer to pull out of the Soho Theatre production of Right Before I Go, citing Dame Maureen Lipman’s casting as the reason.

The Hollyoaks star, who won Best Newcomer at the 2024 Radio Times Awards, made the announcement on Instagram on Tuesday evening.

“I was really looking forward to returning to the project, so this is not a decision I have made lightly,” the soap star wrote.

“However, following the casting of Maureen Lipman and having recently become aware of public comments made by her, I no longer feel the next stage of production aligns with my own personal values and beliefs.”

gbnews

by Giulio Meotti

Bread and circuses…

It is not my mantra and it is not one coined today. Same effects for the same causes: train the masses, buy social peace.

Shortly before he died, the celebrated historian Walter Laqueur told me: “You will not end up like Pompeii, but as a museum and a cultural amusement park for the new rich of globalization.”

France is now rejoicing at the announcement of a mega Saudi investment of 6 billion euros that promises to generate more than 20,000 jobs: a new Dragon Ball theme park outside Paris.

The entertainment division of the Saudi fund will finance the entire project.

The site chosen for the Saudi park is as impressive as it is revealing: precisely on the spot where, in 1987, the first national amusement park dedicated to fairy tales and the great French novels was born (the statue of Gargantua is still there, a Rabelaisian giant reduced to a pitiful wreck), a monumental leisure complex dedicated to the Japanese universe will soon rise, backed by Islamic investors and under the complacent gaze of the public authorities.

Qatar recently gave 50 million euros to the Municipality of Venice “to meet the pressing needs of the city in the management of a unique and extremely complex heritage that transcends borders and represents a treasure for humanity.”

Their “gifts” are never free.

Who is one of the main donors of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London? A Saudi with 5 million pounds.

The same Victoria and Albert Museum that censored a painting of Muhammad?

Senile Europe has decided that its destiny is to entertain. Not to produce, not to invent, not to defend. No: to entertain.

We are no longer the subject of history. We are the object of consumption. The new rich of globalization (Chinese, Arabs, Russians, Indians) come to us to have fun, to buy pieces of the past, to photograph themselves in front of monuments that we are no longer capable of defending.

We, meanwhile, discuss inclusion, decarbonization and gender-neutral rights, while our productive capacities emigrate and die.

We have turned our territories into stage sets for the rich and for sovereign wealth funds. The same territories conquered by the new demography that works in those parks.

A strange and sad destiny of ours, isn’t it?

They will not conquer us with weapons. They will conquer us with sovereign funds, with theme parks and with our own desire no longer to be serious.

Mark my words: they will sell us submission as a form of entertainment. It will arrive with an entrance ticket.

israelnationalnews