Damaged graves and racist graffiti have been found in the Palestinian village of Awarta in the northern West Bank after a Jewish group visited the area.

Palestinians told an Israeli rights group they saw Jewish pilgrims and Israeli soldiers in the area which is also a Jewish burial site, on Tuesday.

The Israeli military has not yet responded to the incident.

On Tuesday 10 people from a nearby settlement were arrested and questioned over an arson attack on a mosque.

At least two tombstones were damaged in the cemetery outside the village, and food and rubbish were left on graves.

In the village, offensive slogans about Arabs were found scrawled in Hebrew, English and Russian.

Israelis are forbidden from entering Awarta, but the Israeli military occasionally organises group trips for settlers to visit nearby Jewish tombs.

Palestinians told the Israeli rights group B'tselem that such a visit had taken place on Tuesday night, and the damage was discovered on Wednesday morning.

The United Nations called Switzerland's ban on new minarets "clearly discriminatory" and deeply divisive, and the Swiss foreign minister acknowledged Tuesday the government was very concerned about how the vote would affect the country's image.

U.N. human rights chief Navi Pillay said Sunday's referendum to outlaw the construction of minarets in Switzerland was the product of "anti-foreigner scare-mongering."

The criticism from Pillay, whose office is based in the Swiss city of Geneva, comes after an outcry from Muslim countries, Switzerland's European neighbors and human rights watchdogs since 57.5 percent of the Swiss population ratified the ban.

"These are extraordinary claims when the symbol of one religion is targeted," Pillay said in a statement. She said she was saddened to see xenophobic arguments gain such traction with Swiss voters despite their "long-standing support of fundamental human rights."

In Athens on Tuesday, Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey said the government was worried about the ban.

"We are very concerned with this referendum. The reality of our societies in Europe and throughout the world is that each limitation on the coexistence of different cultures and religions also endangers our security," Calmy-Rey said during a meeting of foreign ministers of the 56-nation Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

"Provocation risks triggering other provocation and risks inflaming extremism," she added.

Sunday's referendum, which was backed by nationalist parties, forced the government to declare illegal the building of any new minarets.

Over a thousand people joined stars from the Apprentice at this year's 'BIG IFtar' event in aid of the homeless.

The event was organised by the IF charity and supported by other aid organisations including The Salvation Army and Thames Reach, with an aim to share a Ramadan IFtar meal (breaking of the fast) with London's homeless.

Around 1500 people from all communities attended the event called 'The BIG IFtar', in East London's Altab Ali Park to raise awareness about homeless communities around the world.

Former Apprentice celebrities, Tre Azzam, Shazia Wahab, Majid Nagra and Syed Ahmed donned their aprons and chef hats to help serve large quantities of biryani (rice and chicken), prepared for over 1000 local homeless people.

Local MP George Galloway and Baroness Pola Uddin spoke at the event, alongside the Leader of Tower Hamlets Council, Lutfur Rahman.

George Galloway said, "The BIG IFtar was a great way to recognise the plight of homeless people in our very own city. I am happy to support any future plans IF has to help the homeless in this Borough in particular the idea of providing food every Friday for the homeless in conjunction with many of the restaurants of Brick Lane."

Military rabbis are becoming more powerful. Trained in warfare as well as religion, new army regulations mean they are now part of a military elite.

They graduate from officer's school and operate closely with military commanders. One of their main duties is to boost soldiers' morale and drive, even on the front line.

This has caused quite some controversy in Israel. Should military motivation come from men of God, or from a belief in the state of Israel and keeping it safe?

The military rabbis rose to prominence during Israel's invasion of Gaza earlier this year.

Some of their activities raised troubling questions about political-religious influence in the military.

Gal Einav, a non-religious soldier said there was wall-to-wall religious rhetoric in the base, the barracks and on the battlefield.

As soon as soldiers signed for their rifles, he said, they were given a book of psalms.

And, as his company headed in to Gaza, he told me, they were flanked by a civilian rabbi on one side and a military rabbi on the other:

"It felt like a religious war. Like a crusade. It disturbed me. Religion and the army should be completely separate," he said.

It would be foolish to conflate a few isolated incidents but to dismiss them as aberrations would be to deny the prejudice Muslims face across Europe.

A British Minister walks out of a Muslim constituent’s wedding protesting against segregation of male and female guests; a prominent moderate Muslim scholar, Tariq Ramadan, is hounded out of not one but two separate jobs for hosting a show on an Iranian television channel; aggressive right-wing campaigners in Switzerland demand removal of minarets from all mosques; and French President Nicolas Sarkozy calls for a ban on wearing burqa in public.

These incidents, occurring within days of each other in recent weeks in different parts of Europe, have coincided with a rash of new books portraying European Muslims in the darkest possible colour. Their alarmist tone has reminded many of the sort of things once written about European Jews.

Are these simply isolated events? Or is Europe in the grip of a new wave of Islamophobia?

Meanwhile, in Britain, Jim Fitzpatrick, the Minister who stormed out of a Muslim wedding protesting against the “segregation” of men and women, has been accused of “cultural insensitivity” and, worse, playing the “race card” to appease white working class voters in the run-up to next year’s general election. The latter accusation came not from the local Muslim community but from a prospective Tory candidate Tim Archer, who said: “I can’t help but feel he’s playing a certain race card to save his skin at the next election. I think it’s a desperate strategy.”

Two prominent Labour figures are at loggerheads over the decision of farming minister Jim Fitzpatrick to walk out of a Muslim wedding.

Mr Fitzpatrick told journalists he had decided to leave the ceremony rather than be separated from his wife.

Some commentators noted the high proportion of Muslim voters in Mr Fitzpatrick's constituency, and his upcoming election battle with Respect leader George Galloway, who is popular among Muslim voters.

The theory is that Mr Fitzpatrick left the wedding in order to consolidate his popularity among white working class voters.

"I suspect Mr Fitzpatrick has one eye on the general election and has mistakenly used this event for political gain," Labour peer Lord Patel of Blackburn said.

"He is playing to a section of the voters with whom anti-Muslim sentiment is appealing. This is underhand and dangerous."

It is common, but not necessary, for Muslim weddings to have a split congregation along gender lines.

The bridegroom has also demanded an apology from the minister, who he says turned his wedding into a political stunt.

“Jim Fitzpatrick has lost all credibility. He should resign as a government minister.” So demanded George Galloway this morning as it emerged that Fitzpatrick’s account of events at the Muslim wedding he snubbed omitted some crucial facts.

Galloway continued: “If the account given by the groom in the Telegraph is to be believed, it now emerges that Fitzpatrick’s wife was not told by anyone in authority at the wedding that she should go to the women only section, that Fitzpatrick did not take the issue up with the wedding organisers, and that the family of the groom contacted Fitzpatrick as soon as they became aware of the misunderstanding and invited him and his wife back to the wedding to join an unsegregated table.

“This makes it abundantly clear that Fitzpatrick was simply using this wedding to pursue a political vendetta against the Islamic Forum of Europe, entirely misdirected as it turned out, and to pander to those who have prejudices against Muslims and Muslim traditions.

“Fitzpatrick chose to do this over an event that should have been the happiest day of this young couple’s life, which the families will have spent thousands of pounds organising and which Fitzpatrick was privileged to have been invited to.

“He has been an MP for a constituency with a large Muslim minority long enough and he will have attended enough Muslim weddings in that time to know that these weddings are traditionally segregated for Muslim men and women but that exceptions are almost invariably made for non-Muslim men and women on the basis that offence should not be given to those with different traditions and expectations.

“I note Fitzpatrick now says he will apologise for offending the couple and that he left the wedding discreetly. But this must be a bad joke. He went straight to the press and made a statement about his outrageous treatment at the wedding. This is unacceptable behaviour by a government minister and MP. More than that, this behaviour has discredited him as a representative of this government. If he does not do the decent thing and resign, Brown should sack him.”

ENDS

STOP PRESS

Councillor Abjol Miah has made the following statement about Fitzpatrick’s comments: “This is a cynical move from a desperate man looking to benefit from prejudice. His constituents deserve to know if this move was approved by Labour Party HQ and if Rushanara Ali, Labour’s candidate for Bethnal Green and Bow, will denounce these divisive comments.”

The lawyer for three men arrested in anti-terror raids said they were targeted as they fit the "terrorist" stereotype.

Solicitor Amjad Malik told BBC's Asian Network that the men felt discriminated against because they are Muslims and he says they are innocent.

He said: "Anybody who has a beard and goes to prayer cannot be considered a threat to national security."

The men held in Liverpool, Manchester and Clitheroe were not charged.

Of the 12 men arrested in the raids, 11 were Pakistani nationals, with 10 holding student visas. One was from Great Britain.

I have been asked to provide more proof that the Sufi Muslim Council is funded by the Karimov government and the CIA. Well, to some extent you have to take my word that as British Ambassador in Uzbekistan I had my informers and sources. But let me give you some strong supporting evidence.

The average mosque in England and Wales attracts 400 attendees at Friday prayer meetings, while providing a range of community services, a survey has found.

The survey of 255 mosques also revealed that on average they had an estimated annual income of £233,452.

Most - 83% - had been established more than 10 years ago, it found.

Many of the mosques were providing education for children, charity fundraising and leisure activities, the Charity Commission study said.

The independent survey was prepared by BMG Research and commissioned by the Charity Commission's faith and social cohesion unit to provide information on mosques which has not been previously gathered.

Dame Suzi Leather, chair of the Charity Commission, said the research revealed the important contribution mosques were making to communities.

She said: "I'm really interested to see the wide range of services that mosques provide, from healthy living activities to legal advice services and from fundraising for those in financial hardship to sport and leisure.

"The Charity Commission has an essential part to play in supporting all faith-based charities so that they can maximise the contribution they make to society."

Seyyed Ferjani, chair of the Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board welcomed the research, saying it was a useful starting point.

He said: "I hope it will also be a useful resource for Muslim communities throughout England and Wales. The helpful advice and information provided by the faith and social cohesion unit is clearly of benefit to those mosques which responded to the survey. "

One of the arrested men is reported to be a guard at the synagogue.

"What a coincidence, the gang leader is a metropolitan police officer who for the last four years was the personal bodyguard of the synagogue's rabbi," Chavez said in an interview Sunday with the Venevision TV station, Reuters reported.

Chavez broke diplomatic ties with Israel on Jan. 6, while the Gaza operation was ongoing, expelling its ambassador and staff.

The alleged vandals were arrested during weekend raids and are scheduled to be arraigned Monday.

"We thank the authorities for the quick detention of the suspects," Elias Farache, president of Venezuela's Jewish Association, told the Associated Press.

Three months before she was thrust into the national political spotlight, Gov. Sarah Palin was asked to handle a much smaller task: addressing the graduating class of commission students at her one-time church, Wasilla Assembly of God.

Her speech in June provides as much insight into her policy leanings as anything uncovered since she was asked to be John McCain's running mate.

Speaking before the Pentecostal church, Palin painted the current war in Iraq as a messianic affair in which the United States could act out the will of the Lord.

"Pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God," she exhorted the congregants. "That's what we have to make sure that we're praying for, that there is a plan and that that plan is God's plan."

Last week I was at Southwark Crown Court to observe the harrowing trial of Brian Donegan who last August launched a vicious unprovoked attack on the Imam of Regents Park mosque, Shiekh Mohammed El-Salamouni. Sheikh El-Salamouni was left lying on the floor of the mosque with horrific injuries and is now blind for life. In its symbolism to those in the Muslim community, the attack would be comparable for Roman Catholics to an attack on an archbishop at Westminster Cathedral. To add to the local community’s distress, the fall-out from the attack is that Imams from Al-Azhar University who have provided us with the Imams at Regents Park for many years could now leave London if the Egyptian authorities do not feel they will be adequately protected in London .

It is of scant consolation to Sheikh El-Salamouni, but Brian Donegan will be imprisoned indefinitely in a secure hospital after he was declared insane by the court. His punishment and the fact he will spend the rest of life behind bars needs needs to be properly explained to the local community and users of the mosque, some of whom are concerned that the lack of a traditional “guilty” verdict means Mr Donegan has somehow got off lightly. This of course is not the case. It would take the intervention of the Home Secretary for Mr Donegan’s sentence ever to be revisited - something I do not envisage happening and something I will do everything in my gift to prevent.

I have written to Jacqui Smith the present Home Secretary to press home this fact and to emphasise to her that the likes of Mr Donegan must not be allowed to harm our excellent record of harmonious community relations here in London.

Clearly , in the meantime, security needs to be improved in Regents Park mosque and reviewed at other mosques and religious buildings . In light of this horrific experience , it is important that we at least have security outside the room when an Imam is giving counsel - along the lines of that given to MP’s during their surgeries. Mosques should be encouraged to liaise with local police and Safer Neighbourhood Teams for advice on ensuring that religious buildings are as secure as possible for both staff and worshippers.

I sincerely hope this is not the prelude of us losing the Imams from Al-Azhar University in Cairo at Regents Park mosque. Over the years they have provided an invaluable service to the local Muslim community, stretching right back to the appointment of the much-respected Zaki Badawi as Chief Imam in 1978 .

l have written to the Foreign Secretary to outlining my concerns and to ask him to reassure the Egyptian authorities that their Imams can in future continue to feel safe in London.