By William Lobdell, Times Staff Writer

What could be more American? Dozens of young men in Orange County have planned a football tournament for the New Year's weekend in Irvine. But this gathering of Muslim American athletes on the gridiron — they say a first for Southern California — is being flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct by religious leaders dismayed by some of the team's names. Monikers for the flag-football teams include Mujahideen, Intifada and Soldiers of Allah and are accompanied on the league's Web site, http://muslimfootball.com, by logos of masked men, some with daggers or swords.

An organizer of the Jan. 4 event, geared for American Muslims in their teens and 20s, said the names are a sign of football bravado and a show of support for Muslims in the Middle East.

"A lot of the kids on our team are from Palestinian origin," said Tarek Shawky, Intifada's 29-year-old captain and quarterback. "We are in solidarity with people in the uprising. It's about human rights and basic freedoms."

"I think they should be more sensitive and show respect to other people's sensitivities," said Muzammil Siddiqi, director of the Islamic Society of Orange County and a national Muslim leader. "The words themselves do not have bad meanings, but people associate them with what's going on in the world around them."

But others say Palestinian fighters in the Intifada are terrorists and shouldn't be glorified. Another provocative name, Mujahideen, means "holy warrior," and is associated with a variety of Islamic resistance movements, including two on the U.S. government's list of terrorist groups.

"What exactly are they honoring here?" asked Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. "The continued targeting of innocent women and children by homicide bombers deserves to be condemned across the board. It's deeply, deeply disturbing."

In the post-Sept. 11 era, the idea that American-born Muslims in suburbia would give their football teams militant names hurts the image of Islam in the United States, interfaith leaders say. And it doesn't matter whether the reasons for the choices are youthful zeal, football machismo, family connections to the Middle East or religious convictions.

"I think they spoil [a good thing] by politicizing it," said retired Rabbi Bernie King, who lives in Irvine. "Something like this undermines [those working with Muslims] and tends to support those in the community who have suspicions about the real intent of Islam." But one Islamic scholar said she wonders why the team names should be controversial.

"Who cares? Why are people so sensitive?" said Yvonne Yazbeck Haddad, a professor at Georgetown University. "Intifada is something that Muslims and Palestinians all approve of. It means 'just get off my back.'
"Is the only way we accept [Muslims] is if we devalue their faith?"
Shawky and Sabih Khan, 18, organized the eight-team tournament as a way to strengthen ties among young American Muslims who often feel isolated by their minority faith and background.

Islamic youths in the U.S. have played in other Muslim-only sports events, such as basketball and soccer. But the embrace of football, that most exclusively American of sports, shows the steady assimilation of the second-generation of Muslim immigrants.

"All the kids who are involved are sincere Muslim kids, but just as American as everybody else," said Shawky, adding that they've grown up watching football on television and eating at McDonald's. "They're just like your run-of-the-mill, white, Christian kids. It's easy to get lost in the group and forget about who they are. We try to build that sense of who they are, to be proud of being Muslim."

The Muslim athletes aren't the first Americans to choose controversial team names. The NBA's Washington franchise, for example, renamed itself the Wizards in 1997 after Bullets was deemed too violent. In 2000, Wheaton College replaced its Crusader label after 70 years, with the more politically correct Thunder.

Twenty miles down Interstate 5 from Irvine, where the football tournament will be held, a new Catholic high school in San Juan Capistrano changed its name before it opened last year, from the Crusaders to the Lions, a move applauded by local Muslim leaders.

Some of those same officials say they oppose the controversial names for the Muslim football teams, but emphasize that they reflect youthful hyperbole more than any dark meaning.

"They tend to be a little more on the emotional side, and they also look for something that will raise eyebrows," said Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations' Southern California chapter. He said he would advise the players to change the names. Khan said he realized the names could be a problem and asked the teams to reconsider them.

"It bothers me a little bit," said Khan, an 18-year-old Saddleback College student and former Irvine High defensive end and linebacker. "They were just trying to be cool."

But Intifada's Shawky said that his team's name won't change. He says it describes a righteous fight against oppression, whether it's in the Middle East or in America.

"To the kids, it's more of an uprising for basic dignity," said Shawky, adding that in competitive sports, players try to "find as aggressive a name as they can get."

Copyright 2003 Los Angeles Times

The European Union's racism watchdog has shelved a report on anti-semitism because the study concluded Muslims and pro-Palestinian groups were behind many of the incidents it examined. The Vienna-based European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) decided in February not to publish the 112-page study, a copy of which was obtained by the Financial Times, after clashing with its authors over their conclusions.

The news comes amid growing fears that there is an upsurge of anti-semitism in European Union countries. Among many recent incidents, a Jewish school near Paris was firebombed last Saturday, the same day two Istanbul synagogues were devastated by suicide truck bombs that killed 25 and wounded 300.

Turkey, which hopes to join the EU, suffered again at the hands of what are believed to be al-Qaeda inspired terrorists on Thursday with truck bomb attacks on British targets.

Following a spate of incidents in early 2002, the EUMC commissioned a report from the Centre for Research on Anti-semitism at Berlin's Technical University.

When the researchers submitted their work in October last year, however, the centre's senior staff and management board objected to their definition of anti-semitism, which included some anti-Israel acts. The focus on Muslim and pro-Palestinian perpetrators, meanwhile, was judged inflammatory.

"There is a trend towards Muslim anti-semitism, while on the left there is mobilisation against Israel that is not always free of prejudice," said one person familiar with the report. "Merely saying the perpetrators are French, Belgian or Dutch does no justice to the full picture."

Some EUMC board members had also attacked part of the analysis ascribing anti-semitic motives to leftwing and anti-globalisation groups, this person said. "The decision not to publish was a political decision."

The board includes 18 members - one for each member state, the European Commission, Parliament, and the council of Europe - as well as 18 deputies. One deputy, who declined to be named, confirmed the directors had seen the study as biased.

In July, Robert Wexler, a US congressman, wrote to Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy chief, demanding the release of the study.
Ole Espersen, law professor at Copenhagen University and board member for Denmark, said the study was "unsatisfactory" and that some members had felt anti-Islamic sentiment should be addressed too.

The EUMC, which was set in 1998, has published three reports on anti-Islamic attitudes in Europe since the September 11 attacks in the US.
Beate Winkler, a director, said the report had been rejected because the initial time scale included in the brief - covering the period between May and June 2002 - was later judged to be unrepresentative.

"There was a problem with the definition [of anti-semitism] too. It was too complicated," she said. This week, Silvan Sha lom, Israel's foreign minister, proposed a joint ministerial council to fight what Israel sees as a rise in European anti-semitism.

American Jews See Population, Birthrate Drop
Intermarriage keeps climbing, although at a slower pace, a new survey finds. The data were compiled to help preserve the faith.

The Jewish population in the United States declined 5% in the last decade to about 5.2 million and the rate of intermarriage continued to climb, but at a slower pace, a new nationwide survey has found. The study by United Jewish Communities found contradictions in American Jewish life: an increase in the number of children enrolled in Jewish day schools and adults participating in Jewish education, yet "significant segments" of Jews on the margins of religious or community involvement. For example, only 46% of Jews are synagogue members and only 28% light Sabbath candles.

Those mixed findings, the study sponsors said, should influence how the 156 Jewish Federations in the UJC across the country spend upward of $850 million a year to preserve and strengthen Jewish cultural and religious identity in America. "I think we're going to be taking a much more critical look at what types of initiatives that prove to be successful and what are the types that need fine tuning or change," said Lorraine Blass, project manager of the $6-million study.

The study's credibility became an issue last October after part of its findings on population was released and then withdrawn because some field data were not factored into the 5.2-million population estimate. At the same time, another study by a San Francisco-based group — using a broader definition of who was Jewish — placed the population at 6.7 million. But after reevaluating its methodology and findings, UJC said Wednesday that it stood by the 5.2-million figure.

In a telephone interview from New York, Blass said the survey was "meticulously examined." It found that the Jewish population is graying faster than the U.S. population in general, with a median age of 42, (five years older than 10 years ago) compared with 37 for the country as a whole. Children under age 17 account for 20% of the Jewish population and those over age 65 account for 19% of the total Jewish population.

Compared with the overall U.S. population, Jews tend to marry later and, on average, have fewer children. American Jewish fertility rates are below population replacement levels. A key finding involved the extent of intermarriage, a sensitive issue for Jewish leaders concerned about assimilation and loss of identity. The latest study found that 47% of Jews who married since 1996 entered into mixed marriages, and that two-thirds of the children of all intermarried parents were not being reared as Jewish.

Only 13% of Jews who married before 1970 took a non-Jewish spouse, according to Laurence Kotler-Berkowitz, research director of the poll. He said the intermarriage rate had increased threefold to 38% by the mid-1980s. "Since then, the rate of increase has slowed down," he said. It had held steady at 43% during the 10-year period between 1985 and 1995.

Ten years ago, the same poll reported intermarriage at 52%, but that is now believed to be an inflated figure based on a methodology that has been dropped. Intermarriage was more frequent in Western states, including California, where 42% of currently married Jews have non-Jewish spouses, compared with 25% in the more traditional Northeast, the study found. Jews in the West were also generally less observant and less involved in Jewish activities than those in the East. John Fishel, president of the Jewish Federation of Los Angeles, said Wednesday: "This study once gain very loudly trumpets that we need to step back. We need to look at our priorities. We need to reassess what those priorities may be, based on what we would like the Jewish community to be 10 or 15 years from now." Nonetheless, Rabbi Robert Wexler, president of the University of Judaism in Los Angeles, looked on the positive side. Compared to other ethnic groups that came to the U.S. in large numbers in the early years of the 20th century, Jews have been less likely to intermarry, in part because to be a Jew can mean an ethnic or religious identity, or both, he said. "Here is this tenacious holding on to an aspect of their ethnic identity," Wexler said.

The study found that 63% of all American Jews say they have "emotional attachments" to Israel but that only about one out of three Jews have visited Israel. About 40% give to Jewish causes other than local Jewish federations, and 62% give to non-Jewish causes. Looking at religious affiliation, the report said that 46% of Jewish adults are members of synagogues, but it offered no comparisons to past years because survey methodologies changed. Of those, 39% belong to Reform synagogues, 33% Conservative, 21% Orthodox, 3% Reconstructionist and 4% other.

(Begin Text of Infobox)
Jewish Americans by the numbers
Here are the key numerical findings of the National Jewish Population Survey 2000-2001 released Wednesday by United Jewish Communities:
Demographics

Total Jewish population in America: ...5.2 million
Number of Jewish households in America:... 2.9 million
Regional distribution of Jewish population:
Northeast:... 43%
Midwest: ...13%
South:...23%
West: ...22%

Age, Marriage and Family


Median age of American Jews:... 42
Median age of U.S. population:... 35
Percentage of Jewish adults currently married: ...57%
Percentage of Jewish women who are childless at ages:
18-24:... 90%
25-29: ...70%
30-34: ...54%
35-39:... 36%
40-44: ...26%
Number of children required per U.S. woman for population replacement:...2.1
Average number of children born to Jewish women:... less than 1.9
*
Intermarriage

Percentage of Jews wed between 1996 and 2000 who married outside the faith: ...47%
Percentage of married Jews today who are intermarried: ...31%
Percentage of intermarried Jews raising children Jewish:... 33%
Percentage of intermarried Jews whose parents were also intermarried:...74%
*
Involvement in Jewish Life

Percentage of Jews who belong to synagogues:... 46%
Reform: ...39%
Conservative: ...33%
Orthodox: ...21%
Reconstructionist:... 3%
Other:... 4%
Percentage of Jewish children enrolled in Jewish day school or yeshiva:...29%
Percentage of Jews who give to non-Jewish charitable causes:... 62%

BURBANK -- The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to review Burbank's appeal of two lower courts' decisions banning the City Council from opening meetings with sectarian prayers.

The high court refusal means all California cities and counties will be bound by the same prohibition, attorneys said.

"We won at every level possible, and it's incredible," said Roger Jon Diamond, representing Burbank opponents in the suit. "The challenge we anticipate now is to see how other cities will change."

The lawsuit, triggered by a 1999 prayer at a Burbank council meeting in which a Mormon minister invoked the name of Jesus Christ, was brought by Irv Rubin, the late chairman of the Jewish Defense League, and Roberto Alejandro Gandara, a supporter of strict church-state separation.

"This is one of Irv's legacies, a testament to my husband's belief in the Constitution," said his widow, Shelley Rubin. "I will be as vigilant as my husband was to make sure that every city in the state that is sponsoring sectarian prayers is wrong.

"We want to make sure everyone feels welcome to practice the religion they want, but we want them to know in city hall chambers, we are all Americans," she said.

Burbank officials said they were disappointed with the decision.

"We would have liked to have had this looked at," said Burbank's chief assistant attorney, Juli Scott. "You hate to be the city that makes the law that messes it up for everyone else."

Since 1953, Burbank's City Council has begun meetings with an invocation by a member of a nondenominational ministerial association.

Attorney Douglas Collodel, who filed a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the International Municipal Lawyers Association and the other cities defending sectarian prayer, agreed the case will force changes statewide.

"It affects all legislative bodies in California, from the smallest city to the largest," Douglas said. "To avoid being sued, many cities may decide to abolish prayer altogether."

Report: Mel Gibson is building church for his Catholic movement

NEW YORK - Actor Mel Gibson's father isn't shy about admitting his belief in conspiracy theories. Hutton Gibson, an 84-year-old activist and author, says he believes the World Trade Center was destroyed by "remote control," not airliners hijacked by al-Qaida terrorists. He insists that every pope in the last 50 years has been illegitimate, and he denies that six million Jews were killed in the Holocaust.

"Go and ask an undertaker or the guy who operates the crematorium what it takes to get rid of a body," the elder Gibson says in Sunday's editions of The New York Times Magazine. "It takes one liter of petrol and 20 minutes. Now, six million?"

Gibson and his son, the star of blockbuster films like "Braveheart" and "Lethal Weapon," are practitioners of an ultraconservative Catholic movement known as traditionalism. The small splinter group seeks to revive orthodox practices that were abandoned several centuries ago by mainstream Catholicism.

The actor has been especially forthcoming about his religious affiliation recently. Gibson is building a traditionalist church on a 9,300-square-foot complex in Malibu, Calif., for about 70 members, the Times said. He is serving as the director, chief executive officer and sole benefactor of the church, which intends to conduct its Sunday Mass entirely in Latin. The property was purchased by a church group called Holy Family.

In addition, Gibson is directing a film that depicts the last 12 hours in the life of Jesus Christ. The movie, "The Passion," is in production in Rome, with the actors speaking only Latin and Aramaic.

Gibson declined comment for the Times article, but at a news conference to announce the film last September, he acknowledged the difficulty in finding a U.S. studio or distributor for the project.

"Obviously, nobody wants to touch something filmed in two dead languages. They think I'm crazy, and maybe I am. But maybe I'm a genius," Gibson said.

Still, while Gibson and his father belong to the same movement, they don't necessarily share the same beliefs. "He doesn't go along with a lot of what his father says," an unnamed church elder at Holy Family told the Times.

The JDL wishes to speak to Gibson concerning his father's antisemitic statements, as well as the family's outmoded religious beliefs that are rejected by contemporary Catholicism.