Terror strikes South Africa's LGBTQ+ community: Muhsin Hendricks, recognized globally as history's first openly gay imam, was fatally shot in the city of Kabarha in the southern region of the country, according to an announcement from the Australian government.

The imam, who operated a mosque that served as a safe haven for LGBTQ+ Muslims, was traveling in his vehicle accompanied by another individual when their path was blocked by a car. Armed assailants emerged and opened fire, killing Hendricks. According to the police statement, "Two unidentified suspects with covered faces fired multiple shots at the vehicle. The driver fled the scene and only later noticed that Hendricks, who was in the back seat, had been shot and killed."

BREAKING:

A video has been released of yesterday's Islamist terror attack in South Africa in which killed the world's first openly gay imam.

Muhsin Hendricks ran a mosque in Cape Town intended as a safe haven for gay & marginalised Muslims.

He was murdered in an ambush. pic.twitter.com/obZvM4BzGi

— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) February 16, 2025

Though police authorities maintain the motive remains unclear, South Africa's LGBTQ+ community is certain this was a targeted terror attack. Security camera footage circulating on social media platforms documents the shooting incident.

Hendricks founded his mosque in 2011 to provide a sanctuary and prayer space for Muslims who had been ostracized from their communities due to their sexual orientation. The Ghurbaah Mosque, located in Cape Town's Wynberg neighborhood, garnered extensive media coverage as history's first Muslim center offering an inclusive environment for LGBTQ+ members.

"I told myself that perhaps it was time we created our own space, where people could pray without being judged," Hendricks told The Guardian at the time. His decision to establish the mosque came after a friend shared his experience of being forced to listen to an extended sermon condemning homosexuality at his regular mosque.

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A climate of fear and intolerance has emerged in Germany, as Berlin Police Chief Barbara Slowik cautioned Jewish and LGBTQ individuals against entering certain areas of the German capital, Bild newspaper reported Monday.

"I have no intention of stigmatizing any particular group as criminals. Unfortunately, there are specific neighborhoods with a predominant Arab population that shows sympathy toward terrorist organizations. Open antisemitism is being expressed against people of the Jewish faith," Slowik stated.

"There are areas where, to be frank, I would advise those wearing kippahs or visibly identifying as LGBTQ to exercise additional caution. While violent crimes against Jews remain rare – though undoubtedly, even one such incident is too many – I can understand the persistent fear and cautiousness," she added.

Recent months have seen Germany grappling with a surge of anti-Israel demonstrations, prompting police in various locations to impose protest bans and forcefully disperse gatherings. The country has also witnessed Islamist groups organizing rallies advocating for Sharia law implementation, with demonstrators displaying Taliban flags.

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In a sweeping move that further restricts LGBTQ+ rights in West Africa, Mali's National Transitional Council has voted to criminalize homosexuality, with lawmakers approving the measure by a margin of 131-1, PinkNews reports.

The legislation, which awaits final approval from the country's military leadership who seized power in 2021, specifically targets sexual relationships between men, though specific penalties have not yet been disclosed.

Mali's shift toward criminalizing homosexuality comes amid broader changes in the country's governance. Colonel Assimi Goïta, who heads the ruling military junta, had previously moved to remove French as one of Mali's official languages in June 2023, signaling a departure from historical ties with France.

Minister of Justice and Human Rights Mamadou Kassogue had previously indicated the government's stance on the issue, "There are provisions in our laws that prohibit homosexuality in Mali. Anyone who indulges in this practice, or promotes or condones it, will be prosecuted."

Kassogue emphasized the cultural basis for the legislation, stating, "We will not accept our customs and values being violated by people from elsewhere."

The development in Mali follows similar trends across West Africa. In July, Ghana's supreme court dismissed a challenge to the country's Criminal Code of 1960, which categorizes same-sex acts as "unnatural carnal knowledge" and carries a potential three-year prison sentence. Ghana's existing law, dating back to British colonial times, has led to widespread discrimination against LGBTQ+ individuals. The situation could worsen if the pending Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill becomes law.

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Are you interested in earning $1 million? A watchdog organization has announced a provocative $1 million offer to any US LGBTQ advocacy group willing to host a gay pride parade in Gaza or the West Bank, Fox News reported. The New Tolerance Campaign (NTC) says the initiative is designed to be a "wake-up call" to groups like "Queers for Palestine" that have emerged since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel.

Gregory T. Angelo, president of NTC and former president of Log Cabin Republicans, told Fox News Digital, "I don't want people to just shrug off this campaign as some kind of publicity stunt or something that is supposed to be comical. It actually is a legitimate offer."

The campaign aims to highlight the stark contrast in LGBTQ rights between Israel and Palestinian territories, where homosexuality remains deeply taboo and LGBTQ individuals often face severe persecution.

"This campaign emerged to call out these purported advocates of LGBT equality and put our money where their mouths are," Angelo continued. He added that the offer could either expose the challenging conditions for LGBTQ people in Palestinian territories or potentially serve as a "breakthrough moment for pluralism and peace in the Middle East."

NTC plans to promote the campaign using mobile billboards near Columbia University, the Human Rights Campaign headquarters in Washington, DC, and UCLA. The organization has also set up a system for Americans to directly message leaders of prominent LGBTQ rights groups, encouraging them to advocate for LGBTQ rights in Palestinian territories and Arab countries.

Angelo criticized what he sees as a tendency on the left to equate all forms of oppression, telling Fox News, "On the left in the United States, all oppression is the same oppression. And I think the left, quite to their disservice, lumps everything from racial discrimination to sexual orientation discrimination to gender discrimination to Islamophobia, all under the same umbrella. That's certainly not the case."

He contrasted the legal protections and social acceptance for LGBTQ individuals in the US with the situation in Palestinian territories, where same-sex marriage is not recognized and there are no employment protections based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

The campaign comes against a backdrop of ongoing tension in the region. In 2019, Palestinian Authority police banned a gay and transgender rights group from holding events in the West Bank and threatened to arrest participants. Meanwhile, Israel has actively promoted its tolerance of LGBTQ issues, with Tel Aviv known as a popular destination for gay and lesbian travelers, especially during the time of the annual parade.

The New Tolerance Campaign describes itself as a "watchdog organization mobilizing Americans to confront intolerance double-standards by establishment institutions, civil rights groups, universities, and socially-conscious brands." Its website states that "NTC action campaigns empower ordinary Americans to hold accountable self-proclaimed arbiters of tolerance when they betray their own stated values."

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The Montreal Canada Day Parade, a beloved annual event that has drawn hundreds of thousands of spectators since its inception in 1977, has been canceled for 2024, according to an announcement made by the parade's main organizer, Nicholas Cowen.

In a press release issued on June 19, 2024, Cowen stated that a combination of factors, including reduced funding and what he described as interference from the federal government, left him with no choice but to cancel the event. Toronto 99 previously reported that the Trudeau government gave Pride organizers millions of tax dollars for security.

REMEMBER: Justin Trudeau cancelled Canada Day in Montreal, there will be no parade. However, there will be lots of naked old men showing kids their genitals.

Further reading: https://t.co/AlbMcwIQ7O pic.twitter.com/3UrtPHzSo6

— Mark Slapinski (@mark_slapinski) June 29, 2024

"They made it very difficult for me to put on the parade," Cowen said, explaining the challenges he faced in organizing the event. He described a process fraught with bureaucratic hurdles, including repeated requests for documentation and last-minute rule changes that complicated the planning process.

The parade, which typically attracts around 120,000 spectators and has been broadcast in 23 countries, has been a staple of Montreal's Canada Day celebrations for decades. Cowen, who has been involved with the parade since the 1990s, expressed his frustration with the escalating difficulties in securing permits, funding, and approval from governmental authorities. He noted that last year's event had to be reorganized multiple times to satisfy city authorities, a process that he found unusually demanding compared to his previous experiences.

"I thought it was directed at me alone first because of politics," Cowen stated. He added that he had to seek assistance from various elected officials at different levels of government to ensure last year's parade could proceed, a step he had rarely needed to take in his 24 years of experience with the event.

On June 3, 2024, the Government of Canada announced up to $1.5 million in funding for Fierté Canada Pride to enhance security for Pride festivals across the country.

Read the full media release here.https://t.co/KDA00GMyHl

Free Pride Safety Toolkit- https://t.co/BLqw1AQXGO pic.twitter.com/9CgcFTer5m

— RTO 9 (@RTO9_ON) June 4, 2024

Commentator Spencer Fernando has criticized Trudeau stating, "Trudeau has always been more drawn to dictatorships like Communist China and Communist Cuba, and he clearly sees the Anglosphere and Western Civilization as negative forces in the world. And so, Trudeau has sought to erase Canada's identity as a Western nation."

Meanwhile, the Toronto Pride Parade went on uninterrupted and received millions in federal funding. Many expressed outrage about the groups that showed up to the Toronto parade, including a pro-Palestinian group shouting for an "apartheid-free zone" and a nudist group that marched to cheering crowds. Commentators on social media said it was highly inappropriate for "pedophiles that show off their junk" to walk in the family-friendly event. Some said they should have been arrested for indecent exposure.

Toronto Pride parade is a shit show

@BethBaisch

pic.twitter.com/ueASUYIcc1

— Clown World (@ClownWorld_) June 30, 2024

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Hundreds of thousands of parade-goers attended Tel Aviv's Pride March on Thursday, which marks its 25th anniversary this year.

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Hundreds of police officers were deployed across the city to ensure public safety. Some roads were closed starting at 6 a.m. as part of security measures, with further closures in the early afternoon. Parking along the parade route was not allowed, according to police.

Due to tensions triggered by the debate over the proposed judicial reform, the Tel Aviv municipality decided not to let politicians speak at the event. The only exception was made for the city mayor Ron Huldai, known as a vocal ally of the LGBTQ community.

Participants began to gather at 4 p.m., and the march itself started at 5 p.m. The parade ended around 8 p.m.

This article was first published by i24NEWS.

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A group of Russian soldiers gone AWOL picked an unfortunate place to hide, reports out of Ukraine said Sunday afternoon.

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According to the reports, the soldiers hid in a basement in Kharkiv used by members of the city's LGBTQ community, only to be found by members of the community – who reportedly beat them and took them captive.

The Ukrainian LGBTQ community objects to the Russian government's persecution of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender Russian citizens.

Viktor Pilipanko, a Ukrainian LGBTQ rights activist who alerted Israel Hayom to the story, said, "This is our war, the Ukrainians, but we have also been fighting as LGBTQ people, and I'm sure that the comrades in Kharkiv understood that.

"We are confronting a tyrannical, homophobic enemy," Pilipanko said.

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Hate crimes against the LGBTQ community in Israel rose by 10% in 2021, a new report from The Aguda – The Association for LGBTQ Equality in Israel published Wednesday reveals.

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According to the report, a homophobic hate crime was reported to the Aguda's hate crime incident center every three hours last year.

The report also pointed to a worrying increase in anti-LGBTQ sentiment in families, with 43% of homophobic incidents reported involving family members, compared to 28% in 2020. The number of reported cases of LGBTQ youth rejected by their families in 2021 jumped by 41% compared to 2020. In 2021, 444 young people were kicked out of their parents' households because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

According to the report, cisgender male homosexuals reported the most attacks by family members.

Over one-third of reported homophobic hate crimes in 2021 involved incidents against transsexuals, nearly twice the amount reported against transsexuals in 2020.

The report also indicated that 29% of reported transphobic incidents occurred in the healthcare system, whereas 12% of reported transphobic incidents occurred in families. Approximately 9% of reported transphobic incidents took place in the school and university systems.

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The Supreme Court ruled this week that concealing one's sexual orientation from one's spouse was not grounds for monetary compensation. The ruling followed a lawsuit filed by an Israeli woman against her ex-husband, in which she claimed he caused her emotional distress during their marriage by hiding the fact that he was gay, and demanded to be compensated with 5 million shekels.

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Married for a decade, the couple divorced five years ago and have three daughters together. The plaintiff filed a lawsuit against her ex-husband together with her mother at the Jerusalem Family Court.

The two claimed the defendant introduced himself to the family as a heterosexual and religiously observant man, but with time found out that he led a secular lifestyle and was homosexual.

The Family Court initially dismissed the lawsuit, prompting the plaintiffs to appeal to the Jerusalem District Court, which ruled there were grounds for a suit.

The woman then took the case to the Supreme Court, which ruled that matters of the heart – the ex-husband's true feelings, his real motives for institutionalizing the relationship with his ex-wife, and the intensity of his sexual attraction towards her or others – could not be debated in a court of law.

It also ruled that an individual had no legal obligation to disclose to their partner or spouse their sexual preferences or level of religious observance, as these were also part of the person's feelings.

Nevertheless, Supreme Court Judge Noam Sohlberg said that the ruling should in no way be seen "as a seal of approval" for any individual to conceal crucial personal information from their partner before marriage.

The Aguda – Israel's LGBT Task Force lauded the ruling.

"We commend the Supreme Court's ruling, which rectified the District Court's grave mistake. Throughout history, it was never possible to seek compensation for heartbreak in a marital relationship, even in difficult cases, such as infidelity, improper behavior and more.

"This is a correct and proper ruling, which prevents the exploitation of legal proceedings in order to take revenge on one's spouse. The previous ruling, that of the District Court, which was annulled, would have imposed a burden on the LGBT community," it said.

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Workers at ZipRecruiter's Israeli R&D headquarters have organized a donation of laptops to LGBTQ youth who were kicked out of their homes and found shelter at Beit Dror and the Pink Roof.

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Beit Dror offers temporary accommodation to LGBTQ kids age 12-18, from all kinds of backgrounds, who are in crisis. The facility supplies their basic needs – clothing, a place to sleep, meals, and hot showers, as well as emotional support, counseling, and education.

The Pink Roof provides similar emergency accommodations to LGBTQ young adults age 18-25.

Developers Sefi Mintzer and Ephraim Berkovitch, who devote some of their free time to volunteering with the Otot NGO for youth at risk, saw the distress of the young people who were left without support from their families, and had no computers to use for schoolwork or for digital interaction.

Mintzer and Berkovitch prompted ZipRecruiter employees to clean out the R&D center's storage rooms, and gathered up the computers that had been replaced. They donated the computers no longer in use to the young people.

Meanwhile, ZipRecruiter employees took it upon themselves to teach a free introductory programming course to residents of Beit Dror, helping them take the first step on the path to becoming programmers.

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