n class="drop">Last week, Islamists blocked the construction of the first Hindu temple in Islamabad, Pakistan. The project was meant to symbolize tolerance in an age of radicalism. Instead, controversy has turned it into an emblem of dogmatism in the Muslim world. The Pakistani government’s decision to withdraw its support from the temple project is but a symptom of a wider trend. While fundamentalist clerics fought against the Hindu temple in Pakistan, a Turkish court revoked Hagia Sophia’s status as a museum, paving the way for its conversion into a mosque. A few hours later, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced the deportation of Protestant missionaries, accusing them without evidence of “threatening Turkey’s public order.”Read Full Article »
