The Post has some fun stoking readers’ xenophobia with a story today about an upcoming subway ad campaign promoting Islam during Ramadan. Besides the predictable puns (“Train-ing Day for Jihadists,” “Allah board!” and “G-had train”), the story points to a connection between the “proselytizing” ad campaign and terrorism, an assertion based on a YouTube video intended to raise funds for the "You Deserve to Know" Subway Project. One of the talking heads in the......

The Sun reports Mayor Bloomberg doesn't think Muslim holy days should become school holidays. His reason? "The truth of the matter is we need more children in school. More, not less." The topic comes up because City Councilman Robert Jackson, who is Muslim, has introduced a resolution requiring public schools take holidays on Eid Ul-Fitr and Eid Ul-Adha. Ten percent of the NYC school population is Muslim. Jackson argues that parents should have to decide......

Over the weekend, a jury found a black man guilty of second degree manslaughter and criminal possession of a weapon in the August 2006 shooting of a 17-year-old on Long Island. The defendant, John White, grabbed a pistol when a group of teens (who were white) swarmed around his home. The teens were angry at White's son and in the standoff, White shot Daniel Cicciaro in the face. White had claimed Cicciaro lunged for his......

A look at some of this week's noteworthy television: Elmo’s Christmas Countdown (Sunday, 7:00 p.m., WABC 7) It is a brand new Sesame Street Christmas special complete with an all star guest list providing music and voices like ABC News anchor Charles Gibson voicing a news reading reindeer and Ben Stiller voicing an elf. From the sound of it doesn’t seem like it will wind up being an enduring classic like A Charlie Brown Christmas.......

A look at some noteworthy television this week: Lincoln Center Tree Lighting 2007 (Monday, 5:30 p.m, WABC 7) Good Morning America’s Sam Champion and WABC’s Sade Baderinwa host the first televised tree lighting of the season. There will be some performances by Lincoln Center’s resident companies and some guest’s from channel 7’s owner Disney on hand for entertainment for the 8th annual Lincoln Center Holiday Tree lighting. America at a Crossroads (Monday, 9:00 p.m &......

A look at some noteworthy television this week: The Star Jones Show (Monday, 3:00 p.m., CourTV) Star Jones returns to the talk show racket with her own talk show focusing on pop culture, crime and law. Secrets of New York - New York Connections: The Bridges of New York (Tuesday, 8:00 p.m., WNYE 25) In light of recent events, this look at the secrets of the city's bridges should be a must watch. God's Warriors......

Yesterday, six men were arrested for plotting to attack Fort Dix in NJ and other targets in the area. The men, Muslims from (the former) Yugoslavia, Turkey and Jordan, were apprehended after the FBI conducted 14 months of surveillance and infiltrated their group. The arrests came after two of the men tried to buy, per the Post, "AK-47 assault weapons, M-16s and grenade launchers" in their attempt to kill "as many American soldiers as......

A look at some noteworthy television this week: Drive (Sunday and Monday, 8:00 p.m., WNYW 5) Sunday has the two hour debut of Drive crossing the starting line. The show is a drama that follows the participants of an illegal cross country road race who aren't like those you would find in The Cannonball Run. One of the forces behind the show is Tim Minear who has worked on shows like Firefly and Wonderfalls, which......

Before a single student has been enrolled, the Khalil Gibran International Academy is generating a significant amount of controversy. Debby Almontaser is a New York City educator with a Yemeni-Muslim background. She hopes to open an Arabic-themed school to build bridges and increase understanding between different cultures, but so far the opposite has been the result. Conservative commentators have criticized the undertaking as an effort to open a publicly funded madrassa, which is generally interpreted......

The Pentagon released a transcript where Khalid Shaikh Mohammed has confesses to planning the September 11 attacks, as well as other terror attacks, during a tribunal hearing. The NY Times notes that the hearing "also summarized some of the evidence the Pentagon says supports the designation of Mr. Mohammed as an enemy combatant." Mohammed has been in U.S. custody since his capture in 2003. The Times also offered an excerpt of his "rambling" confession where......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: A large fight in the Bronx, an unusual MVA in Manhattan and a "Jet Blue aircraft disturbance" at LaGuardia - Gate B5 Promises from the Department of Transportation mean nothing, even after two children die Activists want tax-paying immigrants to have the right to vote; immigrants did vote in national elections between 1776 and 1926 Stop planning a scuba trip in Fiji - amNew York has the scoop on......

THEATER: Pot-au-Noir (The Black Hole) is a retelling of the story of Cain & Abel "through the lens of the Great American Myth -- combining images of Hollywood Film Noir, the Gold Rush, the Dust Bowl, and Manifest Destiny with a story that is at the core of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and, therefore, America." Jake Hooker’s new production promises lyrical text, contemporary dance and live music to tell a story of lies, deceit, jealousy,......

For various reasons we here at Gothamist have been lightly sidestepping around the current crisis in the Middle East. Luckily there has been a fair amount of news here in New York to keep us busy. And anyway, posting about such a volatile subject seems to just be asking for trouble. Well, here we go trouble. If you've already heard about this, forgive us we were distracted by the blackout. This past Tuesday there was......

Shanghaiist probably knows a little more about China than the Chicago Sun-Times. Giving them the benefit of the doubt on that one. The city does to have a music scenei. Don't even front like they don't. They also have Dorrito bananas and white guys shopping for wives. What they don't have is any more tolerance for jaywalkers. Bostonist sees Boston and Somerville each whip out their art and face off. A plagarized novel is the......

Whoa-- the New York State Liquor Authority has issued a fatwa against a bunch of bars on West Broadway in Tribeca. Their crime? Apparently they are located a little too close to a low-profile mosque located in one of the nearby buildings (the Sufi Masjid al-Farah at 245 West Broadway.). The SLA has issued summons to The Bubble Lounge, Cercle Rouge, and the Tribeca Tavern. Another bar, The Liquor Store, has already been denied a......

In August, we told you about the Vendys, the first annual streetfood awards sponsored by Streetvendor.org. The awards are a wonderful idea-- they celebrate the hard working people that produce some our city's most delicious food, and help dispel those old notions that everything you buy on the street is poisonous, tastes bad, or both. From the looks of it, the four finalists are tightly matched: Thiru “Dosa Man” Kumar -- "the fresh made......

There's a really strange case about two 16 year-old girls being held because the federal authorities are suspicious that they might be suicide bombers. First reported in the NY Times yesterday, there are very few details, just that the two girls, one Bangladeshi, the other Guineanese, were arrested last month and have been held at a Pennsylvania detention center, and that they girls were Muslim and sympathetic to Islamic culture and causes. The Daily News......

Al Sharpton will host Saturday Night Live on December 6. This, plus Tucker Carlson's Esquire essay about visiting Africa wtih Sharpton, Cornel West, and some members of the Nation of Islam (Carlson finds himself actually liking Sharpton), is the mainstreaming of Al Sharpton. We can't wait for the sketch set at his beauty parlor where he gets coiffed. He will definitely be wearing curlers in his hair at some point. Learn more about Al Sharpton's......

Who the hell are these idiots? Some drunken idiots beat up a Sikh cab driver and his family in Woodside, Queens, outside their apartment. The thugs yelled at the turbaned cabbie, "Get out of here, bin Laden, go back to your country or we'll kill you." Passing pizza deliveryman Gregory Hodge yelled at the drunks to stop; Hodge tells the Post, "You see this a lot in this neighborhood. You get a few drunk guys......

That's the problem with the major organized religions like Christianity, Judiasm, Buddism, and Islam- they never go out and do anything wacky like trying to clone Jesus. NY Times: Religious Sect Says It Will Announce the First Cloned Baby: A religious sect that contends that space travelers created the human race by cloning themselves said yesterday that it would announce today that the first cloned human baby had been born.......