Six Moroccan Islamists wanted to punish Pope Benedict XVI

Six Islamic fundamentalists were detained Friday in a probe into anti-Christian incitement including an alleged threat to “punish” Pope Benedict XVI for baptising a noted Egyptian-Italian journalist and member of the European Parliament who converted from Islam to Catholicism.

The six Moroccans, members of the Adl Wal Ihsane (Justice and Charity) fundamentalist movement, are accused of setting up a group “which had among its aims incitement to discrimination, racial and religious hatred, violence and jihad against Christians and Jews,” judicial sources said. Five were placed under house arrest and the sixth detained in prison.

Investigators said they had seized documents in which the six argued against integration and speculated about “punishing the pope” for allegedly encouraging the conversion of Magdi Allam, a Corriere della Sera journalist and centrist Catholic EMP who was baptised at an Easter service in 2008 led by Benedict, taking the middle name of Cristiano (Christian).

Source – ANSA