Ustaz Ahmad Awang

In Malaysia, Reality TV With a Feminist Twist

2011-11-22T20:57:00.004+08:00

Source: The New York Times
By LIZ GOOCH

Contestants on ‘‘Solehah’’ praying before a live telecast of the show in Kuala Lumpur last month (Rahman Roslan for the International Herald Tribune)

KUALA LUMPUR — Meet the latest in reality television, Malay style: 10 young contestants stride confidently onto a green-hued set, ready for their moment before a studio audience and viewers across the country.

But this is no trial by adventure, or a demand to sing and dance. These women in floor-length black skirts, their hair covered with brightly colored scarves, are competing to show superior knowledge of Islam and their ability to teach it to others.

While official religious leadership in this predominantly Muslim country has traditionally been male, women in Malaysia are carving out new roles, including that of female preacher. Now, television has taken up the theme, starting rival preaching contests on separate channels: “Solehah” (pious female in Arabic), and “Ustazah Pilihan” (ideal female preacher in Malay).

“We need women preachers, rather than men,” said Siti Adibah Zulkepli, 21, after her appearance on “Solehah.” “Because they don’t face what we are facing — health problems, how to manage the house, how to manage the children. The woman knows better.”

Women in many Muslim countries have been engaged in religious education behind the scenes. In Malaysia, where women are on the rise in business, politics and academia, the new television shows have shone a spotlight on women’s growing role in religious leadership.

The Malaysian Constitution both declares the country a secular state and specifies Sunni Islam as the official religion. Malays, the majority ethnic group, are automatically classified as Muslim by law. While the country has long been considered moderate in its approach to Islam, more conservative strains have taken root in recent years.

Still, Malaysian Muslim women enjoy greater freedom than many peers in the Middle East. In Malaysia, there is no gender segregation; women hold top positions in banks and other companies, and female university students now outnumber men.

“There are more women than men doing Islamic studies at the universities,” said Zaleha Kamaruddin, an Islamic scholar who in August became the first female rector of the International Islamic University in Kuala Lumpur.

Ms. Zaleha said Malaysia was now “reaping the fruits” of those enrollments, with an increasing number of women becoming Islamic studies lecturers. She said that it was rare for a woman to lead an Islamic university in the Muslim world, but that reaction to her appointment had so far been positive, with several speaking invitations from a surprising source: conservative Saudi Arabia, where female students are subject to strict gender segregation, and women are notoriously not allowed to drive.

“I think Malaysia has started to break the glass ceiling and is trying to be one of the modern Muslim countries,” Ms. Zaleha asserted.

If women are taking on more prominent roles in Islamic education in Malaysia, as they have in Morocco and Turkey, they are still barred from leading men, or mixed congregations, in prayer. While there have been instances of women leading prayers to congregations that include men in North America and Britain, in most Muslim countries, including Malaysia, it remains strictly taboo.

Yet, the contestants on the two television shows are certainly burnishing the image of female preachers here.

Contestants on “Solehah,” who are selected by auditions around the country, study Islam and get coaching in public speaking and personal grooming. During one recent episode, the women produced videos on high school drop-outs and acid attacks and were then asked to comment before a live studio audience on how these issues could be addressed, using Islamic references.

“Ustazah Pilihan” focuses more on a search for “muslimah,” or female Muslim role models. Modeled on a popular TV contest for male imams that premiered last year, it eliminates one contestant a week. Publicity material for the show stresses the “importance of assuming responsibilities as a Muslim woman, not only as a wife or mother but also as an educator, who can shape and nurture potential leaders of the future.”

Prizes have not yet been announced for either show.

Greg Barton, acting director of the Center for Islam and the Modern World at Monash University in Melbourne, who has studied the role of Muslim women around the world, said it would be a mistake to dismiss the significance of Malaysian women’s expanding engagement in Islamic education.

“There’s actually a lot more happening with women in a teaching role than you might think,” he said.

Despite the more conservative interpretations of Islam adopted in recent years, he noted, it is becoming more common for women to give devotional speeches to mixed groups during social gatherings. At such occasions, women often have more time and leeway to deliver their message than male imams who conduct Friday Prayer in mosques, he said.

Ms. Zaleha, the university rector, said she delivered academic lectures on Islam and sometimes led women in prayer in the women’s wing of the university mosque. But a male staff member — “my right-hand man,” she quipped— leads mixed congregations because it is forbidden for women to lead men in prayer, and only men are permitted to deliver the Friday Prayer and sermon.

Mr. Barton said that in neighboring Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-dominant country, women have been very active in large Islamic groups that boast millions of members.

“One wouldn’t think to go looking for feminists in such circles,” he said. “But I would suggest that a lot of important feminist concerns are being addressed by such women,” he added, citing women’s success in disseminating information about birth control and campaigns against polygamy.

Women in Indonesia and Turkey have been involved in public intellectual debates on Islam for decades, he said. Now, it appears, the demand for television content, especially content that appeals to women, has pushed this to the next level in Malaysia.

“Reality TV sells and religion sells in Malaysia,” he said. “Malaysian women are accustomed to enjoying wide success in professional life, and Malaysians view themselves as modern and progressive.”

He predicted that greater education in more conservative Arab countries would enhance women’s influence in Islam there, too. “Expect to see a lot of changes in the Arab world over the coming decade, including in Saudi and Yemen,” he said.

Harussani Zakaria, a mufti of the Malaysian state of Perak, said he welcomed the growing number of women teaching Islam, but he was adamant that women could not lead Friday Prayer in front of mixed congregations.

“They can preach Islam to the men,” he said, “ but they cannot lead the prayers for men.”

Ratna Osman, executive director of Sisters in Islam, a women’s advocacy group based in Kuala Lumpur, disagrees. She argues that, throughout the history of Islam, women, including Mohammed’s wife Aishah, have educated both men and women.

Ms. Ratna said that the new reality shows may encourage a more public role for women in Islam, yet both in many respects broadcast what she considered conservative messages about women’s subordination to men.

Ms. Ratna says that, when her husband was away and she prayed with her 17-year-old son at home, she recited the prayers — unusual in Malay households, where a son rarely follows his mother in prayer once he has reached puberty.

“I will lead the prayer because it’s just logic that I’m the more knowledgeable,” she said. “Why do I need to ask him to lead the prayer? Just because he’s a male? No, I will not take that.”

Source: The New York Times

10 Tahun Sebelum Merdeka

2011-09-08T10:23:00.002+08:00

Kisah perjuangan menuntut kemerdekaan, 10 tahun sebelum merdeka. Saksikanlah sebuah filem dokumentari oleh Fahmi Reza:

10 Tahun Sebelum Merdeka (Bhg. 1/4)

10 Tahun Sebelum Merdeka (Bhg. 2/4)

10 Tahun Sebelum Merdeka (Bhg. 3/4)

10 Tahun Sebelum Merdeka (Bhg. 4/4)

Momokan Komunis Terhadap Hj Mohamad Sabu dan PAS

2011-09-07T16:30:00.013+08:00

Mohamad Sabu menunjukkan kandungan buku 'Pengukir Nama Johor' yang mencatatkan Mat Indera sebagai salah seorang heronya (HarakahDaily.net)

Sudah hampir dua minggu Timbalan Presiden PAS, Haji Mohamad Sabu (HMS) menjadi sasaran serangan pucuk pimpinan UMNO, bermula daripada Presidennya, Dato' Sri Najib Razak dan Timbalannya Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin serta lain-lain pemimpin UMNO pelbagai peringkat terutama yang paling kuat mengampu seperti Rais Yatim, Ahmad Maslan, Noh Omar, dan Khairy Jamaluddin. Serangan itu bermula apabila Utusan Malaysia pada halaman utamanya pada 27 Ogos yang lalu, mendakwa bahawa HMS dalam satu ceramahnya di Padang Menora, Pulau Pinang pada 21 Ogos berkata, “Pengganas Parti Komunis Malaya (PKM) yang menyerang dan membunuh anggota polis dan keluarga mereka dalam tragedi Bukit Kepong adalah sebagai hero sebenar.”

Akhbar milik UMNO itu memutarbelitkan ucapan Timbalan Presiden PAS itu dengan mendakwa bahawa beliau menyatakan Mat Indera, seorang Melayu yang bersekongkol dengan Goh Peng Tun dan 200 anggota komunis adalah wira dan bukannya 25 anggota polis serta keluarga mereka yang mempertahankan diri dalam serangan di balai polis itu.

Media cetak, elektronik dan internet UMNO termasuk blogger-blogger pencacai UMNO terus menyerang HMS dan PAS. Topik dan motif serangan yang merupakan tuduhan dan fitnah bertujuan untuk menggambarkan bahawa HMS menyanjung perjuangan Parti Komunis Malaya (PKM) atau sekurang-kurangnya mengaitkan HMS dan PAS dengan komunis.

Yang agak melucu malah memalukan, ikut tumpang semangkuk menyerang HMS adalah mantan Ketua Polis Negara, Timbalan Ketua Polis Negara, dan beberapa orang ahli akademik termasuk Prof Tan Sri Khoo Kay Kim dan Prof Abu Bakar Hamid (yang selama ini saya menghormati kedua-duanya). Ada pula dua orang profesor (dari USM dan UiTM) yang mempertikai kenyataan Timbalan Presiden PAS itu dengan hanya merujuk kepada laporan Utusan Malaysia yang memutarbelitkan kenyataan beliau. Agaknya kedua-dua profesor seperti inilah yang dikategorikan sebagai “profesor kangkung” yang mulanya diungkapkan oleh mantan Naib Canselor Universiti Malaya, Prof DiRaja Ungku Abdul Aziz.

Sepatutnya profesor-profesor tersebut dan mereka yang hendak membuat ulasan kenalah mengetahui terlebih dahulu apa yang sebenar diucapkan oleh HMS, bukannya berasaskan kepada laporan Utusan Malaysia yang memang sentiasa melaporkan pelbagai berita yang bohong dan fitnah terhadap PAS khasnya, dan Pakatan Rakyat amnya. Utusan Malaysia sudah menjadi alat propaganda UMNO 99.9 peratus. Kalau pun mereka berkenaan itu tidak mengikuti sepenuhnya ucapan HMS yang mengandungi hampir 5,000 perkataan itu, sekurang-kurangnya mereka bacalah transkrip ucapan berkenaan Mat Indera itu yang hanya lebihkurang 100 perkataan. Cuba baca betul-betul apa yang HMS kata seperti berikut:

“... tapi kita lihat cara yang dibuat itu memang banyak yang tak kena... bila hari merdeka nanti tunjuklah filem Bukit Kepong... Bukit Kepong polis itu... polis British... hak serang Bukit Kepong tu lah pejuang kemerdekaan... ketuanya Mat Indera... Melayu... tetapi semua sejarah itu ditutup... Jins Samsudin buat filem... Jins Samsudin tu UMNO... cerita Bukit Kepong hak serang Balai Polis tu penjahat... polis tu polis British, sebelum merdeka, negara kita diperintah oleh British... tapi dibuat filem yang hero hak pertahan balai polis, hak serang tu pengganas, padahal Mat Indera... ketua penyerang balai polis itu... dan akhirnya dia dihukum gantung di Jail Taiping...”

Inilah ayat-ayat yang diputarbelitkan Utusan Malaysia yang kemudian digunakan oleh UMNO dan pencacai-pencacainya untuk menyerang HMS, kononnya HMS menghina polis dan membela komunis. Padahal tidak ada pun perkataan “komunis” yang disebut beliau. Mengikuti ucapan HMS, dapat difahami bahawa beliau menyebut cerita filem Bukit Kepong yang dibuat oleh Jins Samsudin (seorang pendokong UMNO) itu hanya sekadar untuk menggambarkan bahawa UMNO hanya mengiktiraf mereka yang berjasa, kerana mereka bersama dengan British yang menjajah negara kita. Bagi UMNO, mereka yang berkerjasama dengan penjajah British adalah pejuang dan mereka yang menentang British adalah penderhaka atau petualang.

Sebab itu di awal ucapannya antara lain HMS berkata:

“Sepatutnya tokoh pejuang kemerdekaan kena masuk dalam televisyen... kalau nak buh Tunku Abdul Rahman, Dato’ Onn pun takpalah... kena letak juga Dr Burhanuddin, kena letak juga Ustaz Abu Bakar Al-Baqir, kena letak juga Dato’ Ahmad Boestamam, kena letak juga Dato’ Ibrahim Yaakob, kena letak juga perjuangan-perjuangan seperti Mat Kilau dan sebagainya... ini penentang-penentang British... tapi bila merdeka, Tunku Abdul Rahman, Dato’ Onn, Tunku Abdul Rahman, Dato’ Onn... kalau gitu UMNO lah yang layak... betul ke dak?”

Dalam ceramah tersebut HMS tidak nafikan sumbangan tokoh-tokoh UMNO itu, tapi apa yang dikritik beliau adalah sikap UMNO dan kerajaan BN yang menggelapkan jasa pihak lain yang turut berjuang untuk kemerdekaan negara. Tiba-tiba sekarang HMS dituduh sebagai penyokong komunis kerana menyebut nama Mat Indera sebagai seorang pejuang kemerdekaan kerana menentang British dalam masa penjajahan (1950) yang kemudiannya mati di tali gantung.

Sebenarnya kalau mengikuti sejarah UMNO, memang UMNO paling gemar memomokkan pihak-pihak yang tidak bersamanya sebagai penyokong komunis atau mendokong fahaman komunisme. Mula-mula dari Presiden UMNO yang pertama Dato’ Onn Jaafar, UMNO menuduh pejuang kemerdekaan yang tidak bekerjasama dengan penjajah Inggeris sebagai komunis seperti Hizbul Muslimin yang dipimpin oleh Ustaz Abu Bakar Al-Baqir. Begitu juga Partai Kebangsaan Melayu Malaya (PKMM) yang dipimpin oleh Dr Burhanuddin Al-Helmy, Angkatan Pemuda Insaf (API) yang dipimpin oleh Ahmad Boestamam, Angkatan Wanita Sedar (AWAS) yang dipimpin oleh Shamsiah Fakeh, dan Partai Rakyat Kalimantan Malaya (PRKM) yang dipimpin oleh Ustaz Abdul Wahab Nor. Kesemuanya dianggap sebagai penyokong komunis.

Suatu ungkapan Dato’ Onn Jaafar yang dicatatkan dalam sejarah politik negara ialah, “hubaya... hubaya... bahaya dari gunung” yang merujuk kepada kongres di Gunung Semanggol pada Mac 1948 yang dihadhiri oleh kira-kira 5,000 orang dari parti-parti politik yang tersebut di atas dan juga parti-parti bukan Melayu yang tergabung dalam All Malaya Joint Council for Action (AMCJA).

Malah Dato’ Onn Jaafar mengulangi kata-katanya itu dengan mengatakan bahaya dari gunung masih ada lagi, dan ditambah satu bahaya lagi yang tumbuh dari tanah dan menjalar akarnya supaya orang Melayu terhapus dan terjatuh kerana sebenarnya parti Islam itu (Hizbul Muslimin) “merah” (yakni komunis). Tidak hairanlah pemimpin-pemimpin UMNO kemudiannya selepas itu sering mengaitkan PAS dengan komunis atau kegiatan komunis sehinggalah ke hari ini, seperti fitnah yang dilemparkan ke atas HMS. Ini adalah kerana momokan komunis paling mudah mempengaruhi masyarakat Melayu untuk menerimanya, walaupun tuduhan dan momokan tersebut kadang-kadang tidak masuk akal.

Bayangkanlah seorang ulama’ seperti Allahyarham Ustaz Abu Bakar Al-Baqir, begitu juga Allahyarham Dr Burhanuddin Al-Helmy dicop pro-komunis atau sebagai pendokong fahaman komunisme. Saya masih teringat lagi setelah penjajah Inggeris mengisytiharkan Darurat pada Jun 1948, kira-kira sebulan selepas itu sebuah pesawat kecil terbang rendah menggugurkan puluhan ribu risalah di kawasan Semanggol Selinsing dengan gambar portret Dr Burhanuddin yang dicop sebagai pendokong komunis. Ketika itu Ustaz Abu Bakar Al-Baqir bersama beberapa pemimpin Hizbul Muslimin, API, dan PRKM telah ditangkap oleh penjajah Inggeris, yang kemudiannya ditahan tanpa bicara selama hampir 5 tahun. Dr Burhanuddin tidak dapat ditangkap kerana berada di Singapura yang tidak termasuk dalam kuasa undang-undang Darurat Malaya. Beliau hanya kemudian ditahan di Singapura dalam peristiwa rusuhan Natrah pada 1951.

Dari kiri: Ustaz Abu Bakar Al-Baqir, Dr Burhanuddin Al-Helmy dan Ahmad Boestamam

Penjajah bertindak demikian atas desakan UMNO ketika itu. Seorang penghulu muda khas dihantar oleh kerajaan ke Semanggol untuk mengintip pergerakan pejuang-pejuang kemerdekaan di Semanggol khasnya pemimpin dan pendokong Hizbul Muslimin. Penghulu muda tersebut adalah anak buah kepada seorang yang ada hubungan rapat dengan Dato’ Onn Jaafar dan seorang pemimpin UMNO pada ketika itu.

Sejarah seperti inilah yang perlu dibaca oleh orang-orang yang otaknya terkongkong dengan propaganda dan khurafat UMNO mengenai perjuangan menuntut kemerdekaan negara kita. Orang seperti Tan Sri Musa Hassan dan Datuk Seri Khalid Abu Bakar perlulah membuka minda mereka sedikit supaya jangan dianggap sebagai katak di bawah tempurung. Selaku anak jati Gunung Semanggol dan bekas anak murid kepada Ustaz Abu Bakar Al-Baqir, saya sedia memberi banyak lagi maklumat dan cerita yang saya sendiri menyaksikan... bolehlah hubungi saya.

Dari kiri: Shamsiah Fakeh, Ishak Haji Mohammed dan Ibrahim Yaakob

Kini UMNO berada dalam gelabah menghadapi PRU 13. Media alat UMNO khasnya Utusan Malaysia menyerang dan memburukkan HMS semenjak beliau mencalonkan dirinya untuk bertanding jawatan tertinggi nombor 2 dalam PAS. Apabila beliau menang sebagai Timbalan Presiden, UMNO makin bimbang kerana hubungan HMS dengan pimpinan DAP terutama Lim Guan Eng begitu rapat dan mesra yang memang diketahui ramai. Dengan mengaitkan HMS dengan komunis, kelak mereka akan kaitkan pula hubungan PAS dengan DAP sebagai hubungan yang kononnya ada kaitan dengan fahaman komunisme. Lebih mudah lagi mengaitkan DAP dengan komunis kerana sebahagian besar ahli-ahli dan pimpinannya adalah dari kaum Cina. Tetapi mereka terlupa bahawa UMNO lah yang kini paling rapat hubungannya dengan Parti Komunis China dan kerajaan UMNO BN lah di rantau Asia Tenggara yang mempunyai hubungan paling intim dengan kerajaan komunis China.

Dalam bahagian kedua nanti saya akan mendedahkan bagaimana UMNO semenjak zaman pengganas komunis masih bergerak menentang kerajaan Malaysia, pemimpin UMNO sudah menjalin hubungan mesra dengan komunis China...

Rebel military chief says he was tortured by CIA

2011-09-03T21:31:00.008+08:00

Abdulhakim Belhaj's allegations suggest a close relationship between the US and Gaddafi's regime

Source: The Independent
By Patrick Cockburn

Tripoli's notorious Abu Salim jail

The overthrow of Gaddafi has brought together strange allies, but few stranger than Abdulhakim Belhaj, the military commander of all rebel military forces in Tripoli, and Nato. An Islamist whom Gaddafi tried to have the US list as a terrorist, Mr Belhaj says he was tortured by CIA agents after being arrested in the Far East in 2004 and later handed over by them to Colonel Gaddafi for further torture and imprisonment in Libya.

Mr Belhaj, the head of the military council for Tripoli, who led an Islamist guerrilla organisation fighting the Gaddafi regime in the 1990s, told The Independent in an interview that he had been directly "tortured by CIA agents" in Thailand after being first arrested in MALAYSIA.

If true, his story is evidence of the close co-operation between the CIA and Colonel Gaddafi's security services after the Libyan leader denounced the 9/11 attacks. After his stint in the hands of the CIA, Mr Belhaj was kept in Abu Salim prison in Tripoli. He says: "I was in prison for seven years during which I was subjected to torture as well as solitary confinement. I was even denied a shower for three years." Other Libyan Islamist prisoners have related how they were sometimes taken from Abu Salim to be questioned by US officials in Tripoli.

Released from prison in 2010, Mr Belhaj, who had military experience from fighting in Afghanistan against the Russians in the 1980s, became one of the most effective rebel military commanders. He is said by diplomats to have played a crucial role in the capture of Tripoli at the end of last month, and is highly regarded by the chairman of the Transitional National Council (TNC), Mustafa Abdul Jalil.

Ironically, given his claims of previous mistreatment at US hands, Mr Belhaj has emerged as one of Nato's most important allies during their air campaign in support of the rebels over the last six months. Speaking in his headquarters in the Mitiga military airbase on the eastern outskirts of Tripoli, he forcefully denied that he and the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which he helped found in 1995, had ever been allied to al-Qa'ida.

"We never had any link to al-Qa'ida," said Mr Belhaj, a short, soft-spoken, bearded man, who does not use a military title. "We never took part in global jihad. The fact that we were in the same country, Afghanistan, [as al-Qa'ida] does not mean we had the same goal." He stresses that the sole aim of the LIFG was always to overthrow Gaddafi.

Despite his current close co-operation with Nato, Mr Belhaj says he finds it difficult to forgive his treatment by the CIA in the past.

When first detained at an airport in MALAYSIA in 2004 he says he was with his wife: "She was six months pregnant and she suffered a lot."

After a few days, CIA agents took him to Thailand as part of the notorious rendition process by which the agency transferred prisoners to countries where security forces were known to use torture. He says that in Thailand CIA agents took a direct part in his torture, though he did not give details. He says that "if I ever have the chance I will take legal action" against those responsible.

The disclosure of Libya's intelligence files may reveal embarrassing details of co-operation between the CIA and other Western intelligence agencies with Gaddafi's brutal and ruthless security services in pursuit of Islamist opponents. Mr Belhaj says that in the wake of 9/11, the US administration reacted by pursuing "any organisation with an Islamic agenda".

Mr Belhaj spent seven years in Abu Salim prison which was the site of the Gaddafi regime's most infamous atrocity, the massacre of some 1,200 prisoners in 1999, almost all of them Islamists, who had protested against conditions. The first protests which ushered in the uprising in Benghazi this February was by lawyers representing the families of the dead Abu Salim prisoners.

The Libyan prison was run with great savagery even against those whose offences were minor. Students accused of being excessively religious were stripped naked and attacked by dogs. Prisoners who survived might spend decades without seeing their families. In Abu Salim, Mr Belhaj helped write a 419-page document, published in 2009, which repudiated the Jihadi doctrine of holy war and the use of violence to change regimes. The name of the LIFG was changed to the Libyan Islamic Movement for Change. The ideological change, spurred by the failure of radical Islamic groups fighting on their own to overthrow governments, led to Islamists seeking the co-operation of more secular and liberal groups also opposed to Arab police states. It is these popular front coalitions that have won victories in Tunisia, Egypt and now Libya.

Mr Belhaj is keen to underline that he and other Islamists are not seeking to impose their agenda. He says: "The Libyan people have different views and those views will be respected." He also evidently wants to reassure Nato countries that they have not helped get rid of Gaddafi only to see a fundamentalist Islamic state replace him. He had just returned from a meeting in Doha, the capital of Qatar, which has given him significant support, where "I explained to them our vision of the future." Mustafa Abdul Jalil, chairman of the TNC, specifically says he was taken to a Nato meeting in order to reassure the West that he presented no threat.

Mr Belhaj says the thousands of militiamen from all over Libya, who owe allegiance to his Military Council, will ultimately join a new Libyan army or return to civilian life. Asked about mass round-ups of sub-Saharan Africans, often undocumented workers, accused of being mercenaries, he said he wanted harassment stopped, but many immigrants had no identity card. He added: "Last night 10 immigrants came to this base for protection and we will check their IDs and either look after them or help them leave the country."

On the whereabouts of Gaddafi, he said that the military operation room in charge of locating him had "strong information he is in Bani Walid". Saadi, one of Gaddafi's sons had phoned Mr Belhaj a few days ago "to separate himself from his father's regime" and was told that, if he surrendered himself, his safety would be guaranteed and he would receive a fair trial.

Iranian Women Football Team Prevented From Playing In Olympic Qualifier Due To Hijab

2011-07-18T17:58:00.001+08:00

Iranian Women Football Team Prevented From Playing In Olympic Qualifier Due To Hijab

Islam emerges as key issue for GOP

2011-03-10T18:05:00.002+08:00

Source: CNN
By Dan Gilgoff, CNN

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich wants a federal ban on Sharia and opposes a proposed Islamic center near ground zero.

(CNN) -- A conservative activist who served in George W. Bush's White House, Suhail Khan has lately found himself at odds with certain figures who should be allies, like fellow activists on the right and some leading lights of the Republican Party.

Khan, a Muslim, has chafed at recent remarks about Islam from potential Republican presidential contenders like Sarah Palin, who has called on "peaceful Muslims" to oppose a proposed Islamic center near New York's ground zero, and Newt Gingrich, who has called for a federal ban on Sharia, or Islamic law.

Khan supports the New York Islamic center and says there's no threat of Sharia taking hold in the United States.

Then, last month, as he presided over a strategy session at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, Khan was repeatedly interrupted by right-wing activists accusing him of having ties to the Islamic Brotherhood, the Islamist political party based in Egypt.

In recent days, Khan has gone on the offensive, meeting with Republican staffers on Capitol Hill and urging old friends to help halt or dramatically alter the direction of Republican Rep. Peter King's hearings on "radicalization in the American Muslim community," which begin Thursday.

"How did we go from the majority of American Muslims supporting Bush in 2000 to the very misguided comments of people like Palin and Gingrich and these King hearings," Khan asked in an interview this week.

While opinions vary on the propriety of Palin's and Gingrich's remarks and King's hearings, there appears to be a dramatic uptick recently in Republican rhetoric around Islam and Muslims.

In the run-up to last November's elections, Republicans including Palin and Gingrich weighed in against the proposed New York Islamic center, while Oklahoma voters approved a Republican-led effort to ban Sharia law (though the ban was blocked by a federal judge).

In the months since, roughly a dozen other states have started weighing bans on Sharia, with all or almost all of those efforts led by GOP lawmakers.

Other high visibility Republicans have criticized Islam or aspects of the religion or the Muslim community. Mike Huckabee, likely a 2012 presidential candidate, last month called Islam "the antithesis of the gospel of Christ" and criticized congregations that allow mosques to use their churches for prayers.

There are disagreements about what has caused such critiques to become an increasingly important part of GOP messaging and policy efforts. But with the Republican presidential primary on the horizon, as well as the 10-year anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, political analysts say the trend is likely to accelerate.

Republican operatives attribute the movement to lingering fears of terrorism, including an apparent spike in homegrown terrorism.

"People are concerned about terrorists, and anytime someone goes on an airplane they¹re reminded of that," says Ed Rollins, a veteran Republican strategist and CNN political contributor. "There is great mystery about Islam. I don't think the discussion is in a sophisticated place right now, but King is going to make a case."

Frank Gaffney, a conservative Washington activist who has long criticized Islam but whose views have often been rejected by mainstream Republicans, says a spate of high-profile terrorist incidents on American soil is making the GOP more receptive to his message.

The alleged gunman behind the 2009 Fort Hood, Texas, massacre reportedly was radicalized by an American-born cleric based in Yemen. The failed Times Square bomber, sentenced to life in prison last year, is a naturalized U.S. citizen who said he was motivated by Islam.

"We have a problem, and the country is coming to grips with that," says Gaffney, who is among the activists alleging that Khan has ties to radical Islamist groups.

"The Republican presidential candidates are going to have to be knowledgeable about this problem to a degree that they haven't had to be up to this point," Gaffney says.

But other Republicans suggest that inflammatory remarks about Islam are coming from the party's fringes.

"So far, a great many leading Republican figures have been very temperate in their remarks" about Islam, says GOP strategist Whit Ayres. "They¹re making a distinction between peace-loving Muslims and radical terrorists."

He rattled off a list of likely 2012 Republican presidential contenders who he says fit that description: Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, Mitch Daniels, Haley Barbour and Jon Huntsman, all current or former governors.

Asked about whether Palin, Gingrich and Huckabee would make the cut, Ayres said, "I'll leave it at that."

Few Republicans have criticized King's hearings, which could stretch out for more than a year. The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, King has responded to criticism that the sessions single out Muslims, saying, "I will not allow political correctness to obscure a real and dangerous threat to the safety and security of the citizens of the United States."

"We're talking about al Qaeda," King told CNN over the weekend. "There's been self-radicalization going on within the Muslim community, within a very small minority, but it's there, and that's where the threat is coming from at this time."

Of course, the broader issues of terrorism and national security, which often touch on Islam, aren't new to the GOP. John Esposito, a Georgetown University professor of religion and international affairs who focuses on Islam, said in an email message that rhetoric around Islam by "Republicans like Peter King and others go back to post-9/11."

"You could especially see it in presidential primaries," says Esposito, the co-editor of a new book on Islamophobia. "Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mike Huckabee all played the Muslim terrorism card in 2008 without carefully distinguishing between the small minority of cases at that time and the Muslim-American community."

Khan, who served in the Bush White House's Office of Public Liaison and in its Transportation Department, says the increasingly charged GOP rhetoric on Islam reflects a leadership vacuum in the party since it lost the White House in 2008.

"Hours after 9/11, Bush made it clear that ours was a war on violent extremists that were limited in number and were not representative of Islam," Khan says. "That leadership was key in reminding Americans that we¹re all Americans, regardless of faith or ethnic background."

Khan and other critics of the GOP's recent Islam critiques allege that the campaign is part of a broader effort to falsely brand President Obama, who is a Christian, as a Muslim.

"Conservatives see a nice nexus of being able to take advantage of pairing the president as Muslim while burnishing their national security credentials by fear mongering about Islam and Muslims," says Farhana Khera, executive director of Muslim Advocates, a national group.

A Pew survey last fall showed that nearly one in five Americans believe Obama is a Muslim, up from around one in 10 Americans who said he was Muslim in 2009.

Republicans deny allegations of such a campaign. But some non-Muslim strategists within the party have also criticized the way some if its spokespeople treat Islam, warning that harsh rhetoric on Islam could scare off Muslim voters and other religious minorities.

"The support for criticizing a mosque is half a mile wide and an inch deep," Grover Norquist, a top party strategist, told the Washington Post last year around the time of the controversy over the Islamic center near ground zero.

"And at the end of the process," he said, "the only people who will remember it are the people who feel threatened by this -- not just Muslims, but Sikhs, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and Mormons."

Source: CNN

Family helps Gadhafi stay in power

2011-03-10T17:58:00.003+08:00

Source: CNN
By Tom Foreman, CNN

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, 68, has been married twice. He has eight biological children and two adopted children, one of whom died.

(CNN) -- The embattled Libyan leader, Moammar Gadhafi, is one of those rare figures in the world who manages to not only seize power, but also hold onto it for decades. Despite the inevitable mythology that grows up around such figures, however, it is worth noting that he has not done it alone. He has had a large, if at times quarrelsome, family to help him hold onto the reins.

Gadhafi has nine grown children. One is the result of a short marriage to his first wife, seven are with his second wife, and one is adopted. They hold many positions of influence in Libya's security forces, military, telecommunications, and other industries, and plenty of Libya watchers believe Gadhafi uses them not only as agents of his will, but also his eyes and ears.

The most noted power player is Saif Al-Islam. He is the one who shows up relatively often in TV interviews. He is the second oldest son, the oldest from the second wife. He was educated at the London School of Economics. He speaks fluent English, is a fastidious dresser, and he paints. An exhibition of his work was displayed in Moscow.

More importantly, he has long been seen as a possible successor to his father. He has denied any such desire, but others were interested in the idea for quite some time because he was considered more modern in his thinking, even reform minded by many Libya watchers. But that was before his recent and very public vows to fight the protestors to the end.

Another possible successor to the family throne is Mutassim, and accordingly his relationship with Saif Al-Islam is believed to be tense. Mutassim once allegedly helped plot a coup against his father and had to flee the country when it failed. He was eventually forgiven and is now his father's national security adviser. Mutassim was involved in official talks with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2009 about improving U.S./Libyan relations.

Ayesha, who is 34, is the only daughter. In many photos she looks like a blond model, and she is believed to play the role of peacekeeper among the brothers. Yet she also toes a very tough political line. She has been a longtime, loud supporter of anti-government groups (except at home) including the IRA and the insurgents in Iraq. She was famously part of Saddam Hussein's defense team when he was tried and hanged. When The Telegraph asked her how she felt about Iraqis who say he slaughtered thousands of their countrymen, she replied, "You are bound to meet people who may be against your policies."

Hannibal Gadhafi is the headline maker. He has reportedly paid millions of dollars for private parties featuring big name entertainers including Beyonce, Mariah Carey and Usher. Several of the artists now say they have given the money back.

It's not just Hannibal's parties that make news. He has been implicated in a string of violent incidents in Europe. He was accused of beating his staff, although the charges were later dropped. He is married to a model, Aline Skaf, and he was also accused of beating her in a London hotel. She later said her broken nose was the result of an accident.

In a spectacular episode, Hannibal was stopped after driving his Ferrari 90 mph the wrong way on the Champs-Elysees in Paris. He invoked diplomatic immunity.

The sixth son, Khamis, is said to command a special forces unit known as the 32nd brigade, or the Khamis brigade, which protects the Gadhafi family. His troops have been involved in much of the heavy fighting throughout Libya.

Still, despite the various problems and reported clashes among these strong personalities, nothing seems to have driven the family members far enough apart to weaken their collective grip on power for all these years.

Source: CNN

Khan: Islam is not the Enemy

2011-03-10T17:19:00.004+08:00

Source: CNN

Source: CNN

U.S. Muslim groups slam radicalization hearings

2011-03-10T17:09:00.002+08:00

Source: CNN
By the CNN Wire Staff

Washington (CNN) -- Leading American Muslims on Wednesday strongly criticized this week's planned congressional hearing into the alleged radicalization of members of their community, calling it an unfair attack on loyal citizens and a dangerous break from the traditional U.S. embrace of tolerance and pluralism.

Rep. Peter King, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, has said Thursday's hearing is necessary to explore the extent to which al Qaeda is trying to influence and indoctrinate U.S. Muslims, among other things. But his plans have created an uproar, with critics accusing Republican leaders of bigotry and comparing the hearings to Sen. Joseph McCarthy's allegations of Communist infiltration in the early years of the Cold War.

American Muslim leaders have also taken issue with King's assertion that they haven't sufficiently cooperated with law enforcement officials, and dismissed his claim that the overwhelming majority of mosques are run by extremist imams. Such claims are "demonstrably false," said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

"Except for a tiny minority," extremists have found "no fertile ground in America," he said. He said King is engaged in "fear-mongering," and called the New York Republican "unfit" to head the Homeland Security Committee.

"We are not in denial as a community that something is going on, that there are bad actors in every community," said Imam Johari Abdul-Malik, a member of the Council of Muslim Organizations. King is "onto something, but he is going in the wrong direction."

And Attorney General Eric Holder weighed in as well, disputing King's premise that Islamic leaders haven't done enough to help police during a news conference Wednesday afternoon.

Holder said the Justice Department has tried to establish a dialogue with American Muslims, "so that information flows to us, information flows from us." And he warned against doing anything to "alienate entire communities."

"Leaders of the Muslim community and the Muslim community itself have contributed significantly to the resolution of many of the things that we have resolved over the course of the last 12 to 18 months," Holder said. "Tips that we have received, information that has been shared, has been critical to our efforts to disrupting plots that otherwise might have occurred."

In an interview with CNN, King shot back, "That's not my experience."

"New York is the epicenter, and I'm not aware of any tips that have been given in Nassau, Suffolk [counties] or New York City," he said. "That's one. And then talking to officials around the country, I get the same complaints."

Holder has not been called to testify in King's hearings, because he would contradict those complaints, King acknowledged. And he said top Obama administration officials also say al Qaeda is attempting to radicalize American Muslims, so "Where else would we look?"

"I won't demonize anyone," he said. "We're going to show the threat is coming from certain elements and in many ways threatens Muslim Americans as much as it does the entire country."

But Shahid Buttar, executive director of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, said King is more interested in "scoring cheap political points by vilifying vulnerable communities."

On Tuesday, a national group, Muslim Advocate, launched a website aimed at tracking what it calls anti-Muslim rhetoric, particularly among elected officials.

"Our concern is that the King hearings are going to sow fear and mistrust of the Muslim community at a time when the nation needs to be coming together," said Farhana Khera, executive director of the group that launched WhatUnites.Us. "It's essentially a congressional stamp of approval for anti-Muslim hate."

In an earlier interview on CNN's "American Morning," King promised a "thoughtful, meaningful, very fair hearing" and insisted he was not condemning Islam as a religion or American Muslims as a group.

"I would never question anyone's religious beliefs," he said. "The overwhelming majority of Muslims are outstanding patriots." But he added, "There is a very small percentage who have allied themselves with al Qaeda," and he said U.S. Muslim leaders "do not face up to that reality."

"I want to encourage people in the Muslim community ... to be more aggressive in choosing their leaders," he said. "I don't think the leadership right now -- groups such as CAIR -- are doing an adequate job. I think in some ways doing a very poor job of representing the Muslim-American community."

CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper dismissed King's criticism, telling CNN the congressman "doesn't like that CAIR criticizes his past anti-Muslim statements and his Keystone Cops hearing."

Some critics of the hearings have called King's efforts against Islamic-American terrorism hypocritical. In the 1980s, King, an Irish-American, was an active supporter of the Irish Republican Army, an organization the State Department then deemed a terror group, and Gerry Adams, the leader of the IRA's political wing.

The IRA was responsible for hundreds of civilian deaths in terror attacks. But King, however, has defended his efforts, calling the IRA "a legitimate force" for decades. The congressman has insisted he only got involved so heavily with Adams because he knew Adams would be willing to broker peace with the British government.

A January 2010 study from researchers at Duke and the University of North Carolina concluded that the threat stemming from radicalized Muslims is overblown.

In the eight years following the September 11, 2001, attacks, 139 Muslim-Americans engaged in terrorism-related violence or were prosecuted for terrorism-related offenses with violent elements, the researchers concluded. That level -- roughly 17 individuals per year -- "is small compared to other violent crime in America, but not insignificant."

"Homegrown terrorism is a serious, but limited, problem," they asserted.

The report concluded that effective self-policing, denunciations of terrorism, and heightened political engagement were among the factors helping to minimize radicalization in the Muslim-American community.

Critics such as King, however, point to a number of recent examples of alleged homegrown terrorism as evidence of a dangerous trend, including the case of Army Maj. Nidal Hassan, a psychiatrist charged with killing 13 people at Fort Hood in 2009.

Hassan had been in contact with militant cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who was born in New Mexico and preached at a mosque in Virginia before leaving the United States for Yemen.

Last April, New York taxi driver Zarein Ahmedzay pleaded guilty to involvement in a 2009 plot to blow up crowded subway trains. Prosecutors said Ahmedzay conspired with another man -- Najibullah Zazi -- who also pleaded guity and cooperated with authorities.

According to a recent study from the New America Foundation and Syracuse University, the number of cases of American citizens or residents charged with or convicted of taking part in terrorist activities has jumped in recent years. There were 76 such cases in 2009 and 2010 -- nearly half the total since September 11, 2001.

But Muslim-Americans have played a key role in stopping such plots, noted Peter Bergen, a CNN national security analyst. More than 20 percent of post-9/11 Islamist terror cases in the United States began with tips from Muslim community members or involved cooperation from the family members of alleged plotters, he said.

Frank Cilluffo, director of George Washington University's Homeland Security Policy Institute, told CNN Wednesday that the threat of radicalized Americans "continues to metastasize (and) comes in varies shapes, sizes, and forms."

"To suggest that we don't face a threat is wrong," Cilluffo noted. "But to look for a single profile, unfortunately that doesn't exist right now."

CNN's Richard Allen Greene, Alan Silverleib, Dana Bash, Mike Ahlers, and Jeanne Meserve contributed to this report.

Source: CNN

GOP leaders back hearings on Muslims

2011-03-09T20:58:00.003+08:00

Democrats, rights groups see panel singling out community

Source: The Washington Times
By Seth McLaughlin

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor says the hearings “assess how we can better work with the Muslim community in America to stop the spread of radical Islam.” (Associated Press)

Saying extremist elements of Islam are a real threat that need to be confronted, House Republican leaders on Tuesday defended the Homeland Security Committee chairman’s decision to begin hearings this week to investigate the inroads radical Muslims have made in America.

But Democrats, as well as religious and civil rights groups say committee Chairman Peter T. King is singling out the Muslim community and could stoke anti-Islamic sentiment nationwide while providing another recruiting tool for extremists worldwide.

Mr. King, a New York Republican who saw more than 100 of his constituents perish in the Sept. 11 attacks, said his goal is to explore radicalization in the American Muslim community. The first hearing, scheduled for Thursday, will feature testimony from relatives of radicalized Muslim Americans who’ve engaged in terrorism, and Rep. Keith Ellison, a Minnesota Democrat who is the sole Muslim in Congress.

Speaking to reporters Tuesday, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said the backlash against Mr. King’s effort is unwarranted and that the purpose of the hearing is to “assess how we can better work with the Muslim community in America to stop the spread of radical Islam.”

“It is pretty obvious where the problems have been in terms of terrorist activity,” the Virginia Republican said, noting the apparent ties between the suspect in the terrorist attack at Fort Hood and radical Islam. “There is no question that it has been encouraged by the radicalization of folks coming out of Central Asia and the Middle East and [they] have used this as a reason to perpetrate terrorist acts. It is a fairly well accepted notion at this point and that’s where Chairman King is going.”

But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, fired back a few hours later, saying he is “deeply concerned about these hearings, which demonize law-abiding American Muslims who make important contributions to our society, as I would be about congressional hearings to investigate Catholics, Jews or people of any other faith based solely on their religion.”

Asked about Mr. Reid’s comments, Peter Gadiel, president of 9/11 Families for a Secure America, said, “I think the difference is so far as anybody is aware, Jews and Catholics are not encouraging organized terrorism.”

“I have not heard of Southern Methodist conspiracies to blow up buildings or kill soldiers on military bases,” Mr. Gadiel said. “To the contrary, we know there is something called violent jihad and that is not something connected with Southern Methodists, that is connected with Muslims.”

The hearings come about six months before the 10-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and have sparked a vigorous debate across the political spectrum, with some critics likening Mr. King’s hearings to former Republican Sen. Joseph McCarthy and his efforts to expose communists in the 1950s.

But Mr. King said his opponents are “tied up in political correctness.” He said he has no plans of backing down and will do whatever is in his power to prevent another terrorist attack.

Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice, applauded the effort, calling it an important step forward in safeguarding the country against the rising tide of homegrown terrorism.

“Without question, there’s a troubling factual pattern of American Muslims becoming radicalized and focusing on creating havoc here on U.S. soil,” Mr. Sekulow said. “This hearing is designed to get to the bottom of what’s taking place in our nation — how al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations are recruiting and manipulating American Muslims to attack the U.S. This hearing isn’t about profiling — it’s about protecting our homeland.”

But J. Brent Walker, executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, said the hearing “will send a further message that Muslims present a greater threat of terrorism than other religions.”

“It would imply that the potential for terrorism from outside of Islam is not significant enough to merit a hearing,” Mr. Walker said.

Source: The Washington Times

Libya’s first lady owns 20 tons of gold: reports

2011-03-09T17:35:00.004+08:00

Safia Farkash owns an airline company

Source: Al Arabiya News Channel
DUBAI (Mohamed al-Naeimi)

Farkash maintained a low profile throughout Gaddafi’s rule

Since the start of the Libyan revolution on Feb. 17, Libya’s first lady Safia Farkash has not been in the limelight unlike her Tunisian and Egyptian counterparts even though she is known for her enormous wealth and considerable influence.

Safia Farkash owns an airline company called Buraq Air headquartered in the Mittiga International Airport in the Libyan capital Tripoli. Farkash operates the company with the approval of her husband even though it is a rival of the Libyan national carrier and monopolizes the transfer of Libyan pilgrims.

Reports of Farkash’s wealth are varried, but one of the most widely-circulated reports suggests that the first lady owns 20 tons of gold.

News of Farkash’s wealth is in line with the Wiki Leaks documents which stated that Gaddafi is the head of a family that is powerful and rich, yet divided and dysfunctional.

According to Wiki Leaks, Farkash is generally low profile. She travelled in a rented plane and a procession of cars drove her from the airport to her destination. Even the banquet she held at the Bab al-Azizia compound, Gaddafi’s main headquarters, to celebrate the anniversary of the 1969 revolution was quite modest.

During the Lockerbie crisis, the International Coalition against War Criminals (ICAWC), based in France, revealed in 1992 that Gaddafi’s wealth had reached 80 billion U.S. dollars and that his wife’s was estimated at 30 billion.

Story of first lady

Safia Farkash al-Baraasi is the second wife of Libya leader Muammar Gaddafi. She was born in the city of al-Baida in eastern Libyan and hails from al-Baraaesa tribe. They got to know each other when she worked as a nurse and he was admitted to hospital for an appendectomy in 1971. They got married the same year and had seven children, six boys and their only daughter Ayesha.

During the first years of their marriage, Farkash rarely made media appearances, yet in the past few years she started engaging in social activities like taking part in celebrating the 1969 revolution that brought her husband to power and attending the graduation of female police students in 2010.

In 2008, Farkash was elected vice president to the African First Ladies Organization in a meeting of African Union leaders in the Egyptian Red Sea city Sharm al-Sheikh even though she was not present at the meeting and has never taken part in activities related to it.

Several websites reported that Farkash and her daughter Ayesha landed in Germany on February 20, but no one denied or confirmed the news.

(Translated from the Arabic by Sonia Farid)

Source: Al Arabiya News Channel

LSE may withdraw Gaddafi's son PhD

2011-03-02T09:23:00.003+08:00

Critics are calling on the London School of Economics to withdraw a doctorate it granted to the son of Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi as he donated £1.5 million to the university.

Source: PressTV

A Libyan protester holds a sign during a demonstration against Libyan ruler Moammar Gaddafi in Benghazi.

Director of LSE Sir Howard Davies has admitted that he is “embarrassed” about the university's relations with the Qaddafi family saying they should not have accepted the research funding.

"We looked at the pros and cons of engaging with someone like Saif Qaddafi and with the problems in North Africa and we decided that we would do so," Davies told the BBC Radio 4.

The LSE also said it will examine the allegation that Saif al-Islam's cheated to get his PhD degree.

This comes as angry students at the central London campus have called for an independent inquiry into the issue saying the LSE may have given a doctorate to Qaddafi's son to ensure it gets the £1.5 million funding.

Saif al-Islam offered the reward to the university in 2008 shortly after he received a degree from the university's Centre for the Study of Global Governance.

According to Professor David Held from the center there were always concerns at the time of Saif al-Islam's studying there that his work was not his own.

"After he handed in the thesis there was a rumour that he may not have been the sole author. I wrote straight away to his supervisor but there was no substantial evidence," Held said.

This comes as a spokesman for the LSE Students Union said they are “angry” about the issue.

"LSE students are angry and upset that university officials are using degrees at the LSE to raise vast sums of money. There are serious questions about Saif al-Islam's PhD, and we call for an external investigation," the spokesman said.

The questions about the LSE's links to Qaddafi family and the validity of his son's degree were further strengthened when a video emerged showing senior university officials praising the Libyan dictator in a closed door meeting through video link two months ago.

The video shows Qaddafi expressing offensive views about Lockerbie and hitting out at former world leaders including former British PM Margaret Thatcher and former US president Ronald Reagan.

The student who made the video public said the “sycophantic Qaddafi address was held in secret because it was all about keeping money from a tyrant flowing into the LSE”.

"Now that his regime is facing collapse, it's only right that this love-in should be made public," she said.

AMR/HE

Source: PressTV

Libya protesters take over military base

2011-03-02T09:20:00.003+08:00

Hundreds of Libyans including, children and elderly men, have taken over a military air base in southern Benghazi, hoping to begin training to repel attacks by Libyan ruler Muammar Gaddafi's troops.

Source: PressTV

Libyan pro-democracy protesters who are now part of the forces against Libyan ruler Muammar Gaddafi organize ammunition at a military base in Benghazi in eastern Libya, February 28, 2011.

"We are receiving dozens of civilians who want to get trained and then enlisted. We are ready to defend Benghazi and its suburbs. We are here to help our brothers in Tripoli if they ask our support, but I'm sure that they can defend themselves," Colonel Maraey Logny said on Monday, Reuters reported.

Enlisted men at the air base in the city will receive intensive training sessions on using heavy cannons and anti-aircraft weapons.

"I'm calling all Libyan youth to be enlisted to confront this despotic dictator to defend our country, blood and lives," enlisted man Saleh Al-Abidy said.

Large swathes of youth have hurried to military bases all over the country to defend it and be ready to confront any attacks by troops under Libyan ruler.

"I came here to join the Libyan military, because we want to topple Muammar who kills the people." Libyan child Suleiman Meftah said.

A brutal crackdown by the Libyan regime on pro-democracy protesters that began nearly two weeks ago has left an estimated 2,000 people dead so far.

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), nearly 100,000 people have fled the violence in crisis-hit Libya over the past week.

Gaddafi, who led a military coup against King Idris, came to power and established "the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya" in 1969.

The Libyan leader has ruled the North African country for nearly 42 years. He has seven sons and one daughter from two marriages.

Gaddafi and his family members have been holding a tight grip on the country's industries. Reports say they have hidden an estimated at $32.5 billion in secret foreign bank accounts.

The United States and other foreign governments discussed military options for dealing with Libya on Monday as beleaguered Gaddafi scoffed at the threat to his government from a spreading popular revolution.

RZS/HRF

Source: PressTV

US mulls military attack on Libya

2011-03-02T09:15:00.003+08:00

The US has reportedly planned to deploy thousands of its naval and aerial forces near Libya as it mulls over military intervention in the North African country.

Source: PressTV

A Libyan protester holds a sign during a demonstration against Libyan ruler Moammar Gaddafi in Benghazi.

The US military announced on Monday that it will deploy naval and aerial forces near Libya, the Washington Post reported.

A Pentagon spokesman said various contingency plans have been taken into consideration in order to provide options and flexibility once decisions are made.

One option on the table is using NATO air power to enforce a no-fly zone over Libya. This measure, however, requires UN approval.

Also on Monday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, "We will continue to explore all possible options for action."

The development comes as Libyan air force attacked ammunition depots in two separate locations south of Benghazi.

Fighting flared up Monday in Misrata, near the capital where protesters have shot down a helicopter and captured its crew.

A brutal crackdown by the regime on opposition protests that began nearly two weeks ago has left an estimated 2,000 people dead so far.

In Benghazi, many are celebrating their freedom from Muammar Gaddafi's rule after taking control of the city.

However, many Libyans are still dying as a result of insufficient medical supplies to treat severe injuries.

Colonel Gaddafi has been in power since a military coup in 1969.

Gaddafi and his family members have been holding a tight grip on the country's industries for the past four decades. Reports say they have hidden away a massive amount of wealth in secret foreign bank accounts.

JR/HGH/MMN

Source: PressTV

PRESS RELEASE: Egypt – Muslim Brotherhood Deputy Chairman Khairet El-Shater suffers heart attack in prison

2011-03-02T09:10:00.002+08:00

Mubarak regime prisoners given preferential treatment, while political prisoners languish under further restrictions.

Source: Islamic Human Rights Commission

Khairet El-Shater is reported to have suffered a heart attack today in Tura prison. El-Shater was involved in an argument with guards over the preferential treatment received by former Mubarak cohorts Habib Al-Adli, Ahmed Ezz, Ahmed Zuhair Garana, Al-Maghrebi and other government figures who are detained in the same prison for the crimes they committed during Mubarak's era.

El-Shater and others were denied access to open spaces, visitation sessions etc on the basis that the former regime’s prisoners were exercising and would decide when they would like to stop. Other amenities were denied the political prisoners on similar bases relating to privileges granted to Al-Adli et al.

The family of El-Shater expressed their deep concern, and have stated that they hold the Supreme Council for Armed Forces responsible for El-Shater’s condition. El-Shater’s health was already in a poor state. He suffers from diabetes for which he has often been denied treatment while in prison.

IHRC Chair, Massoud Shadjareh stated:

“It is imperative that the focus on human rights issues not be taken away from Egypt simply because Mubarak has gone. His erstwhile military backers still hold power and many issues need to be resolved.

“The new regime needs to do more than simply talk about elections. It must release all political prisoners now, and make serious efforts to find the disappeared men and women who protested during the revolution. Without starting to address the human rights abuses perpetrated in Egypt the new regime fails to inspire confidence in its willingness to transform the country.”

Source: Islamic Human Rights Commission

Egypt/Turkey-Israel: ‘A Clean Break’

2011-02-28T06:02:00.002+08:00

Source: Information Clearing House
By Eric Walberg

February 25, 2011 "MEO" -- While Egypt’s revolution was very much about domestic matters -- bread and butter, corruption, repression -- its most immediate effects have been international. Not for a long time has Egypt loomed so large in the region, to both friend and foe. At least 13 of the 22 Arab League countries are now affected: Algeria, Bahrain, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen.

But just as powerful has been the resonance in Israel. It has no precedent for an assertive, democratic neighbour. Except for Turkey.

As the US was putting the finishing touches on NATO (established in April 1949), Turkey became the first Muslim nation to recognise Israel, in March 1949 (Iran did so a year later). Under the watchful eye of its military, Turkey and Israel had close diplomatic, economic and military relations throughout the Cold War.

The first hint of trouble was Turkey’s denunciation of “Israeli oppression” of the Palestinians in 1987, but it was not until the Justice and Development Party came to power in 2002 that a strong critical voice was heard. In 2004 Turkey denounced the Israeli assassination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin as a “terrorist act” and Israeli policy in the Gaza Strip as “state-sponsored terrorism”.

Saudi acquiescence to US-Israel hegemony is understandable because of the Saudi monarchy’s total reliance on the US dollar income from its oil. As US secretary of state Henry Kissinger told Business Week after Saudi Arabia defied the US with its oil embargo in support of Egypt in the 1973 war against Israel, any more such behaviour would lead to “massive political warfare against countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran to make them risk their political stability and maybe their security if they did not cooperate”.

His words were not idle. King Faisal, who had risked all to help the Egyptians and Palestinians, was assassinated shortly after that, and his act of defiance was the last peep heard from the Saudis. Or Egypt, which went on to make peace with Israel. Even as Turkey’s resistance to Israel has grown hotter, Israel continued to find comfort in the accommodating nature of president Hosni Mubarak’s rule, though it has been a “cold peace” between enemies.

Yes, enemies. For despite official relations and a trickle of photo ops of Egyptian-Israeli leaders shaking hands over the past three decades, 92 per cent Egyptians continued to view Israel as the enemy, according to a 2006 Egyptian government poll. Perhaps Mubarak also found maintaining good relations with Israel distasteful, but he complied with US wishes, getting the second largest US aid package (after Israel).

Current Israeli military strategy was honed in the early1980s, after the elimination of Egypt as a military threat. Two names are identified with it. Ariel Sharon announced publicly in 1981, shortly before invading Lebanon, that Israel no longer thought in terms of peace with its neighbours, but instead sought to widen its sphere of influence to the whole region “to include countries like Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, and areas like the Persian Gulf and Africa, and in particular the countries of North and Central Africa”. This view of Israel as a regional superpower/ bully became known as the Sharon Doctrine.

Sharon’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982 followed traditional imperialism’s strategy of direct invasion and co-opting of local elites, in this case a Christian one. But already this strongman policy was losing its appeal. It didn’t work for Israel in Lebanon. There was always the risk of a strongman turning against his patron or being overthrown.

The more extreme version of the new Israeli game plan to make Israel the regional hegemon was Oded Yinon’s “A Strategy for Israel in the 1980”. Yinon was nicknamed ‘sower of discord’ for his proposal to divide-and-conquer to create weak dependent statelets with some pretense of democracy, similar to the US strategy in Central America, which would fight among themselves and, if worse comes to worst and a populist leader emerges, be sabotaged easily – the Salvador Option. Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah described the Israeli policy based on Yinon in 2007 as intended to create “a region that has been partitioned into ethnic and confessional states that are in agreement with each other. This is the new Middle East.”

Yinon was using as a model the Ottoman millet system where separate legal courts governed the various religious communities using Muslim Sharia, Christian Canon and Jewish Halakha laws. Lebanon would be divided into Sunni, Alawi, Christian and Druze states, Iraq divided into Sunni, Kurd and Shia states. The Saudi kingdom and Egypt would also be divided along sectarian lines, leaving Israel the undisputed master.

“Genuine coexistence and peace will reign over the land only when Arabs understand that without Jewish rule between Jordan and the sea they will have neither existence nor security.” Yinon correctly observed that the existing Middle East states set up by Britain following WWI&II were unstable and consisted of sizable minorities which could be easily incited to rebel. All the Gulf states are “built upon a delicate house of sand in which there is only oil”.

Following on Yinon’s strategy in 1982, Richard Perle’s 1996 “A Clean Break” states: “Israel can shape its strategic environment, in cooperation with Turkey and Jordan, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq – an important Israeli strategic objective in its own right.”

Israeli internal security minister Avi Dichter said shortly after the invasion of Iraq in 2003: “Weakening and isolating Iraq is no less important than weakening and isolating Egypt. Weakening and isolating Egypt is done by diplomatic methods while everything is done to do achieve a complete and comprehensive isolation to Iraq. Iraq has vanished as a military force and as a united country.”

According to Haaretz correspondent Aluf Benn writing on the eve of the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, Sharon and his cohorts “envision a domino effect, with the fall of Saddam Hussein followed by that of Israel’s other enemies: Arafat, Hassan Nasrallah, Bashar Assad, the ayatollah in Iran and maybe even Muhammar Gadaffi.” By presenting the US with facts-on-the-ground and using its US lobby, Israel would keep itself at the heart of American plans for the Middle East.

The invasion of Iraq was always intended as a prelude to the invasion of Iran. The Israeli logic, which is hard to fault, is that with Iraq now occupied, unstable and its inevitably pro-Iranian Shia majority asserting control, Iran has been strengthened, and that the same war plan against Iran is necessary to defeat the chief remaining regional anti-Israeli regime, which is now gathering support from not only Shia, but from Sunni opponents to the US-Israeli project throughout the Arab world. Ben Eliezer told the gathering: “They are twins, Iran and Iraq.”

Despite Turkish storm clouds on the horizon, until 25 January 2011, Israel’s plan was still to replace the Ottoman Turks of yore as the local imperial power. The Arab nations (prepared by British imperial divide-and-conquer and local-strongman policies) would be kept divided, weak, dependent now on Israel to ensure safe access to oil. An Israeli-style peace would break out throughout the region.

But this tangled web has unravelled. Despite the $36 billion poured into Egypt’s military and Americanisation of Egypt’s armed forces since the peace treaty with Israel, according to wikileaks-egypt.blogspot.com US officials complained of the “backward-looking nature of Egypt’s military posture” (read: Israel is still Egypt’s main enemy), that the army generals remained resistant to change and economic reforms to further dismantle central government power.

Egyptian Minister of Defence Muhammad Tantawi “has resisted any change to usage of FMF [foreign military financing] funding and has been the chief impediment to transforming the military’s mission to meet emerging security threats.” In plain language, Egypt’s de facto head of state was criticised by the US because he refused to go along with the new US-Israeli strategy which would incorporate Egypt’s defence into a broader NATO war against “asymmetric threats” (read: the “war on terror”) and to acquiesce to Israel as the regional hegemon.

Mubarak was the Egyptian strongman that fit Sharon’s strategy for the region. But he was overthrown in a truly unforeseen manner -- by the people. Yinon’s divide-and-rule strategy -- in the case of Egypt, by inciting Muslim against Copt -- has also come to naught with the popular revolution here, one of its symbols being the crescent and cross.

There has indeed been “a clean break” with the past, but not the one foreseen by Perle. His scheme can be rephrased as: Egypt and Turkey can shape their strategic environment, in cooperation with Syria and Lebanon, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Israel. As for Dichter’s hubris, it is impossible at this point to see what the future holds for Iraq, but it will not be what he had in mind. And Iran can now breathe a sigh of relief.

A year and a half ago, an Israel Navy submarine crossed the Suez Canal to the Red Sea, where it conducted an exercise, reflecting the strategic cooperation between Israel and Egypt, aimed at sending a message of deterrence to Iran. Just one week after the fall of Mubarak, the canal is being used to deliver a message of deterrence – but this time the message is for Israel, as Iranian warships cross the canal on their way to Syrian ports.

Nor are the upheavals across the Arab world at present following the sectarian scenario envisioned by Yinon. Even the Shia uprising in Bahrain is more about an oppressive neocolonial monarchy, originally imposed by the British, than about Shia-Sunni hostility.

Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has expressed fears about Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood “undermining the peace treaty” which 85 per cent of Israelis approve of. But he need not fear. While Egyptians have no love for Israel, none contemplate another war against what is clearly a more powerful and ruthless neighbour.

What really hurts for the Likudniks is the new Egypt in cooperation with the new Turkey will put paid to the Sharon/ Yinon strategy for establishing Israel as the regional empire. It will have to join the comity of nations not as a ruthless bully, but as a responsible partner.

Eric Walberg writes for Al-Ahram Weekly http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/

Source: Information Clearing House

Gaddafi's son denies crackdown; loyalists reportedly continue attacks

2011-02-25T00:16:00.003+08:00

Source: The Washington Post
By Leila Fadel, Ernesto Londono and Debbi Wilgoren
Washington Post Foreign Service

Moammar Gaddafi has ruled Libya for more than 40 years. Now, he is strongly rejecting opposition demands that he give up power, as anti-government demonstrators continue to push for his ouster. (Photo: John Moore / AP)

BAIDA, LIBYA - Moammar Gaddafi's son denied Thursday that Libya has killed large numbers of protesters through airstrikes and other attacks, while a former top Gaddafi aide said he quit the government to protest its violent crackdown.

Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, Gaddafi's son, disputed the death tolls that have have been reported since the protests began 10 days ago, saying allegations that hundreds have been killed are a "joke."

"Tripoli is quiet," he said in an interview aired on Libyan state television. "Life is normal."

The junior Gaddafi said Libya intends to provide Western journalists on Friday access to Tripoli, the capital, and other cities, so they can corroborate the government's claim that the country remains under Gaddafi's control.

The U.S. State Department issued a warning to Western journalists who have entered Libya in recent days without government permission. Citing information received from top Libyan officials, the warning said some members of CNN, BBC Arabic and al-Arabiya would be allowed into the country, but any reporters not approved by the government as part of that effort would be considered al-Qaeda "collaborators."

"The Libyan government said that it was not responsible for the safety of these journalists, who risked immediate arrest on the full range of possible immigration charges," the State Department warning said.

Libya appears dangerously fractured, with Gaddafi's regime intent on fighting but its authority beyond Tripoli in doubt. The longtime ruler has tightened his grip on the capital, witnesses say, by flooding the streets with militiamen and loyalist troops who were reportedly roaming the streets and shooting opponents from SUVs.

Rebels who launched an uprising last week have consolidated their control of key eastern cities, however, and continued advancing west across the coastal strip, where most of the country's population is clustered. The opposition has called for a large protest Friday.

In the city of Zawiya, 30 miles west of Tripoli, an army unit attacked a mosque where protesters had been stationed for several days, a witness told the Associated Press. The soldiers opened fire with automatic weapons and hit the mosque's minaret with anti-aircraft missiles, the witness, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said.

He told the AP there were casualties, but couldn't provide exact figures. Some of the young men among the protesters had hunting rifles, he said. He said a day earlier an envoy from Gaddafi had come to the city and warned protesters, "Either leave or you will see a massacre."

"What is happening is horrible, those who attacked us are not the mercenaries; they are sons of our country," the witness said, sobbing. After the assault, thousands massed in the city's main Martyrs Square, shouting "leave, leave," in reference to Gaddafi, he said.

The other attack came at a small airport outside Misrata, Libya's third-largest city, where rebels claimed control on Wednesday, AP reported. Militiamen on Thursday attacked a line of residents who were protecting the facility, opening fire with rocket-propelled grenades and mortars, said a resident who saw the assault.

"They left piles of human remains and swamp of blood," the resident told the Associated Press. "The hospitals are packed with those killed and injured."

In Cairo, a cousin and close adviser to Gaddafi said he had defected from the regime to protest its crackdown on the uprising, the Associated Press reported. Gadhaf al-Dam, who arrived in Egypt several days ago, is a member of the Libyan leader's inner circle, handling Libyan-Egyptian relations.

Dam said in a statement that the crackdown has seen "grave violations to human rights and human and international laws," AP reported. He said he left Libya "in protest and to show disagreement."

Oil prices hit $100 a barrel because of the turmoil in the North African oil exporter, a peak not reached since 2008. In Washington and other capitals, attention turned to the possible responses to the crackdown, including economic sanctions or imposition of a no-flight zone over Libya to prevent the use of aircraft against civilians.

In Washington, President Obama said the United States was developing a "full range of options" and would intensify discussions with other nations to address the violent unraveling of Gaddafi's regime.

"The suffering and bloodshed are outrageous and unacceptable," Obama said. The Libyan government "must be held accountable for its failure . . . and face the cost of continued violations of human rights."

But enormous questions remained about whether any foreign powers could wield the influence necessary to head off Libya's dizzying plunge into disorder, much less persuade Gaddafi to reconsider his vow to fight to the death in defense of his 41-year-old regime.

The independent organization Human Rights Watch has estimated that 300 people have been killed in a week of clashes, although some Libyan opposition groups and Western diplomats have said that they fear the figure may be much larger.

A 600-passenger ferry chartered by the U.S. government was in Libya to evacuate U.S. citizens to the nearby island of Malta, but its departure has been delayed by turbulent weather.

Residents reached by telephone in Tripoli on Wednesday said Gaddafi's loyalists appeared to have reclaimed control of the capital after several days of skirmishes. Stores and offices were shut down, the residents said, while blue-uniformed militiamen set up checkpoints and regime loyalists cleaned up graffiti calling for him to step down.

But opposition groups appeared to have taken control of cities across a broad swath of northern Libya that stretched hundreds of miles from Tobruk, near the Egyptian border, to as far as Misurata, 120 miles east of the capital. The loosely organized opposition protected key roads and government installations, with men in fluorescent orange vests patrolling the area, armed with sticks or rocket-propelled grenades.

A state-run radio station previously known as Eastern Radio was under the control of opposition groups, which renamed it Free Radio. In and around Baida, along the northern coast west of Tobruk, the once-omnipresent portraits of Gaddafi had been ripped down or burned.

"Oh Moammar, dictator, it's your turn now," people chanted.

There was ample evidence of recent fighting in Baida. Buildings on Revolution Street were pocked with bullet holes. At La Braq Airport, spent ammunition from rifles and antiaircraft rounds littered the ground. Civilians and defected soldiers climbed on tanks and blocked the runways to stop planes from landing - a precaution, residents said, after people were gunned down last week by purported mercenaries flown in from elsewhere in Africa.

The ability of the rebels to swiftly push west suggested that Libya's powerful tribes, long a beneficiary of Gaddafi's patronage, were turning against him. In recent days, tribal leaders have declared their support for the opposition after Gaddafi's use of warplanes and helicopter gunships to kill hundreds of protesters.

Indeed, the eastern tribes have long complained of being denied a share of Libya's wealth and resources, and eastern cities such as Benghazi have been bastions of opposition. Such grievances led to a revolt in the 1990s and underpinned the ongoing rebellion that began in Benghazi last week, in a country of as many as 140 tribes.

The east's al-Zuwayya tribe threatened to shut down oil production unless authorities stopped the "oppression of the protesters." The Warfala, one of the country's biggest and most influential tribes, has also reportedly joined the opposition. The tribe controls areas around Tripoli.

"We are seeing more and more tribal defections. A lot of police and military in Tobruk, Benghazi and other eastern cities defected because their tribal leaders had ordered them," Ronald Bruce St. John, an author and expert on Libya, said in a telephone interview. "I think you will see more and more in western Libya."

So far, St. John said, it appears that the major tribes in and around Tripoli continue to support Gaddafi.

The signs of a widening rebellion in eastern Libya came as more senior military commanders and government officials defected. The Libyan newspaper Quryna reported that an air force pilot bailed out of his Soviet-made warplane and allowed it to crash rather than following an order to bomb Benghazi.

Residents of Tripoli said a sense of fear pervaded the capital.

"We have been indoors for the past three days," said Rahma, a Libyan American reached by telephone, who insisted that her last name not be used to avoid any retribution. "Tripoli is like a ghost town, as if nobody exists here."

She said her father, also a U.S. citizen, had been detained during an anti-government demonstration a few days ago in front of Tripoli's courthouse and was being held at a hospital on a military base. She said she fears for his safety after listening to Gaddafi's speech, in which he threatened to execute anyone going against the regime.

"We don't know what's going to happen to him," Rahma said.

She said two sons of a neighbor were killed at a protest. The next day, Rahma said, the neighbor placed a green Libyan national flag by her house to show support for Gaddafi and avoid being targeted by his loyalists.

fadell@washpost.com
londonoe@washpost.com

Londono reported from Cairo. Wilgoren reported from Washington. Correspondent Sudarsan Raghavan contributed reporting from Sanaa, Yemen. Staff writer Howard Schneider in Washington contributed to this report.

Source: The Washington Post

Dictators are crumbling and Kingdoms are shaking

2011-02-24T09:47:00.003+08:00

Source: IslamiCity.com
By Dr. Aslam Abdullah

The televised brutality against unarmed civilians seeking their dignity as seen in Egypt, and now in Bahrain and Libya is neither shocking nor unexpected. In many of the Middle Eastern countries the security forces, drawn mainly from tribes loyal to the elites, are hired to protect rulers at every cost and they have done what they were paid to do. In Egypt, the security forces showed some restraint because of the pressure that came from several US army generals under whose command many of the Egyptian military officials were trained. The US army did not want to be openly seen as an accomplice of the crimes against the people of Egypt. In Bahrain and Libya, the situation is different as the US army has little at stake there.

However, what is shocking is the perpetual silence of the leadership of various Islamic movements and Muslim intellectuals all over the world on these known and unknown acts of violence. Major Islamic seminaries in South Asia and South East Asia as well as in the Gulf are quiet. Known Islamic groups have avoided talking about people's right to dissent openly.

With the exception of a few Muslim organizations in the US and abroad, not many have spoken against the violence. Even here, Muslim organizations are reluctant to put their full weight in favor of democratic reforms. They are keen to enjoy the benefit of democracy in America and Europe but are skeptical about democratic reforms in countries with Muslim majority. The debate among some Muslim groups still focuses on the legitimacy of democracy as a form of government within Islamic thought. Many still believe that democracy stands opposite to the concept of divine authority, a position that was expounded recently by Ayman Al-Zawahiri in a statement issued after the departure of Hosni Mubarak from Egypt.

The despotism, the dictatorship and the monarchy practiced in almost every Gulf country and most Muslim majority nations, are nothing new. For almost seven decades, the rulers in those countries have been thriving on coercion and the violation of human rights. They have justified their rule by enlisting the support of a religious leadership that often misuse the Quran and the teachings of the prophet to denounce people's participation in matters of government.

Many Islamic movements and Muslim intellectuals ignore this reality conveniently. The reason is very simple. A number of these movements and individuals were and are still heavily financed by groups and businesses who have close ties with the regime. Some of the leading Muslim institutions in the Muslim world receive funds, directly or indirectly from various corrupt regimes.

During the last seven decades, these rulers have promoted a version of Islam, through financing Islamic institutions all over the world, that promotes sectarianism, factionalism and divisions on the basis of juristic interpretations of Islam. The religious hierarchy that backed them has succeeded in creating a theology that supports the rulers and denounces any attempt on the part of people to seek their dignity. Much of the religious literature that is in circulation in various languages of the world come from outfits that owe their existence to religious groups and businesses owing allegiance to the rulers.

What is ironic is that the opposition of such attempts mainly come from individuals and groups who are backed by the political opponents of the regimes or are the opportunists. Regional political rivalries have played up their conflicts. The Quran and the teachings of the Prophet were always misused by these groups to denounce the other. What an irony that the dictator of Iraq used the name of God to kill his opponents who in turn invoked the name of the same God to promote violence against the supporters of the ruler. When religious hierarchy is itself involved in misusing the faith to serve the political interests what can be expected of the masses?

Not many have tried to question the legitimacy of the regimes on the basis of their understanding of the Quran and the teachings of the Prophet objectively. On the contrary, they have projected the rulers as the shadow of God on earth quoting the Prophet to remain loyal to the elites even if they are wrong.

The Quran states very clearly that human dignity is the cornerstone of a healthy human society. Without ensuring the dignity, people cannot achieve their highest potential. Tribalism, feudalism, racism and ethnicism as well as class based differences are visible in the Muslim world, especially in the Gulf. Despite the claim of Islamic egalitarianism, there exists discrimination, and injustice in every aspect of social life. Labor laws are non-existent. Laws that could protect the dignity of women are absent. Laws that would prevent child labor are no where to be found. The right to dissent is not accepted as a legitimate Islamic concept. Even slavery can be found in pockets of the Muslim world.

Despite the emphasis of the Quran on the preservation of human rights and religious tolerance and freedom, rulers and their supporters twist the Quranic verses to justify every act of indecency.

Those who speak up against these injustices are either often declared heretics or foreign agents or ignorant of true Islam. Obviously, these labels justify their elimination from the society either politically or physically.

The situation is not going to last for ever. The betrayal of the so called Islamic movements and Muslim intellectuals will not prevent the younger generation to take matters in its hand. The access to information including religious information has empowered many people to take a genuine stand on issues and pay the price for that. By 2020, some 60 per cent of the Muslim world population would comprise of youth under the age of 30. This generation will refuse to live under suppression, and injustice. It would not accept the lack of human dignity and human rights as the general norm of the society. It will not tolerate the humiliation of women as well as men based on their gender or class or ethnicity. This generation has risen and will continue to rise demanding changes that will shake the Muslim world to the core. The thrones are shaking and the crowns are falling. It is time that those who have been on the side of injustice realize their wrongs and join hands with those who are seeking change.

It is time to realize that we Muslims are responsible for what has happened to us in the last several decades. We allowed it to happen to us. We allowed suppression and injustice to dominate us at the cost of our dignity. We played in the hands of the power elites and their backers in religious and business and academic circles. We supported the rulers by bowing before them in every sense of the term.

If we are responsible for the situation we alone can change it. Let us seek clarification from our religious hierarchy and religious organizations on people's legitimate rights to govern themselves and the illegitimate rule of despots, dictators and monarchs. We must not remain silent. In every Islamic circle, we must demand explanation for the silence of several decades. Those who who misled us to believe that human dignity and human rights can be compromised for the comfort of rulers have no right to continue to lead us in religious or social affairs. The revolt is coming. It is not only against corrupt rulers but also against those religious scholars too who are accomplice in the crimes against people.

Dr. Aslam Abdullah is editor in chief of the weekly Muslim Observer and director of the Islamic Society of Nevada.

Source: IslamiCity.com

The Veto and the Case for Impeaching President Obama

2011-02-22T17:28:00.003+08:00

Source: Information Clearing House
By Alan Hart

February 21, 2011 "Information Clearing House" -- Never before has an American President’s fear of offending the Zionist lobby and its stooges in Congress been so exposed as it was by Obama’s decision to veto the Security Council resolution condemning continued, illegal Israeli settlement activities on the occupied West Bank and demanding that Israel “immediately and completely cease” all such activities. In a different America – an informed America – some might think, I do, that Obama should be impeached. The charge? TREASON.

After she had exercised the Obama administration’s first veto, the plea made by U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice for understanding of America’s position could not have been more absurd. “Our opposition to the resolution before this Council today should not be misunderstood to mean that we support settlement activity. On the contrary, we reject in the strongest terms the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlement activity.”

So why the veto? Ambassador Rice said:
“The United States has been deeply committed to pursuing a comprehensive and lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians, In that context, we have been focused on taking steps that advance the goal of two states living side by side in peace and security, rather than complicating it. That includes a commitment to work in good faith with all parties to underscore our opposition to continued settlements.”

What nonsense! If the Obama administration really wanted to underscore its stated opposition to Israel’s on-going colonization of the occupied West Bank including Arab East Jerusalem, there was no better or more effective way of doing so than voting for the resolution or abstaining. In either case the resolution would have passed and that would have opened the door to real global pressure on Israel if it continued to defy international law.

As for advancing the goal of a two-state solution, the Obama administration has done the opposite. By allowing Israel to continue its illegal settlement activities and consolidate its occupation, it, the Obama administration, has helped to guarantee that there can never be a viable Palestinian state living side by side with an Israel inside its borders as they were on the eve of the 1967 war.

In the context of the conflict in and over Palestine that became Israel, the only thing to which the Obama administration has been deeply committed is not provoking the wrath of the Zionist lobby and its stooges in Congress and the mainstream media. For all practical purposes Obama has surrendered policy making on Israel-Palestine to this lobby. (The veto marked the complete surrender).

The essence of the problem this presents can be simply stated. The Zionist lobby’s agenda – unquestioning support for Israel right or wrong – is not in America’s own best interests. (In reality it is not in anybody’s best interests including those of Israeli Jews and the Jews of the world).

As I pointed out on I February in my post Crunch time coming for America in the Middle East?, what all Arab peoples want is not only an end to corruption and repression and a better life in their own countries. They also want an end to the humiliation caused by Israel’s arrogance of power and American support for it.

It is clear that the manifestations of Arab people power the world is witnessing were not instigated by Islamist extremist groups and are spontaneous protests with demands by citizens from all sections of civil society. So at the present time that is no evidence to suggest that change brought about by people power in Arab states will create more cover, more scope and more popular support for extremist and violent forces which use and abuse Islam in much the same way as Zionists use and abuse Judaism. But this could change, in my view will change, if America goes on supporting Israel right or wrong. In other words, the more the administration in Washington D.C. is perceived by the Arab street as being complicit in the Zionist state’s defiance of international law and crimes, the more American interests and citizens are likely to be targeted and hit.

The American Constitution states that a president can be impeached and removed from office for “treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanours.”
In my view a president who allows a lobby group to put the interests of a foreign power above those of the country of which they are citizens, and who by doing so puts his fellow citizens more in harm’s way than they otherwise would be, is guilty of treason. (And all the more so when the American-Jewish lobby in question does not speak for more than about a third, and possibly only a quarter, of America’s mainly silent and deeply troubled Jews)

Footnote:

The admirable and courageous Gideon Levy, the conscience of Israeli journalism, has a brilliant article (which I have tweeted) in today’s Ha’aretz with the headline With settlement veto resolution, Obama has joined Likud.

And this is how Gideon concluded his piece:

“If the U.S. had been a responsible superpower, it would have voted for the resolution on Friday to rouse Israel from its dangerous sleep. Instead, we got a hostile veto from Washington, shouts of joy from Jerusalem and a party that will end very badly for both.”

Source: Information Clearing House

Moammar Gadhafi’s Son Warns “Stop The Protest Or Face Civil War & Colonialism” (Video)

2011-02-22T17:11:00.003+08:00

Part 1 of 3

Part 2 of 3

Part 3 of 3

Libya defectors: Pilots told to bomb protesters flee to Malta

2011-02-22T17:06:00.002+08:00

As Muammar Gadaffi's ambassadors and most of Libya's UN mission resign, two air force pilots escape rather than obey orders

Source: guardian.co.uk
John Hooper in Rome and Ian Black

Two civilian helicopters, which landed without authorisation after leaving Libya, at Malta International Airport. Photograph: Darrin Zammit Lupi/Reuters

Two high-ranking Libyan air force pilots have who fled to Malta in their aircraft are reported to have told officials they escaped rather than carry out orders to bomb civilians.

The officers defected as Libyan diplomats in several countries and international organisations resigned in protest at the regime's violent response to the deepening crisis. They included Muammar Gaddafi's ambassadors to China, India, Indonesia and Poland, as well as Libya's representative to the Arab League and most, if not all, of its mission at the United Nations.

Omar Jelban, head of the London People's Bureau, flatly denied an al-Jazeera report he too had quit. Jelban was earlier called to the Foreign Office to hear what William Hague, the foreign secretary, called "our absolute condemnation of the use of lethal force against demonstrators".

The two Mirage F1 jets touched down in Malta after the pilots said they urgently needed to refuel and sought emergency clearance to land. The Times of Malta reported on its website the pilots had told officials they flew to the island after being ordered to bomb protesters occupying Libya's second-biggest city of Benghazi.

One report said they had also brought with them two other members of the Libyan armed forces. The pilots – both colonels – said that, after taking off from Okba Ben Nafi base, they flew low through Libyan air space to avoid radar detection.

The pilots were being questioned by Maltese police who were also trying to identify seven other people who landed from Libya in two civilian helicopters shortly before the arrival of the jets. The helicopters took off from Libya without official clearance and a source in Malta said they appeared to have been in haste, with only one of the seven people aboard carrying a passport.

All seven said they were French. The helicopters' passengers said they were working on an oil platform off Benghazi when the violence in Libya erupted.

The two military jets were at Malta international airport near Valletta, away from the commercial area.

A spokesman for Libya's delegation at the UN told Reuters its members had declared their allegiance to Libya's people, not the government. The spokesman, Dia al-Hotmani, said: "The members of the Libyan mission are representing only the Libyan people and not anyone else."

The deputy UN ambassador told the BBC: "All the Libyan people want Gaddafi to go." Other members of the UN mission had said they were resigning to support anti-government protesters: "We are aware that this will put our families back home in danger, but they are in danger anyway," said member Adam Tarbah.

In New Delhi, Ali al-Essawi accused his government of deploying foreign mercenaries against protesters. And three local employees of the Libyan embassy in Sweden said they had quit in protest.

"It would be hypocritical to assist the Libyan government while we see them attacking people in the streets," said Sayed Jalabi.

Source: guardian.co.uk

Top Sunni cleric says army should kill Kadhafi

2011-02-22T17:02:00.002+08:00

Source: AFP
AFP

Yusuf al-Qaradawi (AFP)

DOHA — Influential Muslim cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi issued a fatwa on Monday that any Libyan soldier who can shoot dead embattled leader Moamer Kadhafi should do so "to rid Libya of him."

"Whoever in the Libyan army is able to shoot a bullet at Mr Kadhafi should do so," Qaradawi, an Egyptian-born cleric who is usually based in Qatar, told Al-Jazeera television.

He also told Libyan soldiers "not to obey orders to strike at your own people," and urged Libyan ambassadors around the world to dissociate themselves from Kadhafi's regime.

Famous in the Middle East for his at times controversial fatwas, or religious edicts, the octogenarian Qaradawi has celebrity status in the Arab world thanks to his religious broadcasts on Al-Jazeera.

He has in the past defended "violence carried out by certain Muslims."

The West accuses the cleric of supporting "terrorism" because he sanctioned Palestinian suicide attacks in Israel. Britain and the United States have refused to grant him entry visas.

The cleric, spiritual leader of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood and longtime resident of Qatar, heads the International Union for Muslim Scholars.

Source: AFP

GAME OVER BROTHER MUAMMAR

2011-02-22T16:58:00.002+08:00

Source: Intifada
Sami Moubayed

Muammar Gaddafi reportedly went into severe depression when his long-time friend and colleague, Saddam Hussain, was toppled by US troops in 2003. Gaddafi’s U-turn was quick — he immediately opened his country to United Nations inspectors, turned a new page with the US, and formally took the blame for the infamous 1988 Lockerbie bombings, agreeing to pay up to $2.7 billion (Dh9.90 billion) to the families of the 270 victims.

The same cannot be said for the more than 200 Libyan citizens who were murdered in cold blood over the past week of demonstrations that have swept Libya, picking up a contagious momentum that started in Tunisia last January.

If the lives of the Lockerbie victims were worth nearly $10 million each, those of Gaddafi’s own citizens are seemingly worth nothing — as far as the Libyan leadership is concerned.

Gaddafi, strangely enough, did not see it coming and still refuses to believe that his time has run out. When addressing the people of Tunisia days after Zine Al Abidine Bin Ali — another friend and colleague — was toppled from the presidency by a popular revolt in January, Gaddafi said that such things don’t happen in Libya “because people are the ones who govern!”

It was a classic case of a leader blinded by power, who has been around for too long, and who seemingly believes the many stories, or should we say lies, that he has fed his people for 42 unbearable years.

One of them is that he is not president of Libya, but “Big Brother Muammar”. Another is that Libya is a democracy that is run by the people, known as popular committees.

The 69-year-old Gaddafi also probably believed that after restoring his relations with the US, portraying himself as a strategic ally in the war on terror after 9-11, and silencing all opposition at home, it was impossible for an ‘Egypt scenario’ to be repeated in Libya.

When it did, Gaddafi showed his true colours, this time, refusing to believe that it was ‘Game over Brother Muammar’.

The images coming out of Libya — where there is no international media covering the massacre — are horrendous. What is uglier than the bloodbath is the haunting silence of Libyan officialdom.

Over 200 people have reportedly been killed and the local morgue in Benghazi and Al Bayda can no longer accommodate the rising death toll. Prisons have been invaded in the chaos, and thousands of criminals have been set free to loot Libyan homes.

Gaddafi has hired African mercenaries to come and kill his own countrymen, and is already using all kinds of weapons, ranging from machine guns on helicopters to cannon fire, to kill young Libyans.

He has cleaned gasoline out of Benghazi to make sure that demonstrators cannot commute to Tripoli. The waters of Benghazi have reportedly been contaminated by his men, and there is a fear he will resort to chemical weapons against groups that have taken the name ‘Grandsons of Omar Al Mukhtar’.

Gaddafi cannot understand how much the world has changed since he came to power four decades ago, and yet, how some things never change. It was street power, after all, that helped him bring down the ageing monarch Idris II back in 1969. The young demonstrators he is killing today are of the same age he had been (only 27) when he decided to impose “regime change” on his country.

The young men and women back then and now, are fed up with nepotism, corruption, and autocracy. Bin Ali tried to silence the demonstration by force but fell 29 days later. Former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak — yet another Gaddafi friend and colleague — lasted for only 18 days.

What Gaddafi is probably thinking is that he can muscle down the Libyan street, forcing it into submission if maximum pain is inflicted on anybody who opposes him.

Gaddafi probably thinks that after surviving the April 1986 US raid on Libya, where many civilians were killed (including his adopted daughter), and the gripping sanctions of the 1990s, he can probably survive anything else.

The man has survived every US president since Richard Nixon, and if people thought Mubarak had been around for way too long, Gaddafi has outlived three Egyptian presidents.

Gaddafi has recently been re-branded as a “friend of the West” receiving former British prime minister Tony Blair, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice.

He has failed to digest that western friendships do not really matter when the curtain falls. The adventurer in him — who refuses to cope with changes of the 21st century — will probably stay in power until either arrested in a military coup or harmed by a Libyan demonstrator, who one day, may storm his palace — as the 1958 case of Iraq’s prime minister Nouri Al Said being murdered by the mob.

He will continue to fire until then, regardless of the death toll or public opinion, and will never flee like Bin Ali, or resign like Mubarak.

Source: Intifada

Gaddafi's son Seif wounded in gunfire, dictator has fled: Muslim Brotherhood

2011-02-22T16:49:00.002+08:00

Source: International Business Times
By IB Times Staff Reporter

Saif al-Islam, son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, speaks during an address on state television in Tripoli, in this still image taken from video, February 20, 2011 (Photo: REUTERS)

Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi’s son Seif al-Islam Gaddafi, who has been leading the campaign to quell the popular uprising that has reportedly led to the fleeing of his father, has been wounded in gunfire, the Muslim Brotherhood has said citing unofficial reports. The report also says Gaddafi, his wife and daughter have fled the country.

The frontline Egyptian Opposition group that took an active role in the ouster of Hosni Mubarak, said in its website on Monday that 38-year-old Seif al-Islam, the second son of Gaddafi, has been wounded in gunfire, but gave no further details.

"Unofficial reports proliferating that Seif al-Islam Gaddafi wounded by gunfire, while his father has fled with his wife and daughter," the website said in a terse report on the unfolding events in Libya, where more than 200 people have been reportedly killed ever since anti-government protests erupted last week.

Rumors have been rife over the weekend that the flashy dictator, who has been in power for more than 41 years, has run away to Venezuela.

If true, the latest piece of information points to the failure of Gaddafi clan's attempt to quell the popular revolt on behalf of their father.

Seif al-Islam, who was appointed by Gaddafi as General Coordinator in 2009, warned over the weekend that a "civil war" was imminent in the country and that the country would see "rivers of blood" if violence continued.

Seif, who earned a PhD from the London School of Economics, is seen as a moderate figure in the Gaddafi household and has been active as a human rights advocate.

Source: International Business Times

Death Toll Soars in Bahrain as Protesters Attacked Near Hospital

2011-02-22T00:23:00.003+08:00

Doctors Report Army Snipers in the Streets as Police Block Medics

Source: AntiWar.com
By Jason Ditz

Bahraini MPs (nearly half of whom resigned yesterday) are calling again for the immediate ouster of the monarchy and the entire government as what started as peaceful protests on Friday turned into yet another bloodbath.

The protesters were marching on the hospital, where hundreds of wounded were taken after the overnight massacre in Pearl Square, when they were met on a residential street by a large number of military forces, including tanks, who opened fire using live rounds just 300 meters from the hospital.

This led to another influx of wounded into the already overwhelmed hospital, before the military and police decided to start blocking the medical teams from bringing in additional casualties. This has left scores if not hundreds of victims in the streets, within visual range of the nation’s largest hospital but with no hope of the hospital’s crews reaching them.

Doctors reported that amongst the hundreds of new casualties most were shot in the head or chest, and that a large number of the wounds appear consistent with sniper attack. The overall death toll of today’s attacks is unclear, of course, with large numbers of bodies still in the streets, but the hospitals have confirmed at least 10 additional dead so far.

Source: AntiWar.com

Report: Egypt has approved Iran warships to use Suez Canal

2011-02-22T00:17:00.002+08:00

This would be first time since Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution that Iranian ships have used Suez; U.S. says they are monitoring the ships and criticize Iran's 'track record' in the region.

Source: HAARETZ.com
By News Agencies

The Suez Canal. Photo by: AP

Egypt has approved the passage of two Iranian warships through the Suez Canal, a source said on Friday, a move that Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman described as "provocative".

"Egypt has agreed to the passage of two Iranian ships through the Suez Canal," the security source told Reuters.

State TV and the official news agency subsequently reported the news, without citing sources. An army source earlier said the Defense Ministry was considering a request by the Iranians to allow the naval ships to cross the strategic waterway.

Iranian officials have said that the request is in line with international regulations.

The United States is monitoring the possible transit of the Iranian ships and does not believe Iran has behaved responsibly in the region, the White House said on Friday.

White House spokesman Jay Carney, briefing reporters on an Air Force One flight from California to Oregon, said, "We're monitoring that, obviously."

"But we also would say that Iran does not have a great track record of responsible behavior in the region," he said.

It is believed to be the first time since Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution that Iranian warships are attempting to pass through the Suez Canal, which links the Red Sea and the Mediterranean.

Iranian officials have said the two vessels, currently in international waters, are headed to Syria for training.

Egypt has been run by an army-led transition government since last week's ouster of President Hosni Mubarak in a popular uprising. Iran's request could pose the first diplomatic dilemma for Egypt's new rulers.

A Suez Canal official said Egypt can only deny transit through the waterway in case of war.

Earlier this week, Lieberman said Iran's attempt to send warships through the canal is a provocation.

"To my regret, the international community is not showing readiness to deal with the recurring Iranian provocations. The international community must understand that Israel cannot forever ignore these provocations," the foreign minister said.

Israel considers Iran an existential threat because of its disputed nuclear program, ballistic missile development, support for militants in the region and its threats to destroy Israel.

Israel has accused Syria and Iran in the past of paying for and smuggling weapons to the Lebanese Shi'ite group, Hezbollah, which fought a war with Israel in 2006.

Source: HAARETZ.com

Egypt protests draw largest crowd yet in defiance of Mubarak regime

2011-02-10T00:24:00.003+08:00

Hundreds of thousands of protesters across Egypt in biggest show of defiance to Mubarak since revolt began.

Source: Middle East Online
By Guillaume Lavallee - CAIRO

Getting stronger and stronger

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators flooded Cairo's iconic Tahrir Square and towns across Egypt on Tuesday, in the biggest show of defiance to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak since the revolt began.

In Cairo, the immense crowd hailed as a hero a charismatic cyberactivist and Google executive whose Facebook site helped kickstart the protest movement on January 25 and who has since been detained and held blindfolded for 12 days.

Many protesters carried the symbols of the Internet social networks Facebook and Twitter, which have become vital mobilising tools for the opposition thanks to online campaigners like Google executive Wael Ghonim.

"I like to call it the Facebook Revolution but after seeing the people right now, I would say this is the Egyptian people's revolution. It's amazing," he said, after he was mobbed by adoring supporters in the crowd.

"Egyptians deserve a better life. Today one of those dreams has actually come true, which is actually putting all of us together and as one hand believing in something," he said.

Ghonim has become a hero to many in the protest movement, having started one of its most popular Facebook sites and been seized by the regime on January 27.

"I'm not a hero, you are the heroes, you're the ones who stayed on this square," Ghonim told the crowd that surged around him, many weeping, clapping and shouting: "Long live Egypt, long live Egypt!"

Earlier, the regime had issued a decree forming a committee to oversee constitutional changes ahead of elections due later this year.

"The president welcomed the national consensus, confirming we are on the right path to getting out of the current crisis," said Vice President Omar Suleiman, whom many now see as the effective power behind the throne.

"A clear road map has been put in place with a set timetable to realise a peaceful and organised transfer of power," he promised, in a televised address.

The vice president has begun meeting representatives of some opposition parties -- including the powerful Muslim Brotherhood, but not some of the street protest groups -- to draw up plans for a democratic transition.

Mubarak has vowed not to stand for re-election in September, but opposition groups say any vote to replace the 82-year-old strongman would not be fair under Egypt's current constitution.

While larger crowds gather daily to protest, several thousand occupy Tahrir Square day and night, sleeping under plastic sheets or under army tanks.

"Patriotic songs about the country used to sound exaggerated, but we own the country now," said 34-year-old doctor Issam Shebana, who came back from Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates to staff a makeshift clinic in the square.

"Yesterday, one man in his 60s said: 'We were cowards. We kept quiet all these years, but you've done it.' It's inspiring. It's a rebirth," he said. "I never thought I'd sleep on asphalt with rain on my face and feel happy."

On Monday, Mubarak tried to buy time, pledging to raise public sector wages by 15 percent and ordering a probe into deadly violence that has left at least 300 people dead in the course of 15 days of protests.

"They announced a pay increase. They are trying to fool us. This is a political bribe to silence people," snorted 36-year-old demonstrator Mohammed Nizar as he queued patiently to join the crowds in Tahrir.

There have been reports Mubarak could seek medical leave in Germany, but Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said: "I am not currently aware of such a request and therefore see no reason ... to contribute to the speculation."

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said it was "critical" the Egyptian government fulfil its promises and move ahead with an orderly democratic transition after days of mass street protests.

Western capitals have generally stopped short of calling for Mubarak to go, urging instead cautious reforms, but French Defence Minister Alain Juppe said it was now time to "bet on the emergence of democratic forces".

Source: Middle East Online

Saudi consultative council likely to debate allowing women to drive

2011-02-10T00:21:00.001+08:00

Saudi Arabia's consultative council will soon discuss a proposal to allow women to drive

Source: GulfNews.com
By Habib Toumi, Bureau Chief

Manama: Saudi Arabia's consultative council will soon discuss a proposal to allow women to drive, a local daily said.

The likely debate of the highly controversial issue was prompted by a petition from 128 Saudi men and women who urged Shaikh Abdullah Bin Mohammad Al Shaikh, the council chairman, to launch discussions about the right of Saudi women to obtain a driving licence and drive, Al Yawm reported.

"As there are many Saudi women who drive in other countries, they should be allowed to do the same in their own country," the petition said. "We do not think that you or any other citizen would accept to see a Saudi woman on the side of the road begging a taxi driver to take her to hospital for instance," the petitioners said in their letter to Shaikh Abdullah.

The petitioners said that the law allowing women to drive should be accompanied by a set of strict rules that stipulate harsh action against males who harass them or annoy them as they drive.

"Stringent actions should include detention and prison terms as well as high fines so that no one would dare to bother women drivers," the petition said.

Other measures include setting up driving schools for women and opening offices in the traffic buildings that would deal exclusively with women, the petitioners said.

Initial reactions to the report in the Saudi daily ranged between support for the petition to outright opposition, the daily reported this week.

Those who were against the petition said that allowing women to drive would result in new social and family problems.

"Allowing women to drive means an increase in the divorce rates, loose family ties, more expensive spare parts, new and more crimes, less commitment for Islamic values and immoral activities, " Mazen, a blogger wrote.

However, those who endorsed the call said that Saudi Arabia should not remain the only country in the world where women are not allowed to sit behind the steering wheel and that the multi-layer reforms should not exclude women.

"Women need to be allowed to drive so that they can be more self-reliant. They will not depend on others and we will not so many foreigners as drivers. Women have often proven that when they are given the appropriate chance, they deliver and perform in a highly respectable manner," Hassan Haji wrote.

Source: GulfNews.com

Cantor: Primary US Goal in Egypt to Stop ‘Radical Islam’

2011-02-10T00:14:00.002+08:00

Expresses Hope for 'Progress' in Egypt

Source: AntiWar.com
By Jason Ditz

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R – VA) declined to directly criticize President Obama for his handling of the growing protest movement in Egypt today, insisting he is “having a tough enough time as it is,” but his comments did suggest he had a different focus.

Rather than giving lip-service to democratic reforms in Egpyt and focusing on the demands of the massive opposition movement being balanced with “stability” as President Obama has, Cantor insisted the US policy in Egypt should be entirely to “stop the spread of radical Islam.”

Cantor’s comments are likely linked at the Western concern about the Muslim Brotherhood, a banned opposition faction that the US has declined to have any official contact with. The group is far from the only opposition faction in Egypt, but is a significant one.

The reason for this is largely the same reason religious factions were so powerful in the Iranian Revolution, that the banning of rival political factions leaves the mosques as one of the few places that people can openly voice dissent. Still, the Muslim Brotherhood has insisted they aren’t trying to seize power for themselves, and has ruled out fielding a candidate for president in the event Egypt has free elections.

Source: AntiWar.com

Millions against Mubarak

2011-02-03T11:23:00.003+08:00

Source: SOCIALISTWORKER.org

International Socialist Review editor Ahmed Shawki reports from Cairo on the latest mass protests against Hosni Mubarak--and what the future holds for Egypt's uprising.

Cairo's Tahrir Square is packed with protesters demanding the downfall of a dictator. (REUTERS)

MASSIVE DEMONSTRATIONS across Egypt Tuesday were followed by a televised speech by President Hosni Mubarak, but his declaration that he wouldn't run for reelection later this year after 30 years in power--apparently at the urging of U.S. government officials--won't satisfy anyone.

Essentially, Mubarak has agreed not to run in an election where no one would have voted for him anyway. The only effect this can have on the uprising will be to sharpen people's sense of determination still further.

The demonstrations today, on the eighth day of Egypt's popular uprising, were a confirmation of the unanimity that Mubarak must go. As one sign in Tahrir Square in Cairo said, "Game over, next player." That sentiment was dominant in all the crowds. But Mubarak continues to hang on, ignoring the volcano that's now erupted beneath him.

According to the media, the sizes of the protests were bigger than any of the previous days. The estimate is that some 2 million Egyptians took to the streets in Tahrir Square and the surrounding areas in Cairo. The square was just a sea of people. In the port city of Alexandria, an estimated 1.5 million marched. In another port city, Port Said, 100,000 to 120,000 people marched. In the city of Suez, by the Suez Canal, an estimated 40,000 marched--and that list doesn't include dozens and dozens of other protests all over the country.

As this article was being written, around 9 p.m. in Egypt, some 1 million people are still in Tahrir Square, or Liberation Square--several hours after the curfew, which no one is really abiding by anyway.

This is an outpouring of the pent-up frustration that millions of Egyptians feel at the rule of Hosni Mubarak. But the demonstrations have a festive feeling--an almost carnival-like atmosphere, with whole families of several generations showing up at the square during the day today.

It was a gathering of people from all walks of life--as broad a cross-section of Egyptian society as you could imagine, in terms of class, in terms of race, in terms of gender. One of the most important features was the fact that Muslims and Copts--who are Egyptian Christians--were raising the need for unity across religious lines. That's especially important after a series of anti-Coptic attacks, including a deadly attack on a Coptic church in Alexandria on January 1.

Another thing I thought was interesting at the demonstration was the association people made between Mubarak and the U.S. government. That was more muted in the first days of the protests, from reports I saw, but not today--people, for example, chanted the slogan: "Mubarak, you coward, you're a slave of the U.S."

There was also a real sense of people having taken charge of things for themselves. For example, everyone who came to Tahrir Square today was searched going in--by agreement between the organizers of the demonstration and the army, to make sure that no provocateurs with weapons were let in. So people were asked to show their national identity card, and were frisked and searched if they had any bags.

If you can imagine this taking place with so many hundreds of thousands of people who got to the square, you get an idea of the atmosphere of calm order prevailing in spite of the incredible numbers of people.

The longer the uprising goes on, the more people begin to feel a sense of their own power--of their capacity to change and control their destiny. That, of course, is an intoxicating feeling, and you see it everywhere in the streets.

A lot hangs in the balance now. Egypt will never be the same--nor will the rest of the Middle East, nor the rest of the world.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

YESTERDAY, MUBARAK swore in a new cabinet after firing the whole government last week. It was the absurd act of a ruler whose time is done.

Everybody agrees that there's no future for the regime. All the players--those at the top of Egyptian society, the United States and its European allies--are now concerned with how to get Mubarak out. But of course, each of the different forces has different solutions and different interests in mind.

Sections of the Egyptian ruling class, as well as the army, indicated more clearly today that they think Mubarak should step down. For example, a well-known and extremely wealthy Egyptian capitalist named Naguib Sawiris, the owner of the mobile phone company Mobinil, today hinted that Mubarak should go.

Yesterday, the army chiefs came on television and announced that the army wouldn't fire on protesters, or block the demonstrators today from exercising their right to peacefully assemble.

And today, state-controlled television showed scenes from Tahrir Square--to the cheers of people in the offices of left-wing activists who I was visiting at the time. It's an unheard-of event that a protest in Egypt is actually reported about in Egypt. And there were reports tonight that at Tahrir Square, state television actually showed up to interview people on the street for the first time since the events began to unfold.

All of which shows that even the country's elite understand what everyone on the street already knows--that the Mubarak regime is finished.

But what comes between being finished and Mubarak actually leaving office is the big question, and that's where the speech tonight comes in.

Mubarak promised that he wouldn't run for reelection in the vote scheduled for September--still more than half a year away. The people in Tahrir Square booed and jeered Mubarak's words as they were broadcast. They listened to him say, in effect, "I know how you feel, but you've been infiltrated, and you're being manipulated." That will satisfy no one.

So the question is: Why was this proposed? Before the speech, word leaked out that Barack Obama had called on Mubarak not to run for reelection, but nothing more. Why did the U.S. go along with something that so clearly wouldn't be accepted by the demonstrators? To save face for Mubarak? Is he really worth it to them?

Of course, one thing that's gained is that Mubarak and the U.S. show they won't give in to popular demand--they won't allow the example of the U.S. and its allies being dictated to by mass protest.

Another possibility is that this is an attempt to separate moderates--to create a cleavage among opponents of Mubarak. If they were able to get an agreement from a moderate leader like Mohamed ElBaradai to say that Mubarak's speech wasn't everything we wanted, but now it's time for orderly constitutional change, and we should wait until September, that might begin the process of isolating more radical elements.

That's a possibility. But so far, all the commentators responding to the speech have said it's not enough. If Mubarak offered this five days ago, it might have worked. But now the situation has gone beyond that.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

FROM THE point of view of those who supported Mubarak for 30 years and who now understand this support can no longer be maintained--most obviously, the U.S. government--the chief concern is how to ensure a "stable transition."

They need a transition that satisfies the mass demonstrations and demobilizes them, but that ensures a status quo without Mubarak, where the broader questions of democratization and inequality--of how Egypt is run, and who by--are avoided, while somebody is brought in as a transitional figure. Even a couple days ago, that was obviously Hillary Clinton's view already, and the push to get Mubarak out of the way has continued to grow.

So why hasn't Mubarak stepped down?

There are many possible explanations. One is his basic mental sanity. Another is that he's been the ruler of Egypt for 30 years, and like Louis XIV in France, he thinks "L'état, c'est moi"--that Egypt is him, and without him, the country itself wouldn't hold together.

But there are other questions. He may also be worrying about what happened to his cohort from Tunisia, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who fled last month after 23 years in power, went to Saudi Arabia, and discovered he was going to be pursued for the crimes he committed while ruling Tunisia--which is why Ben Ali has reportedly left Saudi Arabia and taken up a new home in Libya.

The situation is contradictory. Everybody knows that Mubarak and his immediate allies are finished. Yet they continue to exert some influence, and even seem to be digging in. For example, one of the few places where the Internet was still functioning in Egypt was a luxury hotel downtown called the Semiramis--but that was turned off today. The offices of Al Jazeera were shut down. These are all signs of Mubarak's attempt to maintain a foothold.

There are also rumors that members of the hated police are reappearing and attempting to act as provocateurs in certain areas, after being driven off the streets in the opening days of the demonstrations. The strategy is to let the country descend into chaos. That's helped along by a number of gangs that have marauded around neighborhoods--it's meant to create a sense of crisis, to which the government and presumably the army can step in and justify both a crackdown and a cleanup.

The problem for the regime is that the attempts at creating chaos appear, in the main, to have been thwarted so far by popularly mobilized neighborhood committees--which, in the absence of any police at all, began to take up the defense of people's homes, small businesses and so on.

There are now checkpoints all over Egypt, but unlike previous checkpoints run by police, these checkpoints are run by local popular committees. Driving anywhere in the city after curfew, you're bound to meet one or another checkpoint. But you're let through, if there's a reason for you to be in that neighborhood.

It's not clear exactly what's happening in every neighborhood. But the reports that I've managed to get are that in a great number of working class areas, it's much more of a festive atmosphere. People have essentially set up popular militia committees, which are armed with whatever people can get, from pipes to baseball bats to knives, so they can defend themselves from the police and any threat by gangs of looters and the like.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

OVERALL, THE transformation is amazing. Two weeks ago, I was in Cairo for family reasons. The regime in Tunisia had just been overthrown, and I overheard an American tourist talking on her cell phone and saying, "No, don't worry, I think this one is more stable."

I actually tended to agree with that opinion. I left a few days before the protests began on January 25, and following events from the U.S., I couldn't believe the rapidity of the change.

It's even more obvious now that I'm back in Cairo--the enthusiasm and sense of spirits lifted is obvious, just in the way people comport themselves. After I returned from Tahrir Square today, I saw one of the television commentators remark on how there was hardly a fight or an act of violence at the demonstration, despite the massive numbers and the very, very tightly packed crowds. That was definitely true--it was another sign of the carnival atmosphere.

It's difficult to predict where this will end. There could still be a deal cooked up by the U.S.--which sent a diplomat, Frank Wisner, to meet with Mubarak today--to have him step aside, in spite of the speech tonight. But I still don't rule out the possibility of an attempt by the Mubarak regime to reestablish itself by force.

If it attempts to do so using the army, however, there are big questions. The army presence is very strong in Cairo, but its forces have been on the streets for five or six days, and it's not acting as a hostile force--at least in terms of rank-and-file soldiers. That's not to say that the army isn't a hostile force--just that there's been considerable fraternization going on.

I think movement toward an arrangement that pushes Mubarak aside is more likely, if only because as the protests continue, they have a spillover effect. Also today, Jordan's King Abdullah fired his government and appointed a new prime minister after weeks of protests--which is exactly what Mubarak did in the early days of the demonstrations here, to no effect whatsoever. And already, according to reports, there are demonstrations in Jordan demanding further change.

These are momentous events, and we've only seen the start. We're just at the beginning of what are likely to be even bigger transformations. Imagine, for example, the impact of Mubarak finally stepping aside--and yet there are still the underlying questions of unemployment that affects 40 percent of youth in Egypt, of Palestinian self-determination, of the domination of the Middle East by the U.S. and the West, of the control of Middle East oil.

All that hangs in the balance, and it's forcing everyone involved to think through new strategies. For those of us who have wanted to see the end of the Mubarak regime for many years, our first step is to celebrate the uprising and continue to push as hard as we can--in Egypt and everywhere else--for the downfall of the dictatorship. But we also know that we're just beginning this new struggle of the 21st century.

Transcription by Christine Darosa and Karen Domínguez Burke

Source: SOCIALISTWORKER.org

Robert Fisk: Secular and devout. Rich and poor. They marched together with one goal

2011-02-03T11:17:00.004+08:00

Source: The Independent

Childrenwave Egyptian flags atop an armoured vehicle on the edge of Tahrir Square in Cairo yesterday. (AP)

It was a victory parade – without the victory. They came in their hundreds of thousands, joyful, singing, praying, a great packed mass of Egypt, suburb by suburb, village by village, waiting patiently to pass through the "people's security" checkpoints, draped in the Egyptian flag of red, white and black, its governess eagle a bright gold in the sunlight. Were there a million? Perhaps. Across the country there certainly were. It was, we all agreed, the largest political demonstration in the history of Egypt, the latest heave to rid this country of its least-loved dictator. Its only flaw was that by dusk – and who knew what the night would bring – Hosni Mubarak was still calling himself "President" of Egypt.

Mubarak ended the day as expected, appearing on television to announce that he will hang on until the next election – a promise that will not be accepted by the people he claims to love. The people of Egypt were originally told this was to be "the march of the million" to the Kuba Palace, Mubarak's official state pile, or to the man's own residence in Heliopolis. But so vast was the crowd that the organisers, around 24 opposition groups, decided the danger of attacks from the state security police were too great. They claimed later they had discovered a truck load of armed men close to Tahrir Square. All I could find were 30 Mubarak supporters shouting their love of Egypt outside the state radio headquarters under the guard of more than 40 soldiers.

The cries of loathing for Mubarak are becoming familiar, the posters ever more intriguing. "Neither Mubarak, nor Suleiman, and we don't need you Obama – but we don't dislike USA," one of them announced generously. "Out – all of you, including your slaves," announced another. I did actually find a decaying courtyard covered in rectangular sheets of white cloth where political scribes could spray-paint their own slogans for 40 pence a time. The tea-houses behind Talat Harb's statue were crammed with drinkers, discussing Egypt's new politics with the passion of one of Delacroix's orientalist paintings. You could soak this stuff up all day, revolution in the making. Or was this an uprising? Or an "explosion", as one Egyptian journalist described the demonstration to me?

There were several elements about this unprecedented political event that stood out. First was the secularism of the whole affair. Women in chadors and niqabs and scarves walked happily beside girls with long hair flowing over their shoulders, students next to imams and men with beards that would have made Bin Laden jealous. The poor in torn sandals and the rich in business suits, squeezed into this shouting mass, an amalgam of the real Egypt hitherto divided by class and regime-encouraged envy. They had done the impossible – or so they thought – and, in a way, they had already won their social revolution.

And then there was the absence of the "Islamism" that haunts the darkest corners of the West, encouraged – as usual – by America and Israel. As my mobile phone vibrated again and again, it was the same old story. Every radio anchor, every announcer, every newsroom wanted to know if the Muslim Brotherhood was behind this epic demonstration. Would the Brotherhood take over Egypt? I told the truth. It was rubbish. Why, they might get only 20 per cent at an election, 145,000 members out of a population of 80 million.

A crowd of English-speaking Egyptians crowded round me during one of the imperishable interviews and collapsed in laughter so loud that I had to bring the broadcast to an end. It made no difference, of course, when I explained on air that Israel's kindly and human Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman – who once said that "Mubarak can go to hell" – might at last get his way, politically at least. The people were overwhelmed, giddy at the speed of events.

So was I. There I was, back on the intersection behind the Egyptian Museum where only five days ago – it feels like five months – I choked on tear gas as Mubarak's police thugs, the baltigi, the drug addict ex-prisoner cops, were slipped through the lines of state security policemen to beat, bludgeon and smash the heads and faces of the unarmed demonstrators, who eventually threw them all out of Tahrir Square and made it the Egyptian uprising. Back then, we heard no Western support for these brave men and women. Nor did we hear it yesterday.

Amazingly, there was little evidence of hostility towards America although, given the verbal antics of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton these past eight days, there might have well been. One almost felt sorry for Obama. Had he rallied to the kind of democracy he preached here in Cairo six months after his investiture, had he called for the departure of this third-rate dictator a few days ago, the crowds would have been carrying US as well as Egyptian flags, and Washington would have done the impossible: it would have transformed the now familiar hatred of America (Afghanistan, Iraq, the "war on terror", etc) into the more benign relationship which the US enjoyed in the balmy 1920s and 1930s and, indeed, despite its support for the creation of Israel, into the warmth that existed between Arab and American into the 1960s.

But no. All this was squandered in just seven days of weakness and cowardice in Washington – a gutlessness so at odds with the courage of the millions of Egyptians who tried to do what we in the West always demanded of them: to turn their dust-bowl dictatorships into democracies. They supported democracy. We supported "stability", "moderation", "restraint", "firm" leadership (Saddam Hussein-lite) soft "reform" and obedient Muslims.

This failure of moral leadership in the West – under the false fear of "Islamisation" – may prove to be one of the greatest tragedies of the modern Middle East. Egypt is not anti-Western. It is not even particularly anti-Israeli, though this could change. But one of the blights of history will now involve a US president who held out his hand to the Islamic world and then clenched his fist when it fought a dictatorship and demanded democracy.

This tragedy may continue in the coming days as the US and Europe give their support to Mubarak's chosen successor, the chief spy and Israeli negotiator, Vice-President Omar Suleiman. He has called, as we all knew he would, for talks with "all factions" – he even contrived to sound a bit like Obama. But everyone in Egypt knows that his administration will be another military junta which Egyptians will again be invited to trust to ensure the free and fair elections which Mubarak never gave them. Is it possible – is it conceivable – that Israel's favourite Egyptian is going to give these millions the freedom and democracy they demand?

Or that the army which so loyally guarded them today will give such uncritical support to that democracy when it receives $1.3bn a year from Washington? This military machine, which has not fought a war for almost 38 years, is under-trained and over-armed, with largely obsolete equipment – though its new M1A1 tanks were on display yesterday – and deeply embedded in the corporation of big business, hotels and housing complexes, all rewards to favourite generals by the Mubarak regime.

And what were the Americans doing? Rumour: US diplomats were on their way to Egypt to negotiate between a future President Suleiman and opposition groups. Rumour: extra Marines were being drafted into Egypt to defend the US embassy from attack. Fact: Obama finally told Mubarak to go. Fact: a further evacuation of US families from the Marriott Hotel in Cairo, escorted by Egyptian troops and cops, heading for the airport, fleeing from a people who could so easily be their friends.

Source: The Independent

Iran asks Egypt to meet public demands

2011-01-29T19:21:00.000+08:00

Source: PressTV

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast has called on political leaders in Egypt to follow the “rightful demands” of their people.

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast

“Iran expects Egyptian officials to listen to the voice of their Muslim people, respond to their rightful demands and refrain from exerting violence by security forces and police against an Islamic wave of awareness that has spread through the country in form of a popular movement,” Mehmanparast said Saturday.

He further pointed out that Tehran attaches great importance to the fulfillment of public demands in Egypt and added, “Iran regards demonstrations by the Muslim people of this country as a justice-seeking movement in line with their national-religious demands.”

Mehmanparast went on to say that the Islamic Republic of Iran is “closely following up and monitoring developments in Egypt.”

Clashes have been continuing between government forces and opposition protesters in Egypt for the fifth day.

Dozens of people have been killed in street battles since the demonstrations started on Tuesday. Reports say over 20 people have been killed in the city of Alexandria alone. Some one thousand others have been wounded.

The protesters want Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to end his 30-year rule.

The protesters say they have been emboldened by the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, which saw the overthrow of President Zein El Adbdin Ben Ali.

Mubarak on Friday night ordered the cabinet to step down and pledged to work for more democracy and press ahead with social, economic and political reforms.

He expressed regret over the loss of innocent lives during the anti-government demonstrations but defended the role of government forces in the violent crackdown on protesters.

AR/MGH/HRF

Source: PressTV

Clashes in Alexandria kill 23 Egyptians

2011-01-29T19:17:00.001+08:00

Source: PressTV

At least 23 Egyptian protesters have been killed during clashes with police in the port city of Alexandria as the explosion of anger at President Hosni Mubarak continues to rock the country.

On Saturday, medical sources stated that 23 protesters have lost their lives in streets fighting with police forces in the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria, while 13 people were killed and 75 others injured in the flash point city of Suez, along the strategic Suez Canal, where protesters torched a fire station and looted weapons that they then turned on police earlier on Thursday.

According to medical sources, at least 1,030 protesters have so far been injured as mass protests remain unabated across the country for a fourth consecutive day.

The fall-out comes after a curfew from 6 p.m. to 7 a.m. was imposed on Friday in Cairo, Suez and Alexandria.

Inspired by the recent popular revolution in Tunisia, which resulted in the historic overthrow of the country's President Zine El Abidin Ben Ali, Egyptians have staged similar anti-government protests since Tuesday, calling on Mubarak to relinquish power after three decades in office.

At least five people were killed in Cairo and two in Mansura, north of the capital on Friday, with many fatalities caused by rubber-coated bullets, medics and witnesses said.

On Friday, Mubarak sacked his cabinet and called for national dialogue in an attempt to staunch the flow of public outcry over poverty, high unemployment rates and rampant corruption.

Meanwhile, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon called for an end to violence in Egypt and urged the government to respect freedom of speech.

HA/HRF

Source: PressTV

Paris 'Muslim Batman' angers rightwing US bloggers

2011-01-29T19:15:00.001+08:00

Source: Middle East Online
By Rory Mulholland - PARIS

Rightwing bloggers in US furious that DC Comics chose to make their new superhero a Muslim.

A fictional character threatening the fictional world of rightwing bloggers.

Batman has battled many enemies but now has to face the anger of rightwing US bloggers furious that the comic book caped crusader has recruited a Muslim to run his crime-fighting franchise in Paris.

"The character’s name is Bilal Asselah and he is an Algerian Sunni Muslim and an immigrant that is physically fit and adept at the gymnastic sport parkour," wrote Warner Todd Huston on his site Publius Forum.

"Apparently Batman couldn't find any actual Frenchman to be the 'French saviour'," wrote the rightwinger, apparently discounting the millions of French citizens of North African descent from his definition of "actual" French.

In the December issues of DC Comics Detective Comics Annual and Batman Annual, the caped crusader has set up Batman Incorporated and wants to install a superhero in cities around the world to fight crime.

The hero he picks in France is called Nightrunner, the alter ego of a 22-year-old from Clichy-sous-Bois, a tough Paris suburb where urban unrest sparked riots in immigrant districts across France in 2005.

Bilal Asselah, a Frenchman of Algerian origin, was caught up in that unrest and at one point he and his friend got beaten up by police who mistook them for rioters.

Bilal's friend reacted by later burning down a police station and ended up being killed by police.

But Bilal, thanks largely to the influence of his pious Muslim mother, rejects hate and fear.

He concentrates on learning parkour, the form of acrobatics where practitioners jump from buildings and leap over walls and street furniture, as spectacularly seen at the start of the 2006 James Bond film "Casino Royale."

When riots again threaten to engulf his neighbourhood, Bilal puts on a mask and, using his parkour skills, becomes Nightrunner and sets out to set things right again.

Nightrunner's integrity, athletic prowess, and triumph over personal adversity made him Bruce Wayne's obvious choice to represent Batman in Paris.

But rightwing bloggers in the United States, who are also upset over plans for a black actor to play the Norse God Thor in an upcoming blockbuster movie, are incensed that DC Comics chose to make their new superhero a Muslim.

They see it as pandering to political correctness.

"Unfortunately, readers of Batman will not be helped to understand what troubles are really besetting France," wrote Huston on Publius Forum.

"In this age when Muslim youths are terrorizing the entire country, heck in this age of international Muslim terrorism assaulting the whole world, Batman’s readers will be confused by what is really going on in the world.

"Through it all DC makes a Muslim in France a hero when French Muslims are at the center of some of the worst violence in the country’s recent memory," he wrote.

The Angry White Dude blog, which described Islam as the "religion of murder," mocked that "Nightrunner the Muslim sidekick will have strange new powers to bury women to their waists and bash their heads in with large rocks."

US comic book creator Bosch Fawstin, who wrote on his blog that "DC Comics has submitted to Islam," is coming up with his own antidote.

"If you’re as sick and tired of this IslamiCrap as I am, be on the lookout for my upcoming graphic novel, The Infidel, which features Pigman, an ex-Muslim superhero who is the jihadist’s worst nightmare," he blogged.

DC comics did not respond to an AFP request for an interview with David Hine, the writer of the album featuring Nightrunner, and declined to comment on the controversy.

But the British-born author told a US website that he had tried to "come up with the kind of hero I would want to see in a comic book if I were French."

"The urban unrest and problems of the ethnic minorities under (President Nicolas) Sarkozy’s government dominate the news from France and it became inevitable that the hero should come from a French Algerian background," he told the Death and Taxes site.

The mini-storm on the English-language blogosphere -- where left-leaning or pro-Islam sites are attacking the rightwingers for their hostility to a Muslim superhero -- has so far only sparked a tiny number of reactions on French-language websites.

The albums went on sale here last month but the small numbers stocked were quickly sold out, book stores said.

Source: Middle East Online

Poll results challenge Huntington’s 'clash of civilisations' theory

2011-01-29T19:09:00.004+08:00

Source: Middle East Online
By Sara Reef – NEW YORK

Vast majority of polled individuals in Muslim and Western countries believe greater interaction would benefit rather than threat.

Half of Muslims believe the West does not respect Muslim societies.

The vast majority of individuals in both Muslim-majority and Western countries surveyed in a recent poll believe greater interaction between them would be a benefit rather than a threat. In fact, an average of 59 per cent of people across 48 countries says it’s advantageous.

These findings are part of a new report, “Measuring the State of Muslim-West Relations: Assessing the ‘New Beginning’”, released this past November by the Abu Dhabi Gallup Center, which surveyed over 100,000 respondents from 2006 to 2010 and across 55 countries. This report challenges political scientist Samuel Huntington’s “clash of civilisations” theory by showing that the majority of people in countries surveyed perceive Muslim-Western interaction as a benefit, rather than a threat.

The report reveals that half of Muslims believe the West does not respect Muslim societies and to do so, it should abstain from desecrating religious symbols. They also want to see more Muslim characters featured accurately in movies, which is surprising because it demonstrates the power of film in contributing toward increasing respect between Muslim societies and Americans.

Perhaps most importantly, researchers say religion and politics play a key role in determining individuals’ desire to engage.

Forty per cent of Muslims surveyed in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region believe political differences are the primary cause of Muslim-Western tensions, and are more likely to believe violent conflicts can be avoided. As for people in the United States and Canada, 35 per cent think political differences are the cause of such tensions while 36 percent think the cause is religious; 40 per cent of Muslims surveyed in the MENA region believe religion is the primary cause of these tensions.

Those not ready for increased interaction between the Muslim world and the West are more likely to see these tensions grounded in religious differences. Individuals who blame religion for the Muslim-Western divide are much less optimistic about avoiding conflict. According to Gallup, those individuals who blame religion as a source of tension are not ready for increased interaction, and are likely to remain so indefinitely.

The Gallup poll also shows a strong correlation between education and one’s readiness to view increased Muslim-Western interaction as a benefit. The majority of individuals with a high school or more advanced degree are likely to view increased interaction as a benefit, regardless of whether they are from a Muslim society or a Western country.

Moving forward, Gallup recommends for Muslim and Western society leaders to emphasise resolving political issues rather than religious conflicts. This should be done by creating policies that are fair to both Muslim-majority and Western countries, and take culturally appropriate differences into account. An example of this might be easing visa restrictions for students or tourists from the Muslim world that are interested in visiting the United States. This gesture would increase the number of Muslim tourists in the country, thereby enhancing cultural exchanges and promoting improved understanding.

The last section of the report focuses on perceptions of people in three acute conflict areas: Afghanistan, Iraq, and Israel and the Palestinian territories. People were asked their opinions on daily realities as well as increased Muslim-Western interactions. Gallup included in the report policy recommendations to address local needs in Iraq and Afghanistan; however, no recommendations for doing the same in Israel or the Palestinian Territories were offered. Since this conflict continues to be one of the largest tensions between Muslim societies and the United States, readers of the report would have benefited from recommendations on this issue. But it is precisely because this is such a contentious issue that Gallup may have chosen to avoid making any recommendations.

Following US President Barak Obama’s June 2009 speech in Cairo there has been an increase in Muslim-Western exchanges, such as “programs promoting entrepreneurship, student and scholarly exchanges, partnerships to eradicate disease, as well as programs to increase women’s education in majority Muslim societies.” However, sceptics believe real change has yet to occur. In early 2010, approval of US leadership decreased in several Arab countries, perhaps because Obama didn’t meet expectations of change in the Arab world.

It also makes one thing clear: although we have made some progress in improving Muslim-Western relations, there is still a lot of work to be done.

Sara Reef is Director of Cross Cultural Initiatives at Intersections International. This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews).

Source: Middle East Online

Muslims to make up quarter of global population

2011-01-29T19:00:00.001+08:00

Source: Middle East Online

Muslim population growth outpaces non-Muslims' with Pakistan to overtake Indonesia as most populous.

The world's Muslim population will grow twice as fast as the non-Muslim population in the next 20 years.

WASHINGTON - The world's Muslim population will grow twice as fast as the non-Muslim population in the next 20 years, when Muslims are expected to make up more than a quarter of the global population, a study published Thursday predicts.

Using fertility, mortality and migration rates, researchers at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life project a 1.5-percent annual population growth rate for the world's Muslims over the next two decades, and just 0.7 percent growth each year for non-Muslims.

The study, called "The Future of the Global Muslim Population," projects that in 2030 Muslims will make up 26.4 percent of the world’s population, which is expected to total around 8.3 billion people by then.

That marks a three-percentage-point rise from the 23.4-percent share held by Muslims of the globe's estimated 6.9 billion people today, the study says.

More than six in 10 followers of Islam will live in the Asia-Pacific region in 2030, and nuclear Pakistan, which has seen a rise in radical Islam in recent months, will overtake Indonesia as the world's most populous Muslim nation.

In Africa, the Muslim population of the sub-Saharan country of Nigeria will be greater than that of Egypt in 20 years, the study projects.

And in Europe, Pew predicts the Muslim population will grow by nearly a third in 20 years, from 44.1 million people, or six percent of the region's inhabitants in 2010, to 58.2 million or eight percent of the projected total population by 2030.

Some European Union (EU) countries will see double-digit percentages of Muslims in their population by 2030: Belgium's Muslim population is projected to rise from six percent to 10.2 percent over the next 20 years, while France's is expected to hit 10.3 percent in 2030, up from 7.5 percent today.

In Sweden, Pew predicts Muslims will comprise nearly 10 percent of the population compared to less than five percent today.

Britain's Muslim population is predicted to rise from 4.6 percent to 8.2 percent by 2030, and 9.3 percent of the population of Austria is forecast to be Muslim by then, compared to less than six percent of residents of the alpine country now.

Russia, which is not a member of the EU, will continue to have the largest Muslim population in absolute terms in Europe in 2030, with 18.6 million Muslims or 14.4 percent of the total population of the vast country.

The United States, meanwhile, is projected to have a larger absolute number of Muslims by 2030 than any European countries other than Russia and France, but proportionally, Muslims will make up a much smaller percentage of the population of the United States than they do in Europe.

The Muslim share of the US population is projected to grow from its current level of less than one percent to 1.7 percent by 2030, making Muslims "roughly as numerous as Jews or Episcopalians are in the United States," the study says.

Source: Middle East Online

Kenyataan YB Dato' Ibrahim Ali Di Dalam Dewan Rakyat

2011-01-06T16:22:00.006+08:00

(Dipetik dari: Penyata Rasmi Parlimen, Jilid II, Bil 67, 18 Januari 1993)

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The Islamification of Britain: record numbers embrace Muslim faith

2011-01-04T22:35:00.008+08:00

Source: The Independent UK
The number of Britons converting to Islam has doubled in 10 years. Why? Jerome Taylor and Sarah Morrison investigate

Hana Tajima, 23, fashion designer: "I became friends with a few Muslims in college, and was slightly affronted and curious at their lack of wanting to go out to clubs or socialise." (Photo: Susannah Ireland)

The number of Britons choosing to become Muslims has nearly doubled in the past decade, according to one of the most comprehensive attempts to estimate how many people have embraced Islam.

Following the global spread of violent Islamism, British Muslims have faced more scrutiny, criticism and analysis than any other religious community. Yet, despite the often negative portrayal of Islam, thousands of Britons are adopting the religion every year.

Estimating the number of converts living in Britain has always been difficult because census data does not differentiate between whether a religious person has adopted a new faith or was born into it. Previous estimates have placed the number of Muslim converts in the UK at between 14,000 and 25,000.

But a new study by the inter-faith think-tank Faith Matters suggests the real figure could be as high as 100,000, with as many as 5,000 new conversions nationwide each year.

By using data from the Scottish 2001 census – the only survey to ask respondents what their religion was at birth as well as at the time of the survey – researchers broke down what proportion of Muslim converts there were by ethnicity and then extrapolated the figures for Britain as a whole.

In all they estimated that there were 60,699 converts living in Britain in 2001. With no new census planned until next year, researchers polled mosques in London to try to calculate how many conversions take place a year. The results gave a figure of 1,400 conversions in the capital in the past 12 months which, when extrapolated nationwide, would mean approximately 5,200 people adopting Islam every year. The figures are comparable with studies in Germany and France which found that there were around 4,000 conversions a year.

Fiyaz Mughal, director of Faith Matters, admitted that coming up with a reliable estimate of the number of converts to Islam was notoriously difficult. "This report is the best intellectual 'guestimate' using census numbers, local authority data and polling from mosques," he said. "Either way few people doubt that the number adopting Islam in the UK has risen dramatically in the past 10 years."

Asked why people were converting in such large numbers he replied: "I think there is definitely a relationship between conversions being on the increase and the prominence of Islam in the public domain. People are interested in finding out what Islam is all about and when they do that they go in different directions. Most shrug their shoulders and return to their lives but some will inevitably end up liking what they discover and will convert."

Batool al-Toma, an Irish born convert to Islam of 25 years who works at the Islamic Foundation and runs the New Muslims Project, one of the earliest groups set up specifically to help converts, said she believed the new figures were "a little on the high side".

"My guess would be the real figure is somewhere in between previous estimates, which were too low, and this latest one," she said. "I definitely think there has been a noticeable increase in the number of converts in recent years. The media often tries to pinpoint specifics but the reasons are as varied as the converts themselves."

Inayat Bunglawala, founder of Muslims4UK, which promotes active Muslim engagement in British society, said the figures were "not implausible".

"It would mean that around one in 600 Britons is a convert to the faith," he said. "Islam is a missionary religion and many Muslim organisations and particularly university students' Islamic societies have active outreach programmes designed to remove popular misconceptions about the faith."

The report by Faith Matters also studied the way converts were portrayed by the media and found that while 32 per cent of articles on Islam published since 2001 were linked to terrorism or extremism, the figure jumped to 62 per cent with converts.

Earlier this month, for example, it was reported that two converts to Islam who used the noms de guerre Abu Bakr and Mansoor Ahmed were killed in a CIA drone strike in an area of Pakistan with a strong al-Qa'ida presence.

"Converts who become extremists or terrorists are, of course, a legitimate story," said Mr Mughal. "But my worry is that the saturation of such stories risks equating all Muslim converts with being some sort of problem when the vast majority are not". Catherine Heseltine, a 31-year-old convert to Islam, made history earlier this year when she became the first female convert to be elected the head of a British Muslim organisation – the Muslim Public Affairs Committee. "Among certain sections of society, there is a deep mistrust of converts," she said. "There's a feeling that the one thing worse than a Muslim is a convert because they're perceived as going over the other side. Overall, though, I think conversions arouse more curiosity than hostility."

How to become a Muslim

Islam is one of the easiest religions to convert to. Technically, all a person needs to do is recite the Shahada, the formal declaration of faith, which states: "There is no God but Allah and Mohamed is his Prophet." A single honest recitation is all that is needed to become a Muslim, but most converts choose to do so in front of at least two witnesses, one being an imam.

Converts to Islam

Hana Tajima, 23, fashion designer
Hana Tajima converted to Islam when she was 17. Frustrated by the lack of variety in Islamic clothing for converts she founded Maysaa, a fashion house that designs western-inspired clothing that conforms to hijab.

"It's true that I never decided to convert to Islam, nor was there a defining moment where I realised I wanted to be Muslim. My family aren't particularly religious. I was interested in religion, but very disinterested in how it related to my life. I grew up in rural Devon where my Japanese father was the ethnic diversity of the village. It wasn't until I studied at college that I met people who weren't of the exact same background, into Jeff Buckley, underground hip-hop, drinking, and getting high. I met and became friends with a few Muslims in college, and was slightly affronted and curious at their lack of wanting to go out to clubs or socialise in that sense. I think it was just the shock of it, like, how can you not want to go out, in this day and age.

"It was at about that time that I started to study philosophy, and without sounding too much like I dyed my hair black and wore my fringe in front of my face, I began to get confused about my life. I was pretty popular, had good friends, boyfriends, I had everything I was supposed to have, but still I felt like 'is that it?' So these things all happened simultaneously, I read more about religion, learned more about friends of other backgrounds, had a quarter life crisis. There were things that drew me to Islam in particular, it wasn't like I was reaching for whatever was there. The fact that the Qur'an is the same now as it ever was means there's always a reference point. The issues of women's rights were shockingly contemporary. The more I read, the more I found myself agreeing with the ideas behind it and I could see why Islam coloured the lives of my Muslim friends. It made sense, really, I didn't and still don't want to be Muslim, but there came a point where I couldn't say that I wasn't Muslim.

"Telling my family was the easy part. I knew they'd be happy as long as I was happy, and they could see that it was an incredibly positive thing. My friends went one of two ways, met with a lack of any reaction and lost to the social scene, or interested and supportive. More the former, less the latter."

Denise Horsley, 26, dance teacher
Denise Horsley lives in North London. She converted to Islam last year and is planning to marry her Muslim boyfriend next year.

Denise Horsley, 26, dance teacher: "I was introduced to Islam by my boyfriend." (Photo: Susannah Ireland)

"I was introduced to Islam by my boyfriend Naushad. A lot of people ask whether I converted because of him but actually he had nothing to do with it. I was interested in his faith but I went on my own journey to discover more about religion.

"I bought loads of books on all the different religions but I kept coming back to Islam - there was something about it that just made sense, it seemed to answer all the questions I had.

"I would spend hours in the library at Regents Park Mosque reading up on everything from women's rights to food. Before I went to prayers for the first time I remember sitting in my car frantically looking up how to pray on my Blackberry. I was so sure people would know straight away that I wasn't a Muslim but if they did no-one seemed to care.

"During Ramadan I'd sit and listen to the Qur'anic recitations and would be filled with such happiness and warmth. One day I decided there and then to take my shahada. I walked down to the reception and said I was ready to convert, it was as simple as that.

"My friends and family were rather shocked, I think they expected there would be some sort of huge baptism ceremony but they were very supportive of my decision. I think they were just pleased to see me happy and caring about something so passionately.

"I grew up Christian and went to a Catholic school. Islam to me seemed to be a natural extension of Christianity. The Qur'an is filled with information about Jesus, Mary, the angels and the Torah. It's part of a natural transition.

"I do now wear a headscarf but it wasn't something I adopted straightaway. Hijab is such an important concept in Islam but it's not just about clothing. It's about being modest in everything you do. I started dressing more modestly - forgoing low cut tops and short skirts - but before I donned a headscarf I had to make sure I was comfortable on the inside before turning my attention to the outside. Now I feel completely protected in my headscarf. People treat you with a new level of respect, they judge you by your words and your deeds, not how you look. It's the kind of respect every dad wants for their daughter.

"There have been some problems. Immediately after converting I isolated myself a bit, which I now recognise was a mistake and not what Islam teaches. I remember a lady on a bus who got really angry and abusive when she found out I had converted. I also noticed quite a few friends stopped calling. I think they just got tired of hearing me say no - no to going clubbing, no to going down the pub.

"But my good friends embraced it. They simply found other things to do when I was around. Ultimately I'm still exactly the same person apart from the fact that I don't drink, don't eat pork and pray five times a day. Other than that I'm still Denise."

Dawud Beale, 23
Dawud Beale was a self-confirmed "racist" two years ago who knew nothing about Islam and supported the BNP. Now a Muslim, he describes himself as a Salafi - the deeply socially conservative and ultra-orthodox sect of Islam whose followers try to live exactly like the Prophet did.

Dawud Beale, 23: "I was ignorant about Islam and then I went on holiday to Morocco, which was the first time I'd been exposed to Muslims." (Photo: Susannah Ireland)

"I was very ignorant to Islam for most of my life and then I went on holiday to Morocco, which was the first time I was exposed to Muslims. I was literally a racist before Morocco and by the time I was flying home on the plane a week later, I had already decided to become a Muslim."

"I realised Islam is not a foreign religion, but had a lot of similarities with what I already believed. When I came back home to Somerset, I spent three months trying to find local Muslims, but there wasn't even a mosque in my town. I eventually met Sufi Muslims who took me to Cyprus to convert.

"When I came back, I was finding out a lot of what they were saying was contradictory to what it said in the Qur'an. I wasn't finding them very authentic, to be honest. I went to London and became involved with Hizb-ut-Tahrir, the political group who call for the establishment of an Islamic state.

"But while I believe in the benefits of Sharia law, I left this group as well. The problem was it was too into politics and not as concerned with practicing the religion. For me, it is about keeping an Islamic appearance and studying hard. I think we do need an Islamic state, but the way to achieve it is not through political activism or fighting. Allah doesn't change the situation of people until they see what's within themselves.

"I have a big dislike for culture in Islamic communities, when it means bringing new things into the religion, such as polytheism or encouraging music and dance. There is something pure about Salafi Muslims; we take every word of the Qur'an for truth. I have definitely found the right path. I also met my wife through the community and we are expecting our first child next year."

Paul Martin, 27
Paul Martin was just a student when he decided to convert to Islam in an ice-cream shop in Manchester four years ago. Bored of what he saw as the hedonistic lifestyle of many of his friends at university and attracted to what he calls "Islam's emphasis on seeking knowledge," he says a one-off meeting with an older Muslim changed his life.

Paul Martin, 27: "I liked the way the Muslim students I knew conducted themselves. It's nice to think about people having one partner for life and not doing anything harmful to their body." (Photo: Susannah Ireland)

"I liked the way the Muslims students I knew conducted themselves. It's nice to think about people having one partner for life and not doing anything harmful to their body. I just preferred the Islamic lifestyle and from there I looked into the Qur'an. I was amazed to see Islam's big emphasis on science.

"Then I was introduced by a Muslim friend to a doctor who was a few years older than me. We went for a coffee and then a few weeks later for an ice cream. It was there that I said I would like to be a Muslim. I made my shahada right there, in the ice cream shop. I know some people like to be all formal and do it in a mosque, but for me religion is not a physical thing, it is what is in your heart.

"I hadn't been to a mosque before I became a Muslim. Sometimes it can be bit daunting, I mean I don't really fit into this criteria of a Muslim person. But there is nothing to say you can't be a British Muslim who wears jeans and a shirt and a jacket. Now in my mosque in Leeds, many different languages are spoken and there are lots of converts.

"With my family, it was gradual. I didn't just come home and say I was a Muslim. There was a long process before I converted where I wouldn't eat pork and I wouldn't drink. Now, we still have Sunday dinner together, we just buy a joint of lamb that is halal.

"If someone at college had said to me 'You are going to be a Muslim', I would not in a million years have believed it. It would have been too far-fetched. But now I have just come back from Hajj - the pilgrimage Muslims make to Mecca."

Stuart Mee, 46
Stuart Mee is a divorced civil servant who describes himself as a "middle-of-the-road Muslim." Having converted to Islam last year after talking with Muslim colleagues at work, he says Islam offers him a sense of community he feels is missing in much of Britain today.

"Everything is so consumer-driven here, there are always adverts pushing you to buy the next thing. I knew there must be something longer term and always admired the sense of contentment within my colleagues' lives, their sense of peace and calmness. It was just one of those things that happened - we talked, I read books and I related to it.

"I emailed the Imam at London Central Mosque and effectively had a 15 minute interview with him. It was about making sure that this was the right thing for me, that I was doing it at the right time. He wanted to make sure I was committed. It is a life changing decision.

"It is surprisingly easy, the process of converting. You do your shahada, which is the declaration of your faith. You say that in front of two witnesses and then you think, 'What do I do next?' I went to an Islamic bookstore and bought a child's book on how to pray. I followed that because, in Islamic terms, I was basically one month old.

"I went to a local mosque in Reading and expected someone to stop me say, 'Are you a Muslim?' but it didn't happen. It was just automatic acceptance. You can have all the trappings of being a Muslim - the beard and the bits and pieces that go with it, but Islam spreads over such a wide area and people have different styles, clothes and approaches to life.

"Provided I am working within Islamic values, I see no need in changing my name and I don't have any intention of doing it. Islam has bought peace, stability, and comfort to my life. It has helped me identify just what is important to me. That can only be a good thing."

Khadijah Roebuck, 48
Khadijah Roebuck was born Tracey Roebuck into a Christian family. She was married for twenty five years and attended church with her children every week while they lived at home. Now, divorced and having practiced Islam for the last six months, she says she is still not sure what motivated her to make such a big change to her life.

"I know it sounds odd, but one day I was Tracey the Christian and the next day I was Khadijah the Muslim, it just seemed right. The only thing I knew about Muslims before was that they didn't drink alcohol and they didn't eat pork.

"I remember the first time I drove up to the mosque. It was so funny; I was in my sports car and had the music blaring. I wasn't sure if I was even allowed to go in but I asked to speak to the man in charge, I didn't even know he was called an Imam. Now I wear a hijab and pray five times a day.

"My son at first was horrified, he just couldn't believe it. It's been especially hard for my mum, who is Roman Catholic and doesn't accept it at all. But the main thing I feel is a sense of peace, which I never found with the Church, which is interesting. Through Ramadan, I absolutely loved every second. On the last day, I even cried.

"It is interesting because people sometimes confuse cultures with Islam. Each Muslim brings their different culture to the mosque and different takes on the religion. There are Saudi Arabians, Egyptians and Pakistanis and then of course there is me. I slot in everywhere. A lot of the other sisters say to me, 'That is why we love you, Khadijah, you are just yourself.'"

Source: The Independent UK

War and peace in Quran and Bible

2011-01-03T10:17:00.004+08:00

Source: Aljazeera.net
By Riz Khan

One of the widest perceptions in the Western world, especially after the attacks of September 11, is that Islam's holy book, the Quran, promotes conflict, violence and bloodshed.

Muslims argue that many of the verses of the Quran – such as the one asking the Prophet Muhammad and his followers to "slay them [unbelievers] wherever ye find them, and drive them out of the places whence they drove you out" – are taken out of context.

Muslim scholars say that the scriptures have been intentionally misused by Muslims and non-Muslims alike to advance political agendas.

Critics say that the texts promote extremism, and that Islam has left a trail of blood across world history.

Recently, Philip Jenkins, one of the world's leading religion scholars, conducted a study comparing the texts of the Quran and the Bible, and found that "the Bible contains far more verses praising or urging bloodshed than does the Quran."

Riz speaks with Philip Jenkins and Shaker Elsayed, the imam of Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Centre in the US and former secretary general of the Muslim American Society.

This episode of Riz Khan aired from Wednesday, December 29, 2010.

Source: Aljazeera.net

Acknowledging political Islam

2011-01-03T09:55:00.003+08:00

Source: Aljazeera.net
By Robert Grenier

The US has historically supported suppressive secular regimes in the Middle East, a policy with obvious shortcomings.

Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the Democratic opposition going against incumbent Hosni Mubarak in the upcoming elections, has catalogued the rights violations committed by the Egyptian regime. But when push comes to shove, would Western nations really support him if it meant Islamists in the periphery gaining more power? [EPA]

"Regimes that fight, survive."

The words were those of a senior member of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), the "house" think-tank of AIPAC, the pro-Israel US lobbying organisation. Spoken at a scholarly conference in 1992, they were meant as a reproach to people like me, who argued that an ageing generation of autocratic leaders in the Middle East risked facilitating the rise of a wave of violent, anti-democratic Islamists unless they were willing to accommodate the aspirations of the seemingly more democratically-inclined Islamists in their midst.

A movement to which we referred in those days as "political Islam" was gaining momentum throughout the region, and there was much disagreement among Western scholars and government practitioners as to how - or indeed whether - to accommodate it. The language of political opposition in the region, then as now, was overwhelmingly Islamic; the question was whether there were any useful distinctions to be made among the various Islamist currents, and whether any would permanently accept a democratic model - or instead adhere, as many feared, to a doctrine of "one man, one vote, one time."

Choosing suppression over justice
WINEP, then as now, was generally representative of right-leaning political opinion in Israel, and this case was no exception. One of the more influential voices from that quarter belonged to Binyamin Netanyahu, who argued at the time that there was a clear alignment of interests between Israel and the secular regimes of the surrounding Arab states.

The Islamist trends beginning to menace the latter were echoed in newly-ascendant Islamic-inspired Palestinian organisations such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which posed the greatest threat to Israel. The secular Arab regimes, according to this line of thinking, should therefore find it in their interest to make peace with Israel and isolate the Islamists, both in Palestine and elsewhere, rather than allowing Islamic oppositionists to exploit a growing identification between Islam and Arab nationalism, and to use popular anti-Israeli sentiment to engulf both Israel and the Arab regimes alike.

Therefore, my WINEP friend argued - in suitably coded language - the Arab regimes should employ against the Islamists the repression so successfully employed by Israel in thwarting the Palestinians' popular resistance to occupation during the first Intifada: "Regimes that fight, survive."

The issues of the day were most starkly represented in Algeria, where a moderate Islamist opposition led by the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) had made rapid democratic inroads, only to be brutally repressed in early 1992 by the Algerian army, just when it was on the verge of winning an overwhelming majority in the Algerian National Assembly. The muted response of the US and other Western powers to this military coup gave testament to their fear of the Islamist wave, and the primacy in their thinking of practical over ideological considerations.

Whatever their pro-democratic rhetoric, when faced with a choice between the ascension of religiously conservative Arab nationalists overtly opposed to US policy in the region on the one hand, and repression on the other, the West was prepared to support repression. My friend from WINEP, no doubt, approved.

The elusive promise of stability
Appalled at the time by what I regarded as a pusillanimous and hypocritical US policy, my dissenting view was based not just on moral, but on practical criteria. I did not believe that support for democracy should only be bestowed on those democrats favourable to us. More pointedly, however, it seemed to me that the Arab masses, if denied the opportunity for political recourse through democratic means, would turn instead to revolutionary forces who embraced a far more radical and violent conception of Islam.

And indeed, such was the path immediately taken in Algeria. With the moderate, democratic Islamist opposition imprisoned or otherwise neutralised by the regime, its place was assumed by far more radical, Takfiri elements, represented by the GSPC. Algeria descended into a cauldron of almost unimaginable violence, which was ultimately to claim as many as 200,000 lives.

All this came back to mind recently in response to an op-ed penned in the US press by Mohamed ElBaradei, former Director-General of the IAEA, and now the putative head of Egypt's democratic opposition. In it he catalogues the many abuses perpetrated by the Mubarak regime during the just-concluded Egyptian parliamentary elections, and decries the policies of Mubarak and his cronies in the NDP and the security forces not just on moral grounds, but on practical ones as well. Their tactics, he asserts, carry with them the ultimate threat of revolution, and should therefore draw the active opposition of the West: "The rights of the Egyptian people," he says, "should not be trampled in exchange for an elusive promise of stability."

I strongly agree with ElBaradei, and am convinced that the ambivalence of US attitudes toward democracy in the region - most clearly seen in the hostile US reaction to Hamas' sweeping electoral victory in 2006 - carries a clear threat of promoting long-term disaster. But one must concede that the course of history between 1992 and now much more clearly favour the old arguments put forward by WINEP than they do my own.

Shifting power structures
Consider: The Algerian civil war of the 1990s, rather than ending, as I had initially anticipated, in the defeat of a corrupt, military-dominated elite, has instead led to the thorough marginalisation of a violent Islamist movement which has discredited itself in the eyes of the people. While its face has changed, the old elite survives. And the passing of an elder generation of leaders, rather than hastening the disintegration of repressive and unrepresentative power structures across the region, has led instead to the relatively smooth transfer of power to their sons - in Morocco, in Jordan, in Syria, and in UAE. We can probably expect to see the same shortly in Libya and, most significantly, in Egypt - Mr. ElBaradei and the democratic opposition notwithstanding.

I believe it is right that ElBaradei should solicit the support of world opinion and warn of the consequences for regional stability of the continued frustration of Egypt's popular aspirations for reform. No doubt his pleas will continue to receive an encouraging echo in the Western press. But if he expects more than that, he is fooling himself. For when push comes to shove, the US and other western governments, to the extent they can influence events at all, will opt, in Mr. ElBaradei's words, for the elusive promise of stability.

It is easy to criticise an unlovely regime like that of Hosni Mubarak, and both public and private figures in the US rise enthusiastically to the task. But just let them glimpse a realistic prospect for the Egyptian Muslim Brothers to gain a significant share of power, and their enthusiasm will rapidly wane. I and others who believe as I do remain convinced that this is a significant mistake, and that the prominent current of thinking in the US which refuses to make a significant distinction between groups like the Muslim brothers and the violent Islamists who embrace the banner of Al Qaeda is wrong-headed. Our problem is that we simply cannot find compelling evidence to make our case. Absent new facts, which only the people of the region can provide, we are destined to lose the debate.

Robert Grenier is a retired, 27-year veteran of the CIA’s Clandestine Service. He was Director of the CIA’s Counter-Terrorism Center from 2004 to 2006.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.

Source: Aljazeera.net

Muslim Women Gain Higher Profile in U.S.

2011-01-01T11:40:00.006+08:00

Source: NYTimes.com
By Brian Knowlton

ATLANTA — Around Sept. 11, 2001, not long after she founded the Islamic Speakers Bureau of Atlanta, Soumaya Khalifa heard from a group whose name sounded like “Bakers Club.” It wanted a presentation.

Soumaya Khalifa founded the Islamic Speakers Bureau of Atlanta. Photograph: Kendrick Brinson for the International Herald Tribune

The address was unfamiliar, but she went anyway. The group turned out to be the Bickerers Club, whose members love to argue. Islam was their topic du jour and their venue was a tavern. Ms. Khalifa laughed, and made the best of it.

Ms. Khalifa, who was born in Egypt and raised in Texas, wears a head scarf but also juggles, comfortably, the demands of American suburbia: crowded schedule, minivan and all.

She is one of a type now found in most sizable U.S. cities: vocal Muslim women wary of the predominantly male leadership of their community and increasingly weary of suspicions of non-Muslims about Islam.

These women have achieved a level of success and visibility unmatched elsewhere. They say they are molded by the freedoms of the United States — indeed, many unabashedly sing its praises — and by the intellectual ferment stirred when American-born and immigrant Muslims mix.

“What we’re seeing now in America is what has been sort of a quiet or informal empowerment of women,” said Shireen Zaman, executive director of the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, a nonprofit research institute founded after the 2001 attacks to provide research on American Muslims. “In many of our home countries, socially or politically it would’ve been harder for Muslim women to take a leadership role. It’s actually quite empowering to be Muslim in America.”

As Najah Bazzy, a American-born nurse and founder of several charities in Michigan, put it: “Yeah I’m Arab, yeah I’m very American, and yeah I’m very Islamic, but you put those things in the blender and I’m no longer just a thing. I’m a new thing.”

It is not always easy. Several of the Muslim women interviewed for this article said they had been the object of abusive letters, e-mails or blog posts.

Yet in their quest to break stereotypes, America’s Muslim women have advantages. They are better educated than counterparts in Western Europe, and also than the average American, according to a Gallup survey in March 2009. In contrast to their sisters in countries like Egypt and Saudi Arabia, they are just as likely as their menfolk to attend religious services, which equates to greater influence. And Gallup found that Muslim American women, often entrepreneurial, come closer than women of any other faith to earning what their menfolk do.

“Muslims coming to North America are often seeking an egalitarian version of Islam,” said Ebrahim Moosa, an associate professor of Islamic studies at Duke University. “That forces women onto the agenda and makes them much more visible than, say, in Western Europe.”

Besides her speakers’ bureau, which advertises itself as “a bridge between Islam and Americans of other faiths,” Ms. Khalifa heads a consultancy working with students, executives, soldiers and even the F.B.I. to overcome stereotypes. Some people she addresses have never met a Muslim. Some look askance at head scarves.

Ms. Khalifa, who has degrees in chemistry and human resources, began wearing a head scarf in her mid-30s, about 15 years ago. At first, she said, people looked at her “like I was different, Muslim, un-American, stupid.”

But she is quietly persistent. When a small-town newspaper refused to run Ms. Khalifa’s ad listing the hours of a nearby mosque, she organized a successful boycott by local churchmen.

Perhaps the most noticed figure among American Muslim women is Ingrid Mattson. In a bright-red jumper and multicolored head scarf, she stood out among the gray-haired clerics in black who gathered in Washington in September to try and defuse the anger over the planned mosque near the World Trade Center site in New York.

Ms. Mattson, who is 47 and teaches at the Hartford Seminary in Connecticut, became the first woman to head the Islamic Society of North America, one of the largest Muslim associations on the continent.

She was first elected vice president on Sept. 4, 2001, then president in 2006, a position she held until September; those years were so full of sound and fury over all things Muslim that gender took a back seat.

“But what happened on Sept. 11 and after has led American Muslims to be more involved in civic society,” Ms. Mattson said, “and Muslim women were finding that a very rich area for activity.”

“The only area where there’s a limitation is religious leadership — the imam,” she added, predicting that “we will have some communities in the future that have female imams.”

Historically, Muslim women have wielded power from behind the scenes, with notable exceptions like Benazir Bhutto, the late former prime minister of Pakistan. A 2009 survey of the world’s most influential Muslims by Georgetown University and the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Center listed just 2 women in the top 50: a Syrian religious leader and Queen Rania, wife of the Jordanian king. Ms. Mattson received an honorable mention.

Tayyibah Taylor founded Azizah to celebrate Muslim women of achievement. Photograph: Kendrick Brinson for the International Herald Tribune

Muslim women in the United States reflect the country’s diversity: white converts like Ms. Mattson, women of Middle Eastern background like Ms. Khalifa, or Tayyibah Taylor, a convert of Caribbean descent in Atlanta who founded a glossy magazine, Azizah, to celebrate Muslim women of achievement.

The magazine may profile “America’s first all-Muslim, all-female law group” or a hijab-wearing flight attendant, but it also takes up issues like AIDS and spousal abuse. Despite its struggles, Azizah, with a circulation of 45,000, recently celebrated its 10th birthday.

Azizah is a magazine for Muslim women published in Atlanta. Photograph: Kendrick Brinson for the International Herald Tribune

“I didn’t see Islam as taking my freedoms as a woman,” said Ms. Taylor, who is 57 and studied the Koran in Jidda for six years. “It really opened up worlds for me.”

The Muslim population in Atlanta, now estimated at 80,000, has its roots in the 1950s, when a small group of Nation of Islam worshipers, mostly black men, met in a grubby building shared with a chapter of the Ku Klux Klan. Waves of immigrants from South Asia, the Middle East or, most recently, Bosnia and Herzegovina, swelled its ranks. The metropolitan area, with 5.5 million people, now has 40 mosques.

But while Muslim women have gained prominence, much of their activity remains outside the mosque.

“There is a missing link in terms of what the Muslim religion teaches about gender equality,” Ms. Khalifa said. “The leadership in our mosques is not reflective of our population — there are hardly any women.”

Imam Plemon T. el-Amin, a retired leader of the Atlanta Masjid of Al-Islam, talked of “a slow move — really an indecisiveness — about getting women fully involved in day-to-day Islamic activities.” That, he said, is changing.

One issue is gender separation at prayer, imposed to reflect Islamic notions of modesty. In some mosques, women are relegated to separate rooms. But, Imam el-Amin said, “I’m seeing mosques do much better at trying to make those separate accommodations equal.”

Ms. Mattson’s election to lead the Islamic Society of North America, or ISNA, was a signal moment.

Her election “broke a barrier and made it much more acceptable for women to take a leading role as leaders of the entire community, not just women,” said Dalia Mogahed, executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies and a former adviser on faith issues in the Obama White House.

Imam el-Amin added, “That’s exactly what ISNA and many of the Muslim organizations needed to see.”

Source: NYTimes.com

WikiLeaks cables: Pope wanted Muslim Turkey kept out of EU

2010-12-11T16:01:00.005+08:00

Source: guardian.co.uk
By Heather Brooke and Andrew Brown

Vatican diplomats also lobbied against Venezuela's Hugo Chávez and wanted 'Christian roots' enshrined in EU constitution

A WikiLeaks cable reports that Pope Benedict XVI, seen here being received by Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara in 2006, 'might prefer to see Turkey develop a special relationship short of EU membership'. Photograph: Dylan Martinez/AFP/Getty Images

The pope is responsible for the Vatican's growing hostility towards Turkey joining the EU, previously secret cables sent from the US embassy to the Holy See in Rome claim.

In 2004 Cardinal Ratzinger, the future pope, spoke out against letting a Muslim state join, although at the time the Vatican was formally neutral on the question.

The Vatican's acting foreign minister, Monsignor Pietro Parolin, responded by telling US diplomats that Ratzinger's comments were his own rather than the official Vatican position.

The cable released by WikiLeaks shows that Ratzinger was the leading voice behind the Holy See's unsuccessful drive to secure a reference to Europe's "Christian roots" in the EU constitution. The US diplomat noted that Ratzinger "clearly understands that allowing a Muslim country into the EU would further weaken his case for Europe's Christian foundations".

But by 2006 Parolin was working for Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, and his tone had distinctly chilled. "Neither the pope nor the Vatican have endorsed Turkey's EU membership per se," he told the American charge d'affaires, "rather, the Holy See has been consistently open to accession, emphasising only that Turkey needs to fulfil the EU's Copenhagen criteria to take its place in Europe."

But he did not expect the demands on religious freedom to be fulfilled: "One great fear is that Turkey could enter the EU without having made the necessary advances in religious freedom. [Parolin] insisted that EU members – and the US – continue to press the [Turkish government] on these issues … He said that short of 'open persecution', it couldn't get much worse for the Christian community in Turkey."

The cables reveal the American government lobbying within Rome and Ankara for Turkish EU membership. "We hope a senior department official can visit the Holy See and encourage them to do more to push a positive message on Turkey and integration," concluded the 2006 cable.

But by 2009, the American ambassador was briefing in advance of President Barack Obama's visit, that "the Holy See's position now is that as a non-EU member the Vatican has no role in promoting or vetoing Turkey's membership. The Vatican might prefer to see Turkey develop a special relationship short of membership with the EU."

Roman Catholicism is the only religion in the world with the status of a sovereign state, allowing the pope's most senior clerics to sit at the top table with world leaders. The cables reveal the Vatican routinely wielding influence through diplomatic channels while sometimes denying it is doing so. The Vatican has diplomatic relations with 177 countries and has used its diplomatic status to lobby the US, United Nations and European Union in a concerted bid to impose its moral agenda through national and international parliaments.

The US charge d'affaires D Brent Hardt told Parolin, his diplomatic counterpart in Rome, of "the Holy See's potential to influence Catholic countries to support a ban on human cloning" to which Parolin emphasised his agreement with the US position and promised to support fully UN efforts for such a ban.

On other global issues such as climate change, the Vatican sought to use its moral authority as leverage, while refusing itself to sign formal treaties, such as the Copenhagen accord, that require reporting commitments.

At a meeting in January this year Dr Paolo Conversi, the pope's representative on climate change at the Vatican's secretariat of state, told an American diplomat that the Vatican would "encourage other countries discreetly to associate themselves with the accord as opportunities arise".

The Americans noted that Conversi's offer to support the US, even if discreetly, was significant because the Vatican was often reluctant to appear to compromise its independence and moral authority by associating itself with particular lobbying efforts.

"Even more important than the Vatican's lobbying assistance, however, is the influence the pope's guidance can have on public opinion in countries with large Catholic majorities and beyond."

The cables also reveal that the Vatican planned to use Poland as a trojan horse to spread Catholic family values through the structures of the European Union in Brussels.

The then US ambassador to the Holy See, Francis Rooney, briefed Washington in 2006, shortly after the election of Pope Benedict XVI, that "the Holy See hopes that Poland will hold the line at the EU on 'life and family' issues that arise" and would serve as a counterweight to western European secularism once the country had integrated into the EU.

The cable notes that Pope Benedict is preoccupied with Europe's increasing psychological distance from its Christian roots.

"He has continued to focus on Poland's potential in combating this trend. This was one of the themes of the visit of several groups of Polish bishops to the Vatican at the end of last year [2005]. 'It's a topic that always comes up,' explained Monsignor Michael Banach, the Holy See minister of foreign affairs country director for Poland. He told us that the two sides recognised that the Polish bishops needed to exert leadership in the face of western European secularism."

Across the Atlantic, the Vatican has told the Americans it wants to undermine the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez, in Latin America because of worries about the deterioration of Catholic power there. It fears Chávez is seriously damaging relations between the Catholic church and the state by identifying the church hierarchy as part of the privileged class.

Monsignor Angelo Accattino, in charge of Caribbean and Andean matters for the Vatican, said Obama should reach out to Cuba "in order to reduce the influence of Chávez and break up his cabal in Latin America".In December last year, America's adviser for western Europe at the UN, Robert Smolik, said the Vatican observer was "as always active and influential behind the scenes" and "lobbied actively and influentially in the corridors and in informal consultations, particularly on social issues".

In 2001 another American diplomat to the Vatican stated: "The Holy See will continue to seek to play a role in the Middle East peace process while denying this intention." (1792)

Source: guardian.co.uk

Muslim Athena Protes Atas Perobekan Al Quran oleh Aparat Polisi

2010-11-24T18:36:00.003+08:00

Sumber: arrahmah.com
Oleh Althaf

ATHENA (Arrahmah.com) - Ratusan Muslim yang tinggal di Athena melakukan protes di luar balai kota pada hari Kamis (18/11/2010) terhadap aksi polisi Yunani yang telah merobek sebuah teks Al-Quran setelah menangkap seorang pedagang kaki lima asal Mesir, kata para pejabat, diungkap Dawn pada Jumat (19/11).

Setidaknya terdapat 300 Muslim dari berbagai negara berkumpul di alun-alun di luar balai kota sebelum pemerintah menghalau rumor dan membebaskan sang pedagang, kata polisi.

Protes ini terjadi setelah penyerang tak dikenal berusaha untuk mengunci dan membakar 40 migran Bangladesh di dalam masjid pada Selasa malam, seorang pemimpin Muslim mengatakan.

"Iklim ini telah sangat menjadi beban," kata Naim El Gadour, ketua Persatuan Muslim Yunani, dikutip AFP.

Dalam insiden lain pada hari yang sama, pertemuan Muslim di alun-alun di Athena untuk merayakan Idul Adha, dilecehkan oleh penduduk lokal yang melemparkan telur pada mereka dan menyalakan musik dengan keras dari balik jendela sebuah rumah.

Anggota kelompok sayap kanan juga mengancam secara fisik untuk mengusir Muslim dari alun-alun tetapi ditahan oleh polisi anti huru hara.

Kemarahan terhadap para migran dan serangan rasis semacam ini telah meningkat di jalan-jalan Athena dalam beberapa bulan terakhir bersamaan dengan resesi ekonomi yang menimpa negara itu dan menyebabkan ribuan buruh terkena PHK.

Perasaan anti-migran termanifestasi dalam pemilihan lokal bulan ini dimana kelompok ekstrim kanan, Chryssi Avgi (Golden Dawn), terpilih sebagai anggota dewan kota.

Saat ini terdapat sekitar 100.000 Muslim dari negara-negara Arab, Afrika dan anak benua India tinggal dan bekerja di Athena, dan ada dalam posisi yang subordinat dengan upah minim dan mengalami eksploitasi, akomodasi yang buruk, serta sering menjadi objek penyimpangan hukum.

Meskipun telah memberikan janji, namun pemerintah Yunani tak kunjung merealisasikan tempat ibadah resmi bagi Muslim, bahkan memaksa Muslim untuk menyewa sebuah flat atau gudang tak sudah tidak terpakai untuk dijadikan masjid.

Negara Ortodoks yang memendam luka lama karena ada di dalam pemerintahan Kekhilafahan Turki Utsmani selama hampir empat abad, saat ini terus melakukan ketidakadilan pada kaum Muslim yang hidup di sana dengan hanya membatasi akses khusus Muslim di timur laut yang berbatas dengan Turki dimana minoritas Muslim asal Turki tinggal.

Semua jejak Islam di Athena telah dimusnahkan pada abad ke-19 awal ketika agama Kristen kembali menjadi agama yang resmi di Yunani dan perselisihan birokrasi dan kelompok oposisi dari para pemimpin gereja lokal dan walikota berhasil menghentikan rencana pembangunan sebuah masjid dan pemakaman. (althaf/arrahmah.com)

Sumber: arrahmah.com

Christian teachers at Des Moines Muslim school gain insight into religion, themselves

2010-11-24T18:30:00.003+08:00

Source: DesMoinesRegister.com
By REID FORGRAVE

Emily Miller, an energetic elementary schoolteacher in Des Moines, loves to sing. So one recent morning, after her first-graders put away their backpacks and sharpen their pencils, she sits them in a semicircle and sings a variation of a song she learned growing up Catholic in southwest Iowa.

"Allah told Noah, there's gonna be a floodie, floodie!" the 22-year-old sings. The children join in. "Allah told Noah, there's gonna be a floodie, floodie! Get those animals out of the muddie, muddie! Children of Allah."

It's a typical morning at New Horizons Academy, a private day care and school at the Islamic Center of Des Moines. But for Miller and Jennifer DeMuynck, classes here are like nothing they've experienced before.

From the planned Muslim community center near ground zero in New York City to a Florida pastor's threat to burn Qurans, the debate over Islam's place in America persists.

It pains Miller and DeMuynck to hear all that. When they walk into their jobs every morning and see their young students - some who wear hijabs, some who ask about the difference between the teachers' Christian God and their own Allah, all of whom are schooled in a religious environment shielded from today's charged political climate - they see their jobs as a privilege. Working here gives them an outsider's view into the everyday life of Iowa Muslims.

"It's similar because they're in desks, and they're kids, and I'm their teacher, and we have a whiteboard," DeMuynck said. "Everything else is different."

Such as:

• The reminder DeMuynck frequently gives her five female students, all of whom wear the hijab: "Your hair is showing." Their embarrassment is as if they just learned their fly is down.

• The Arabic banner hanging inside Miller's classroom, with a prayer asking Allah to multiply their blessings.

• The daily schedule on the wall: reading, Arabic, math, Islamic studies, lunch, Quran, nap, prayer, snack.

• The numerous brochures and posters in the hall, such as one for tour packages for the hajj, the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, or another for a program that aims to deliver copies of the Quran to everyone in America ($100 buys 50 English translations).

• The home countries of Miller's six students: Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Sudan and the Palestinian territories. Each speaks a different language at home.

"We're small in size, but we're more diverse than any school you'll find in the state of Iowa, and that's priceless to us," said Luai Amro, a Palestinian-American who is director of the Islamic Center of Des Moines and who hired the women earlier this year. "It means real life. It's not going to be a foreign concept for them, dealing with people of different faiths, different races, different colors. You must plant the seed at an early age."

New teacher admires 'devotion to their God'
Nobody is more surprised that Miller and DeMuynck teach at this 35-student Islamic school than the two teachers themselves.

Miller, a recent Central College graduate from Corning, embraces religion in her classroom more than DeMuynck does. Miller considers herself a liberal Catholic who "has some bones to pick" with her church, mostly with its hierarchy and strict interpretation of the Bible. Miller said she once feared Muslim men who wore long beards and prayed fervent prayers. When she started teaching here, she began to analyze Islam, and the religion seemed like a possibility for her to convert to. But when Miller read about what she sees as the subjugated role of women in Islam, she decided it wasn't for her. Since then, Miller has rejuvenated her Christian faith, and she loves working in a school where Allah - God - is spoken of constantly.

She sings her students Christian children's songs like "My God is So Big," substituting the word Allah for God. She has prayed with her students in the school's prayer room. Miller attended an Iftar meal during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and wore a hijab out of respect.

"I tell people I work at the Islamic Center, and one person asked, 'Has anybody threatened you?' " Miller said. "If I didn't know better, I'd say these people are such wonderful Christians. I admire their devotion to their God, and I believe it's the same God as mine."

Evangelical Christian feels faith strengthen
DeMuynck, a 36-year-old who went back to school for a teaching degree and has been substitute teaching in public schools for a couple of years, is less comfortable with Islam. She tries to keep religion out of her classroom altogether, although she's found that difficult.

She's the more evangelical Christian of the two teachers, attending Grace Evangelical Free Church in Huxley and speaking of her faith in the language of a born-again. She said a blessing over her classroom when she was first hired. She asks other Islamic Center employees to escort her students into the prayer room so she doesn't have to. She teaches reading, writing and arithmetic; religion, she believes, belongs to the specialized teachers down the hall.

"All my kids know I'm Christian, and all the parents know I'm Christian," DeMuynck said.

Once, the students asked the name of DeMuynck's God. "It's Jesus, right?" they asked. "No, it's God," DeMuynck replied. "God is the one and only God. You call him Allah. I call him God."

In some ways, teaching here has opened DeMuynck's eyes about Islam. She learned that Muslims don't worship Muhammad; the prophet is God's messenger. She learned the hijab isn't an affront to a Muslim woman's rights: "The hijab is modesty," DeMuynck explains. "A parent told me that in Muslim culture, the hair is a girl's prettiest asset. They cover it so they don't flaunt it."

In some ways, teaching here has strengthened DeMuynck's Christian faith. She's seen inconsistencies in Islam that don't appear in her interpretation of Christianity. She likes that her own two children grew up praying words they understand, whereas students at the Islamic school sometimes pray in another language.

One thing DeMuynck has also learned is that Islam and Christianity have many differences, but there are fewer differences between people - especially when you get past the media stereotypes and into everyday life.

"There's extremism in every religion," DeMuynck said. "Christians who want to burn the Quran, that's extremist. It's just more televised for Muslims."

Both teachers say their own Christianity hasn't wavered in the face of the natural spiritual tension of facing another religion every workday.

Miller has become more cognizant of the little things that might offend Islamic sensibilities: Once, she showed her students a photograph of her petting a pig, not considering that might offend. (Eating pork is considered haram, or forbidden by Islamic law.) In the school, Miller no longer reaches out to shake hands when she meets a male parent, nor does she use her left hand to eat, both considered offensive to some Muslims.

DeMuynck struggles with delineating the difference between her students' religion and her students' culture. DeMuynck has read parts of the Quran so she can better understand her students' lives, but at the same time she's been reading "The Case for Christ," by Christian author (and former atheist) Lee Strobel. For DeMuynck, the Christian book has given her concrete proof about the existence and the divinity of Jesus Christ. It has strengthened her view that the Bible is consistent, but the Quran is not.

Whatever the faith: Kids are kids
Maryam Iyer, a 6-year-old who is missing her two front teeth, sprawls on a beanbag in the corner of DeMuynck's classroom. Like all the students here, her shoes are off.

"Put your book away. It's time for Islamic studies," DeMuynck instructs her.

The girl pops up and walks down the hall. Her Islamic studies teacher, Zareena Basha, an Indian Muslim in Iowa since 1997, greets her with the traditional Islamic greeting: "As-salamu alaykum."

Maryam opens her book, "I Love Islam, Level 1." She skips past the five pillars of Islam, which she learned last week, and opens to a page that contains the story of the prophet. Maryam recites the names of Muhammad's four daughters and three sons - they recently drew a family tree of the prophet's family - then she reads a passage about the founder of her religion.

"Prophet Muhammad used to go to a cave called Ghar Hiraa," Maryam reads. "Ghar Hiraa was on the top of a mountain called Jabal-un-Noor, or the Mountain of Light. ... Muhammad was very scared in the cave. He was alone in the cave, and it was dark. This was the first time that he had seen an angel!"

The teacher puts on a music tape. The tune is from "Yankee Doodle," but the words are different, using an Arabic phrase that says only Allah should be worshiped.

"La ilaha illa Allah, Muslims say it loudly," Maryam sings. "La ilaha illa Allah, stand up for Islam proudly."

Then Islamic studies class ends, and Maryam walks back to her regular classroom. In one room, DeMuynck shushes a child who is talking while others take a test. In the classroom next door, Miller lets a girl sit on her lap as they go over reading. Miller's class goes out for recess, climbing on the jungle gym and taking turns on the swing set. On the way back in, her students get into a religious debate, one that shows that, no matter the religion, kids are kids.

Asks Amina Mackic, 5, whose parents are from Bosnia: "Do you know who made spiders?"

Jawad Ali, 5, whose parents are from Pakistan, replies, "Allah! Allah made the spiders."

Moltazam Aldow, 5, whose parents are from Sudan, chimes in, "No! Spider-Man made the spiders."

Source: DesMoinesRegister.com

Cairo and Jakarta: A tale of two Obama speeches

2010-11-23T18:07:00.005+08:00

Source: National Post
National Post Staff

When U.S. President Barack Obama addressed the Muslim world in Cairo last year, his speech was laden with references to the past, to Islam and to the tensions plaguing the Middle East. On Wednesday, in updating his speech, his remarks were more about democracy and development.

The full text of both speeches are posted below for you to compare for yourself. (Click here to jump down to the Cario speech.)

President Barack Obama’s speech at the University of Indonesia in Jakarta on Nov. 9, 2010:
Terima kasih. Terima kasih, thank you so much, thank you, everybody. Selamat pagi. It is wonderful to be here at the University of Indonesia. To the faculty and the staff and the students, and to Dr. Gumilar Rusliwa Somantri, thank you so much for your hospitality.

Assalamualaikum dan salam sejahtera. Thank you for this wonderful welcome. Thank you to the people of Jakarta and thank you to the people of Indonesia.

Pulang kampung nih. I am so glad that I made it back to Indonesia and that Michelle was able to join me. We had a couple of false starts this year, but I was determined to visit a country that’s meant so much to me. And unfortunately, this visit is too short, but I look forward to coming back a year from now when Indonesia hosts the East Asia Summit.

Before I go any further, I want to say that our thoughts and prayers are with all of those Indonesians who are affected by the recent tsunami and the volcanic eruptions — particularly those who’ve lost loved ones, and those who’ve been displaced. And I want you all to know that as always, the United States stands with Indonesia in responding to natural disasters, and we are pleased to be able to help as needed. As neighbors help neighbors and families take in the displaced, I know that the strength and the resilience of the Indonesian people will pull you through once more.

Let me begin with a simple statement: Indonesia bagian dari didi saya. I first came to this country when my mother married an Indonesian named Lolo Soetoro. And as a young boy I was — as a young boy I was coming to a different world. But the people of Indonesia quickly made me feel at home.

Jakarta — now, Jakarta looked very different in those days. The city was filled with buildings that were no more than a few stories tall. This was back in 1967, ’68 — most of you weren’t born yet. The Hotel Indonesia was one of the few high rises, and there was just one big department store called Sarinah. That was it. Betchaks and bemos, that’s how you got around. They outnumbered automobiles in those days. And you didn’t have all the big highways that you have today. Most of them gave way to unpaved roads and the kampongs.

So we moved to Menteng Dalam, where we lived in a small house. We had a mango tree out front. And I learned to love Indonesia while flying kites and running along the paddy fields and catching dragonflies, buying satay and baso from the street vendors. I still remember the call of the vendors. Satay! I remember that. Baso! But most of all, I remember the people — the old men and women who welcomed us with smiles; the children who made a foreign child feel like a neighbor and a friend; and the teachers who helped me learn about this country.

Because Indonesia is made up of thousands of islands, and hundreds of languages, and people from scores of regions and ethnic groups, my time here helped me appreciate the common humanity of all people. And while my stepfather, like most Indonesians, was raised a Muslim, he firmly believed that all religions were worthy of respect. And in this way he reflected the spirit of religious tolerance that is enshrined in Indonesia’s Constitution, and that remains one of this country’s defining and inspiring characteristics.

Now, I stayed here for four years — a time that helped shape my childhood; a time that saw the birth of my wonderful sister, Maya; a time that made such an impression on my mother that she kept returning to Indonesia over the next 20 years to live and to work and to travel — and to pursue her passion of promoting opportunity in Indonesia’s villages, especially opportunity for women and for girls. And I was so honored when President Yudhoyono last night at the state dinner presented an award on behalf of my mother, recognizing the work that she did. And she would have been so proud, because my mother held Indonesia and its people very close to her heart for her entire life.

So much has changed in the four decades since I boarded a plane to move back to Hawaii. If you asked me — or any of my schoolmates who knew me back then — I don’t think any of us could have anticipated that one day I would come back to Jakarta as the President of the United States. And few could have anticipated the remarkable story of Indonesia over these last four decades.

The Jakarta that I once knew has grown into a teeming city of nearly 10 million, with skyscrapers that dwarf the Hotel Indonesia, and thriving centers of culture and of commerce. While my Indonesian friends and I used to run in fields with water buffalo and goats — (laughter) — a new generation of Indonesians is among the most wired in the world — connected through cell phones and social networks. And while Indonesia as a young nation focused inward, a growing Indonesia now plays a key role in the Asia Pacific and in the global economy.

Now, this change also extends to politics. When my stepfather was a boy, he watched his own father and older brother leave home to fight and die in the struggle for Indonesian independence. And I’m happy to be here on Heroes Day to honor the memory of so many Indonesians who have sacrificed on behalf of this great country.

When I moved to Jakarta, it was 1967, and it was a time that had followed great suffering and conflict in parts of this country. And even though my stepfather had served in the Army, the violence and killing during that time of political upheaval was largely unknown to me because it was unspoken by my Indonesian family and friends. In my household, like so many others across Indonesia, the memories of that time were an invisible presence. Indonesians had their independence, but oftentimes they were afraid to speak their minds about issues.

In the years since then, Indonesia has charted its own course through an extraordinary democratic transformation — from the rule of an iron fist to the rule of the people. In recent years, the world has watched with hope and admiration as Indonesians embraced the peaceful transfer of power and the direct election of leaders. And just as your democracy is symbolized by your elected President and legislature, your democracy is sustained and fortified by its checks and balances: a dynamic civil society; political parties and unions; a vibrant media and engaged citizens who have ensured that — in Indonesia — there will be no turning back from democracy.

But even as this land of my youth has changed in so many ways, those things that I learned to love about Indonesia — that spirit of tolerance that is written into your Constitution; symbolized in mosques and churches and temples standing alongside each other; that spirit that’s embodied in your people — that still lives on. Bhinneka Tunggal Ika — unity in diversity. This is the foundation of Indonesia’s example to the world, and this is why Indonesia will play such an important part in the 21st century.

So today, I return to Indonesia as a friend, but also as a President who seeks a deep and enduring partnership between our two countries. Because as vast and diverse countries; as neighbors on either side of the Pacific; and above all as democracies — the United States and Indonesia are bound together by shared interests and shared values.

Yesterday, President Yudhoyono and I announced a new Comprehensive Partnership between the United States and Indonesia. We are increasing ties between our governments in many different areas, and — just as importantly — we are increasing ties among our people. This is a partnership of equals, grounded in mutual interests and mutual respect.

So with the rest of my time today, I’d like to talk about why the story I just told — the story of Indonesia since the days when I lived here — is so important to the United States and to the world. I will focus on three areas that are closely related, and fundamental to human progress — development, democracy and religious faith.

First, the friendship between the United States and Indonesia can advance our mutual interest in development.

When I moved to Indonesia, it would have been hard to imagine a future in which the prosperity of families in Chicago and Jakarta would be connected. But our economies are now global, and Indonesians have experienced both the promise and the perils of globalization: from the shock of the Asian financial crisis in the ‘90s, to the millions lifted out of poverty because of increased trade and commerce. What that means — and what we learned in the recent economic crisis — is that we have a stake in each other’s success.

America has a stake in Indonesia growing and developing, with prosperity that is broadly shared among the Indonesian people — because a rising middle class here in Indonesia means new markets for our goods, just as America is a market for goods coming from Indonesia. So we are investing more in Indonesia, and our exports have grown by nearly 50%, and we are opening doors for Americans and Indonesians to do business with one another.

America has a stake in an Indonesia that plays its rightful role in shaping the global economy. Gone are the days when seven or eight countries would come together to determine the direction of global markets. That’s why the G20 is now the center of international economic cooperation, so that emerging economies like Indonesia have a greater voice and also bear greater responsibility for guiding the global economy. And through its leadership of the G20’s anti-corruption group, Indonesia should lead on the world stage and by example in embracing transparency and accountability.

America has a stake in an Indonesia that pursues sustainable development, because the way we grow will determine the quality of our lives and the health of our planet. And that’s why we’re developing clean energy technologies that can power industry and preserve Indonesia’s precious natural resources — and America welcomes your country’s strong leadership in the global effort to combat climate change.

Above all, America has a stake in the success of the Indonesian people. Underneath the headlines of the day, we must build bridges between our people, because our future security and prosperity is shared. And that is exactly what we’re doing — by increasing collaboration among our scientists and researchers, and by working together to foster entrepreneurship. And I’m especially pleased that we have committed to double the number of American and Indonesian students studying in our respective countries. We want more Indonesian students in American schools, and we want more American students to come study in this country. We want to forge new ties and greater understanding between young people in this young century.

These are the issues that really matter in our daily lives. Development, after all, is not simply about growth rates and numbers on a balance sheet. It’s about whether a child can learn the skills they need to make it in a changing world. It’s about whether a good idea is allowed to grow into a business, and not suffocated by corruption. It’s about whether those forces that have transformed the Jakarta I once knew — technology and trade and the flow of people and goods — can translate into a better life for all Indonesians, for all human beings, a life marked by dignity and opportunity.

Now, this kind of development is inseparable from the role of democracy.

Today, we sometimes hear that democracy stands in the way of economic progress. This is not a new argument. Particularly in times of change and economic uncertainty, some will say that it is easier to take a shortcut to development by trading away the right of human beings for the power of the state. But that’s not what I saw on my trip to India, and that is not what I see here in Indonesia. Your achievements demonstrate that democracy and development reinforce one another.

Like any democracy, you have known setbacks along the way. America is no different. Our own Constitution spoke of the effort to forge a “more perfect union,” and that is a journey that we’ve traveled ever since. We’ve endured civil war and we struggled to extend equal rights to all of our citizens. But it is precisely this effort that has allowed us to become stronger and more prosperous, while also becoming a more just and a more free society.

Like other countries that emerged from colonial rule in the last century, Indonesia struggled and sacrificed for the right to determine your destiny. That is what Heroes Day is all about — an Indonesia that belongs to Indonesians. But you also ultimately decided that freedom cannot mean replacing the strong hand of a colonizer with a strongman of your own.

Of course, democracy is messy. Not everyone likes the results of every election. You go through your ups and downs. But the journey is worthwhile, and it goes beyond casting a ballot. It takes strong institutions to check the power — the concentration of power. It takes open markets to allow individuals to thrive. It takes a free press and an independent justice system to root out abuses and excess, and to insist on accountability. It takes open society and active citizens to reject inequality and injustice.

These are the forces that will propel Indonesia forward. And it will require a refusal to tolerate the corruption that stands in the way of opportunity; a commitment to transparency that gives every Indonesian a stake in their government; and a belief that the freedom of Indonesians — that Indonesians have fought for is what holds this great nation together.

That is the message of the Indonesians who have advanced this democratic story — from those who fought in the Battle of Surabaya 55 years ago today; to the students who marched peacefully for democracy in the 1990s; to leaders who have embraced the peaceful transition of power in this young century. Because ultimately, it will be the rights of citizens that will stitch together this remarkable Nusantara that stretches from Sabang to Merauke, an insistence — (applause) — an insistence that every child born in this country should be treated equally, whether they come from Java or Aceh; from Bali or Papua. That all Indonesians have equal rights.

That effort extends to the example that Indonesia is now setting abroad. Indonesia took the initiative to establish the Bali Democracy Forum, an open forum for countries to share their experiences and best practices in fostering democracy. Indonesia has also been at the forefront of pushing for more attention to human rights within ASEAN. The nations of Southeast Asia must have the right to determine their own destiny, and the United States will strongly support that right. But the people of Southeast Asia must have the right to determine their own destiny as well. And that’s why we condemned elections in Burma recently that were neither free nor fair. That is why we are supporting your vibrant civil society in working with counterparts across this region. Because there’s no reason why respect for human rights should stop at the border of any country.

Hand in hand, that is what development and democracy are about — the notion that certain values are universal. Prosperity without freedom is just another form of poverty. Because there are aspirations that human beings share — the liberty of knowing that your leader is accountable to you, and that you won’t be locked up for disagreeing with them; the opportunity to get an education and to be able to work with dignity; the freedom to practice your faith without fear or restriction. Those are universal values that must be observed everywhere.

Now, religion is the final topic that I want to address today, and — like democracy and development — it is fundamental to the Indonesian story.

Like the other Asian nations that I’m visiting on this trip, Indonesia is steeped in spirituality — a place where people worship God in many different ways. Along with this rich diversity, it is also home to the world’s largest Muslim population — a truth I came to know as a boy when I heard the call to prayer across Jakarta.

Just as individuals are not defined solely by their faith, Indonesia is defined by more than its Muslim population. But we also know that relations between the United States and Muslim communities have frayed over many years. As President, I have made it a priority to begin to repair these relations. As part of that effort, I went to Cairo last June, and I called for a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world — one that creates a path for us to move beyond our differences.

I said then, and I will repeat now, that no single speech can eradicate years of mistrust. But I believed then, and I believe today, that we do have a choice. We can choose to be defined by our differences, and give in to a future of suspicion and mistrust. Or we can choose to do the hard work of forging common ground, and commit ourselves to the steady pursuit of progress. And I can promise you — no matter what setbacks may come, the United States is committed to human progress. That is who we are. That is what we’ve done. And that is what we will do.

Now, we know well the issues that have caused tensions for many years — and these are issues that I addressed in Cairo. In the 17 months that have passed since that speech, we have made some progress, but we have much more work to do.

Innocent civilians in America, in Indonesia and across the world are still targeted by violent extremism. I made clear that America is not, and never will be, at war with Islam. Instead, all of us must work together to defeat al Qaeda and its affiliates, who have no claim to be leaders of any religion –– certainly not a great, world religion like Islam. But those who want to build must not cede ground to terrorists who seek to destroy. And this is not a task for America alone. Indeed, here in Indonesia, you’ve made progress in rooting out extremists and combating such violence.

In Afghanistan, we continue to work with a coalition of nations to build the capacity of the Afghan government to secure its future. Our shared interest is in building peace in a war-torn land — a peace that provides no safe haven for violent extremists, and that provide hope for the Afghan people.

Meanwhile, we’ve made progress on one of our core commitments — our effort to end the war in Iraq. Nearly 100,000 American troops have now left Iraq under my presidency. Iraqis have taken full responsibility for their security. And we will continue to support Iraq as it forms an inclusive government, and we will bring all of our troops home.

In the Middle East, we have faced false starts and setbacks, but we’ve been persistent in our pursuit of peace. Israelis and Palestinians restarted direct talks, but enormous obstacles remain. There should be no illusion that peace and security will come easy. But let there be no doubt: America will spare no effort in working for the outcome that is just, and that is in the interests of all the parties involved — two states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security. That is our goal.

The stakes are high in resolving all of these issues. For our world has grown smaller, and while those forces that connect us have unleashed opportunity and great wealth, they also empower those who seek to derail progress. One bomb in a marketplace can obliterate the bustle of daily commerce. One whispered rumor can obscure the truth and set off violence between communities that once lived together in peace. In an age of rapid change and colliding cultures, what we share as human beings can sometimes be lost.

But I believe that the history of both America and Indonesia should give us hope. It is a story written into our national mottos. In the United States, our motto is E pluribus unum — out of many, one. Bhinneka Tunggal Ika — unity in diversity. We are two nations, which have traveled different paths. Yet our nations show that hundreds of millions who hold different beliefs can be united in freedom under one flag. And we are now building on that shared humanity — through young people who will study in each other’s schools; through the entrepreneurs forging ties that can lead to greater prosperity; and through our embrace of fundamental democratic values and human aspirations.

Before I came here, I visited Istiqlal mosque — a place of worship that was still under construction when I lived in Jakarta. And I admired its soaring minaret and its imposing dome and welcoming space. But its name and history also speak to what makes Indonesia great. Istiqlal means independence, and its construction was in part a testament to the nation’s struggle for freedom. Moreover, this house of worship for many thousands of Muslims was designed by a Christian architect.

Such is Indonesia’s spirit. Such is the message of Indonesia’s inclusive philosophy, Pancasila. Across an archipelago that contains some of God’s most beautiful creations, islands rising above an ocean named for peace, people choose to worship God as they please. Islam flourishes, but so do other faiths. Development is strengthened by an emerging democracy. Ancient traditions endure, even as a rising power is on the move.

That is not to say that Indonesia is without imperfections. No country is. But here we can find the ability to bridge divides of race and region and religion — by the ability to see yourself in other people. As a child of a different race who came here from a distant country, I found this spirit in the greeting that I received upon moving here: Selamat Datang. As a Christian visiting a mosque on this visit, I found it in the words of a leader who was asked about my visit and said, “Muslims are also allowed in churches. We are all God’s followers.”

That spark of the divine lives within each of us. We cannot give in to doubt or cynicism or despair. The stories of Indonesia and America should make us optimistic, because it tells us that history is on the side of human progress; that unity is more powerful than division; and that the people of this world can live together in peace. May our two nations, working together, with faith and determination, share these truths with all mankind.

Sebagai penutup, saya mengucapkan kepada seluruh rakyat Indonesia: terima kasih atas. Terima kasih. Assalamualaikum. Thank you.

President Barack Obama’s speech at Cairo University, Eygpt on Jun. 4, 2009:
Thank you very much. Good afternoon. I am honored to be in the timeless city of Cairo, and to be hosted by two remarkable institutions. For over a thousand years, Al-Azhar has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning; and for over a century, Cairo University has been a source of Egypt’s advancement. And together, you represent the harmony between tradition and progress. I’m grateful for your hospitality, and the hospitality of the people of Egypt. And I’m also proud to carry with me the goodwill of the American people, and a greeting of peace from Muslim communities in my country: Assalaamu alaykum.

We meet at a time of great tension between the United States and Muslims around the world — tension rooted in historical forces that go beyond any current policy debate. The relationship between Islam and the West includes centuries of coexistence and cooperation, but also conflict and religious wars. More recently, tension has been fed by colonialism that denied rights and opportunities to many Muslims, and a Cold War in which Muslim-majority countries were too often treated as proxies without regard to their own aspirations. Moreover, the sweeping change brought by modernity and globalization led many Muslims to view the West as hostile to the traditions of Islam.

Violent extremists have exploited these tensions in a small but potent minority of Muslims. The attacks of September 11, 2001 and the continued efforts of these extremists to engage in violence against civilians has led some in my country to view Islam as inevitably hostile not only to America and Western countries, but also to human rights. All this has bred more fear and more mistrust.

So long as our relationship is defined by our differences, we will empower those who sow hatred rather than peace, those who promote conflict rather than the cooperation that can help all of our people achieve justice and prosperity. And this cycle of suspicion and discord must end.

I’ve come here to Cairo to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect, and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive and need not be in competition. Instead, they overlap, and share common principles — principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.

I do so recognizing that change cannot happen overnight. I know there’s been a lot of publicity about this speech, but no single speech can eradicate years of mistrust, nor can I answer in the time that I have this afternoon all the complex questions that brought us to this point. But I am convinced that in order to move forward, we must say openly to each other the things we hold in our hearts and that too often are said only behind closed doors. There must be a sustained effort to listen to each other; to learn from each other; to respect one another; and to seek common ground. As the Holy Koran tells us, “Be conscious of God and speak always the truth.” That is what I will try to do today — to speak the truth as best I can, humbled by the task before us, and firm in my belief that the interests we share as human beings are far more powerful than the forces that drive us apart.

Now part of this conviction is rooted in my own experience. I’m a Christian, but my father came from a Kenyan family that includes generations of Muslims. As a boy, I spent several years in Indonesia and heard the call of the azaan at the break of dawn and at the fall of dusk. As a young man, I worked in Chicago communities where many found dignity and peace in their Muslim faith.

As a student of history, I also know civilization’s debt to Islam. It was Islam — at places like Al-Azhar — that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s Renaissance and Enlightenment. It was innovation in Muslim communities that developed the order of algebra; our magnetic compass and tools of navigation; our mastery of pens and printing; our understanding of how disease spreads and how it can be healed. Islamic culture has given us majestic arches and soaring spires; timeless poetry and cherished music; elegant calligraphy and places of peaceful contemplation. And throughout history, Islam has demonstrated through words and deeds the possibilities of religious tolerance and racial equality.

I also know that Islam has always been a part of America’s story. The first nation to recognize my country was Morocco. In signing the Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, our second President, John Adams, wrote, “The United States has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Muslims.” And since our founding, American Muslims have enriched the United States. They have fought in our wars, they have served in our government, they have stood for civil rights, they have started businesses, they have taught at our universities, they’ve excelled in our sports arenas, they’ve won Nobel Prizes, built our tallest building, and lit the Olympic Torch. And when the first Muslim American was recently elected to Congress, he took the oath to defend our Constitution using the same Holy Koran that one of our Founding Fathers — Thomas Jefferson — kept in his personal library.

So I have known Islam on three continents before coming to the region where it was first revealed. That experience guides my conviction that partnership between America and Islam must be based on what Islam is, not what it isn’t. And I consider it part of my responsibility as President of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear.

But that same principle must apply to Muslim perceptions of America. Just as Muslims do not fit a crude stereotype, America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire. The United States has been one of the greatest sources of progress that the world has ever known. We were born out of revolution against an empire. We were founded upon the ideal that all are created equal, and we have shed blood and struggled for centuries to give meaning to those words — within our borders, and around the world. We are shaped by every culture, drawn from every end of the Earth, and dedicated to a simple concept: E pluribus unum — “Out of many, one.”

Now, much has been made of the fact that an African American with the name Barack Hussein Obama could be elected President. But my personal story is not so unique. The dream of opportunity for all people has not come true for everyone in America, but its promise exists for all who come to our shores — and that includes nearly 7 million American Muslims in our country today who, by the way, enjoy incomes and educational levels that are higher than the American average.

Moreover, freedom in America is indivisible from the freedom to practice one’s religion. That is why there is a mosque in every state in our union, and over 1,200 mosques within our borders. That’s why the United States government has gone to court to protect the right of women and girls to wear the hijab and to punish those who would deny it.

So let there be no doubt: Islam is a part of America. And I believe that America holds within her the truth that regardless of race, religion, or station in life, all of us share common aspirations — to live in peace and security; to get an education and to work with dignity; to love our families, our communities, and our God. These things we share. This is the hope of all humanity.

Of course, recognizing our common humanity is only the beginning of our task. Words alone cannot meet the needs of our people. These needs will be met only if we act boldly in the years ahead; and if we understand that the challenges we face are shared, and our failure to meet them will hurt us all.

For we have learned from recent experience that when a financial system weakens in one country, prosperity is hurt everywhere. When a new flu infects one human being, all are at risk. When one nation pursues a nuclear weapon, the risk of nuclear attack rises for all nations. When violent extremists operate in one stretch of mountains, people are endangered across an ocean. When innocents in Bosnia and Darfur are slaughtered, that is a stain on our collective conscience. That is what it means to share this world in the 21st century. That is the responsibility we have to one another as human beings.

And this is a difficult responsibility to embrace. For human history has often been a record of nations and tribes — and, yes, religions — subjugating one another in pursuit of their own interests. Yet in this new age, such attitudes are self-defeating. Given our interdependence, any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will inevitably fail. So whatever we think of the past, we must not be prisoners to it. Our problems must be dealt with through partnership; our progress must be shared.

Now, that does not mean we should ignore sources of tension. Indeed, it suggests the opposite: We must face these tensions squarely. And so in that spirit, let me speak as clearly and as plainly as I can about some specific issues that I believe we must finally confront together.

The first issue that we have to confront is violent extremism in all of its forms.

In Ankara, I made clear that America is not — and never will be — at war with Islam. We will, however, relentlessly confront violent extremists who pose a grave threat to our security — because we reject the same thing that people of all faiths reject: the killing of innocent men, women, and children. And it is my first duty as President to protect the American people.

The situation in Afghanistan demonstrates America’s goals, and our need to work together. Over seven years ago, the United States pursued al Qaeda and the Taliban with broad international support. We did not go by choice; we went because of necessity. I’m aware that there’s still some who would question or even justify the events of 9/11. But let us be clear: Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 people on that day. The victims were innocent men, women and children from America and many other nations who had done nothing to harm anybody. And yet al Qaeda chose to ruthlessly murder these people, claimed credit for the attack, and even now states their determination to kill on a massive scale. They have affiliates in many countries and are trying to expand their reach. These are not opinions to be debated; these are facts to be dealt with.

Now, make no mistake: We do not want to keep our troops in Afghanistan. We see no military — we seek no military bases there. It is agonizing for America to lose our young men and women. It is costly and politically difficult to continue this conflict. We would gladly bring every single one of our troops home if we could be confident that there were not violent extremists in Afghanistan and now Pakistan determined to kill as many Americans as they possibly can. But that is not yet the case.

And that’s why we’re partnering with a coalition of 46 countries. And despite the costs involved, America’s commitment will not weaken. Indeed, none of us should tolerate these extremists. They have killed in many countries. They have killed people of different faiths — but more than any other, they have killed Muslims. Their actions are irreconcilable with the rights of human beings, the progress of nations, and with Islam. The Holy Koran teaches that whoever kills an innocent is as — it is as if he has killed all mankind. And the Holy Koran also says whoever saves a person, it is as if he has saved all mankind. The enduring faith of over a billion people is so much bigger than the narrow hatred of a few. Islam is not part of the problem in combating violent extremism — it is an important part of promoting peace.

Now, we also know that military power alone is not going to solve the problems in Afghanistan and Pakistan. That’s why we plan to invest $1.5 billion each year over the next five years to partner with Pakistanis to build schools and hospitals, roads and businesses, and hundreds of millions to help those who’ve been displaced. That’s why we are providing more than $2.8 billion to help Afghans develop their economy and deliver services that people depend on.

Let me also address the issue of Iraq. Unlike Afghanistan, Iraq was a war of choice that provoked strong differences in my country and around the world. Although I believe that the Iraqi people are ultimately better off without the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, I also believe that events in Iraq have reminded America of the need to use diplomacy and build international consensus to resolve our problems whenever possible. Indeed, we can recall the words of Thomas Jefferson, who said: “I hope that our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us that the less we use our power the greater it will be.”

Today, America has a dual responsibility: to help Iraq forge a better future — and to leave Iraq to Iraqis. And I have made it clear to the Iraqi people [pause] I have made it clear to the Iraqi people that we pursue no bases, and no claim on their territory or resources. Iraq’s sovereignty is its own. And that’s why I ordered the removal of our combat brigades by next August. That is why we will honor our agreement with Iraq’s democratically elected government to remove combat troops from Iraqi cities by July, and to remove all of our troops from Iraq by 2012. We will help Iraq train its security forces and develop its economy. But we will support a secure and united Iraq as a partner, and never as a patron.
And finally, just as America can never tolerate violence by extremists, we must never alter or forget our principles. Nine-eleven was an enormous trauma to our country. The fear and anger that it provoked was understandable, but in some cases, it led us to act contrary to our traditions and our ideals. We are taking concrete actions to change course. I have unequivocally prohibited the use of torture by the United States, and I have ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed by early next year.

So America will defend itself, respectful of the sovereignty of nations and the rule of law. And we will do so in partnership with Muslim communities which are also threatened. The sooner the extremists are isolated and unwelcome in Muslim communities, the sooner we will all be safer.

The second major source of tension that we need to discuss is the situation between Israelis, Palestinians and the Arab world.

America’s strong bonds with Israel are well known. This bond is unbreakable. It is based upon cultural and historical ties, and the recognition that the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history that cannot be denied.

Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust. Tomorrow, I will visit Buchenwald, which was part of a network of camps where Jews were enslaved, tortured, shot and gassed to death by the Third Reich. Six million Jews were killed — more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today. Denying that fact is baseless, it is ignorant, and it is hateful. Threatening Israel with destruction — or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews — is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve.

On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people — Muslims and Christians — have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than 60 years they’ve endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead. They endure the daily humiliations — large and small — that come with occupation. So let there be no doubt: The situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. And America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own.

For decades then, there has been a stalemate: two peoples with legitimate aspirations, each with a painful history that makes compromise elusive. It’s easy to point fingers — for Palestinians to point to the displacement brought about by Israel’s founding, and for Israelis to point to the constant hostility and attacks throughout its history from within its borders as well as beyond. But if we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth: The only resolution is for the aspirations of both sides to be met through two states, where Israelis and Palestinians each live in peace and security.

That is in Israel’s interest, Palestine’s interest, America’s interest, and the world’s interest. And that is why I intend to personally pursue this outcome with all the patience and dedication that the task requires. The obligations — the obligations that the parties have agreed to under the road map are clear. For peace to come, it is time for them — and all of us — to live up to our responsibilities.

Palestinians must abandon violence. Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and it does not succeed. For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation. But it was not violence that won full and equal rights. It was a peaceful and determined insistence upon the ideals at the center of America’s founding. This same story can be told by people from South Africa to South Asia; from Eastern Europe to Indonesia. It’s a story with a simple truth: that violence is a dead end. It is a sign neither of courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus. That’s not how moral authority is claimed; that’s how it is surrendered.

Now is the time for Palestinians to focus on what they can build. The Palestinian Authority must develop its capacity to govern, with institutions that serve the needs of its people. Hamas does have support among some Palestinians, but they also have to recognize they have responsibilities. To play a role in fulfilling Palestinian aspirations, to unify the Palestinian people, Hamas must put an end to violence, recognize past agreements, recognize Israel’s right to exist.

At the same time, Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel’s right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine’s. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop.

And Israel must also live up to its obligation to ensure that Palestinians can live and work and develop their society. Just as it devastates Palestinian families, the continuing humanitarian crisis in Gaza does not serve Israel’s security; neither does the continuing lack of opportunity in the West Bank. Progress in the daily lives of the Palestinian people must be a critical part of a road to peace, and Israel must take concrete steps to enable such progress.

And finally, the Arab states must recognize that the Arab Peace Initiative was an important beginning, but not the end of their responsibilities. The Arab-Israeli conflict should no longer be used to distract the people of Arab nations from other problems. Instead, it must be a cause for action to help the Palestinian people develop the institutions that will sustain their state, to recognize Israel’s legitimacy, and to choose progress over a self-defeating focus on the past.

America will align our policies with those who pursue peace, and we will say in public what we say in private to Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs. We cannot impose peace. But privately, many Muslims recognize that Israel will not go away. Likewise, many Israelis recognize the need for a Palestinian state. It is time for us to act on what everyone knows to be true.

Too many tears have been shed. Too much blood has been shed. All of us have a responsibility to work for the day when the mothers of Israelis and Palestinians can see their children grow up without fear; when the Holy Land of the three great faiths is the place of peace that God intended it to be; when Jerusalem is a secure and lasting home for Jews and Christians and Muslims, and a place for all of the children of Abraham to mingle peacefully together as in the story of Isra — (applause) — as in the story of Isra, when Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed, peace be upon them, joined in prayer.

The third source of tension is our shared interest in the rights and responsibilities of nations on nuclear weapons.

This issue has been a source of tension between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran. For many years, Iran has defined itself in part by its opposition to my country, and there is in fact a tumultuous history between us. In the middle of the Cold War, the United States played a role in the overthrow of a democratically elected Iranian government. Since the Islamic Revolution, Iran has played a role in acts of hostage-taking and violence against U.S. troops and civilians. This history is well known. Rather than remain trapped in the past, I’ve made it clear to Iran’s leaders and people that my country is prepared to move forward. The question now is not what Iran is against, but rather what future it wants to build.

I recognize it will be hard to overcome decades of mistrust, but we will proceed with courage, rectitude, and resolve. There will be many issues to discuss between our two countries, and we are willing to move forward without preconditions on the basis of mutual respect. But it is clear to all concerned that when it comes to nuclear weapons, we have reached a decisive point. This is not simply about America’s interests. It’s about preventing a nuclear arms race in the Middle East that could lead this region and the world down a hugely dangerous path.

I understand those who protest that some countries have weapons that others do not. No single nation should pick and choose which nation holds nuclear weapons. And that’s why I strongly reaffirmed America’s commitment to seek a world in which no nations hold nuclear weapons. And any nation — including Iran — should have the right to access peaceful nuclear power if it complies with its responsibilities under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. That commitment is at the core of the treaty, and it must be kept for all who fully abide by it. And I’m hopeful that all countries in the region can share in this goal.

The fourth issue that I will address is democracy.

I know — I know there has been controversy about the promotion of democracy in recent years, and much of this controversy is connected to the war in Iraq. So let me be clear: No system of government can or should be imposed by one nation by any other.

That does not lessen my commitment, however, to governments that reflect the will of the people. Each nation gives life to this principle in its own way, grounded in the traditions of its own people. America does not presume to know what is best for everyone, just as we would not presume to pick the outcome of a peaceful election. But I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things: the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn’t steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose. These are not just American ideas; they are human rights. And that is why we will support them everywhere.

Now, there is no straight line to realize this promise. But this much is clear: Governments that protect these rights are ultimately more stable, successful and secure. Suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away. America respects the right of all peaceful and law-abiding voices to be heard around the world, even if we disagree with them. And we will welcome all elected, peaceful governments — provided they govern with respect for all their people.

This last point is important because there are some who advocate for democracy only when they’re out of power; once in power, they are ruthless in suppressing the rights of others. So no matter where it takes hold, government of the people and by the people sets a single standard for all who would hold power: You must maintain your power through consent, not coercion; you must respect the rights of minorities, and participate with a spirit of tolerance and compromise; you must place the interests of your people and the legitimate workings of the political process above your party. Without these ingredients, elections alone do not make true democracy.

The fifth issue that we must address together is religious freedom.

Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance. We see it in the history of Andalusia and Cordoba during the Inquisition. I saw it firsthand as a child in Indonesia, where devout Christians worshiped freely in an overwhelmingly Muslim country. That is the spirit we need today. People in every country should be free to choose and live their faith based upon the persuasion of the mind and the heart and the soul. This tolerance is essential for religion to thrive, but it’s being challenged in many different ways.

Among some Muslims, there’s a disturbing tendency to measure one’s own faith by the rejection of somebody else’s faith. The richness of religious diversity must be upheld — whether it is for Maronites in Lebanon or the Copts in Egypt. And if we are being honest, fault lines must be closed among Muslims, as well, as the divisions between Sunni and Shia have led to tragic violence, particularly in Iraq.

Freedom of religion is central to the ability of peoples to live together. We must always examine the ways in which we protect it. For instance, in the United States, rules on charitable giving have made it harder for Muslims to fulfill their religious obligation. That’s why I’m committed to working with American Muslims to ensure that they can fulfill zakat.

Likewise, it is important for Western countries to avoid impeding Muslim citizens from practicing religion as they see fit — for instance, by dictating what clothes a Muslim woman should wear. We can’t disguise hostility towards any religion behind the pretence of liberalism.

In fact, faith should bring us together. And that’s why we’re forging service projects in America to bring together Christians, Muslims, and Jews. That’s why we welcome efforts like Saudi Arabian King Abdullah’s interfaith dialogue and Turkey’s leadership in the Alliance of Civilizations. Around the world, we can turn dialogue into interfaith service, so bridges between peoples lead to action — whether it is combating malaria in Africa, or providing relief after a natural disaster.

The sixth issue — the sixth issue that I want to address is women’s rights.

I know –- I know — and you can tell from this audience, that there is a healthy debate about this issue. I reject the view of some in the West that a woman who chooses to cover her hair is somehow less equal, but I do believe that a woman who is denied an education is denied equality. And it is no coincidence that countries where women are well educated are far more likely to be prosperous.
Now, let me be clear: Issues of women’s equality are by no means simply an issue for Islam. In Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, we’ve seen Muslim-majority countries elect a woman to lead. Meanwhile, the struggle for women’s equality continues in many aspects of American life, and in countries around the world.

I am convinced that our daughters can contribute just as much to society as our sons. Our common prosperity will be advanced by allowing all humanity — men and women — to reach their full potential. I do not believe that women must make the same choices as men in order to be equal, and I respect those women who choose to live their lives in traditional roles. But it should be their choice. And that is why the United States will partner with any Muslim-majority country to support expanded literacy for girls, and to help young women pursue employment through micro-financing that helps people live their dreams.

Finally, I want to discuss economic development and opportunity.

I know that for many, the face of globalization is contradictory. The Internet and television can bring knowledge and information, but also offensive sexuality and mindless violence into the home. Trade can bring new wealth and opportunities, but also huge disruptions and change in communities. In all nations — including America — this change can bring fear. Fear that because of modernity we lose control over our economic choices, our politics, and most importantly our identities — those things we most cherish about our communities, our families, our traditions, and our faith.

But I also know that human progress cannot be denied. There need not be contradictions between development and tradition. Countries like Japan and South Korea grew their economies enormously while maintaining distinct cultures. The same is true for the astonishing progress within Muslim-majority countries from Kuala Lumpur to Dubai. In ancient times and in our times, Muslim communities have been at the forefront of innovation and education.

And this is important because no development strategy can be based only upon what comes out of the ground, nor can it be sustained while young people are out of work. Many Gulf states have enjoyed great wealth as a consequence of oil, and some are beginning to focus it on broader development. But all of us must recognize that education and innovation will be the currency of the 21st century — (applause) — and in too many Muslim communities, there remains underinvestment in these areas. I’m emphasizing such investment within my own country. And while America in the past has focused on oil and gas when it comes to this part of the world, we now seek a broader engagement.

On education, we will expand exchange programs, and increase scholarships, like the one that brought my father to America. At the same time, we will encourage more Americans to study in Muslim communities. And we will match promising Muslim students with internships in America; invest in online learning for teachers and children around the world; and create a new online network, so a young person in Kansas can communicate instantly with a young person in Cairo.

On economic development, we will create a new corps of business volunteers to partner with counterparts in Muslim-majority countries. And I will host a Summit on Entrepreneurship this year to identify how we can deepen ties between business leaders, foundations and social entrepreneurs in the United States and Muslim communities around the world.

On science and technology, we will launch a new fund to support technological development in Muslim-majority countries, and to help transfer ideas to the marketplace so they can create more jobs. We’ll open centers of scientific excellence in Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia, and appoint new science envoys to collaborate on programs that develop new sources of energy, create green jobs, digitize records, clean water, grow new crops. Today I’m announcing a new global effort with the Organization of the Islamic Conference to eradicate polio. And we will also expand partnerships with Muslim communities to promote child and maternal health.

All these things must be done in partnership. Americans are ready to join with citizens and governments; community organizations, religious leaders, and businesses in Muslim communities around the world to help our people pursue a better life.

The issues that I have described will not be easy to address. But we have a responsibility to join together on behalf of the world that we seek — a world where extremists no longer threaten our people, and American troops have come home; a world where Israelis and Palestinians are each secure in a state of their own, and nuclear energy is used for peaceful purposes; a world where governments serve their citizens, and the rights of all God’s children are respected. Those are mutual interests. That is the world we seek. But we can only achieve it together.

I know there are many — Muslim and non-Muslim — who question whether we can forge this new beginning. Some are eager to stoke the flames of division, and to stand in the way of progress. Some suggest that it isn’t worth the effort — that we are fated to disagree, and civilizations are doomed to clash. Many more are simply skeptical that real change can occur. There’s so much fear, so much mistrust that has built up over the years. But if we choose to be bound by the past, we will never move forward. And I want to particularly say this to young people of every faith, in every country — you, more than anyone, have the ability to reimagine the world, to remake this world.

All of us share this world for but a brief moment in time. The question is whether we spend that time focused on what pushes us apart, or whether we commit ourselves to an effort — a sustained effort — to find common ground, to focus on the future we seek for our children, and to respect the dignity of all human beings.

It’s easier to start wars than to end them. It’s easier to blame others than to look inward. It’s easier to see what is different about someone than to find the things we share. But we should choose the right path, not just the easy path. There’s one rule that lies at the heart of every religion — that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. This truth transcends nations and peoples — a belief that isn’t new; that isn’t black or white or brown; that isn’t Christian or Muslim or Jew. It’s a belief that pulsed in the cradle of civilization, and that still beats in the hearts of billions around the world. It’s a faith in other people, and it’s what brought me here today.

We have the power to make the world we seek, but only if we have the courage to make a new beginning, keeping in mind what has been written.

The Holy Koran tells us: “O mankind! We have created you male and a female; and we have made you into nations and tribes so that you may know one another.”

The Talmud tells us: “The whole of the Torah is for the purpose of promoting peace.”

The Holy Bible tells us: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.”

The people of the world can live together in peace. We know that is God’s vision. Now that must be our work here on Earth.

Thank you. And may God’s peace be upon you. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Source: National Post

John Ware asks: How do you define extremism?

2010-11-23T17:58:00.003+08:00

Source: BBC Panorama
By John Ware

About 5,000 UK children are being taught the Saudi national curriculum

What is extremism - how do you define it?
The Education Secretary Michael Gove says: "You know it when you see it."

That does not seem to be the case for some part-time Saudi schools in Britain.

As Panorama has discovered, a network of more than 40 weekend Saudi schools have been offering to teach the Saudi national curriculum to Muslim children in the UK and some of it is very extreme indeed.

Text books teach school children about the correct way to chop off the hands and feet of thieves - a hand for the first offence, a foot for the second.

It tasks pupils to spell out the "reprehensible qualities" of Jews. It explains that the penalty for sodomy is execution - possibly by being thrown off a cliff - and that Zionists are plotting to take over the world for Jews.

'Anti-Semitism'
This is a reference to a late 19th century "plot" by Russian anti-Semites who claimed the elders of Zion had written a series of secret "Protocols" to achieve global domination of the economy and media.

These "Protocols" were exposed as a hoax 89-years-ago.

But for 15-year-old Muslims studying the Saudi national curriculum here in Britain in the hope of getting into a Saudi university, the plot continues to the present day. There are "many proofs" of the Protocols' "veracity", the grade 10 text book says.

BBC Newsnight exposed similar anti-Semitic sentiments in Saudi text books at a Saudi school in London in 2007. The Saudi government's promise of a "comprehensive" review of all offensive material in their curriculum does not seem to have been comprehensive enough.

These Saudi schools have been going for about 30 years.

The Saudis have got away with this for so long because part-time schools do not have to register with the Department for Education (DfE), so they do not get inspected. That may now change.

Mr Gove told me the school inspectorate Ofsted will shortly report to him about how "part-time provision is better registered and better inspected".

Easier said than done.

Western influence
Thousands of children from all faiths attend other perfectly respectable part-time schools at the weekend. And these classes are not just held in church halls, mosques, synagogues, and temples. Some are in the backrooms of private houses.

What about full-time faith schools of which there are around 25,000 in England and Wales? Do they all recognise extremism when they see it? Assuredly most do. But not all. And this is where the spotlight again falls mainly on Muslim faith schools.

There are not as many Muslim faith schools per head of population as there are Christian (most of which are now 'faith' in name only) and Jewish.

But Muslim parents are turning to faith schools, mostly private, in increasing numbers in order to preserve the Islamic ethos of their offspring and to shield them from western influence.

In our comparison of more than 100 websites of schools of all faiths, it was the anti- western tone of some Muslim schools that was most striking.

Let us be clear. No-one is talking here about teaching terrorism.

The real concern is about a school ethos that reinforces separatism - either by living in separate enclaves or by not buying into the core values of a liberal democracy - tolerance, equality between men and women, and respect for man made laws.

Integration
The Muslim population of Britain has been rising rapidly and research by the economics department at Bristol University shows that Muslim children are the most segregated in Britain.

Faith schools are growing in popularity. Which way will Muslims be pulled - towards or away from the mainstream?

The new government, much like the last one, sees integration as the long term solution to radicalisation because it has recognised that a sense of Muslim isolationism from wider UK society can increase vulnerability to radicalisation by charismatic preachers.

That is why the entire school inspection system is now being reviewed by the Education Secretary.

Many Muslim faith schools clearly do manage to preserve their Islamic identity whilst embracing the pluralism of a liberal democracy.

I was struck how the Al Furqan school in Birmingham displayed symbols of all the faiths, including Buddhism and Hinduism, shunned by many Conservative Muslims as normalising polytheism - the worship of Gods other than God.

For me the symbolism seemed clear: Al Furqan was genuinely striving to connect to the mainstream.

Just as clearly, however, other Muslim schools we encountered seemed in varying degrees to want to stay separate, leading separate lives in separate enclaves.

Following a lengthy study, the centre right think tank Policy Exchange, today publishes recommendations about how to protect children of all faiths from religious fundamentalism in the classroom.

Due diligence
Will these steer more Muslim faiths schools in the general direction of schools like Al Furqan?

The report finds that the education system is currently "not equipped" to prevent "extremist influences" in faith schools.

It includes Ofsted whose often glowing reports about a school's promotion of "spiritual, moral and cultural" values seem at variance with the school's links to fundamentalist preachers, Islamic institutions, mosques and websites.

One of the report's authors John Bald, a former Ofsted Lead Inspector, says Ofsted was never designed to sift and weigh evidence of this kind.

Policy Exchange also say the government should set up a dedicated Due Diligence Unit based at the DfE to vet new applicants who want to establish new academies and schools independent of government under Mr Gove's Free Schools plan.

I am told that currently due diligence consists of not much more than a "google search...of Companies House and Linkedin".

Mr Gove is already adopting some of these recommendations.

He told me he is not going to "attempt to police what people believe" but is "determined to ensure that those who have access to public money and those who are shaping young minds, do not peddle an extremist agenda".

Applications from "any organisation or individual who we fear might be associated with extremism" will be rejected, Gove explained.

As in other spheres, the attempt to shape a new British identity from childhood - one that is both British and Muslim at ease with their common citizenship - seems to have entered a new phase.

Source: BBC Panorama

Sultan of the Muslim World

2010-11-20T17:14:00.001+08:00

Source: Foreign Affairs Magazine
Soner Cagaptay

Summary: Since the days of the Ottoman Empire, a fine balance between the Islamic side of Turkey’s identity and its secular, nationalist side has driven Turkish foreign policy. Now the AKP has upset that balance and left Turkey searching for a new role in world affairs.

SONER CAGAPTAY is a Senior Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and is the co-author, with Scott Carpenter, of Regenerating the U.S.-Turkey Partnership.

Why the AKP’s Turkey Will Be the East’s Next Leader
Turkey may be the most Muslim nation in the world. It was forged through blood and war as a state exclusively by and for Muslims -- a claim it shares only with Pakistan. Fleeing persecution in Europe, Russia, and the Caucasus, millions of Turkish and non-Turkish Muslims settled there, and today almost half of Turkey’s 73 million citizens are descendants of these disparate peoples. This little-known story is why modern Turkey was born a Muslim nation: when the Ottoman Empire finally collapsed at the end of World War I, Muslims from all over the empire joined with ethnic Turks to defend the new nation against Christian foes -- the Allied forces, Armenians, and Greeks. Since then, the balance between this Islamic aspect of Turkey’s identity and its other -- secular nationalist -- side has guided the course of Turkish foreign policy.

Religion remained a salient national identity well into the post-Ottoman period. For example, when Greece and Turkey exchanged minority populations in the 1920s as part of the settlement of the Greco-Turkish conflict, Turkey handed over Turkish-speaking Orthodox Christians from Anatolia in return for Greek-speaking Muslims from Crete. Still, Turkish identity was not based purely on Islam: starting in the 1920s with Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Turkey’s first president, the country’s Kemalist politicians have tried to emphasize the unifying power of nationalism. They promoted the idea of a singular, Western democratic civilization that was not only unified by religion and had room for all Turks. Turkish nationalism was secular in the sense that citizens were expected to be Westernized but could still be Muslim if they chose. Consequently, Kemalists turned Turkey’s foreign policy westward. And from the 1920s to the early part of this century, Turkish elites and governing parties adopted pro-Western foreign policies, embraced NATO, and marched closer toward EU membership.

But now Atatürk’s legacy has started to unravel. Since 2002, a party with Islamist roots, the Justice and Development Party (AKP), has unearthed Turkey’s Muslim identity. At first, many assumed that the AKP’s emphasis on Islam would not move Turkey away from the West. In fact, many heralded the AKP’s Turkey as a model democratic Muslim nation. But due to the resonance of the notion of a politically-defined “Muslim world” in the post-9/11 world, a state with a Muslim identity is especially vulnerable to viewing the world in terms of Huntingtonian clashes of civilizations.

Riding the wave of anti-Western sentiment unleashed by the 2003 Iraq war, the AKP has chilled Turkey’s relationship with the West and, instead, has tried to reposition the country as a leader of the re-christened Muslim world. It has encouraged an “us (Muslims) versus them (the West)” worldview at the expense of Turkey’s historic flexibility. In his book, Strategic Depth, the AKP Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, summarizes this position: “Turkey’s traditionally good ties with the West are a form of alienation.” Undoubtedly, the AKP’s hostility toward the West would not have resonated with Turks before 9/11 and the wars that followed. The AKP was able to cast the war in Iraq as an attack on Muslims -- Turks included -- and place Turkey firmly on the side of the Muslim world.

The AKP, after eight years of rule -- an unusually long reign in Turkish politics (and the longest in Turkey’s democratic history if the party wins upcoming general elections in June 2011) -- has amassed enough power to turn its words into actions. Already, it has stocked the high courts with sympathetic judges, after winning a referendum that empowered the party to appoint top judges without a confirmation process. And it has sought to limit the role of the army in the government’s affairs.

Although this move may seem good for democracy, it has actually done harm. The government has used Ergenekon, the code word for an alleged nationalist organization that supposedly was plotting a coup, as an excuse to bully the military and arrest opponents, successfully neutering any opposition. The government’s use of illegal wiretaps against critics has created a republic of fear: anyone who challenges the AKP can land in jail under the most spurious of allegations. Recently, Hanefi Avcı, a police chief famous for rooting out communists in his district in the 1980s, was arrested and charged with being a member of a communist cell. This came just days after he published his memoirs, which were critical of the AKP’s methods of intimidation.

Not long ago, many would have expected the military, which has traditionally been the guardian of Turkey’s secular, nationalist identity, to intervene as politics got out of hand. But the implication of the AKP’s ever-increasing power, especially after it changed the line of succession for the military’s top brass, is that the military will bend to the AKP’s will and play along with its newfound leadership role in the Muslim world. In October, the military remained quiet when the AKP objected to NATO’s plans to place a missile defense shield in Turkey. This suggests that the AKP no longer perceives Iran and Syria as threats. And there are already signs that the military is stopping its decades-long practice of purging Islamist officers from its ranks, which would open the way for grass-roots Islamization of NATO’s second-largest army.

As the AKP goes, so will the Turkish population. Since the modernizing days of the Ottoman sultans, the political culture of the population has been imposed by the elite. And the AKP, with its coterie of Islamist billionaires, media personalities, think tanks, and universities, is Turkey’s new elite. Turkey’s population has already seemingly bought into the AKP mindset. According to a recent poll by TESEV, an Istanbul-based nongovernmental organization, the number of people identifying themselves as Muslim increased by ten percent between 2002 and 2007. Almost half of them described themselves as Islamist, which means they believe that this illiberal ideology, rather than secular democracy, should guide Turkey’s political system. This is a stark departure from Ataturk’s vision, which suggested that Turks could be Western, politically secular, and Muslim all at once.

Many Turks formerly believed that they shared values and interests with the West, making collaboration with NATO, the United States, and the European Union, beneficial. But after the rise of the AKP -- and after the 9/11 attacks and the Iraq war defined the Muslim world in opposition to the West -- that is no longer the case: according to the 2010 Transatlantic Trends report, 55 percent of Turks now feel that Turkey has such different values from the West that it is a non-Western country. And although in 2004, 73 percent of Turks believed that membership in the European Union would be a good thing, only 38 percent did in 2010. Alarmingly, according to the latest Pew Global Attitudes Project, 56 percent of Turks view the United States as a military threat. As suspicion of the West has grown, desire to cooperate with the Middle East has risen. This year, according to Transatlantic Trends, 20 percent of Turks desired more cooperation with the Middle East, compared to ten percent in 2009.

If the AKP is emphasizing Islamic identity and positioning itself as the leader of the Muslim world at home, is the Muslim world ready to accept its leadership? In fact, Turkey may be well suited for the role: in addition to its status as the seat of the Ottoman Empire, which was the heir to the caliphate, Turkey has the largest economy and most powerful military of any Muslim nation. Nonetheless, the AKP has some work to do to convince Muslim countries that Turkey is their rightful sultan. Some, including the Syrian regime, which is looking for a new, strong regional patron, might be willing to accept Turkey’s leadership. But others, such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, will be more reluctant. They already consider themselves the center of the Muslim world.

Still, the AKP appears to have enormous popularity on the streets of Cairo and Damascus. Finally, many non-Arab Muslim countries promote their own brands of political Islam and have their own ideas about who should speak on behalf of the Muslim world. To win them over, and increase its standing in the skeptical Middle East, the AKP will cynically use Islamist causes to improve its standing with Muslim publics. For example, it might declare solidarity with Hamas (but not the secular Palestinian Authority) to agitate for Palestinian nationhood. It can also be expected to lambast European policies toward Muslim immigrants and vocally take issue with any U.S. policies involving Muslims, such as the Israel-Palestine conflict, the conflict in Sudan, and Iran.

So far, many of the AKP’s efforts to defend global Islamist causes, such as its frustrated attempt last summer to broker a nuclear deal between Iran and the West, have faltered. Still, even if Turkey cannot convince the rest of the Muslim world of its power, Turks have already bought into the AKP’s brand of us-versus-them Islam at the expense of its nationalist identity. In other words, the AKP will have its cake and eat it too unless Turks stop believing in a Huntingtonian clash between the Muslim world and the West -- or unless Kemalism reemerges to assert the nationalist, secular aspects of Turkey’s identity. And the next chance for that to happen will be the June 2011 elections, which may be the most important battle for Turkey’s soul in over two centuries, since the Ottoman sultans first turned Turkey to the West.

Source: Foreign Affairs Magazine

Pedalling to the pilgrimage

2010-11-14T18:02:00.007+08:00

Source: Aljazeera
Malika Bilal in Mecca

Haron and Cairncross left Cape Town in February and arrived in Mecca nine months later (Credit: Cape2Mecca)

The idea began as a hypothetical situation - what would happen if a few friends attempted to bicycle from their home in South Africa to the Muslim holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia in time for the annual Hajj pilgrimage?

Twelve countries, nine months and untold kilometres of freshly traveled earth behind them, the hypothetical has become a reality for Cape Town residents Nathim Cairncross, 28, and Imtiyaz Ahmad Haron, 25.

The two pedalled their way across the Saudi border in late October, arriving nearly three weeks before the official start of the Hajj, the annual Muslim pilgrimage to the Kaaba in Mecca.

The pilgrimage, which falls during the last month of the Islamic calendar and begins on November 14 this year, is a rite that forms one of the five pillars of Islam and is mandatory for able-bodied Muslims of means at least once in their lifetime.

The two began planning their journey in December, shortly after Haron floated the idea to Cairncross, his friend of nearly seven years. Haron had been reading up on the Hajj, which draws about two million Muslims to Saudi Arabia annually.

Inspired by the stories of pilgrims that had made the arduous journey to Mecca before him, Haron decided that he wanted to join their ranks and enlisted Cairncross to come along – with a twist. The two would make the trek using only their bicycles.

"In life there's a consistent principle for me," Cairncross told Al Jazeera.

"If I work very hard for something, at the end of the day it's sweeter; I value it more. After nine months [cycling] through Africa and the Middle East – of course, I value it more."

Training for the trek
Their journey began on February 7, on a cold and rainy morning at a mosque in Cape Town, where nearly 500 people had gathered to bid them farewell and pray for their well being.

Escorted about 70km out of town by local cycling clubs supporting their effort, the two were then left alone to traverse the road ahead using their maps, their bicycles and sheer determination.

"We're not professional bike riders," Cairncross said. "But we did physical training – increased exercises – two months before, going up the mountains [of Cape Town], running on the beach, swimming."

Even as they trained for the trek, Haron and Cairncross also had to combat the naysayers, who discouraged them from embarking on the ride, and others who did not think the two would go through with the plan.

Undaunted, the friends plotted their itinerary, consulted the South African traffic department to ensure they could use the roads, researched visa entry rules, and sought medical advice from doctors, who "diagnosed us as crazy", the two said.

Word soon began to spread of their plan, and their story caught the attention of local radio stations. Once their journey began, those stations kept in touch with the riders, calling them periodically to check in on how the ride was progressing, and reporting back to listeners in Cape Town.

The support helped buoy them through their long journey, across Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and the green peaks of Malawi.

Kindness of strangers
They cycled 80-100km per day, starting after the pre-dawn Muslim prayer, and stopping at night at hotels, campsites, or mosques, where they would tell their story to welcoming listeners who would then invite them to stay the night and eat a meal.

They made friends along the way - locals, other cyclists and tourists curious about their journey. Haron and Cairncross welcomed the curiosity, seeing it as an opportunity to explain Islam, Hajj, and why they intended to perform the pilgrimage.

"On the ground you can speak to the people," Cairncross said.

"You get an opportunity that traveling by plane or car you don't get. And you learn much more, you discover much more about yourself. It was an existential experience."

However, speaking to people posed a challenge in some countries, where the number of English-speakers was few, and language represented a barrier. Refusing to let that hinder them, Haron and Cairncross began to pick up the basics of the languages they encountered, consulting with locals and researching when they could find an internet connection.

In addition to the language barriers, the two faced minor technical problems – tire punctures, broken chains, and cushion malfunctions. But they said safety was never an issue, and despite their limited budget they always managed to find food and shelter.

Africa to Asia
From Malawi, the friends cycled through Tanzania, visiting the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba, before heading to Kenya and the border of Ethiopia.

But it was at that border that Haron and Cairncross faced their first major obstacle of the trip. The two had planned to travel through Ethiopia and into Sudan, but border authorities denied their exit from Kenya into the east African country, leaving the friends temporarily stranded, and without a plan.

After myriad calls to South African embassy officials and a hasty refiguring of their original plan, Haron and Cairncross booked plane tickets and flew to Turkey, determined to complete their mission despite the slight hiccup.

They spent the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan traveling through Turkey, from Istanbul and Ankara to Gaziantep, one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world.

From Turkey, they cycled to Aleppo and Damascus in Syria, where they were pleasantly surprised by the depth of Syrian hospitality as children ran up to their bicycles and invited them home to lunch.

Mercy from the skies
Then it was on to Jordan – with a 24-hour trip to the city of Jerusalem to visit Masjid al-Aqsa – before heading back over the Allenby Bridge connecting Israel and the Palestinian territories to the Jordanian border. After biking the rugged hills of Petra and riding past the Dead Sea, the two at last cycled through the Arabian desert and over the Jordanian border into Saudi Arabia in late October.

"At the Tabuk border, we ran into three generals at the border post, and they were very impressed with our trip," Cairncross said.

"So they made things easy for us, processed our visas, and while that was happening, they took us to their office, allowed us to sleep over and eat breakfast."

With a stop in Medina, Haron and Cairncross finally made it to Mecca, under heavy grey skies reminiscent of the day that they set out on their trip. The two friends have not yet decided how they will get back to Cape Town – and they are soliciting donations to help defer some of those costs, including a bid to sell their bicycles when the trip is over.

However, despite the uncertainty of the future, they said they knew the trip was more than worth the effort when they stepped foot into the confines of Mecca.

"It was an incredible feeling," Cairncross said.

"It was storming when we got to Mecca, with thunder and lightening. But we were so keen to get in, to see the Kaaba for the first time.

"Making tawaf (the circulation around the Kaaba) with your ihram (unstitched garments worn by pilgrims) soaking through – the rain was like mercy coming down on us. Not that we're special, but it felt like, God willing, our efforts were accepted."

Source: Aljazeera

Separation of church and state hyped as a campaign issue

2010-10-28T17:27:00.007+08:00

Source: Yahoo! News
By Rachel Rose Hartman

For the second time in the past two weeks, a tea party Republican has sparked a miniature media furor by questioning the separation of church and state.

"I disagree strongly with the concept of separation of church and state," Colorado Senate candidate Ken Buck said in a video publicized yesterday. "It was not written into the Constitution."

Buck made the remark in 2009, but video footage of the event was posted on liberal website ThinkProgress Tuesday -- just one week after tea party Republican Christine O'Donnell made headlines for asking during a Delaware Senate debate where in the Constitution that provision exists.

Many liberal commentators poked fun at both candidates -- especially O'Donnell, whom critics claimed was not looking to score a debate point but was demonstrating her own deficient grasp of the Constitution. The same critics derided both tea party hopefuls as "extremists" -- but the absence of any constitutional basis for church-state separation has long been a bedrock belief in conservative circles.

Indeed, a review of recent public statements from prominent conservatives shows how widespread the idea is -- and how, in a movement conservative context, provoking the derision of liberal commentators on the issue is far from a liability.

Sarah Palin in April stated: "Lest anyone try to convince you that God should be separated from the state, our founding fathers, they were believers. And George Washington, he saw faith in God as basic to life."

Republican Sharron Angle, candidate for Nevada Senate, has repeatedly made clear her position that a separation of church and state is an "unconstitutional doctrine."
Dan Severson, Republican candidate for Missouri secretary of state, said last week: "Quite often you hear people say, 'What about separation of church and state?' There is no such thing. I mean it just does not exist, and it does not exist in America for a purpose, because we are a Christian nation."

Republican House candidate Glen Urquhart of Delaware also questioned the separation of church and stat -- and gained extra media attention for suggesting it was Adolf Hitler who coined the phrase.

GOP Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, whose insurgent 2008 presidential bid is widely credited as one of the forerunners of the tea party movement, in 2003 wrote in an essay: "The notion of a rigid separation between church and state has no basis in either the text of the Constitution or the writings of our Founding Fathers."

Such assertions obviously command little assent among liberal Democrats -- but for candidates such as O'Donnell, Buck and Angle, the refutation of a constitutional basis for church-state separation alerts the powerful evangelical conservative base that they are candidates keenly attuned to the worldview of the evangelical right.

Buck spokesman Owen Loftus told the Denver Post that the left is just using the video as a distraction in the closing days of the campaign.

The First Amendment to the Constitution states: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof ..." And the idea of a "wall of separation" demarcating the spheres of church and state is credited to Thomas Jefferson, in an 1802 letter to the Danbury Baptist Association.

The Supreme Court ruled in 1947 that the Establishment Clause of the Constitution prescribes a "wall of separation" between religion and state, but conservative legal thinkers contend that the ruling isn't grounded in the original intent of the Founders or the Constitution's actual language.

(Photo: AP/Barry Gutierrez)

Source: Yahoo! News

Is Islam Really the Greatest Threat to the World Today?

2010-10-27T16:51:00.006+08:00

Source: Voice of Jihad

Recently the former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, in an interview, asserted that “radical Islam” was the greatest threat to the world today. However, the term “radical Islam” is a comparatively recent phrase coined by the enemies of Islam to vilify Muslims seeking to organize themselves and live according to the edicts of Islam. After the defeat of European Crusaders at the hands of Muslim armies in Palestine , the European powers realized that they could never succeed in capturing and retaining any Muslims lands unless they distort the principles of Islam. Therefore, when European powers embarked on their aggressive colonial conquests, they did not only snatched these lands from the Muslims but also concocted a complicated and malevolent plan to distort the religion of Islam: Firstly, they tried to dilute the concept of Jihad in Islam. Secondly, they introduced the European notion of separation of politics and religion.

Thirdly, they abolished all Islamic laws and replaced them with man-made laws. The colonialists were aided in their plans by some hypocrites and heretics who, being enticed by worldly gains, actively supported the European powers in their designs against Islam.

The enemies of Islam succeeded in their plans to such an extent that today, ours enemies can call any Muslim recognising the validity and importance of these three aspects, as radicals and the whole world,including some simple-minded Muslims, actually believe their propaganda. This brief historical summary is being provided to clarify any misgivings that an average reader might have about the comments of the former British Prime Minister.

As for his comments that “radical Islam” is the biggest threat to the world today; to call it a lie, would be an understatement. Tony Blair said that radical Islamists believed themselves to be justified in the use of chemical,biological, and nuclear weapons. To our understanding, no Muslim country has ever been associated with the use of nuclear weapons, the only two nuclear weapons that were used against civilian populations were those of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, and both of those crimes against humanity were carried out by Americans.

Even today, the U.S. and its coalition allies continue to use uranium-depleted weapons against innocent civilians in Afghanistan . Muslims were not the ones who invented or used chemical and biological weapons in conventional (or unconventional) warfare.

The first deliberate large-scale use of chemical and biological weapons occurred in World War I, where all the warring parties were European powers. Muslims do not stock-pile large quantities of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. The only countries who have them are the very same ones that call themselves the defenders of worldpeace . Their refusal to disarm their nuclear weapons, while denying other countries the same measure of security poses the biggest threat to world peace today. When confronted with the hypothesis that Chechens, Kashmiris, Palestinians,Iraqis and Afghans were resisting foreign occupations of their lands, Tony Blair, who has always been a man of more form than substance, could not answer in any meaningful way,and simply resorted to typical British rhetoric calling our entire way of life “regressive, wicked, and backward-looking”. We are no more regressive than Tony Blair with his nostalgic thinking of when Britain actually was a power that mattered. We are no more wicked than Tony Blair who continues to justify his decision to invade Iraq without any legal pretext and despite the fact that no weapons of mass destruction were ever found in Iraq . And we are no more backward-looking than Britain whose very way of life is based on what they received from us and Roman way of life.

For over two centuries, Western powers have been plundering the resources of Muslim lands and murdering its inhabitants with impunity. Their aggressions against the Muslim populations have continued unabated until now. The discovery of vast natural resources and the strategic importance of the regions have reignited the greed of the Westerners seeking to further pillage our lands. The Muslim populations of these regions have been denied basic freedoms and their right to live according to their religion. This is why Western powers are so alarmed by this trend of Muslims returning to their religion and living according to its dictates. People like Tony Blair know that Islam is the only viable force in the world capable of thwarting their colonial ambitions in the region.

It was largely due to this Islamphobia that, when the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan was established, the Western powers were so quick in condemning it, and were looking for any pretext to destroy this legitimate government. The attacks on the twin towers were just the excuse the enemies were looking for to try and destroy our religion once and for all. The United States began their invasions of Muslims lands on nothing more than unproven speculation. The evidence they presented was mere circumstantial conjecture barely admissible in any legal tribunal. In one of the most ghastly acts in international law, the United Nations Security Council actually sanctified the invasion of Afghanistan without asking for any kind of proof linking any attacks on foreign nations by the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.

The very least the United Nations could have done was to verify the truth or falsity of the evidence presented by the United States, and negotiate with the Islamic Emirate to set up a tribunal to give the accused culprits a fair trial under Sharia Law. Instead, the Western forces began a policy of blatant violations of international norms and customs, while the United Nations and other so called champions of human rights remained muted. The truth is that the actions America , in concert with Britain (at the time led by Tony Blair), took have proven to be the greatest threat to the world today. They have invaded and violated the sovereignty of dozens of Muslims countries around the world. They have killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people in Afghanistan , Iraq and other Muslim countries. They have taken innocent civilians off our streets and subjected them to the most grotesque forms of torture in Abu Ghuraib, Bagram and Guantanamo prisons. They have openly burned our Quran, and perpetrated an act of desecration by drawing caroons of our Holy Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him),and called our religion a threat to world peace. They continue to bombard innocent Afghan civilians under the most unprovoked circumstances. And to top it all, they brazenly accuse us of terrorising our own people and being a threat to the world. It is hard to imagine which planet they live in and which aliens they hope to convince with their lies.

The reception Tony Blair received in Dublin is clear proof that no humans believe his stupendous lies.

Source: Voice of Jihad

Muslims live under dictatorship in US

2010-10-27T01:12:00.002+08:00

Source: PressTV.ir

Logo of United Nations Human Rights Council

Muslims live under “ dictatorship” in the US, says an African-American Muslim activist, ahead of a review of the US human rights records by the UN Human Rights Council.

In less than two weeks, the Human Rights Council will, for the first time ever, assess the human rights status of the United States in a Universal Periodic Review (UPR).

“We [Muslims] believe that it is our duty, it is our responsibility to stand up to what we call the United States government's 'constitutional dictatorship',” activist and Imam of Masjid al-Islam Abdul Alim Musa told Press TV on Monday.

“When we say a constitutional dictatorship, we mean that they have a constitution, but with all of the new anti-terrorism bills, patriot acts, all of the homeland securities, all of the FBI memos... all of these new charges that they operate on allow them to go around all of the constitutional guarantees [for human rights,]” he added.

It is not only the Muslims that are under pressure in the United States, as other minorities also suffer discrimination.

According to a UPR report provided by the US government, the unemployment rate for African-Americans is 15.8 percent and for Hispanics, 12.4, compared to only 8.8 percent for whites.

A little less than half of African Americans and Hispanics own their homes, compared to three-quarters of the whites.

A person with disabilities is only one-fourth as likely to be employed as a person without, and white Americans are twice as likely as native Americans to have college degrees.

HJL/TG/HRF

Source: PressTV.ir

Most Israelis view Tel Aviv negatively

2010-10-27T01:04:00.002+08:00

Source: PressTV.ir

Far-right Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman (Credit: Getty Images)

A new survey conducted by an Israeli institute reveals that a majority of Israelis have negative views about the Tel Aviv regime.

The poll was conducted by Maagar Mochot, one of Israel's leading research institutions, in September and released in late October. The institute interviewed 1,200 Israeli adults.

According to the opinion poll, 81 percent of respondents considered Israel's image as negative and just 15 percent viewed Israel positive.

Israel fabricated its existence in 1948 during the Six-Day War against the Arab world, forcing 711,000 Palestinians to leave their homeland.

Estimates for 2008 put the number of the refugees at over 4.6 million.

In 1967, Tel Aviv went on to occupy and later annex the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem), the promised capital of the future Palestinian state. The move is considered illegal under international law.

AGB/PKH/MMN

Source: PressTV.ir

Religious Bias in US Textbooks?

2010-10-18T14:12:00.007+08:00

Source: Middle East Online

By comparison with Christianity, coverage of other world faiths is static and limited. Coverage of Islam in textbooks is similar to Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism in its focus on early origins rather than change over time. Christian history is actually treated in an exemplary manner in most history textbooks, notes Susan Douglass.

The allegation that textbooks favour Islam over Christianity is spurious, and the Texas Board of Education has been misled (Credit: bikyamasr.com)

(Middle East Online) Washington, DC - Last week, the Texas Board of Education adopted a resolution with a 7-6 vote that "accuses textbook publishers of favoring Islam over Christianity and tells them to stop it." Although the resolution is non-binding on future board members or textbook publishers, it attempts to set a precedent and represents acceptance of an allegation that although unproven, may be raised in other states. The resolution did not in fact concern textbooks currently in use in Texas.

The allegation that textbooks favour Islam over Christianity is spurious, and the Texas Board of Education has been misled.

A look at common US textbooks refutes the charge, which distorts the role of teaching about religion in US public schools. State social studies content standards require the beliefs, practices and history of major world religions be taught within constitutional guidelines for the academic study of religion. As such, textbooks are scrutinised prior to adoption in every state.

The resolution is based on sections on Islam and Christianity in textbooks. What about the other faiths? As a textbook reviewer for two decades, I assert that most textbooks are similar enough to allow generalisations about the coverage of religions. A world history textbook index might contain more entries under Islam than Christianity, but adding keywords like Church, clergy, monastery, cathedral, pope, Reformation, Protestant and Bible tips the scales the other way. Textbooks cover the roots of Christianity in the history of Judaism, and Old Testament figures like Abraham and Moses. Content about early Christianity is only a fraction of overall content on this faith.

Christian history is actually treated in an exemplary manner in most history textbooks. Why? Because Christianity is thoroughly intertwined with the history of European civilisation. Textbooks describe its rise in the late Roman Empire and its spread into Asia, Africa and Europe. They narrate the Roman Catholic Church's influence in medieval Europe and its split from the Eastern Orthodox Church. Textbooks cite cultural contributions of Christianity in learning, arts and social life.

They trace changes in the Christian tradition – intellectual movements, interactions with political and social systems – through the centuries. The books cover the role of Christianity in the Crusades, Renaissance and Reformation, Age of Exploration, Scientific Revolution and American history.

By comparison with Christianity, coverage of other world faiths is static and limited. Judaism is emphasised in the context of ancient times, but fades from the story with the rise of Christianity. References to the 13th century rabbi and philosopher Maimonides or pogroms during the Crusades do not make up for the absence of Jewish intellectuals and contributions to European culture, or Jewish merchant communities from the Mediterranean to China.

Textbooks describe Hinduism and Buddhism in ancient India. Buddhism's spread along the Silk Road extends the story, but readers find little about change over time. Textbooks show people practicing these faiths today, but the gap between ancient origins and contemporary faiths is wide.

Students may conclude from this imbalance that only Christianity possessed a rich, multi-faceted tradition. The charge that Christianity is shortchanged in textbooks is based on a distorted reading of the books, meant to foster a sense of victimisation among Christians.

Coverage of Islam in textbooks is similar to Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism in its focus on early origins rather than change over time. Many book's indexes are affected by the overuse of religious terms like "Islamic Empire" instead of geographic terms. This usage stems from Western academics, not textbook publishers. Terms like jihad (struggle) and sharia (Islamic principles) present another problem. Critics want to see such complex terms defined as "good" or "bad", while scholars recognise their complexity over time.

Historical thinking skills require differentiated views. Textbooks should not project concepts broadcast by today's extremists onto centuries of history.

Content on world religions is not new to textbooks, but texts on "non-Western" faiths were often inaccurate and inadequate. Hindu Americans have recently challenged textbook coverage on these grounds, just as historians and Muslim educators have worked to improve accuracy of content on Islam.

As a result, textbook coverage of Islam and other religions has improved in recent years. Textbooks today reflect attention to balance in page counts, topics, images and quotes from scripture. Editors enlist reviewers and take account of First Amendment guidelines for teaching about religion.

Backlash against improvement in the coverage of religions – not only Islam – has resulted in claims that coverage is too positive. Some want to project fear of Islam onto centuries of history, reducing the Muslim world’s relations with the West to a clash of civilisations. Efforts to improve accuracy are confused with proselytising or whitewashing, which is neither the intent nor the outcome of teaching about religions in public school.

The First Amendment Center – an advocacy group in the United States that works to preserve and protect First Amendment freedoms through information and education – has promoted understanding among Americans of diverse beliefs for decades, using a framework that offers other countries struggling with religious pluralism a model to emulate. State standards reflect national consensus that citizens should be literate about the world's religions. Political opportunism should not prevent students from learning within this American civic framework.

Susan Douglass is an educator and author formerly affiliated with the Council on Islamic Education (currently the Institute for Religion and Civic Values). She is an Education Consultant with the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University, and a doctoral student at George Mason University. This article is distributed by the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) with permission from the author. Source: newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith.

Source: Middle East Online

In quiet revolution, Turkey eases headscarf ban

2010-10-18T13:54:00.002+08:00

Source: www.reuters.com
By Ece Toksabay and Ibon Villelabeitia

Women in headscarves attend a demonstration in front of the Constitutional Court in Ankara October 23, 2008 (Credit: Reuters/Umit Bektas)

(Reuters) - Freshman Busra Gungor won't have to wear a wig to cover her Islamic headscarf, as many pious relatives and friends did to avoid getting kicked off campus.

In a landmark decision, Turkey's Higher Education Board earlier this month ordered Istanbul University, one of the country's biggest, to stop teachers from expelling from classrooms female students who do not comply with a ban on the headscarf.

It was the latest twist in a long political and legal tussle in Turkey between those who see the garment as a symbol of their Muslim faith and those who view it as a challenge to the country's secular constitution.

"I was ready to wear the wig, just like my cousin did," said Gungor, a 18-year-old student wearing a pastel-colored headscarf. "This is about my freedom. I don't see why my headscarf should be seen as a threat to anybody."

The debate is not unique to Turkey -- France and Kosovo, for example, ban headscarves in public schools, and parts of Germany bar teachers from wearing them.

But it goes to the heart of national identity in this country of 75 million Muslims whose modern state was founded as a radical secular republic after World War One.

Disputes over the headscarf and other public symbols of Islam are part of a wider debate over how to reconcile modernity and tradition as Turkey tries to achieve its decades-old ambition to join the European Union.

Together with the courts, Turkey's army -- which has a long history of intervening in politics and has ousted four elected governments -- has long seen itself as a bulwark against any roll back toward Islamization. Easing Turkey's secular laws would have been unthinkable a few years ago.

But reforms aimed at bringing Turkey closer to the EU have clipped the generals' power. In a sign of how influence and attitudes are shifting, the latest change on headscarves happened with more of a whimper than a bang.

"This is the same fight Turkey has had for 80 years over the secular-pious issue," writer Mehmet Ali Birand commented in an article entitled "Let them dress the way they want."

"The world has changed. Turkey has changed. Let's close those old books and look into the future," Birand said.

NEW CLASS
A bid by the ruling AK party to lift the headscarf ban three years ago sparked a major political crisis and almost led to the party being closed by the Constitutional Court for anti-secular activities.

But the rise of a new class of observant Muslims to form the backbone of the AKP, which has its roots in political Islam and has held power since 2002, is challenging old notions.

Opponents of the headscarf ban -- in place since a 1982 military coup -- say it is a violation of individual freedoms and incompatible with a modern democracy. Supporters say the prohibition is necessary precisely to defend Turkey's democratic values.

"Turkey needs to find a new relationship between state and religion," Ergun Ozbudun, an constitutional expert, said at a recent lunch with EU ambassadors and journalists.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who comfortably won a referendum last month on government-sponsored constitutional reforms, has declared plans for a brand new basic law.

Seen as clear favorite in 2011 elections, the AKP is widely expected to try again to remove the headscarf ban. Among reforms approved in last month's referendum were an overhaul of the Constitutional Court, traditionally dominated by secularist judges.

TURNING TIDE
Until the decision by the Higher Education Board, girls from religiously conservative families say they had to wear hats or wigs to conceal their headscarves in order to attend classes. Others decided to stay at home.

As the tide turns, some secularists fear growing social conservatism and "neighborhood pressure" will force them to change their lifestyle and adopt the headscarf.

"I don't think we will feel pressure to cover here in Istanbul, but I believe there could be a risk in most universities in Anatolian cities," said 18-year-old Begum Yildiz, a female student smoking a cigarette outside the university's entrance.

Another student who did not give her name was less sanguine: "I don't want the ban to be lifted. I know many girls whose families force them to wear the headscarf and they take it off at college. University has been a place for them to feel free."

Pinar Gedik, a student of Arabic who wears a pink headscarf, said the ban was still being enforced in some faculties.

"I can attend classes with my headscarf now, but it's still banned in many departments. The pressure is still there."

Although symbols of Islam are now more common in the public sphere, sensibilities are still raw. The talk of the town these days is whether generals and secularist politicians will attend a October 29 reception at the presidential palace on National Day.

President Abdullah Gul, whose wife wears a headscarf as does Erdogan's, traditionally hosts two separate receptions for guests with covered and uncovered wives. This year he plans to hold one ball.

Muharrem Ince, a senior MP from the secularist Republican People's Party, has said his party will boycott the ceremony.

"The president is changing the tradition of double receptions. This is because the AKP want to impose the headscarf not only at universities but from top to bottom," he said.

(Additional reporting by Ibon Villelabeitia; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)

Source: www.reuters.com