David Cameron - Our Friend?

David Cameron has spent the last week living with a Muslim family in Birmingham. I’ve been going over this in my head and have contemplated what his true motives behind this could be. It’s not every day politicians decide to move in with us! Was it a publicity stunt to appease voters from the Muslim community? If so, he must have had to deal with the inevitable wrath from the pro-Israeli lobbies in the UK and abroad who undoubtedly must have given him hell for reaching out to Muslims. Does he truly want to reach out to us, to try to understand us, because he really does care for all citizens of our country? Either way, Muslims must take note that Cameron could be the next PM and it is about time we started to pay attention and look into those who reach out a friendly hand. I’m not saying Conservatives and Cameron are the answers to our prayers in relation to the horrific foreign policy our country turn a blind eye to. But research into the Conservatives, into Cameron and we could be pleasantly surprised….

In the meantime, I urge people to post some appreciative feedback on his blog for trying to reach out and extend a hand to us. Remember, if you don’t, pro-Israeli Zionists will speak on your behalf damning his actions…or even worse certain people from our own community!

Some extracts from his blog:

http://www.webcameron.org.uk/118

My final thought yesterday was that integration is a two way street. Yes we can ask minority ethnic communities to work at integrating with British society as a whole, but we have to recognise that it won’t happen unless there’s something attractive to integrate into. Time after time I heard people here talking about the uncivilised behaviour and values that they see all around them. As I’ve said before, we can’t just bully people into being more British, we’ve got to inspire them. And frankly, there are many aspects of our society today which are hardly inspiring – the drinking, the drug-taking, the rudeness and incivility, the lack of consideration for others, anti-social behaviour…we’ve got a serious fight on our hands to build a responsible society that is the kind of society people admire and want to be part of. I know we can do it because most people in this country, like the people I’ve met here, are decent, hard-working and committed to their communities. We’ve got to much more to make sure that those are the values that win out.

Hijabi Power in Action!

In western Sweden, a Muslim woman has won her battle with a supermarket which told her at a job interview that she couldn't work there if she refused to remove her headscarf. The woman took her case to the Ombudsman against Ethnic Discrimination and was awarded compensation. The ICA Kvantum supermarket in Västra Frölunda were ordered to apologize to the woman and pay her around $11,000 in damages. The supermarket has adjusted its dress code for staff.

…And who says Muslim women are oppressed, meek and timid characters…! I rate this woman for refusing to be victimised or compromise her right to wear hijab in a workplace. I rate her for not just making a fuss and moaning about this form of discrimination and oppression – she took some solid action and worked within the systems to make an effective change for her and her community.

It’s so refreshing to hear Muslim women refusing to accept discriminatory acts and take it upon themselves to empower themselves and stand up for their rights. Remember ladies, if you want something bad enough – you’re gonna have to go out and do it yourself!

Girl power rocks!

Muslim schools – 'a ticking time-bomb waiting to explode' - ???

Speaking at a seminar on the subject of segregation, Nick Johnson of the Commission for Racial Equality asked:

"If a Muslim child is educated in a school where the vast majority of other children are also Muslim, how can we expect him to work, live and interact with people from other cultures when he leaves school? This is a ticking time-bomb waiting to explode."

I personally have mixed views about segregating our future generation from one another, based on their religious beliefs. By all means everyone is allowed the freedom to choose the best educational facilities for their child - I know I’d appreciate it! But coming from a professional from within state education, as well as a young British Muslim, I can appreciate the sentiments behind Nick Johnston’s statement. We live in a multicultural, cosmopolitan society, world even whereby we must interact with people of different backgrounds, cultures, religions, colour, dialects – you name it! So to understand them, to appreciate what they contribute to our society, should we not then be integrated with them in all aspects of our lives – be it from school to shopping at a supermarket and working with them professionally.

But how will our future generation even acknowledge the beautiful diversity we have in this world if they are educated strictly separately from them?

At the same time, I can appreciate why parents may decide to send their child to a ‘Muslim school’ – I’ve had heated discussions with my bro-in-law’s decision to send my above average niece to one (she’s so damn bright, I’m telling ya!). Bringing up children with the core principals, values and teachings of Islam is becoming a challenge in today’s ‘western world’ as he put it and hence they want their child to have a solid foundation of her religion from a young age – before college and university.

But what happens when my 6 year old niece gets to college where her peers are both male and female and of different colour, background, beliefs? Will she be able to adapt to this new ‘world’? Will interaction come second nature to people she may never have come across before…? To people she will live with in society?
And if every, no scratch that, if half of Muslim children went to Islamic schools – who would be left in state schools to represent the Muslim community to make known that we’re not a bunch of fundamentalist extremists that want to be segregated from non-Muslims?

But I’ll leave you with this note, how many times have you heard people in influential positions slam Islamic schools as a threat to community cohesion and unable to prepare Muslim children as good British citizens. Why are Muslim schools singled out when there are thousands of state-funded Christian schools, compared to about 5 state-funded Muslim schools? And while only 3% of British Muslim children attend Muslim schools 49% of British Jewish children attend Jewish schools.

Findings of a recent study by Dr Andrew Holden stated: "The greater degree of racial tolerance in an overwhelmingly Asian/Muslim populated school again calls into question the common sense assumption that mixed schools represent the most tolerant environments."

The biggest and most important issue that Nick Johnson and the Commission for Racial Equality should be concerned about in order to foster an inclusive, cohesive British society, is Islamophobia in state schools. What is being done about this! Rather than moaning and bleating about Muslim schools, collect evidence of Islamophobia in schools and counter it!

Latest example of Islamophobic racist kids in action:

Phew…feels good getting that off my chest!
Peace out.

Take up the Green Jihad

To keep in tune with EMPOWERING US’ Environmental Week, I thought I would carry out research via the inexhaustible internet. I have to add here that I was slightly apprehensive about what I would find (or how little I would find!) but I’m pleasantly surprised at what’s out there. Today I’d just like to remind readers of one of our many duties as a Muslim – our God-given responsibility to care for and safeguard our planet, what is ordained upon us by our Creator and the importance the Holy Quran gives to nature…

A fascinating article by Fareena Alam and Abdul Rahman Malik makes some crucial and insightful connections to Islam and the environment we live in…

Sacred balance

For most Muslims, Islam is more than merely a cultural or political identity. Religion matters – and thus any motivating argument about environmental activism must have at its core a message drawing on the sacred. The spiritual dimension, in other words, is at the heart of ‘Islamic environmentalism’. Nature is a sacred web of relationships, finely balanced and resonating with divinely given life. As the Quran says, “The sun and the moon follow courses precisely reckoned and the stars and the trees bow themselves in adoration and the heavens, God has raised them up, and set a balance. Transgress not in the balance.”

To transgress this balance is to commit a crime against God. Even the other creatures that inhabit this vast sacred dominion are not considered incidental. “No animal is there crawling on the earth and no bird flying on its wings that is not part of communities like yourselves,” the Quran reminds us. When we disrupt the natural order, we are upsetting communities as complex and diverse as our own. The Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) once said: “The Earth is like your mother; you came from it and you will return to it.”

The relationship is intimate. By polluting the source of life and damaging the Earth we are actually doing irreparable harm to ourselves. Men and women of faith never used to see themselves as separate from the environment. They were always attuned to the natural order and the movement of the sun, the moon and the stars guided their devotions. The reality of climate change and other “inconvenient truths” are indicative of how we have upset both the physical and spiritual order of the earth.

How, then, to reconnect? As Abdal-Hakim Murad puts it: “The Prophet Muhammad gave people something they could actualise in their worlds, in order to give them a form of life that would allow them to reconnect with nature. What is it that we in the modern world can offer?”

To answer this question, he does offer some practical advice. “We can be, as we so often are, moaning from the edges. It cannot be a menu of pure Luddite rejectionism. We need to make calls to people to be recognisably human in the middle of the modern world. Muslims engage in fasting, one of the most ancient of human rituals, perhaps like no other sacred tradition in the world. We pray not according to a timetable set by someone in some distant hierarchy, but in tandem with the planet beneath our feet, the sun and the moon. We break fast when the sun drops below the horizon and no amount of manipulation can alter that. To be embedded in the tradition of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, is to be embedded in the natural world. That is the kind of Muslim voice I think should be heard. We must exist, in the things we say and do, with our lifestyle, to be living witnesses to a form of life that is genuinely pre-modern. We drive cars, become lecturers, use computers – but in the basic patterns of our life, we are following a form of life that is pre-modern.”
The word on the street

This practical message has resonance for a new generation of Muslim environ-mentalists. In London, a remarkable community-based group has grown out of the work of IFEES. The London Islamic Network for the Environment, established by the World Development Movement activist and former IFEES project manager Muzammal Hussain, aims to make the message real at the grassroots level – through local events and campaigns where participants can get their hands dirty.

Borrowing from the approach of other community-based social justice movements, Hussain has sought to promote regular local engagement, with monthly meetings and links with existing campaigns, bringing a unique Islamic take to such events as last November’s Campaign for Climate Change march. Both LINE and IFEES also worked with the London Sustainability Exchange (LSx) in an innovative project in Tower Hamlets to sponsor Friday sermons on explicitly environmental issues [see Mosque with a mission].

LINE’s local focus and Hussain’s open-door approach has led to the initiative being replicated in the Midlands (MINE), Sheffield (ShINE) and Wales (WELCOME).

So to sum up – remember what has been prescribed to you by your creator. We will all be held to account for our actions (or lack of) on the Great Day so alongside our other responsibilities and obligations as a Muslim, make ‘Green Jihad’ one of them!

“The Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) once said ‘The Earth is like your mother; you came from it and you will return to it.’”

Muslim Organisations and the Environment

Keeping in line with environmental week, I've decided to write about Muslim organisations and the environment.

Without a doubt, the environment is very important, and you'd expect Muslims to be right at the forefront of doing good work in this field - however, it seems that this is not the case at all.

There are very few Muslim organisations that are doing something: LINE, IFEES and MPACUK (they have a section called Green Muslims which I think is really useful) are the ones that come to mind.

I have to admit, I would've rather had said the names of mosques instead of these organisations, because the mosque should be the are where we go to learn about Islam in every sense of the word.

Imagine if our mosques taught us to be more environmentally friendly, imagine the postive impact on society. Yes, caring for the environment is common sense, but the mosque could be the centre from where we could learn how to refine our need to help the environment.

I know I seem to have moved onto the mosques, but that's because they are so important for Muslims, yet the mosque leaders don't seem to see this. I think it's great we have some organisations doing something, but imagine if our mosques were active (or atleast more active than they are), then we wouldn't need other organisations. Our mosques would be the centre of reforming society.

In conclusion, our mosques really need to shape up if they want to be the beacons of light they once were - may Allah guide us all to being true Muslims, and not just people who follow a bunch of rituals. Ameen.

“You are the best of the nations raised up for (the benefit of) men, you enjoin what is right and forbid the wrong and believe in Allah…”

(Surah Al Imran 3:110)

Muslims funny?

Lying on a sun-bed by the pool last week, listening to cheesy 90s pop, sipping mint tea, pretending to read Isiah Berlin’s Two Concepts of Liberty but really chuckling at the guy on the other side of the pool stacking it, wondering why God invented Speedos and why it seems only the French wear them, I mused at the four things to me that cut across barriers: good music, good food, laughter and pain. Ok I suppose that statement is debatable. For example music- because what I enjoy won’t necessarily be enjoyed by the next person (something perfectly exemplified by our house). Food, only to a certain extent is that true, cos believe me whilst that snail soup being served in the souq had a huge queue, it did not look appetizing to me one bit. And I suppose there are way more things that transcend barriers other than the four I mention- beauty etc. But hey the sun and all morning spent shopping in the medina makes you tired.

The same thought came to me on Tuesday night as I was watching Shazia Mirza at the Comedy Camp. Shazia Mirza is a comedienne and MAN is she funny. It wasn’t even out of the five what particularly she actually said was the funniest, but it was more the way she said it. I think it was also because what she said was different that ensured she got the most laughs of the night. And afterwards when I overheard a dude say “she really made me see Muslims in a different way”, it just further enhanced my belief that comedy is the way forward.

In the past we have seen comedy make people much more comfortable with people from the gay and lesbian community, the Jewish community, the black community etc. Now is it surely not long overdue that the same is done by the Muslim community? Yet I know of like 3 Muslim comedians. Admittedly I don’t go out of my way looking for them, but if they’re any good I shouldn’t have to.

To sum up, (I’m starting 2 feel like JD in scrubs- the funniest programme EVER- with the need to sum up every post like he does with every episode) I’m saying you funny Muslims get yourselves out there. Comedians have a unique ability to dispel fear and tension, by making groups seem more accessible and human. Remember, God made you funny for a reason! Use it!

Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad - Contentions 11

Props to Brother Haseeb for posting this.

These are the latest Contentions by Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad.

My favourite: Peace without justice is not peace at all

I think this is so true in the modern day. I mean there are so many Muslims who are happy with the lives they live, or are too busy 'perfecting' themselves to care about children in Darfur, Palestine and even in our own backyards.

The older generations of Muslims have failed us, not the great Muslims of the past, I mean Muslims in their 40s or above. They allowed the atrocities to continue while they concentrated on their own needs. We as human beings need to do something. There are so many good organisations (Muslim and non-Muslim) out there who are doing something like: MCB, MPACUK, ISB (although ISB really sucks :p) and Stop the War! . We, too, need to stand up

Say: My Lord has enjoined justice, and set upright your faces at every time of prayer and call on Him, being sincere to Him in obedience; as He brought you forth in the beginning, so shall you also return.
Surah Al-Araf, Verse 29

Iran will be attacked - at precisely 4am on the 6th of April

The drums of hate are beating again, and the army of hate has Iran in its sights.

WASHINGTON DC, -- The long awaited US military attack on Iran is now on track for the first week of April, specifically for 4 am on April 6, the Good Friday opening of Easter weekend, writes the well-known Russian journalist Andrei Uglanov in the Moscow weekly “Argumenty Nedeli.” Uglanov cites Russian military experts close to the Russian General Staff for his account.

The attack is slated to last for 12 hours, according to Uglanov, from 4 am until 4 pm local time. Friday is the sabbath in Iran. In the course of the attack, code named Operation Bite, about 20 targets are marked for bombing; the list includes uranium enrichment facilities, research centers, and laboratories.

The first reactor at the Bushehr nuclear plant, where Russian engineers are working, is supposed to be spared from destruction. The US attack plan reportedly calls for the Iranian air defense system to be degraded, for numerous Iranian warships to be sunk in the Persian Gulf, and for the most important headquarters of the Iranian armed forces to be wiped out.

The attacks will be mounted from a number of bases, including the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. Diego Garcia is currently home to B-52 bombers equipped with standoff missiles. Also participating in the air strikes will be US naval aviation from aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf, as well as from those of the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean. Additional cruise missiles will be fired from submarines in the Indian Ocean and off the coast of the Arabian peninsula. The goal is allegedly to set back Iran’s nuclear program by several years, writes Uglanov, whose article was reissued by RIA-Novosti in various languages, but apparently not English, several days ago. The story is the top item on numerous Italian and German blogs, but so far appears to have been ignored by US websites.

Observers comment that this dispatch represents a high-level orchestrated leak from the Kremlin, in effect a war warning, which draws on the formidable resources of the Russian intelligence services, and which deserves to be taken with the utmost seriousness by pro-peace forces around the world.

Asked by RIA-Novosti to comment on the Uglanov report, retired Colonel General Leonid Ivashov confirmed its essential features in a March 21 interview: “I have no doubt that there will be an operation, or more precisely a violent action against Iran.” Ivashov, who has reportedly served at various times as an informal advisor to Russian President Vladimir Putin, is currently the vice president of the Moscow Academy for Geopolitical Sciences.

Ivashov attributed decisive importance to the decision of the Democratic leadership of the US House of Representatives to remove language from the just-passed Iraq supplemental military appropriations bill that would have demanded that Bush come to Congress before launching an attack on Iran. Ivashov pointed out that the language was eliminated under pressure from AIPAC, the lobbing group representing the Israeli extreme right, and from Israeli Foreign Minister Tsipi Livni.

“We have drawn the unmistakable conclusion that this operation will take place,” said Ivashov. In his opinion, the US planning does not include a land operation: “ Most probably there will be no ground attack, but rather massive air attacks with the goal of annihilating Iran’s capacity for military resistance, the centers of administration, the key economic assets, and quite possibly the Iranian political leadership, or at least part of it,” he continued.

Ivashov noted that it was not to be excluded that the Pentagon would use smaller tactical nuclear weapons against targets of the Iranian nuclear industry. These attacks could paralyze everyday life, create panic in the population, and generally produce an atmosphere of chaos and uncertainty all over Iran, Ivashov told RIA-Novosti. “This will unleash a struggle for power inside Iran, and then there will be a peace delegation sent in to install a pro-American government in Teheran,” Ivashov continued. One of the US goals was, in his estimation, to burnish the image of the current Republican administration, which would now be able to boast that they had wiped out the Iranian nuclear program.

Among the other outcomes, General Ivashov pointed to a partition of Iran along the same lines as Iraq, and a subsequent carving up of the Near and Middle East into smaller regions. “This concept worked well for them in the Balkans and will now be applied to the greater Middle East,” he commented.

“Moscow must exert Russia’s influence by demanding an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council to deal with the current preparations for an illegal use of force against Iran and the destruction of the basis of the United Nations Charter,” said General Ivashov. “In this context Russia could cooperate with China, France and the non-permanent members of the Security Council. We need this kind of preventive action to ward off the use of force,” he concluded.
Source: The Intelligence Daily

I truly hope that Iran isn't attacked, but we've all got to stop kidding ourselves.

I personally think that they are gonna go for Iran, then Syria and then bring on Pakistan.

May Allah protect the innocent and end their suffering - Ameen.

"Reach Out To Israel, Arabs Urged"

I don't think everybody needs to be told as to what is going on in Palestine. Our mothers are being raped there this very second, and another one of our brothers just got shot in the head.

But I can't believe that Arab countries are being asked to reach out to Israel! Below is the article from the BBC

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has called on Arab nations to reach out to Israel.

Ms Rice was speaking in Jerusalem after three days of meetings with Israeli, Palestinian and Jordanian leaders.

She said Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas had agreed to meet every two weeks.

Ms Rice also said there was a "path of co-operation" with the new Palestinian unity government.
The secretary of state was speaking on the eve of the opening of an Arab League summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

'Complex' issues

Ms Rice urged Arab nations to take a more active role in regional peace efforts, although she said the presence of the militant Hamas faction in the Palestinian government made the issues "more complex".

"The Arab states must be reaching out to Israel... to show Israel that they accept its place in the Middle East," she said.

Ms Rice said there could be co-operation with the new Palestinian unity government but stressed again that Hamas must renounce violence.

Hamas has refused to adhere to three key international demands to recognise Israel, renounce violence and honour previous peace agreements.

Ms Rice said Mr Olmert and Mr Abbas would meet regularly and that she would attend some of the meetings.

"They achieved something, which is the very regularised meetings between the two of them, in which they will not just talk about their day-to-day issues, but also about a political horizon," she said.

Ms Rice said it was "not inconceivable" for a peace deal to be reached before the end of US President George W Bush's tenure.

But she added: "We're not yet at the... [stage] of final status" negotiations.

I can't believe this - it's like they're saying "why don't you Arabs do more? - it's all your fault".

Yes the Arab nations should do more - they should help their Palestinian brothers and sisters by forcing the Western countries to see that they can't be paid up (as so many of the arabs have already) and that they want Israel to no longer exist - everyone can live in Palestine in peace. If it was possible in the past then surely it is possible now.

The part that really made my blood boil though was when Condoleeza Rice said:

"The Arab states must be reaching out to Israel... to show Israel that they accept its place in the Middle East," she said.

Israel is murdering innocent people day in and day out. The only crime of the Palestinians is that they are Palestinians.

But how do we stop this? How can we end the killing of the Palestinians?

The answer lies in our mental ressurection. We shouldn't stay oblivious to the butchering of the Palestinians. It's our foreign policy (along with America's ) which allows Israel to get away with murder.

Change the foreign policy, then you change the future of the Palestinans to something that they can look forward to.

Our mosques and our MPs have too long allowed injustice to prevail - now we have to hold them to account and show Allah that we are Muslims who do care and want to please Him.

If we politically activate then we can ensure that Palestinians get the justice that they deserve.

Remembering Malcolm X

Today's the 21st of March and on this very date 43 years ago a man was martyred in the cause of the Truth - I speak of none other than Brother El Hajj Malik al Shabazz (aka Malcolm X).

I'm been reading his autobiography recently, and it is absolutely amazing (it can be purchased from here).

He spoke the Truth with no fear and he really was, and is, a great role model for people who want to make a change for a brighter future - may Allah bless him for all the good he did and all the good he has done after his death. Allah says about the martyrs that they are alive, and as we can clearly see, Malcolm X's legacy lives on and inspires so many people to the straight path even today.

Here's a short video about Malcolm X - enjoy:

20th March 2003

No I didn't get the date wrong, but I just wanted to remind everyone that it's been 4 years since America attacked Iraq and ,well, got away with it.

No proof, no truth, all spoof.

So many lives were lost and now it seems Iran will be next.

We shouldn't let that happen.

We can't let that happen.

We CAN do something, but we should realise that it all depends on politics and on our (the UK's) foreign policy. Our elected 'leaders' are letting us down and we should hold them to account.

Remember, they work for us, not the other way around.

I know it sounds like I'm ordering you guys to do this, but it's just that I read this action alert by MPACUK (here's the link), and it made me realise that sitting around for our butchering leaders to change their stances by themselves ain't gonna happen. We gots to teach them a lesson :P

At least let's try to make a difference -as victory is for the believers, and Allah loves those that strive in His Cause.

It's that time again

Assalaamualaikum all,

'Tis the season to be jolly, and no, I'm not referring to Christmas (although Merry Christmas to all my christian friends out there).

I'm talking about Hajj, and insha'allah this year I'm going to be going for this beautiful journey aswell. It's been hell trying to get the visa, but hey that's bound to happen when you got a a corrupt government handing out visas (and no, I'm not talking about Blair and co. today, but about the Saudis).

But it seems a special someone might be joining me there aswell....

This is from an article from USA Today:

"I'm 38 years old, and I'm just getting an understanding of what life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness means," he says….

He's friends with vocal Scientologist Tom Cruise and attended Cruise's wedding in Italy. Although Smith has learned about the controversial religion, he has not converted to it. He says he's a connoisseur of all faiths.

"I want to go on the hajj to Mecca," [Will] Smith says. "I don't believe in religious separatism. I love people, and I don't believe that the twin towers getting knocked down means all Muslims are bad.

"I was raised in a resurrection Baptist church in Philadelphia, and my grandmother was a devout member of the church. The things that I believe are 90% morally what I learned growing up. But the additions that Jada and I have made — we've travelled around the world."
They have been "to India, and United Arab Emirates, and to Jordan and to Jerusalem. We are students of world religions."

Now I'm not saying that Will Smith is a Muslim (although according to Wikipedia he is - as is Ice Cube :P), but only Muslims can go on Hajj, so you never know...

Well seeing as most of our mosque leaders can only speak urdu or hindi it's good to see that Brother Will Smith is trying to learn how to communicate with them, cos I doubt the mosque leaders will know how to "get jiggy with it" ....

Fiamaanallah,

Abu Funza