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Saturday, August 8, 2009

1.Indonesia: From a terrorist commander to a terrorist counsellor

Islamic World News
27 Oct 2008, NewAgeIslam.Com

1.Indonesia: From a terrorist commander to a terrorist counsellor

 

1. Indonesia: From a terrorist commander to a terrorist counsellor

2. Boyolali (Indonesia): Young radicals divided

3. Terrorism: Beyond religion

4. Using Reverse Psychology, Al Qaeda Endorses Obama

5. Lahore: Jamaat-e-Islami for just Islamic system in Pakistan

6. Islam: Answer to Capitalistic Debacle

7. Separation of Islam and Justice

8. Baghdad: Iraq's main Sunni party suspends contacts with US

9. Voices from a convention on Indian Muslim women

10. Johannesburg: Schoolgirl wants to paint country pink

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 Indonesia: From a terrorist commander to a terrorist counsellor

Fighting terrorism with power of persuasion

By WARREN P. STROBEL

McClatchy Newspapers

Sitting in a Papa Ron's pizza outlet in the Indonesian capital, Nasir Abbas looks more like a would-be business entrepreneur than a former Islamic militant. He's dressed in a grey polo shirt and blue jeans, ordering a takeout pizza for his children. He munches on an appetizer in between calls on his cell phone.

However, for 15 years, before his 2003 arrest and jailhouse conversion, Abbas rode the underground currents of international terrorism. He learned weapons skills, taught fighters in camps from Afghanistan to the Philippines and earned the rank of a senior commander in Jemaah Islamiyah, Southeast Asia's most feared Islamic terrorist group.

His students included the men who plotted the October 2002 Bali resort bombings, which killed more than 200 and remain one of the world's deadliest terrorist attacks since

Sept. 11, 2001.

His remorse over the massacre of civilians and the Indonesian police's careful handling of him transformed Abbas. From a terrorist commander he became a terrorist counsellor, working with the police to try to convince other captured militants that their interpretation of Islam is wrong.

"I (came to) understand that the Bali bombings were a crime, not a jihad," he says.

Today, Abbas is the most famous alumnus of an Indonesian government initiative that fights terrorism by persuasion. Authorities try to "de-radicalize" militants, debating religion with them and reconnecting them with their families instead of relying on the high-tech weapons and harsh interrogation techniques that have characterized President Bush's approach since Sept. 11.

"Because terrorism is an ideologically motivated crime, it is not possible to stop it using mere physical operations," said Ansyaad Mbai, the head of the Indonesian government's Counter-Terrorism Coordinating Desk. "Based on our experience, the harder we hit them with military force, the more radical they become." Mbai is critical of the Bush administration's approach to fighting terrorism. The war in Iraq, in particular, has made the job of handling terrorism in Indonesia harder, he said: "Even the moderate Muslim leaders find it difficult to explain that the war taking place in the Middle East is not a war against Islam."

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, treats terrorism as a crime, not a cause for war.

This "soft" approach hasn't always been popular with Western governments, particularly the U.S., which protested Indonesia's 2006 release of Jemaah Islamiyah spiritual leader Abu Bakar Bashir, one of several terrorist suspects and convicts to gain early remission.

For every Nassir Abbas, there's an unrepentant detainee who will never be talked out of violence, no matter how eloquent the persuasion. This includes three convicted Bali bombers sitting on death row. One, who goes by the single name Mukhlas, is Abbas' brother-in-law. Abbas acknowledges that he hasn't been able to get through to him.

The three men appear to have exhausted their appeals and are expected to be executed by firing squad before year's end. They and their followers have promised retribution, fueling fears of new violence.

Yet Indonesia's fight against terrorism has been an undeniable, if qualified, success, according to officials and private analysts in several countries.

Using methodical police work and programs to counter radical ideologies, Indonesian authorities have reduced Jemaah Islamiyah to a remnant of its former self. The Indonesian government has benefited from public revulsion at a string of bombings against civilians.source: http://www.kansascity.com/451/story/858997.html

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 Indonesia's Young radicals divided

BOYOLALI (Indonesia) - FOR the skullcapped students of the Darusy Syahadah Islamic School, there is no question that the three radical jihadis behind the 2002 bombings on Indonesia's Bali Island are heroes.

Sheltering from the equatorial sun on the steps of the school's mosque, the students crowd to offer their approval of bombers Amrozi, Mukhlas and Imam Samudra.

Authorities said this week the three bombers will face the firing squad by early November for their role in the attack, which killed 202 people.

'They're holy warriors, that's how I respond, they're holy warriors,' said Sir Muhammad Royhan Syihabuddin Ar-Rohmi, a slight 18-year-old.

His friend, Nawawi, also 18, leaned forward in agreement: 'They are like us, they wanted to do good deeds.'

With its peeling buildings, stray sheep and low-hanging mango trees, Darusy Syahadah in Central Java has long been a key hub for recruitment and indoctrination in the Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) militant network, experts say.

While authorities have wound up JI cells and killed and imprisoned key militants, JI-linked Islamic boarding schools across Indonesia have been left to spread the network's radical ideology.

If a new generation of JI bombers were to emerge, it would be from schools like this. Alumni include Salik Firdaus, a suicide bomber who obliterated himself in the 2005 Bali bombing that killed 20 people.

However, analysts say the picture is not quite that simple. Hurt by the police crackdown and facing public disgust over bombings, JI is deeply split, said Ms Sidney Jones, a JI expert at the International Crisis Group think-tank

A small minority faction behind fugitive Malaysian Noordin Mohammed Top still supports and is working towards bombing local and foreign targets, she said.

The other more numerous factions, dominating the schools, continues to glorify jihad, or holy war, but many of its members have been influenced by a government 'deradicalisation' strategy that has helped halt attacks.

'I think the schools are still problematic, they are inculcating the idea of the glory of jihad. But there isn't a jihad to fight now,' Ms Jones said.

'The question is: what will these graduates be doing five to 10 years from now?'

For Mr Mustaqim, the principal of Darusy Syahadah, the watchword is preparation.

The school encourages exercise and self-defence and aims to strengthen and defend Islam, said Mr Mustaqim, sporting white robes, a wispy beard and bruises on his forehead from frequent prayer.

'It says in the Koran that infidels will strengthen each other and wage a war of falsehood. We have been instructed to strengthen Islam against falsehood,' he said. On suicide bombings against civilians? The hallmark of Noordin?s faction - Mr Mustaqim stressed that the aim is noble but the methods incorrect.

'In the methods (Noordin) has taken we're not on the same path. Methods, that's what I?m talking about, methods,' emphasised Mr Mustaqim, whose wife is the sister of Ubeid, a JI militant jailed for helping the fugitive Noordin.

Outside the mosque, student Nawawi said it was 'up to God' whether he would follow the example set by the Bali bombers.

'Not everyone has to follow them,' he said.

At the al-Mukmin boarding school founded by alleged JI spiritual head Abu Bakar Bashir in the nearby town of Ngruki, the bombers are honoured but opinions are similarly mixed.

About 1,600 students attend classes in rooms bedecked with cardboard cutouts of assault rifles and posters extolling the virtues of 'martyrdom.'

Sitting on the floor of his lounge in the school grounds, the acid-tongued Bashir blamed the main 2002 blast on a CIA 'micro-nuclear' device fired from a ship off the Balinese coast.

'The bomb Amrozi set off, the first one, at most it shattered glass and didn't wound people, or at most wounded them a little,' he said.

'(The bombers) struggled in that way not as terror but with the aim of defending Islam, which is being terrorised by America and its friends... they are counter-terrorists, not terrorists,' he said.

But al-Mukmin school principal Wahyudin said the bombers? indiscriminate bombing of nightclubs on the island was a disproportionate response to the global oppression of Muslims.

'What I can fault is that Bali is not a conflict area, it's not an area of war. Although we can say there certainly were enemies there, there were also non-enemies. That has to be avoided. That was a mistake there,' he said. – AFP source:

http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/SE%2BAsia/Story/STIStory_295116.html

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Terrorism: Beyond religion

New Delhi Oct 26, 2008,

The reports that members of extremist Hindu groups have been arrested in connection with a terrorist bomb attack in Malegaon should be used as an opportunity by all political parties to de-communalise the issue of terrorism. So far, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has used its anti-terrorism plank as a thinly veiled form of anti-Muslim mobilisation. Separately, the case has been made quite often that militant activity has a religious/minority basis (Muslims in the Kashmir valley, Sikhs during the Punjab terror phase, and Christians in Nagaland). This was always a partial picture, of course, because there are the Bodos in Assam and the Naxalites in the heartland, not to mention the Gorkhas of Darjeeling, all or most of whom are Hindu, while groups advocating Hindutva have been attacking Christians in Orissa and Karnataka. Now that the boot can be on any foot, so to speak, this is an opportunity to move from posturing to serious thought and action.

For a start, even where the problem is sourced to religious minorities, it must be recognised that there are other factors at work—history and ethnicity in the case of the Nagas as well as Kashmiris, for instance, while Orissa has a tribal vs. dalit colour to the conflict. Second, mainstream political parties rarely speak up in the broader national interest against militant groups from their community. Factions of the Akali Dal, for instance, were compromised during the militant phase that Punjab suffered in the 1980s, and Muslim organisations and parties have rarely spoken out against Islamist terror.

While the BJP is ever willing to argue for tough anti-terrorist laws and for banning organisations like the Students Islamic Movement of India (Simi), it adopts a quite contrary posture when the Bajrang Dal's goons run riot for weeks on end in Orissa's Kandhamal district, arguing that the Dal is a 'nationalist' organisation and cannot therefore be compared with Simi. Yashwant Sinha, in arguing that those whom the police suspects of having perpetrated the Malegaon blasts should not be termed 'Hindu', merely echoes pleas in the past from Muslims and Sikhs who have argued that terrorists should not be given a community tag. And if, tomorrow, the police were seen to be indulging in third-degree or worse against Hindu suspects, as they have done for years in Kashmir, Punjab and elsewhere, the BJP may not remain quite so enamoured of laws that give the police untrammelled powers to extract confessions under duress and then present as evidence in the courts.

The failure of the mainstream political parties to take unbiased positions when tested on sub-national issues shows up even in Mumbai, where Raj Thackeray has been conducting a violent campaign against 'outsiders' in Mumbai; yet, no major political party (least of all, the 'nationalist' BJP) has joined serious issue with him on the fundamental freedoms granted under the Constitution.

For a start, therefore, everyone must recognise that terrorism is not a party issue, or something to be used as communal football. There is of course a communal basis to most terrorists, in that they speak and act in the name of their religion or their co-religionists, but everyone should agree that terrorists place themselves beyond the pale of any community. Second, causes must be identified—you could argue that the Malegaon blast was a Hindu response to repeated Islamist terror strikes, but the counter-argument would be that the Islamist terror groups are responding to what happened to the Babri Masjid and in Gujarat. The cycle of counter-productive violence and counter-violence has to be broken, and it can be done only if the mainstream parties choose to address the problem rather than grandstand in the hope of mobilising along community lines and garnering votes. Source: http://www.business-standard.com/india/storypage.php?autono=338407

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Using Reverse Psychology, Al Qaeda Endorses Obama

Oct 25th, 2008

by Morgaan Sinclair in All News, Congressional News, Middle Eastern News, Presidential News, The United Nations, The War on Terror, US Government News,

 

It's a bit shocking, really, that the Washington Post rushed to print an alleged endorsement of John McCain by Al Qaeda. Missing was any verification by authorities that it was authored by anyone in command of any of its tawdry, misanthropic, holier-than-thou, spiritually moronic band of woman-beating, bombing and beheading throwbacks. One wonders what the motive of the Washington Post could have been to act (again) as the mouthpiece for terrorists without any fact-checking, a term that has apparently been erased from its editors' lexicon. It apparently doesn't occur to them that it's possibly not to provide free advertisement for them. Apparently, all one has to do to effect instantaneous worldwide publication of one's opinion – and influence a Presidential election in the United States – is claim to be Al Qaeda and endorse a candidate. Not only that, but then the Leftist press in America will pick it up and circulate it as truth. Meanwhile, the purpose of these Al Qaeda poseurs in attempting to tamper with U.S. presidential elections – given that they do not get a vote – represents several things: The Memo. Just another little missive from your blood-lusting Islamofascist superiors that they are the ones to be in charge, lest you forget, so they expect you to follow their instructions. The veiled threat of violence will be legitimately assumed.

Egoistic Arrogance. Of course we must be interested in their opinion.

The use of the most transparent form of reverse psychology. What Al Qaeda wants – since it wants our destruction – must be what we don't want. So if they say they want Obama, we will, like lemmings, rush to Obama, because if they want McCain it's our sacred duty as loyal Americans to support the other candidate. Or, so they hope.

Now, let's flesh that out a little bit, since whether Americans get it or not, the media obviously doesn't.

Did the headlines say, "Al Qaeda makes attempt to smear McCain with 'endorsement.'?" Nope, but they should have.

Did the headlines say, "Al Qaeda throws support behind Obama with phony McCain endorsement?" Nope, but they should have.

Did the headlines say, "Al Qaeda plays same game as last election with manipulative 'endorsement.'?" Nope, but they should have.

What every single or implied headline said was: "Al Qaeda Endorses McCain."

Of course Al Qaeda doesn't endorse McCain. Al Qaeda –like Hizbollah, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Hamas – endorses Obama. And that is not because he is a Muslim, for he is not. He has belonged for 20 years to a virulently anti-white Black Liberation Theology church in Chicago. He converted from Islam to Christianity before puberty, so imams have no authority to issue fatawa against him charging apostasy. Obama was registered as a Muslim at an Indonesian school. He does have Islamic training. But he is no longer a Muslim. Obama is Leftist, not radical Islamist. No, it's none of that.

What thrills Islamofascists – a term coined by Matthias Ruthven and perhaps used as early as the 1970s by Olivier Roy – is that they are looking for a Presidential candidate whose thinking and policy they can infiltrate. And they have found one in Obama. After all, the express wish of the Council on American-Islamic Relations – CAIR, an unindicted co-conspirator in terrorist financing and the group that used to called itself "Hamas in the United States" – is to see shari'a law implemented in America. ICNA and ISNA, both also unindicted co-conspirators in terrorist financing, have also gravitated to Obama, and in the case of ISNA it's a real problem. These are the guys that made hay over the Headscarf Photo Flap – widely used to paint Muslims as victims in Obama's campaign. Rep. Keith Ellison went after Obama with a vengeance, and he got everything he wanted and then some. Here's how it went.

Two Muslim women in headscarves positioned themselves behind Obama at a photo shoot. One of them was a member of the deeply suspect MSA, about which volumes have been written in the last two years recounting their indoctrination to radical Islam of Muslim students by this campus organization. MSA is also tainted by accusations of women within their own ranks that they were forced into Islamic dress cover as a kind of religious testimony to the faith. Of course, Muslim men never put up with the inconvenience of wear hot robes in the Dog Days of Summer to "testify for their faith." No, it's the women who have to do that. One woman recounts being called by the head of an MSA wing, a man who then put his wife on the phone with the girl so the wife could scream at her for not complying with stated dress norms. This echoes, of course, the virulent Saudi Princess Haifa, wife of former Ambassador Bandar bin Sultan (who had the habit of strolling into Cabinet meetings uninvited, so powerful was he), who frequently called embassy wives together for her verbally violent punishment soiress where the women were scathed for the slightest infractions of dress or "morals." Yeah, right. The tactic here is to have a woman discipline another woman at the behest of a male, who will then have to bear no responsibility for being the male chauvinist pig he is. Any questions?

Anyhow, these two Muslim women positioned themselves for an Obama photo shoot that I can promise you would have been distributed all over the Middle East as a fund-raising poster for ISNA. Meanwhile, back in the United States, CAIR and other Muslim propaganda groups screamed "Discrimination!" (which it was not) and then "Racism!" Now that last one is interesting given that Islam is not a race: It is a lift from the Civil Rights Movement, where it was legitimate, but the propagandists are aware that Americans are very sensitive to accusations of racism and too afraid of appearing racist to fight the false accusation when they are smeared with it. There should be a class action lawsuit brought against CAIR, ISNA, ICNA and every other group that uses this false epithet to silence everybody who doesn't agree with them.

At any rate, it is with the Headscarf Flap that I really began to feel for Obama. He is not an anti-Muslim person. Far from it. And it is likely his staff would have had the same reaction to anybody brandishing a sign that read "Zionists for Obama" in Trajan font or somebody waving a massive crucifix with "Stop Abortion" carved on it. No sane Presidential candidate is going to allow his or her campaign to be appropriated for religious advertising.

In this case it was a simple case of Islamic Bill boarding, the presence of a headscarf to visually claim space to make a silent representation of a connection with or control of a political or social unit or physical space. OK, I confess to having invented the term. But that's what it is in some cases.

This supposed connection of Islam with Obama did not and does not exist — at least not until now. But now it does exist.

How powerful is Islamic Bill boarding? Well, it's pretty powerful. It can make it appear that Obama is Muslim, which most in the Muslim world already believe he is (and that will be a problem for him if he is elected), and it also makes it appear that MSA and ISNA and CAIR appear to be very powerful in American politics in general and in Obama's campaign in particular.

And the upshot of all this is that Obama got creamed, in three specific ways.

First he was rapped for "racism" and the women in headscarves were quickly fashioned into victims by CAIR.

Second, he got Rep. Keith Ellison, the first Muslim on Congress, all over him publicly. But after a few weeks, Ellison and others had strong-armed Obama into total submission.

Third, part of that "submission" (there's that word again) is that Obama has a new "Muslim advisor" who has radical connections thoroughly discussed in several articles in the last two weeks, the best of which articles was Daniel Pipes' article "Would Obama Pass a Security Clearance?" Answer: No.

So, faced with bad press and intimidation by the bad guys most likely to behead you if they don't like you, what does Obama do? He fronts a headscarf in the form of Ingrid Mattson, president of ISNA — the same-same unindicted co-conspirator in terrorist financing named above – for a precious little "Interfaith Moment" at the Democratic National Convention.

Watch this closely, for it is shocking indeed. In a country in which MOST Muslim women do NOT wear cover, Ingrid Mattson is one of the few high-ranking Muslim women who does. So what Muslim woman does Obama choose for his token? One of the many U.S. Muslim women who is moderate? No.

Ingrid Mattson is a Saudi Wahhabi apologist and a radical. What would happen to Ingrid if she appeared on Saudi TV without a face veil? She'd be stoned to death. What would happen if she showed up at the Grand Mosque dressed as she was on American national TV? She would have been whipped to death on the streets by the religious police. Ingrid Mattson, like Al-Arabiya's Nadia Bilbassy-Charters – who interviewed Laura Bush at the White House dressed in a skirt halfway up her thigh and appeared at the National Press Club in a skin-tight, white satin sheath with a hemline higher than that! – is one of the Spin Sisters, one of the women fronted by radical Islamist men to make them appear to be gender egalitarian when they are not. Women like Ingrid Mattson could care less what happens to the rest of the oppressed Muslim women of this world so long as they get theirs. Look at Mattson's position? Fame, Power, A little more fame. Now she's been seen on national TV in her headscarf, while defending the repressive Saudis. She has never made a a statement against FGM (which is mandatory in Shafi'i Sunni Islam), never lent support to Shirin Ebadi's incredibly brave attempt to wrest women's freedom from the Iranian mullahs, never decried the murder of Turkish feminist Konca Kouris, never hailed Farzana Hassan's attempt to prevent shari'a law from being imposed in Canada, and never touted the scholarship of the devout Muslim women seeking a new, gender-egalitarian (it was ruined by centuries of overtly manipulative translation) hermeutics of the Qur'an.

The headscarf means many things. Mostly it means ignorance of the fact that it was NEVER mandated by Muhammad and did not appear in Islamic culture until three centuries after the advent of Islam. Therefore many women who wear it do it because they think it is mandated and want to do the right thing. But in the West it is often holier-than-thou competition for men's attention both with other Muslim women and with Western women they call "sluts" whether they have evidence for it or not. As a woman, I can't tell you how infuriated I am at this accusation and how sick I am of hearing it.

What headscarfing is, often, is political Islamic Billboarding at the behest of men. Worldwide, the headscarf is, overwhelming, male oppression of the female that prevents men from having to experience any anxiety that one of "their" women will be found a tempting little plumb by some other man. Men do not have to earn women's love, they merely have to make an arrangement with her father for it (despite the Qur'an's guarantee of freedom in marriage for women as well as men). In the strict Wahhabi orientation Ingrid Mattson refers to as a "reformation," it is an act of slander against the female form as a sexual organ from toes to crown, with the exception of hands and eyes, a form that is utterly controlled and violently criminalized. How bad is it? In Saudi Arabia, the abaya covers everything but hands and eyes. Well, make that one eye. Last week the Wahhabi imams in Saudi Arabia said that one eye must be covered, because two eyes is just too much of an evil trap for a man's sexual purity. This is an apparent attempt to control those lurid glances at the market, where women are already under the control of a male chaperone!

But I digress. The point is that while Muslim women in Iran endure torture in Evin Prison to escape this oppression, it bothers Ingrid Mattson not at all to support oppression of Muslim women by sporting one herself in the name of faith.

Anyhow, back to the Democratic National Convention. Here comes Ingrid Mattson in her headscarf – a payback from the alleged affront to the Muslim community for Obama's refusal to have his campaign used for Islamic Billboarding. Ellison was pleased. The American Muslim community flocked to Obama's side. Mattson made a speech that should have sent off screaming warning bells, but Americans behaved as if they were stricken with connexin-26 gene deafness.

But this warrants another, closer look. Who else appeared? A Christian priest and a Jewish rabbi. Where were the Hindus, whose numbers in the USA are larger than those of the Muslims, who claim they are over 6 million when likely the most accurate number is 1.3 million? Where are the Buddhists? Where are the Jains? Where are the Native American medicine men? Where are the Baha'i and Amadiyyah, whom the Sunnis punish and persecute worldwide with charges of apostasy? Where are the Orthodox? Where are the Taoists and the Confucians? Where are the Sufis, so vilified by the Wahhabis and the Taleban — the Sufis whose European and American forms may represent the best hope for Muslims in America? Where are the New Agers, who in this country vastly outnumber the Muslims and are the fast-growing spiritual orientation in American (no, you were mislead, it is not the Muslims)?

You will not find any of those faiths appearing with the radical-learning, Wahhabi-oriented, headscarf-flaunting Muslima Ingrid Mattson! Why? Because only the People of the Book – Jews and Christians – are even marginally acceptable to these 7th-century-styled Muslims, and all the rest are considered to be practitioners of illegitimate, if not Satanic, religions and faiths. Obama would not have made the mistake of including them when a Muslim speaks. He wouldn't have dared. Especially since the entire purpose of this tawdry exercise was to front a headscarf in capitulation to intentionally-invented Muslim grievance.

Is Obama a Muslim? No.

Is Obama pandering to a radical Muslim minority? Yes.

Is he accepting advisors who have radical links? Yes.

Is he a coward? Yes. And that is the problem with Obama: He is woefully inexperienced, as this incident also shows, but he is, worse, a coward.

Obama, despite his terrible associations, has only one real problem: He doesn't know when he needs to stand up and refuse to cow to such pressures, and he doesn't have the spine to do it when he does realize it.

So, does Al Qaeda really want McCain to win? Of course not. They want Obama to win, because if he does, the whole problem of establishing shari'a law for Muslims in the United States (read: women, since shari'a is most concerned with keeping control of women) gets a lot easier. And that's just the first step. It's Muslims first, then everybody else. And they'll do it with non-Muslims by using the tactic that the free speech, free choice, and free women of this culture are an insult to their faith. They will also use the "family law" codes that allow the also sexist (but not to anything like the same degree) Jewish Beths Din family law to institute legal shari'a courts (as in Britain) among Muslims here. Problematically, the vast majority of Muslims in America, moderates all, have caved to Saudi pressure for radical imams – Tabeban-trained in Pakistan or Wahhabi-trained in Saudi Arabia – to run American mosques. Now they run 80% of them, and the American Muslim community has not had the spine to correct the problem and doesn't have it now.

But make no mistake: Al Qaeda endorsed Obama because they already know, by everything he has done and all he has not done, that he is the best bet for entering American power centers by the back door. And Americans should be highly suspect of a media that helped them run this little piece of reverse psychology on the American public.

And Americans should also realize that the evidence of Obama's capitulation to what Stephen Schwartz calles "The Wahhabi Lobby" in the United States is incontrovertible and crystal clear: When a candidate for the Presidency of United States fronts a headscarf worn by a radical in a pandering and obsequious attempt to prevent bad press, he is too spineless and self-serving to be President of the United States.

Source: http://www.bloggernews.net/118331

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Jamaat-e-Islami for just Islamic system in Pakistan

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Lahore: Jamaat-e-Islami has stressed there should be no ambiguity in Islam as the basic cause behind creation of Pakistan and the only ideology that can keep Pakistan united and secured.

If Pakistan has to be kept integrated and strong, enemy conspiracies aimed at secularising the country and weakening the Islamic values of modesty, decency and brotherhood must be effectively countered in order to protect its ideological borders besides the geographical boundaries, said different leaders and scholars while addressing the second session of JI convention at Minar-e-Pakistan on Saturday.

The second day witnessed increased participation and activities of JI workers who kept pouring from all parts of the country despite security fears. JI leadership said the number of participants crossed the figure of four hundred thousand Saturday afternoon but the arrivals continued till the night. Security remained heightened at the huge tentage village as different proceedings continued peacefully throughout the day.

The second session titled contemporary challenges to Pakistan was chaired by JI secretary General Syed Munawar Hasan since naib ameer Prof Ghafoor Ahmad who was scheduled to chair could not arrive from Karachi due to death of his wife. Besides a conference of JI women wing was also held chaired by Qazi Hussain Ahmad that discussed strategies for countering challenges to practicing Muslim women in modern day world.

Addressing the women conference, Qazi Hussain Ahmad stressed the need for establishing just Islamic system having balance between the rights of men and women as enshrined in Islamic injunctions.

He warned that Muslim woman and her values of modesty and chastity was the prime target of the west which had deprived its women of those values. Qazi said west was busy making Muslim women practically convert to secularism by using vast resources, media and hollow western values.

Qazi cited a recent meeting of UN Human Rights Commission in which JI delegation shook the flawed western values and decaying family system as a result of that. Qazi hailed the JI women workers who traveled long distances to participate in congregation under difficult circumstances for the sake of Islamic cause. He said none of the secular parties could convene women congregation at such a large scale despite abundance of resoureces.

Qazi lamented that today's society that called itself developed was depriving women of their inheritance, and making them a mere show before the society by making her compete with men. He said today's women were being deprived of their modesty for the sake of industrial and business profits.

He said JI would continue struggle for Islamic rights for women and keeping them linked to their past by countering enemy conspiracies. He asked JI women to convey the message of the congregation to every household in the country.

Addressing the second session various JI leaders said Pakistan would always remain incomplete without enforcement of complete Islam and securing freedom of Kashmir.

JI secretary general Syed Munawar Hasan said present PPP government continued Gen Musharraf's policies which caused serious problems for Muslim Ummah specially Pakistan. He said government's role in giving up Kashmir cause amounted to cut up jugular vein of the country. He said JI fully backed lawyers' movement and would continue till the restoration of chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry but, he warned, purging the lawyers movement from black sheep was a must for achieving that objective.

Munawar expressed serious concerns over the humiliation and victimization of national hero and father of country's nuclear program Dr Qadeer Khan, demanding his immediate release and restoring his honor and privileges. He said whole nation was suffering from the consequences of Gen Musharraf's decision to put country into American slavery. He demanded immediate release of Dr Aafia Siddiqi and hundreds of other missing persons.

He warned the PPP government against keeping Gen Musharraf's foreign and interior policies, demanding immediate halt in military operation in tribal areas, withdrawal of army and negotiations with tribal people for solving all pressing issues. He said American intervention and attacks on Pakistani soil must be stopped under all circumstances.

He condemned MQM for its fascist tendencies, particularly the May 12 mayhem, and urged upon the people to come out for bringing a positive change for a better future. He said JI train march proved that masses were averse to the way PPP leadership was running government affairs and wanted to reverse Musharraf's pro American policies.

JI NWFP ameer Sirajul Haq alleged president Zardari and military generals were supporters of colonists and their agenda in Pakistan, adding that JI would continue its struggle against the colonists and their agents. He said history was a testimony that colonists never succeeded defeating the spirits of Muslim freedom fighters of this region. He said after killing millions of human beings through nuclear bombs and deadliest arsenal containing the biggest convention bombs like daizy cutters, Washington finally launched a crusade against Muslims but it remained conquering handful of ill-armed rustics despite pumping in vast resources to crush them. Washington and Nato had already accepted mental defeat as its generals were looking for face saving exits in shape of talks with Taliban. He expressed sorrow that during the in camera session of national assembly, his photographs were shown with the caption saying he was offering funeral prayers of terrorists. He said in fact that funeral was of innocent students of Bajaur seminary martyred by American bombing and it was a pity that PPP government called its innocent school children as terrorists.

JI deputy secretary-general Dr Farid Paracha said certain forces and enemy agents were creating deliberate confusion about Pakistan ideology and its Islamic foundations. He emphasized that JI will continue struggle for Islamic Shariah in the country. He cited speeches of Quaid Azam saying that he intended to make Pakistan and abode of Islam.

JI Sindh ameer Asadullah Bhutto said it was a matter of sorrow that lawyers struggle was used to reach to the power corridors and ascend to the throne of Presidency. He said JI will continue its struggle for restoring the judiciary at the position of Nov 2, 07. He said PPP government made several attempts to undermine the lawyers' struggle including the increase in judges' number in Finance Bill. He said another party supported this move which had dissociated itself from the cabinet on the pretext of insincerity with judges restoration. He said certain black sheep in lawyers' long march caused serious damage to their movement. He paid tributes to chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry.

Al-khidmat Foundation chairman Naimatullah Khan said the basic aim of JI was to extend the Dawah of Islam to all human beings and serving humanity was the best way towards that objective. He said Al-Khidmat Foundation (AKF) undertakes various social welfare activities in and outside the country spending over one billion rupees every year.

He said a department in the name of Khidmat-e-Khalq was established soon after Pakistan came into being which rehabilitated those migrating from India. He said despite political bans and restrictions JI's social welfare department continued its activities. He cited earthquake of 2005 in which medicines, food, clothings, shelters and artificial limbs were provided to thousands of people.

He said AKF undertook similar activities for people from Chitral to Karachi all over the year proving health, education, sanitation, water supply etc. to the deprived sections of the society. Source: http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=143239

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Islam Answer to Capitalistic Debacle

Srinagar, Oct 25, KONS:  Some twenty percent of US population has more debt than assets today and this debt amounts to some 6 trillion dollars, Shoib-bin-Mukhtar, an Islamic Scholar from Al-Azhar University said at a conference on global financial debacle in Kashmiri capital Srinagar.

Al-Azhar scholar was here to deliver a talk on "Global Financial Debacle: An Eye-Opener towards Framing Islamic Economics Order" in the Kashmir University.

He said some twenty percent of US population is trapped in deep debt and it was more than the assets they hold today. He informed that this debt amounted to some six trillion dollars.

Mukhtar said that the "Islamic economic system has been a success for thousands of years and it is for sure going to benefit the present world as well".

"Solutions to all problems are embedded in Islam, he said adding "We should not narrow down the concept of Islamic economics to Islamic banking or finance but Islamic economics is a much broader concept and it surely has the potential to be an alternative to capitalistic economic system".

Registrar Kashmir University Prof Syed Fayaz presided over the function which was attended by a galaxy of scholars, students and teachers of the University.

Earlier introducing the topic the head of the department, commerce, Prof Khursheed Ahmad said that capitalistic economic system is in deep crisis at present due to current credit crunch which has given rise to a debate the world over.

Prof Khurshhed said that there is a need towards having a look towards the Islamic economic order as well as an alternative for the capitalistic economic system.

Calling the Islamic system as most ideal one, Prof Khurseed said that there is need to educate people about this system which he said preaches socio–economic justice as well.

Source:http://www.kashmirobserver.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1591:islam-answer-to-capitalistic-debacle-&catid=50:localnews&Itemid=81

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Separation of Islam and Justice 

26 October 2008

It appears like Yang Berhormat Zulkifli Nordin, a Member of Parliament for Kulim has put his foot in his mouth again. After his very embarrassing performance at the Bar Council recently, one would imagine he would have learnt his lesson by now. Yesterday Zulkifli said he does not care about anyone's opinion and he only cares about Islam. He gives an impression that he is an Islamic Mujahiddin who fights for Islam and who fights to uphold Islamic principles.

They say those who forget history are doomed to repeat its mistakes and I do not know whether Zulkifli Nordin is a student of history or not, but maybe he should brush up on his history, in particular history concerning Islam before he next opens his mouth and embarrasses the party that he is representing in parliament, which is  Party Keadilan Rakyat. Party Keadilan Rakyat, as the name suggests, stands for justice. Islam and justice go hand in glove. You cannot separate Islam from justice or vice versa.

Let us look at just the last 50 or 60 years of Islamic history and try to get a good idea on what happens when Muslim leaders try to separate justice from Islam. Let us look at Algeria in the 1950's and the 1960's when they fought against French colonization or French occupation of Algeria. Both sides, the French colonists and the Muslim mujahiddins perpetuated crimes against humanity, to use the current key word that is banded about.  Women were murdered. Women were raped. Children were murdered by bashing their heads on the wall. People were shot in cold blood and all sorts of crimes against humanity were perpetuated under the disguise of fighting for justice. What justice can there be when millions of citizens are killed in the struggle to gain a foothold in a territory? The French called it French territory and the Algerians said "This is free Algerian territory" and they wished independence. But in the fight seeking justice many, many people were massacred. It was almost like an ethnic cleansing.

Eventually the French decided to leave. Charles des Gaulle, the French who went on to become the French president made a decision that it was no longer tenable for the French to hold on to Algeria and they decided to give Algeria independence. But did the killings stop? No. A secular government was set up and the Islamists not being happy, decided they wanted an Islamic government.  And the killing continued. This time it was no longer between the French and the Algerians but it was between the Algerians and the Algerians. And many Christians and many Jews were killed in the crossfire  as well. Recently the FIS which is an Islamic party won the elections and the military immediately walked in and took over and sacked the government. The killing continues into its 3rd phase since the fifties and sixties.

Look at other countries, for instance in Iraq. When Saddam decided to oppose the Shia Islamic government of Iran, he moved his forces across the border and the 8-year war that ensued resulted in 1 million deaths. 1 million Muslims, Muslims killing Muslims. And today those deaths continue as Iraqis now fight against the American occupation of their country. Hundreds of thousands of Kurds were killed even before the American invasion of Iraq. And these Kurds were massacred, they were gassed. And entire colonies and community of Kurds who are Muslims were killed by their own Muslim government. The list continues. Afghanistan has resulted in 2 millions deaths. At first it was Afghans killing Afghans. Then it was Afghans killing Russians and vice versa. And now it is back to Afghans killing Afghans.

More Muslims have died in the course of struggling for justice. More Muslims have died in Muslim killing Muslim then in all the other Muslim-Christian wars over the last 1000 years.

Zulkifli Nordin is an Islamist. He probably claims he has been detained twice under the infamous ISA. The ISA is a law that stifles freedom of speech and freedom of association and Zulkifli Nordin says he does not care about other people's opinions. The ISA therefore suits him well because the ISA also does not care about other people's opinions. Does this mean that Zulkifli Nordin therefore supports the ISA? If so, let him speak now and make his stand clear as to what he thinks about the ISA. It is strange that a person like Zul who raids the bar council and who makes statements that he only cares about Islam and does not care about anything else would have that kind of mentality.

Was it not Abu Bakar, the first caliph of Islam who took out his sword and placed it before him and said, if he deviates from Islam, to take his sword and cut off his own head? Abu Bakar was responding to a question from the floor where one of the followers of Islam asked how can  they be sure that Abu Bakar would be a good leader and will rule justly and will not deviate from Islam. And Abu Bakar's response was, he offered his head to be executed with his own sword! That is a mark of a true Islamic leader, an Islamic leader who cares about other people's opinion.

Zulkifli Nordin said he does not care about other people's opinion. He is not a true Muslim and he is certainly not a true leader. He should redeem himself by resigning. Resign from the party and remain an independent candidate just like Ibrahim Ali who said he supports the ISA. Better still, Zulkifli Nordin should resign his seat in Kulim and allow for a by-election so that we can see whether the voters would like to continue to vote for a member of parliament who does not care about other people's opinions. Zulkifli Nordin is a disgrace not only to Parti Keadilan Rakyat but also to Islam. A member of parliament who does not care about other people's opinion should no longer remain a member of parliament.

Source: http://mt.m2day.org/2008/content/view/14260/84/

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Iraq's main Sunni party suspends contacts with US

25-10-08 By SAMEER N. YACOUB

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq's largest Sunni party said Saturday that it has suspended official contacts with American military personnel and civilians after the killing of a man near Fallujah.

The Iraqi Islamic Party accused the raid of having a "hidden political motive" in an indication of rising tensions in Anbar province ahead of provincial elections, due to be held by the end of January.

The U.S. military said U.S.-backed Iraqi soldiers arrested a wanted insurgent leader suspected of training roadside bomb cells in an operation Friday that killed an armed man who opened fire on the troops.

The IIP alleged that a senior member of the party was killed in his bed and five others were arrested during the raid in the Halabsa area on the outskirts of the former insurgent stronghold.

It accused the troops of targeting party members after its success in forging tribal alliances with other political blocs.

"The hidden political motive behind this incident is clear," the party said in a statement posted on its Web site.

The party said it "has decided to suspend all official contacts with the Americans, both military and civilians, until the party receives a reasonable explanation about what happened, along with an official apology."

It also demanded assurance those responsible would be punished, compensation for the victims and the release of the five detainees.

Supporters of the Iraqi Islamic Party rallied Saturday in Fallujah to protest the raid.

The IIP has been locked in a bitter rivalry with Sunni tribal leaders who joined forces with the United States against al-Qaida in Iraq in so-called Awakening Councils that started in Anbar and spread to other Sunni areas.

That has raised concerns that the political tensions could lead to new violence by disrupting the Sunni revolt, which is considered a key factor in recent security gains.

American forces handed over security responsibility for the province to the Iraqis on Sept. 1 but they retain a presence in Anbar, which stretches west from Baghdad to the borders with Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

Also Saturday, about 300 Shiites rallied in the southern city of Basra against a U.S.-Iraqi security pact currently under negotiation.

The demonstrators were members of a local Muslim charity linked to Iraq's largest Shiite political party, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, or SIIC.

The council has not decided whether to support the security agreement, and its decision will be crucial in determining whether it wins parliamentary approval. Critics oppose the pact as an infringement of national sovereignty.

Demonstrators raised banners that read "No to the agreement of humiliation" while chanting "No to America."

Negotiators face a Dec. 31 deadline to reach agreement on the pact, which is aimed at replacing the U.N. mandate for foreign forces in Iraq that expires at that time.

The proposed deal calls for all U.S. combat forces to be removed from Iraqi cities by June 2009 and for all forces to leave the country by the end of 2011, unless both sides agree to an extension.

Opposition from members of Sayyid al-Shuhada, a charitable organization in Basra, is significant because the protests against the deal so far have largely been led by followers of anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Iraq's Cabinet decided Tuesday to ask the U.S. for changes to the draft agreement as key Shiite lawmakers warned the deal stands little chance of approval as it stands.

The decision also raised doubts that the agreement can be ratified before a new American president is elected next month.

In violence Saturday, a bomb attached to a car exploded near Andalus Square in central Baghdad, killing a brigadier general and wounding his guard and a civilian bystander, according to police and hospital officials.

Defense Ministry officials could not be reached for confirmation or more details.

Elsewhere in Baghdad, a roadside bomb struck an Iraqi army patrol, killing one soldier and wounding three others, a police official said.

The Iraqi officials all spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to release the information.

Associated Press writer Sinan Salaheddin contributed to this report. Source :

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hwK_CSpBxsNuVUEaDuOwmSSCiqGwD941O6MO0

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VULNERABLE, BUT UNITED, Voices from a convention on Indian Muslim women

Githa Hariharan

When we think of the lives of Muslim women in India, we tend to think only of disadvantage. Of vulnerability. There's truth in this association, but it's not the complete truth. This was made quite clear at a recent national convention on Muslim women, organized by the All India Democratic Women's Association in New Delhi.

Consider two apparently contradictory images. On the one hand, there's the image of vulnerability — as women and as Muslims — and this vulnerability is compounded when poverty is part of the picture. On the other hand, there's the image of strength, born out of a determination to get what is their due. These two images could not be separated from each other as the women at the convention spoke about their daily lives — the obstacles they face, their minor triumphs, their passionate demands and hopes.

The theme of vulnerability was almost never out of sight. There were the inevitable references to drinking water, electricity, rations, education and health services. Again, the lack of access or poor access to these amenities was an indicator of multiple levels of disadvantage. It illustrated not only economic vulnerability, but also the discrimination suffered by poor Muslim areas with increasing ghettoization.

Consider, for instance, a few of the stories of these women. Naseem from Delhi, Malka from Lucknow, and Mujiba from Karnataka spoke of work and wages — the long hours, the working conditions, the lack of State support, the cuts taken by middlemen and, most of all, the gap between working hours and wages, and the even bigger gap between what they earn and what their basic needs cost.

Naseem has been working for the last 22 years in the handicrafts industry. Having sat for years in the same posture at work, she has a continuous pain in her back and knees. And what does she earn for this painful work? If she works 8 to 12 hours a day, she earns Rs10 to 15; the best she can do is Rs 30 a day. "In these times of soaring prices," she says, "our incomes are going down, not up."

Malka, from Lucknow, has been working for 30 years embroidering — zardosi, kaamdani and chikan. She gets Rs 500 for the saris that she used to make for Rs 2,500-3,000, and she still has to pay for the thread. When Malka's husband left her, she was determined to show him that she could raise the children by herself. But how is she to do this on the money she makes? How is she to educate them, or do "anything good for them"? "We make others beautiful, but we can't even feed our children," she rues. She has a constant pain in her stomach, her eyesight is going, but she cannot stop the zardosi work since she still has two daughters to be married.

Mujiba, a beedi-worker from Karnataka, recounts an equally bleak story. Five people in her family, including children, cut leaves, sort them, and roll the tobacco, so they can try to make a thousand beedis in a day. They get Rs 20 for the whole lot. Mujiba also described the context in which her family's work has to be seen. They have trouble getting drinking water; they have trouble with housing and health facilities. And they are among the five lakh unregistered workers, which means they do not have BPL cards.

But these are not merely heartrending stories told by pathetic victims. Onstage, Naseem, Malka and Mujiba hold the audience with their articulate description of their living and working conditions. They know their rights. They know they can fight for these rights more effectively if they pool their individual strengths together to construct a collective strength. They know that a collective struggle will give greater meaning to their demands as struggling individual women.

Naseem, for instance, says of female, Muslim, home-based workers: "They have no recognition; they're working as if they have no legal rights at all… The minimum wage in Delhi is Rs 140 a day, but that's what most of us poor women make in a month." Malka adds, "Rs 1.50 per kurta is the rate in chikan work. You tell me — is this enough when a woman and her daughters have slaved all day?" She knows how many people take their cut so that by the time their payment filters down to them, it has dwindled to an insignificant amount. Mujiba too knows that in her part of Karnataka, the beedi-workers get only half the usual rate. And she is aware that when the beedi-workers in Mangalore went on strike, they got an assurance of better rates.

Among the questions raised during the convention were two basic, big, recurring questions. How are we to survive? How are we to raise our children? Some of the women offered answers to these questions. Malka, for instance, says, "There are many women like me in Lucknow. We have to move forward together. We have to make sure we get a fair wage. We have to do these ourselves, and we have to help others in distress too." Malka's words should make us hang our heads in shame, but they also make us proud: her words show us what can be achieved when women's organizations and progressive political groups lend their support to the daily lives and struggles of poor Muslim women. Such support could make these women believe that if they try, they can even "make a hole in the sky".

Source: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081026/jsp/opinion/story_10000598.jsp

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A Johannesburg schoolgirl wats Muslim women to "go pink"

 Suthentira Govender                     

Oct 26, 2008

A Johannesburg schoolgirl is encouraging Muslim women to "go pink" to show their support for breast cancer awareness.

Humairah Jassat, a 17-year-old Grade 11 pupil at Azaadville Muslim School, has appealed to Muslim schoolgirls and women throughout South Africa to wear a pink hijab on Wednesday in support of Global Pink Hijab Day this week.

The initiative was started last year by Muslim women in the United States to raise awareness about the disease.

"October is a special month dedicated to breast cancer. With that in mind, I have initiated a South African version of Global Pink Hijab Day,' said Jassat.

"I was on the Internet recently and I stumbled on information about the Pink Hijab Day initiative. It really appealed to me. I thought this was an opportunity to make a change."

She was also motivated to start the project because of her personal experience.

"I know women who have been affected by breast cancer, some of whom have died. It has touched my life and I want people to be aware that nobody is immune to it. This is why I decided to take a stand."

She said the media portrayed Muslim women as being "oppressed and unable to help or educate others".

She believes her initiative will not only refute these perceptions, but also give Muslim women a platform to take a stand for a worthy cause.

"I believe by wearing a pink headscarf — which is a symbol of modesty for Muslim women — they will be showing support for breast cancer sufferers from all faiths, be it Hindu, Christian, Muslim or Jewish.

"I want to support my fellow women through this initiative, not just Muslim women."

Over the past two weeks, Jassat has been spreading word mainly among Muslim schools around the country.

"I have asked principals to allow their female teachers and pupils to wear pink headscarves on the day. So far, I have had an excellent response. Women have come out in support of wearing pink."

Source: http://www.thetimes.co.za/PrintEdition/News/Article.aspx?id=870324


http://www.newageislam.org/NewAgeIslamArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=931

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