Religion Dispatches
…transformation of using a double “s” is funny because it doesn’t exist in Arabic. For someone who insists he knows Arabic—and he spends a lot of time telling us he does—he doesn’t really show it. I also find it odd that he was apparently raised in secular Iraq as an engineering student and decided that he was programmed with “Islam.” In the span of 23 years he has managed to become a theological scholar with a 780 chapter thesis. It almost reads…
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…merica is ominously described as a “liberal advocacy group that ran ads on Arab TV apologizing for the actions of US troops”: See if this sounds different: Faithful America ran an ad on al Jazeera expressing regret for the abhorrent abuses that took place at Abu Ghraib—sort of similar to the way that George W. Bush (quite appropriately) apologized to Jordan’s King Abdullah at a Rose Garden press conference back in May of 2004: “I told him I was so…
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…crisis is Pakistan, but it sends the Middle East into a crisis, involving Arab countries, Israel, China. Everyone is reacting to this crisis including the U.S. government, which is reacting and trying to mitigate this crisis. We see the Foreign Service, the State Department, and the U.S. military. It debuts on June 21st. We are short on time, so I want to make time for one last question: What’s your advice to people who want to be creators, who w…
Read MoreJune 17 dawned many hours ago in Saudi Arabia, and early reports suggest that the day declared “Women 2 Drive” by Saudi women’s rights activists has been a success. Reports are coming in from Saudi journalists and Twitterists: about 20 women have been seen driving in Riyadh. Five or six drove past the capital. Women have also been reported driving in Jeddah. And there have been no arrests. An early morning YouTube video depicted one woman driving…
Read More…rsy earlier this year about his two-decade membership in Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ. Yet just 45 percent of those polled identified the Illinois senator as a Protestant. The Obama-is-a-Muslim confusion is caused by fallacious Internet rumors and radio talk-show gossip. McCain went so far at one of his town hall meetings to grab a microphone from a woman who claimed that Obama was an Arab. The Texas numbers are unusual because most n…
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…geles called Horizontal Muslims, which she describes as an “activist group united by a desire to be active in other communities, to organize on behalf of other communities.” She said she appreciates the group’s diverse leadership, a contrast to the “board entirely made of middle-aged Arab men” at the mosque she used to attend. Aly now runs Collaboryst, an organization that helps Muslim American professionals hone and market their skills while prov…
Read More…e ass-backward country preacher spouting off about his xenophobic fears of Arab-Americans and/or Islam? Indifference, ridicule, pity — any of these would’ve been an appropriate response to this fool. Arguing him down outside the center would’ve been fine, too, for the more passionate among us. But throwing the man in jail truly risks turning a gasbag into a poster boy for the fight against governmental assaults on free speech. What’s more, it’ll…
Read More…f. The Uzbek and Tajik headscarves often look more like kerchiefs than the Arab headscarf styles, which cover all or most of the hair, the ears, and the neck. The latter style is what Tursunov finds troubling, especially since this style is increasing in popularity among Uzbek women. In pressing for national dress, the imams caution against the Arabization of Islam, attempting to revive Uzbekistan’s and Tajikistan’s Islamic identities rather than…
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…ion of TQ bands. Do you believe that TQ is having an impact outside of the United States? If so, what? Why do you think it is having an appeal? If not, why? Is it the music (the genre being very particular to the Anglophone world)? the underlying thought of treating “Muhammad as punk rocker?” BU: What an ignorant question. Anglophone world? Punk is ten times bigger in Kuala Lampur than it ever will be in the UK, France, or Germany. Or America. No…
Read More…c and political engagement: make your society better. As we’ve seen in the Arab world recently, the “liberty narrative” is not foreign to Muslims, and does not need to be inculcated. Like any skill, it must be developed and nurtured. That holds true for all Americans, not just Muslims. Unfortunately, Jasser’s argument starts falling apart when he gets to specifics, and shows he does not comprehend why people are upset by these hearings. His eviden…
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