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Issue # 28, February 2011
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ARAB REVOLUTIONS ON NOW!
Made in the USA: The Arab world’s sleeping giant is awake! Yvonne Ridley London
US Administrations have been blighted since 9/11 by a deadly cocktail of arrogance and ignorance with a twist of the strong desire for revenge. But before you take aim and fire you have to know your
enemy, and the scattergun policies of the Bush and now the Obama regimes have served only to create hatred and mistrust against the US in areas where it was never present. In fact, far from driving the likes of al Qaida into oblivion this strategy turned the USA into al Qaida’s finest recruiting
Revolution stories Tarek Chamkhi Editor in Chief
M
ission
Hizb ut-Tahrir is right Mr. Barack Mubarak, or Hosni Obama, or whatever your name is!
Irfan Yusuf
Before this column commences, an apology is in order. The draft of this piece was submitted to the editor very late. Hence, the editor could not process it as quickly as he’d like to. You see, I was occupied by certain events happening in other parts of
the world. My eyes were glued to Al Jazeera English for a week or so, watching the dying (for some people, literally) days of the Tunisian uprising. I then watched the rise of the peaceful protest in Egypt. I couldn’t write this column earlier because I was transfixed by the sight of Christians and Muslims marching side by side, calling for a better future for
transforms it into a free, new world. While the White House has continued its arrogant behaviour, treating Muslim-majorit y countries like its own backyard, some smarter European leaders have gotten the message: “Western governments will be more alert to the need to reach out to civil society in these societies and be more proactive on some sort of democracy agenda,” Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt wrote in an e-mail recently. The US regime was surprised by the fall of the ex CIA agent Ben Ali, just as it was shocked at the Iranian Islamic revolution back in 1979 and at the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989. Despite its intelligence work 24/7 in over one hundred bases and secret locations around the world, it continually fails to anticipate the determination and desire for freedom of people living
accomplished!” my Tunisian Australian friend announced with excitement and happiness shining from his eyes. That same one-line quote headlined the famous press release from the Algerian revolution in 1962 when the French finally run away. “For the last six decades or so, the people of the North African region, and the entire Arab world, have been oppressed by our pro-West politicians and generals. They have dominated our fates, resources, and abused our lives and wellbeing,” my friend added. Now, according to my friend—who has taken the events of the revolution as personally as his native countrymen in Tunisia—after ex-president Ben Ali fled the country on January 14, we should expect the dominos to continue to fall, and all the region to catch the fire as a pan-Arab revolution
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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Participate in breaking the siege of Gaza �شاركوا بك�سر ح�صار علی غزة
We need your help to deliver a message of support for the people of Gaza.
members are intending to send a delegation to participate in this convoy. We need your نحتاج الی help to achieve م�ساعدتكم this noble goal and الر�سال ر�سالة to participate in محبة وتاييد this international ل�شعب غزة initiative to break the siege of Gaza. After participating You can donate in the Viva Palestina by sending a 5 convoy of aid to cheque to PO Gaza, Viva Palestina Box 1619 Auburn Australia is seeking 1385. You also can your support to donate at website fund raise money to of our partner send activists and organisation on donations to Gaza this www.socialjustice. coming May. net.au. Official The flotilla is receipts will be expected to leave provided Istanbul in the middle For more of May with hundreds information, of activists and hundreds of tonnes of you can contact Omer on 0403 624 materials, including building materials. 564 or Jamal on 0404 447 272 or email: Viva Palestina Australia in cooperation with vivapalestinaustralia@yahoo.com.au other community organisations and active
A scientific forum at Prince Naif University of Security Sciences in Riyadh in January cautioned the public against possible abuse of the internet to promote terrorism and extremism. Speaking at the forum, Abdul Aziz Al-Ghamdi, president of the university, said Muslims were the largest victims of terrorism in the world. He emphasised that Islam had nothing to do with terrorism. Prince Bandar bin Abdullah bin Mishari, director of the National Information Center at the Ministry of Interior, opened the forum, which focused on the role of the internet in combating terrorism and extremism. The forum was organised by the Saudi university in association with the antiterrorism team at the United Nations Global Counterterrorism Center in the US and the German Ministry of Interior. Prince Bandar underscored the Kingdom’s achievements in combating terrorism and extremism, referring to its pre-emptive strikes against terrorists. “We have foiled about 220 terrorist attacks in the Kingdom,” he said, emphasizing the Kingdom’s firm stand against terrorism. “We have become a model to follow in this field.” He also pointed out that the Arab AntiTerrorism Agreement, which was signed during a joint meeting of Arab interior and justice ministers in Egypt in 1998, was the first of its kind in the world. The meeting of Arab interior justice ministers is held on a yearly basis in Tunisia and is considered by many the only successful Arab cooperative program. It has previously been organised under the direct supervision of the ex Tunisian dictator Ben Ali, who fled his country on 14th January 2011, following a successful revolution.
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Forum: Muslims are main victims of terrorism
SMALL GROUP TUITION
Every child can succeed
Issue # 28, February 2011
Women’s Wellbeing Program A four week Women’s Wellbeing Program is to be held in Broadmeadows, every Tuesday morning 10am-12pm during March. What you will learn: • Strategies for happiness & optimism • Techniques for quickly improving your mood • Develop positive thinking & helpful coping strategies • Improve your self esteem & energy levels • Improve your sense of purpose & motivation • Identify your strengths & resources that will make the above possible! When: 1st, 8th, 15th, 22nd March. Cost: BULK BILLED with a Mental
Health Treatment Plan obtained from your GP (Ring the clinic to find out about your eligibility) or $45/ session. With: Monique Toohey (Muslim Psychologist & Group Trainer) How: Be inspired & supported in a fun, interactive women’s only group. Sorry no child care available. Where: Nasihah Consulting: Northern Psychology Clinic Suite 13/11-17 Pearcedale Pde, (cnr Dimboola Rd), Broadmeadows (opposite Magistrates Courts/next to leisure centre) BOOK NOW: 9351—1166 Email: info@nasihahconsulting.com You do not have to have Depression to attend this course, just a desire to be more in control of your negative emotions.
Page 4
Issue # 28, February 2011
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Muslim Aid facing emerging world relief
Sanitarium needs help to go halal
Sanitarium foods, a Seventh Day Adventist company is producing halal certified products such as cereals, So Good Milk, Marmite and peanut butter, according to Saltshakers.
Some anti Muslim groups have been organising campaigns to stop Sanitarium from producing halal certified products. Readers are encouraged to take action to support ongoing production of halal products by writing to:
A new year and some would say a time to start afresh. But grave emergencies mean men, women and children around the world remain stuck in the same cycle of poverty and misery that plagues them everyday. Millions around the world have been affected. In Sri Lanka flooding has caused o v e r 24,000 houses to be destroyed and led to dangerous f o o d shortages. In Brazil at least 700 people have been killed and 15,000 people left homeless after heavy rainfall triggered flooding and landslides. Years of conflict and ongoing strife mean the Palestinian people have to endure some of the worst conditions on the planet. In Somalia, a lack of rainfall and high temperatures in 2010 has left the
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Afghanistan: Australian Federal Police helped to build secret hit lists Australian police in Afghanistan have helped compile secret intelligence files on insurgent leaders later targeted in captureor-kill missions by special forces soldiers. The Pentagon has confirmed that Australian Federal Police officers are “assigned to work with” a joint police task force in Kabul that produces files used by military commanders to “shape the battlefield” - a term often used to describe the capture-or-kill raids mounted by elite troops in Afghanistan. While Australian Federal police are officially not allowed to contribute intelligence for military purposes, in reality they have little control over who uses the information they help compile. Cables obtained by WikiLeaks and provided exclusively to the Herald show how the joint police effort in Kabul has been hampered by a lack of staff. A request
from the US embassy in October last year said more officers were needed to help others working under the joint command of the Afghan government and NATO. There has been a rise in capture-or-kill missions aimed at insurgents, with as many as 17 raids a night in Afghanistan by special forces teams from Australia, the US, Britain and other countries. The soldiers work off a secret hit list, a centralised military database that includes information from police intelligence. US military officers have previously confirmed that some of those targeted include Afghans involved in narcotics with strong links to the insurgency. One general told a US Senate committee the aim is to “persuade them to choose legitimacy or [we] remove them from the battlefield.” In response to questions from the Herald, the AFP said its officers were assisting the
Afghan police in identifying drug traffickers and encouraging their prosecution through the local justice system. But the Afghan justice system is racked by corruption and crippled by a lack of resources. Australian officials have told the Herald the international effort is increasingly relying on the military’s capture-or-kill missions. An Australian Federal Police statement concedes that the Afghan suspects it helps to identify “may coincidentally include Taliban leaders’’. The statement also says the AFP cannot comment on “the dissemination … and the processing of military data [or] the activities of other agencies.” The US Senate’s foreign relations committee was told the military and police are seizing information to “develop an intelligence profile of the networks and the drug kingpins.”
Puntland region with severe drought. Sadly 2011 has begun with many disasters worldwide. Muslim Aid Australia is responding to all major emergencies to help those affected. This is why we have
launched the Global Emergency Appeal to provide relief for thousands affected by natural disasters, changing weather patterns and conflict in countries around the world. Photo: providing drinking water in Pakistan after recent floods.
However, the targeting of insurgent leaders is weakened by the Afghan government’s willingness to release those captured by the international military. Since July this year the Afghan government has sought the release of a record number of inmates before they are put on trial - as many as 700 suspected Taliban fighters and mid-level leaders - and at least 500 have been released. Another 2009 US State Department cable, obtained by WikiLeaks, says the US pressed the Afghan government to stop releasing drug suspects from custody. The Herald understands the target list includes more than 60 major traffickers who contribute funds to the insurgency. Source: Sydney Morning Herald and other agencies.
Contributors DECEMBER 2010/Jan 2011: Umar Abdullah - Amirudin Ahamed - Iftikar Ahmad - Kamariah Ahmed
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Egypt: Muslim Brotherhood spokesman says Islamist rule in Egypt no threat to West
Islamist rule in Egypt would pose no threat to the West because it would be more democratic and broad-based than President Hosni Mubarak’s “dictatorship”, a member of the banned Muslim Brotherhood said. Speaking to Reuters as huge anti-government protests raised uncertainty about Mubarak’s political fate, veteran of Egypt’s main opposition movement Kamel El-Helbawy said the 1978 peace treaty with Israel might also be safe in Egypt postMubarak if Egyptians felt it delivered justice to all parties. “A new era of freedom and democracy is dawning in the Middle East and Arab world,” Helbawy, an influential cleric in the international Islamist ideological movement, said in an interview in London, where he has lived since 1994. “That’s more important than declaring that a ‘new Islamist era is dawning’, because I know Islamists would not be able to rule Egypt alone. We should and would cooperate — Muslims, leftists, communists, socialists, secularists.” “Dictators like Mubarak have always told the West, wrongly, there is no difference between Islamists like the Brotherhood and some violent groups who are real fundamentalists.” A member since 1952, Helbawy has long been a prominent member of the Brotherhood’s overseas thinkers, working in Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Britain. In
the mid-1990s he served as the Brotherhood’s spokesman in the West, and helped create the Muslim Council of Britain and the Muslim Association of Britain. Helbawy said that if change came peacefully he would return home for the first time since 1988. Egyptians from all backgrounds were fed up with “dictatorship, corruption, lack of proper freedom and lack of development” like Arabs starting to protest in growing numbers in other countries, he said. “The West is always afraid that if the Brotherhood came to power it would end freedoms or do something (negative) with Israel. But I stress that the Brotherhood are among the people who defend democracy in full, and like to see democracy prevailing, because democracy gives them some of their rights.” The Brotherhood has said it would put the 1978 Camp David peace accords signed by then-Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to a referendum if it took power. Helbawy said the peace deal “is an issue that could be discussed” in a post-Mubarak Egypt. A key test of the landmark accords would be if they promoted justice, he said. If they did, “then everyone should respect the agreements. But if there is an agreement that does not deliver justice it cannot be tolerated whether you are Muslim Brotherhood, leftist or anyone else.” Source: Reuters and other agencies.
Muslim Aid cleared of funding terrorist organisations Hamed Chapman For the fourth time, a British Muslim charity has been cleared by the Charity Commission of allegations of channelling funds to terrorist organisations. Last month, the watchdog vindicated Muslim Aid’s position that it did not unlawfully fund the Al-Ihsan Charitable Society. Due to a lack of evidence, it chose not to even bother to investigate seven other allegations made in the Daily Telegraph that are no longer online. “The Commission found no evidence of irregular or improper use of the charity’s funds or any evidence that the charity had illegally funded any proscribed or designated entities,” it said. “By publishing this report, the Commission has given a public assurance that public allegations of links between the charity and terrorism are unsubstantiated.” Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Muslim Aid, Sir Iqbal Sacranie, expressed his satisfaction with the process of the investigation and its final conclusions. “We are immensely grateful to our supporters and partners across the world for their steadfast trust in the integrity of the charity and the belief that Muslim Aid complies fully with the national laws, including counter-terrorism laws,” Sacranie said. Muslim Aid, which works in over 70 countries, said the investigation had been prompted by “defamatory articles” authored by Andrew Gilligan and published by the Daily Telegraph and its sister paper, the Sunday Telegraph, earlier last year. The Commission only investigated allegations linked with Al-Ihsan Charitable Society, which was designated in the UK in June 2005 under the Terrorism (United Nations Measures) Order 2001,
making it a criminal offence to fund it without a licence from HM Treasury. On the other allegations, which are in line with Israeli attempts to starve funding to Palestinian organisations, the Commission said it was “not provided with sufficient evidence to support the allegation.” A spokesperson for the Commission said the sources of information provided to them “referred to a number of media reports to support the allegations made.” In the Commission’s view, these media articles “do not in themselves constitute evidence of links to terrorist entities, nor do they provide evidence that charitable funds have been used for terrorist purposes. Journalistic reporting does not necessarily provide the underlying source material or evidential basis for allegations and may not, therefore, give sufficient evidence to support such serious allegations for the Commission to consider taking regulatory action.” Despite the findings, Gilligan accused the watchdog of “weakness” in the face of terrorism and claimed that new figures showed it had launched more scrutiny of private schools and other institutions than of charities allegedly funding terror. He further alleged that there was a “party political bias” in the Commission under Dame Suzi Leather, who he said was an active member of Labour. In 2009, Britain’s top Palestinian charity, Interpal, was cleared by the Charity Commission for the third time of any alleged links with so-called terrorist organisations. Previous inquiries in 1996 and 2003 also found insufficient evidence to support allegations made by pro-Israeli lobby. Source: MuslimNews,UK.
Issue # 28, February 2011
Page 5
Have you stopped beating your wife?
Usama Hasan* The plain truth about domestic violence and the “wife-beating” verse of the Quran, including a holistic study of important but rarely-quoted hadiths on the subject. My conclusion is simple: God and Mohammed, peace be upon him, clearly wished to ban domestic violence, as numerous hadiths indicate. The verse was always known to be a temporary compromise, an extremely limited concession that required minimum use of violence, if at all. “New” findings are: 1. Numerous hadiths say emphatically, “Don’t beat your wives.” The Quran apparently says, “You may beat your wives.” This apparent difficulty must be resolved. The verse is perhaps the most quoted by critics and enemies of Islam, the Quran and the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him. 2. The article tries to highlight a basic and serious flaw with the way many Muslims read and teach the Quran, including some preachers and clerics. Helping to correct this problem will, Godwilling, open the way to dealing with numerous other controversial issues and “problematic” ayahs and hadiths. 3. Many issues around human rights and women’s rights, gender-equality, dhimmitude and so on may be fruitfully-addressed along similar lines. Feedback is welcome, especially from students and scholars of Islam as well as activists and reformers, particularly those involved with women’s rights. 1. There is a verse (ayah) of the Quran (Surah al-Nisa’ or Chapter: Women, 4:34) that may appear to condone domestic violence against women. 2. Domestic violence is a problem in most, if not all, communities and societies. For example, current statistics indicate that approximately 1 in 3 British women experience domestic violence during their lifetime. Although the overwhelming majority of cases of domestic violence in Muslim households are due to wider human factors such as difficulties with relationships and anger-management, a handful of cases involve the husband feeling justified in using violence against his wife on the basis of this Quranic text. 3. Such an attitude is not uncommon amongst socially-conservative Muslims who are “religious” in a formal sense: for example, a conservative leader of Indian Muslims is said to have given a public statement in 2010 denouncing a new law in India that criminalised domestic violence, thus: “They are taking away our divine right to hit our wives.” 4. This fundamentalist misinterpretation of the Quran is sometimes sanctioned by the legal system in Muslim-majority countries, for example, as in the UAE’s Federal Supreme Court ruling of October 2010. 5. A large number of hadiths (traditions of the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him) contain the explicit, emphatic prohibition, “Do not beat your wives!” 6. These hadiths may appear to contradict the Quran, if the latter is read in a superficial, fundamentalist way. 7. A holistic reading of the Quran, sunnah and hadiths, taking into account the sociohistorical context of the revelation of the Quran and of the Prophetic guidance preserved in authentic hadiths, shows clearly that God and Mohammed wished to ban wife-beating and domestic violence completely. As a temporary measure, and as a step on the way, an extremely limited, reluctant concession was given that only allowed minimal violence as a symbolic gesture of displeasure on a husband’s part. This was in a strongly patriarchal society that used to bury baby girls alive because of their gender and where sons would inherit their fathers’ wives. Such practices were outlawed
by Islam, which also granted rights to women in 7th-century Arabia that were only achieved by European women in the 19th century, such as the independent right to own their property upon marriage. 8. The evidence for this interpretation is overwhelming, from the 8th-century AD Mufti of Mecca who ruled that “a man may not hit his wife” to the 20th-century Mufti of the Zaytuna in Tunis who ruled that the State may ban domestic violence and punish any man who assaulted his wife. 9. The “gradualist” approach of the Quran and sunnah described in this case is a common feature in Islam. Other examples are the prohibition of wine, gambling, fornication and adultery. Modern reformers argue that the same principle applies to the abolition of slavery and the principle of gender-equality. 10. Recently, a number of Muslim thinkers and scholars, unfamiliar with the holistic approach to the Quran, hadith and sharia embodied in the universalist Maqasid theory of Islamic law, have attempted to re-translate the “wife-beating” verse to mean something else. Alternative translations and interpretations include temporary separation of husband and wife, travelling and even making love as a way of solving marital disputes. A prominent example of this is Dr. Laleh Bakhtiar’s recent translation, The Sublime Qur’an (2007) that is largely-promoted precisely based on her translation of the wife-beating verse. Although well-intentioned, such interpretations and translations are either grammatically unsound or far-fetched, or both. Furthermore, they ignore the overwhelming evidence provided by the hadith traditions and simply do not placate the critics of Islam. The normative, orthodox account of the issue in this study provides a thorough, honest and principled solution to the difficulties apparently posed by the wifebeating verse. 11. The presence of hadiths with weak isnads (chains of narration) that would otherwise justify wife-beating may be evidence that some early Muslims themselves misunderstood the issue and either fabricated or misreported traditions on the subject. The value of the work of expert hadith scholars throughout the ages who meticulously sifted genuine narrations from the weak ones, may be seen to be crucial. The work of al-Albani, a 20th century hadith scholar, is especially valuable, for example his gradings for every hadith in the four famous Sunan collections of Sunni Islam. Albani concentrated more on the chains of narration than the meanings of the traditions, but nevertheless confirmed that all the hadiths banning wife-beating or only allowing a limited concession are authentic whereas all those justifying it absolutely are weak. 12. This study highlights a fundamental problem with the way many Muslims, including some scholars and clerics, read the Quran. Rather than being read as a “textbook” or “instruction manual” as some superficial, populist, fundamentalist or hadith-rejecting preachers advocate, it should be remembered for what it is: a collection of divine signs, guidance and wisdom revealed to the heart of the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him, by God via the Archangel Gabriel ( Jibril), the Holy Spirit, peace be upon him. This guidance was always supposed to be manifested by people of piety and the remembrance of God, taking their situation and socio-historical contexts into account. A critical awareness of hadith and history has always been required, along with worship of God and service of humanity, to be guided towards the true way of following the Quran. * Usama Hasan is a London based writer. This summary is extracted from the author’s blog: http://unity1.wordpress.com The full study to be published on Crescent Times’ website insha Allah.
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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The adab of invitations Fa’izah Batchelor* Islam is a social religion. Friday prayer being obligatory for men is a perfect example of the importance of getting together and connecting with our fellow Muslims. Getting together should strengthen our faith and build connections within the community. Accepting invitations is an important part of maintaining and developing relationships and this is demonstrated in many hadith. Narrated Al-Bara’ bin ‘Azib: “Allah’s Apostle ordered us to do seven things and forbade us to do other seven. He ordered us: to follow the funeral procession, to visit the sick, to accept invitations, to help the oppressed, to fulfill the oaths, to return the greeting and to reply to the sneezer: (saying, “May Allah be merciful on you,” provided the sneezer says, “All the praises are for Allah,”). He forbade us to use silver utensils and dishes and to wear golden rings, silk (clothes), dibaj (pure silk cloth), qissi and istabraq (two kinds of silk cloths).” [Sahih Bukhari Book#23, Hadith #331.] This hadith shows that accepting an invitation is as important as returning salaams. Most scholars agree that accepting an invitation is highly regarded (mustahab), while others say that it is obligatory (fard). It is agreed by all scholars that accepting the wedding invitation is obligatory (fard). Narrated Abu Huraira: “The worst food is that of a wedding banquet to which only the rich are invited while the poor are not invited. And he who refuses an invitation (to a banquet) disobeys Allah and His Apostle.” [Sahih Bukhari Book #62, Hadith #106] However there are also many hadith on the importance of accepting non-specific invitations. Ibn ‘Umar used to accept all invitations as shown in the hadith below. Narrated Nafi’: “Abdullah bin ‘Umar said, Allah’s Apostle said, ‘Accept the marriage invitation if you are invited to it.’ Ibn ‘Umar used to accept the invitation whether to a wedding banquet or to any other party, even when he was fasting.” [Sahih Bukhari Book #62, Hadith #108] Muslims should be jumping at the chance to
accept invitations for the reward that it brings. The following report likens accepting an invitation to setting a captive free. While, for most of us, releasing captives is something that we can never experience, accepting an invitation is well within our grasp. Narrated Abu Musa: “The Prophet said, ‘Set free the captives and accept invitations.’” [Sahih Bukhari Book #89, Hadith#285.] Accepting invitations is the right of our fellow Muslim on us. As Muslims we can ask for these rights on the Day of Judgement. Narrated Abu Huraira: “I heard Allah’s Apostle saying: The rights of a Muslim on the Muslims are to follow the funeral processions, to accept invitation and to reply the sneezer.”[Sahih Bukhari Book #23, Hadith#332.] We shouldn’t be exclusive in the invitations we accept. We should be happy with the invites that we receive whether to a lavish party or to a small gathering. We should be grateful that we are invited. It shouldn’t matter what the host is offering. Narrated Abu Huraira: “The Prophet said: I shall accept the invitation even if I were invited to a meal of a sheep’s trotter, and I shall accept the gift even if it were an arm or a trotter of a sheep.” [Sahih Bukhari Book #47, Hadith#742.] After looking at this evidence, why are we so flippant in accepting invitations? Are we waiting for a better offer? Or are we simply unable to plan ahead more than a few days. Can we accept invitations without prejudice? This is a challenge for all of us. The rewards are uniting Muslims, developing a positive community, eradicating suspicion and hurt, fulfilling our obligations to our fellow Muslims and pleasing Allah and his messenger. You should try it. * My name is Fa’izah Batchelor and I am for improving relationships, all relationships. If you would like more information on building and improving relationships email me at faizahbatchelor@gmail.com I would love to hear from you.
LINK TO PROPHET MOHAMMED SAW The Anti-hadith Movement Part II Kamariah Ahmad* With the resurgence of Islam, many among the elites have non-traditional Islamic ideals. They classify themselves as secularist and modernist in contrast to the fundamentalist who campaign for Muslims to return to Islam’s original teachings. The secularists are those who believe that it is possible to separate religion and politics. This is done by restricting religion to the individual private sphere of life thus excluding it from the arena of politics and law. The modernist position will be a compromise between those with ‘traditional Islamic beliefs’ and those who ‘inherited a modern Western nation-state ideology’. They will try to explain sharia law, reject some hadith and explain the Quran in a new way to suit their current situation; at the same time compromising arguments against the universal Islamic ideals. For some modernists and the anti-hadith movement, hadith, sunnah or the tradition’s of the Prophet Mohammed (pbuh) are seen as backward, anti-progress and rigid. They swallow the false assumption that these are something static. Therefore, in order to move forward they believe they have to tear themselves away from the past and embrace the modern ways. Colonialism and modernity have produced modern Muslims such as Sayyid Ahmad Khan and Taha Hussein who reject sunnah and say that it has nothing to do with Islam. Another modernist Ahmed Amin suggests doing away with hadith and sunnah. Kassim Ahmad as a modernist believes that Muslims should reject and abandon
hadith and just follow the Quran. He agrees with the opinion of another modernist R a s h a d Khalifah who was a ‘murtad’ and was assassinated in 1988. R a s h a d Khalifah under the influence of modernity claimed that he was a ‘Messenger to the Modern World’. He launched vicious attacks on the sunnah of the Prophet Mohammed. As modernists they claimed they were in a better position to explain the Quran as they believed that the ‘Sayings and Traditions’ of the Prophet were not suitable for the present time and applied only to the Arabs 1400 years ago. Kassim Ahmad in his anti-hadith movement, as with the others, claimed “The Quran is a divine book that is complete, detailed and comprehensive. It does not need any other books to complete or detail its teaching. Therefore any other books including hadith and sunnah should be rejected. They claim that Allah Himself will teach man the Quran as in Surah Ar-Rahman, verse 1-2, that says: “The Most Gracious (Allah)!
Adelaide Muslim community supports new Muslims Janine Evans CT editor South Australia One can experience a plethora of emotions when ‘Embracing Islam’. The spiritual euphoria of this life changing choice can be tainted with a feeling of being overwhelmed by what seem to be an endless array of rules and regulations. Well meaning individuals from a wide variety of ethnic backgrounds offer an array of advice reassuring the new Muslim that it is ‘Islamically correct’. Unfortunately, such advice is often contradictory and not based in Islam but instead in cultural traditions passed off as religious requirements. If you are a woman this advice comes thick and fast “don’t wear this; wear that” “don’t sit here; sit there” ‘you must do this, not that’, and it goes on. It can become very confusing and may start to erode the joy of your choice to become a Muslim allowing doubts to creep in. After 18 years of living as an Australian Muslim I reflect on those early days with a conviction that my choice to make my shahada was the best thing I ever did, along with a feeling of disappointment that an unnecessary burden was put upon me as I learned my new religion, for there was very little support for new Muslims in Australia and particularly in Adelaide at that time. It always seemed to me
He has taught (you mankind) the Quran by His mercy”. Here they insist that the role of the Prophet is just to deliver the Message, nothing more than that. In reply to the above statement, Muslims have long accepted that Prophet Mohammed (pbuh) was chosen by Allah as a model to mankind, as an example of the best of behaviour for man to follow. In many verses of the Quran Allah mentioned the appointment of the Prophet as the expounder of the Quran. In Surah AnNahl, verse 44, it says “With clear signs and books (We sent the messengers). And We have also sent down unto you (O Mohammed) the dhikir [reminder and advice (i.e. the Quran)], that you may explain clearly to men what is sent down to them, and that they may give thought.” From the above verse we understand Allah gave Prophet Mohammed the authority to explain the Quran. Through hadith and sunnah, Muslims come to know the Prophet and the message of the Quran in detail. Without hadith it will be impossible to perform the ‘salat’ (ritual prayer) for example. The Quran instructs Muslims to perform the ritual prayers. For the method and readings/verses of Quran to be read during the prayer, Muslims must follow the guidance set by the Prophet Mohammed. The Quran teaches man to live in a certain
to be a head count with claims of ‘Mashallah another Muslim’ leaving the new Muslim to find their own way in a sea of contradictory statements. In Adelaide forward thinking Muslims have recognised this void and are acting to fill it. On a recent Saturday night behind the Adelaide Mosque – the oldest working Mosque in Australia, new Muslims were welcomed by other reverts (converts) and those born to the faith. It was an evening filled with common concerns and forgotten memories as recent reverts and those of us who have solidified our faith in many years of Islamic practice spoke about common reactions and issues we faced or are now facing with learning a new way of life. It was heartwarming to see women keen to take on the issues that surround our religion in the wider Australian community with conviction and strong faith and men with pride on their faces as they talked about embracing Islam. Not only has this group of young Adelaide Muslims seen the need for new Muslims to come together for support but they have also established a programme for these and others who are making this faith journey, to give them correct information about what they might encounter and what they should expect of themselves. This action is to be applauded – Alhamdulillah - for this journey should be one filled with joy not uncertainly. May Almighty Allah (swt) guide this group and encourage others to join and emulate this wonderful initiative.
manner and Allah has chosen Prophet Mohammed who has the most beautiful character for us to follow as an example. All Muslims in various parts of the world who love the Prophet will try to emulate his good behaviour. It may be his physical behaviour and practices or his spiritual devotion to the Creator. An intelligent foreign observer will be able to detect these universal practices that from sunrise to sunset unite all Muslims. It may be in the manner of eating, to cutting nails or giving ‘salam’ (greeting) or in the major actions of washing before prayer, giving charity, performing hajj for example. The principles of the law contained in the Quran were explained in detail in the hadith and sunnah, which together form the second basic source of Islamic law or sharia. In the next article, ‘Part III,’ we will follow the arguments of the modernists and secularists who say that hadith is not authentic; it is mere conjecture and vastly corrupted. Note: Muslim offer praise upon speaking, hearing or reading God’s proper name in Arabic Allah, and also offer salutation and invoke blessings upon speaking, hearing or reading the names of Prophet Mohammed. The abbreviation s.w.t following the name of Allah stands for ‘subhanahu wa ta’ala’ which means Glory be He, the Most High As for s.a.w. it stands for ‘sallAllahu ‘alayhi as-salam’ which means ‘God’s blessings and greetings of peace be upon him’ (also noted as pbuh in English meaning peace and blessings be upon him) following the mention of the names of Prophet Mohammed.
References:
Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Ideals and Realities of Islam – The Prophet and Prophetic Tradition, published by Aquarian 1994 Nazim Basksh, article titled ‘In the Spirit of Tradition’ – a journal published by Q-News Intl.Ltd. Lecture notes from Dr.Ibrahim M.Zein – Int. Islamic University Malaysia. * Kamariah Ahmad is a Singapore based author and commentator. She is a frequent contributor to CT.
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Hyder Gulam: a Muslim leader building bridges What do an Royal Australian Air Force Officer, a lawyer, a Registered nurse, an accredited mediator and the President of the Islamic Council of Victoria all have in common. Well manifested in Br Hyder Gulam, are all these attributes.
Hyder was elected President of the ICV late last year. He is no stranger to leadership roles, having been President of the Student Union at Deakin University, when he studied nursing. He also founded the Islamic Society of Deakin University in 1995 and in 2008 co-founded the Muslim Legal Network, which has now expanded from Victoria to NSW, with plans to extend coverage to WA and Tasmania soon. When asked about his new role as President of ICV, Hyder replied: “I walk humbly in the footsteps of a great man, namely Brother Ramzi Elsayed, whom we are blessed to have as our Vice President. I am also blessed to have many of the previous ICV Executive staying on, and to have very good people coming on board for the first time, including Craig Dent, Mohamed Nur, Nawal Ali and Nadeem Hussain. “Working at the ICV can be demanding and stressful at times. However, it is the effort that you make in responding to emails, attending ICV functions, contributing to meetings and leading programs that has positive outcomes for our ummah. The most important thing to remember is our vision, which is: To build a better community for all Australians through the empowerment of Muslims in Victoria.” On election day, Hyder outlined his goals for his term of Presidency which were: 1. To work for the best interests of the ummah without fear or favour. 2. To unite the many Muslim organisations and the Muslim Societies at the various Victorian Universities and foreign student associations under the ICV banner. 3. To grow ICV membership from the current 38 member societies and introduce a system whereby older member societies ‘mentor’ the newer member societies. 4. To continue to foster positive and productive relationships with AFIC (Muslims Australia), ANIC and the Board of Imams - Victoria. 5. To engage the Victorian government and agencies at all levels to obtain the best outcomes for Muslims in Victoria. 6. To focus on our core areas and consolidate corporate governance
and risk management. The ICV’s core areas are: •NILS (the ICV Qara Hassan No Interest Loans Scheme) •Australia-Indonesia Muslim Exchange •Muslim Leadership Programs •Hospital and Prison
Chaplaincy •the multifaith and interfaith engagement program ( JCMA) •Convert support program •City Circle •Stories in the Park •Prayer Facilities •Conducting workshops on Islam for non-muslims, schools, Government departments and other agencies •Provision of meeting and office space for the Muslim community •The ICV Arts program •Miscellaneous Muslim community matters. 7. To be become financially self sufficient. 8. To engage with and provide therapeutic strategies on issues that impact our community such as domestic violence, dispute resolution, unemployment, youth affairs. 9. To fund raise for community goals. 10. To provide platforms for young Muslim professionals to work in the best interests of the ummah using a model similar to that of the Muslim Legal Network (ie a Health Professionals committee, a Media and Journalists committee etc). 11. To build up our volunteer database. 12. To implement a Muslim awareness week in Victoria. 13. To be pro-active rather than reactive in media engagement strategies. 14. To continue to provide leadership for the ummah and the wider Victorian community in terms of strategic planning for mosque developments regionally. 15. To stand up against violence and bigotry within (and against) our community. 16. Finally, to continue our dawa work to be noble, pious model citizens. Hyder expressed his concern with the status of halal certification, saying that he would investigate this matter during the term of his Presidency. His main goal however is to work towards uniting the ummah. “The theme under my Presidency is ‘One Mosque’. We are all Muslims, and like the fingers of my hand [he formed a fist] when the ummah is united we are strong, and no one can divide us”.
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Issue # 28, February 2011
Page 7
MCCA:
significant business achievements On the 22 of December 2010, at the Annual General 1300 724 734 Meeting (AGM) * This promotion is only for Amlak of the MCCA Group, Dr. Aladin Zayegh on behalf of the Chairman Dr Akhtar Kalam welcomed Mr. Hyder Gulam and Mr. Mohammad Helmy to the MCCA Ltd. Board. Dr. Zayegh also acknowledged and extended his appreciation and gratitude to the MCCA Group’s directors, management staff and above all their customers for their contribution and support of MCCA. MCCA started business in 1989 as a registered cooperative in the inner Melbourne suburb of Burwood with $20,000 and a vision to address the financial, banking and investment needs of the Australian Muslim community by offering sharia compliant housing mortgage loan products. Regarded as the pioneer of Islamic finance in Australia, MCCA now operates from two modern offices in Sydney Road Coburg (Head Office and Victorian Branch) and in Haldon Street, Lakemba (Sydney / New South Wales Branch) The MCCA Ltd. Board of Directors is comprised as follows: Dr. Akhtar Kalam – Chairman Dr. Zuhair Segu, Dr. Abdul Khair Jalaluddin, Dr. Zehdi Ferkh, Dr. Aladin Zayegh, Mr. Hyder Gulam, Mr. Mohammad Helmy. This year MCCA celebrated its 21st birthday – a significant milestone for the business and a testament to its steadfast commitment to the values of integrity, excellence, innovation, faith and people. These very important values have provided the foundation for MCCA’s business longevity, direction, financial success and product development. Furthermore, the Directors have remained committed to MCCA’s long term objective to be Australia’s first Islamic retail bank. In 2009 MCCA developed and launched the ASIC regulated MCCA Income Fund in response to a growing demand within the Australian Muslim community for a sharia compliant investment based on ethical investing principles as an alternative to mainstream investments. The MCCA Income Fund has been well received by the Muslim community and last quarter the fund targeted a distribution of 5% return (annualised). New product development plans are well advanced and the MCCA Group is on target to release three new sharia compliant products by the second quarter of 2011: *Property Trust *Superannuation Trust *Equity Trust During his AGM address Dr. Zayegh made mention of the Australian Taxation Board Review that is currently underway. Dr. Zayegh said he welcomed the review and hoped that it would address many of the anomalies that have adversely impacted on Islamic finance and future Islamic banking products and product development and innovation. Dr. Zayegh concluded, “We are confident that the MCCA Group will continue to grow and develop new and innovative sharia compliant financial products and services demanded by Australian Muslims and in doing so provide the benchmark for the Australian Islamic banking and finance industry.”
www.mcca.com.au
Above from left: Ibrahim Yusuf, of Victoria, and Nizam Jazeer President of the La Trobe University Nijamudeen, President of the Islamic Islamic Society, Hyder Gulam, Society of Deakin University. President of the Islamic Council
QLD: Flood crisis donations Muslim Charitable Foundation Brisbane (www.muslimcharitablefoundation.com.au) Account name: Muslim Charitable Foundation Emergency Acct • Bank: Bank of Queensland • BSB: 124 155 • Account No: 2089 7395 Human Appeal International Australia : (www.humanappeal.org.au) • Bank: Commonwealth Bank of Australia • BSB: 062-191 • Account No 0090-3948 (Please state specifically that the donation is for the flood appeal) Muslim Aid Australia (www.muslimaid.org.au) Muslim Aid Australia • Commonwealth Bank of Australia • BSB: 062-191 • Account no: 10 448 216 ( in order to receive your receipt, please email your deposit stub details to mail@muslimaid.org.au if you make a direct deposit for any appeal) Mercy Mission(www.mercymission.org.au) Account Name: Mercy Mission Dawah Inc. • St George Bank • BSB: 113 879 • Account Number: 456 608 524 SWIFT: SGBLAU2S
PERSONAL ADS - 30 year old Muslim male living in Sydney. Medium build, olive skin, looking for religious, nice girl from any part of Australia. Feel free to ask me any questions. I can be contacted by email: jc9351354@gmail.com - 35 year old ethnic Sunni, practicing Muslim, Australian citizen living in Sydney. Working full time, looking for honest, devoted, serious, pious, good looking girl for marriage. Age group could be 18-30 years, open to race, background or country. I am 5 feet 4 inches tall, 55kg with beard, average build, don’t drink or smoke at all. Very easy going, honest, practice sunnah, simple life style. Any hafiza, aleema (niqaab or hijab) would be first priority. If you are interested, drop me a line today: blue.ocean1066@yahoo.com.au
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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Australia Day – more than just a celebration
Shaazlah Hafreth* CT Editor, QLD
Once again Australia Day has come and gone and every Australian, be they new to the country or old, has had the opportunity to consider that they are part of a diverse and rich culture that makes Australia what it is today. Australia has come a long way since the arrival of the First Fleet under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip at Sydney Cove on January 26th, 1788. Although this day was not known as Australia Day until over a century later, records of celebrations on January 26th date back to 1808. It is presently an official public holiday in each and every state and territory of Australia, with a host of events and activities spread throughout every region to bring friends and families together and remind them of their Australian heritage. “I think most people see it as a day off but I think it is a day to treasure who we are in a free country,” says Alyssa Brown (25), a former resident of the Gold Coast, who currently lives in Sydney. Alyssa’s family has been in Australia for many generations and she says that she loves Australia’s multicultural society because it “brings new ideas” and “helps us grow” as a nation. New Zealand born Umm Ibrahim says that she
Community leader named Australia Day ambassador
ACT community and Muslim leader, Mr Ikebal Patel was been named the ACT’s 2011 Australia Day Ambassador by Chief Minister Jon Stanhope. Mr Patel is President of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, the peak national body representing the interests of Australian Muslims. He is also the Chair of the Muslim Advisory Council of the ACT and Board Chairman of the Islamic School of Canberra. As an Australia Day Ambassador, he attended various events in Canberra on January 26 and was presented with a special Ambassador pin. “Mr Patel has made an enormous contribution to the Canberra community as a public advocate of harmony and tolerance between people of different faiths, and will be a very worthy ACT Ambassador on our national day,”
grew up and did most of her schooling in Australia. “Australia is home for me Alhamdulillah,” she says. “I love that (Australia) is so family oriented, I love how you can take walks along the beach, there’s loads of parks for the kids, there’s outdoor activities everywhere you go. “These things seem trivial but when you’ve travelled a lot, it’s the small things that make you appreciate home.” The floods of 2011 did put a damper on things, but did not take away the spark of brotherhood amongst the Australian people, as they decided to make the most of Australia Day by collecting funds for the flood victims. “Let’s make this Australia Day really mean something,” Global Care spokesperson Ken Wootton said in the Gold Coast Sun. “I can think of no better way to honour our nation and its people, than helping the victims of the recent devastating floods.” Imam Imran Husain of the Arundel mosque and the Gold Coast community said that a national day was good to show unity and solidarity among a multicultural Australia. “It’s important to express our identity and portray our wonderful country,” he said in the Gold Coast Sun. *Shaazlah Hafreth is Queensland editor of Crescent Times. With experience as a primary school teacher, she is also a mother, an avid reader and blogger, co-host of the website www. infomuslim.com and is currently writing her first novel.
Chief Minister Mr Stanhope said. Mr Patel is a member of various organisations proactive in helping communities work together, including Civil Liberties Australia and the Australian Partnership of Religious Organisations. He is also an ambassador of the White Ribbon Foundation for the elimination of violence against women. In recognition of his continued dedication to enhancing the welfare of others, Mr Patel was awarded the Pride of Australia “Fair Go” Medal in 2010 and received a Special Commendation in the Community Category of the ACT Volunteer of the Year awards in 2006. “Mr Patel has spent most of his life assisting others, particularly helping with the resettlement of refugees. His dedication to the protection and advancement of civil liberties and human rights is recognised both locally and nationally. I am pleased that, along with thousands of Canberrans, Mr Patel will be helping us celebrate Australia Day,” Mr Stanhope said when announcing Mr Patel’s appointment to the role.
Defend authentic Islam and condemn violent myths Sandra Elhelw* New Year’s Day 2011, whilst Egypt’s Coptic Christian’s attended midnight prayer services at the Church of St. Mark and Pope Peter, in Alexandria, extremists detonated a bomb killing 21 people, and wounding 91. I always presumed Egypt, my ethnic homeland, would be immune from violent religious tensions, but on the morning of New Years, I awoke finding my assumption slightly naïve – or perhaps arrogant. My utopia was founded upon the Quran, hadith, and Islamic folklore which demonstrates respect for people of other faiths, particularly Christians and Jews. Most Muslims are familiar with such teachings, and as a result, take it for granted that our religion is a peaceful one, not feeling the need to prove it to the world, because to us – it’s obvious. Unfortunately, our religion’s tranquillity is not as apparent to the rest of the world. As with
other terrorist attacks since 2000, Islam was portrayed as the ultimate perpetrator. It’s easy to disregard such claims as baseless nonsense, simply ignoring them. But the fact remains that the idea of Islam as a violent religion is widespread, often going unchallenged by Muslims worldwide, why this is, I will never understand. We can’t expect to dispel these myths about Islam without, at least, actively denouncing them. In an attempt to condemn the bombings, and affirm the true principles of Islam, I drafted a letter to Adelaide’s Coptic Orthodox Community, asking several Islamic organisations to sign it. The support of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, The Islamic College of South Australia, The Inter-Cultural Dialogue Society, The Islamic Students Society Adelaide University, Assisting Shift in Multi-Cultural Australia and Ayn
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Nurse’s Notes:
Female genital cutting
Judy Nelson-Eldawy*
There is a silent epidemic afflicting between 100 to 140 million women worldwide. Assuming the victims survive its initial attentions, they bear physical and psychological scars for the rest of their lives. This epidemic is not biological in nature; rather it’s one that arises from tribal custom, cultural tradition and societal pressures. It is female circumcision, also known as female genital mutilation(FGM) or by the more culturally sensitive term, female genital cutting(FGC). FGC is defined as the practice of cutting, scraping, pricking, excising, burning or scarring of the female genitalia for no medical reason or health benefit. FGC is practiced in many African countries, parts of the Arabian peninsula and the Middle East and parts of Southeast Asia. It is found in Mexico and Brazil and is reported to be practiced by the Pano Indians of Peru and by the Pitta Patta Aborigines of Australia. There are four categories of FGC. Type 1 is often referred to as “Sunnah or Islamic” circumcision and involves the removal of the prepuce (hood or skin of) the clitoris or the partial or total removal of the clitoris. Type 2 is partial or total removal of the clitoris and the labia minor and labia majora. Labia are the skin folds or ‘lips’ surrounding the vagina. Type 3 is called infibulation, which is the narrowing of the vaginal opening by cutting and repositioning the labia,with or without excision of the clitoris. A reverse infibulation(re-cutting) is needed to allow for sexual intercourse or childbirth. This type of FGC is also known as “Pharonic circumcision” as the ancient Egyptians used to practice FGC. Type 4 involves the pricking of the clitoris with a needle or the tearing or ripping of the vagina or the burning or scarring of genitals. Sometimes FGC is performed in a medical facility by trained personnel. However, for various reasons ranging from criminalisation of FGC by many countries to lack of medical care or even personal preference; most often it is performed by traditional female practitioners. These women usually have no medical training and the operation is done in non-sterile environments with no anesthetic; using razor blades, bits of metal or broken glass. Aside from the immediate risk of death from shock or infection, women suffer from painful, life-long recurring urinary tract and reproductive tract infections. Cysts are common and infertility is a risk as are higher rates of pregnancy and labor and delivery complications. A 2006 study of data collected from 28,393 women from obstetric clinics in several African countries found all forms of FGC caused increased risk of fetal death. Then there is psychological trauma of varying degrees including but not limited to trust issues, relationship difficulties and sexual dysfunction. Surprisingly, given the nature of this procedure; FGC doesn’t eliminate all sexual pleasure. Reasons for FGC are as diverse as the cultures who embrace this practice. These include: -Tribal custom/tradition upheld as an expression of cultural or ethnic identity. Usually in response to colonial powers or governments reviling or banning the practice. -Rite of passage -Cultural and/or societal pressures to have females undergo FGC as a means of protecting their virginity and thus the family honor. Some societies view women who have not had FGC as unmarriagable. Societies espousing this view usually have Type 3 FGC predominate and see the
Academy has helped weaken the violent stigma surrounding our community. Egypt’s Muslims also took a stand against extremism. On the Coptic Christmas, January 7th, thousands of Muslims surrounded Egypt’s churches, offering their bodies as human shields to protect Christian worshipers. World wide, Muslims are organising activities exemplifying
smallest openings in infibulation as most desirable and commanding the highest bride prices for the women possessing them. -Immigration from areas that do not practice FGC to ones that do -A belief that the clitoris is a “male” part and is “unclean” and a female is “beautiful and clean” after FGC. -Religious reasons such as a belief that both males and females must be circumcised to uphold the Abrahamic Covenant and/or a belief that the Prophet Mohammed(pbuh) endorsed this practice. This last is a controversial issue among Islamic scholars. There is nothing in the Quran or sunnah that states circumcision of females is either obligatory or recommended. All hadith regarding FGC attributed to the Prophet Mohammed(pbuh) are not authentic and all chains of reporters are weak. However, among the four schools of Islamic thought; the Shafi’i and the Hanbali rule FGC as mandatory, Maliki rules it as sunnah and the Hanafi rules it as not sunnah but recommended. The latest ruling from Al-Azhar Supreme Council on Islamic Research, the body from which much Sunni Islamic fatwa is issued; decreed that FGC has no basis in core Islamic law and should not be practiced. For the Coptic Christian community, Coptic Pope Shenouda stated neither the Quran nor the Bible demanded or recommended female circumcision. Many Western nations have criminalised FGC to varying degrees. In 1997, Australia made FGC as well as the taking of a child outside the country for the purpose of having FGC, a criminal offense in all states and territories. International law recognizes FGC as a human rights violation. Despite this, approximately 3 million girls world wide will undergo FGC this year. Families will take their girls to be cut believing this to be a beneficial practice, an honorable and proud tradition and/ or a sign of religious devotion. Immigrants to Western nations will return to birth nations on vacation for this purpose. Education, not criminalisation, is the key to ending this practice. To that end, many organisations, such as the Orchid Project, are dedicated to ending FGC. In Kenya, there is a movement working to replace FGC with a week long rite of passage called “Circumcision With Words”. Grass roots networks talk with FGC practitioners in refugee camps and other communities about the problems arising from FGC. Some have even stopped their practice entirely or have refused to do the most damaging type 3 FGC as a result. This can come at a high personal cost to the practitioner, in the form of loss of status and loss of livelihood. In communities where FGC is advocated, families choosing not to cut their daughters keep this decision quiet. Girls who decide they don’t want FGC can find themselves homeless runaways, ostracised by families and subject to forcible FGC on their return. In these societies, community and religious leaders and medical personnel advocating FGC are the ones who need to be convinced of the damage FGC does to the individual woman and to society as a whole. As citizens of the world, it behooves us all to be educated about FGC. *Judy Nelson-Eldawy is an American Muslim wife and mother who lives most of the year in Egypt. She has a Bachelor of Science in Nursing and over 20 years experience in the fields of psych/mental health, medical/surgical and home health nursing. She advocates a holistic approach to health and the use of alternative therapies in conjunction with more conventional Western treatment modalities.
the inherent respect Islam has for those of other religions. It is truly heart-warming to see our brothers and sisters taking a stand against unjustified violence. We all have an obligation to initiate, encourage and support such actions. *Sandra Elhelw is a student at the University of Adelaide.
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Issue # 28, February 2011
East West
PLANET IRF
Tarek Chamkhi
Irfan Yusuf continued from front page
continued from front page
each other, each other’s children and their shared nation. I was overjoyed by reports of Muslim sheikhs and Coptic priests standing on tanks embracing each other. I watched ordinary Egyptians organising their own organic spontaneous security system to protect their homes at night and to ensure trouble-free protests during the day. I was further delayed when images of Molotov cocktails thrown in all directions were shown, when Mubarak unleashed his goons on horseback to charge at the people. I was then shocked by the response of Barack to Mubarak’s lame excuses for not giving up power despite the millions who wanted him out. As
just what Qutb suffered at the hands of an Egyptian dictator. They might ask whether they could maintain their sanity after being subjected to such inhumane and gruesome treatment. They might also ask whether the same kind of treatment is being sold to the United States to deal with terror suspects. And they might ask whether they would tolerate such treatment being given to prisoners in Australia. The hypocrisy and double standards of pro-Mubarak morons in the West helps me understand why young politically-minded Muslim kids are attracted to groups like Hizb ut-Tahrir. I do not agree with HT’s methodology. But HT insist that the various systems that underpin Western capitalism and liberalism are
if to make matters worse, Mubarak appointed the man in charge of the torture of Australian citizen Mamdouh Habib as Vice President. As expected, Julia Gillard had nothing to say about this. Then again, Ms Gillard was probably worried about matters closer to home. Around this time, I was flicking channels between Al Jazeera English and ABC24, where I saw reports of a massive cyclone the size of Europe about to hit central and northern Queensland. I watched as evacuation orders were issued for places I had lived and worked in – Mackay, Airlie Beach, Bowen and Townsville. So I contacted the editor and apologised. He accepted my apology and had his own confession to make. He said that he would not have processed it quickly even if I had sent it to him on time. He was occupied also, which explains why this issue of the newspaper is somewhat late. He was transfixed by events in Tunisia and then Egypt and then the cyclone. Thanks to the 24 hour news cycle, events in Tahrir Square and the esplanade at Cairns can enter our living rooms at the touch of a few buttons. In the case of the former, we probably knew more about what was happening than Egyptians relying on Egyptian State TV. It’s so easy to become engrossed in these events, especially when you have a strong sense of justice. Ignorant pundits have been blabbing on about the Muslim Brotherhood and Syed Qutb. Maybe they should read about
rotten to the core. And their biggest allies in spreading this message are men like Barack Hussein Obama and Hosni Mubarak. Obama’s own grandfather was tortured by dictatorial colonial powers in Kenya. Yet Obama is prepared to support a dictator like Mubarak who treats political prisoners in the same manner, if not worse. Furthermore, Obama has made it clear that the policy of rendition – of sending terror suspects to countries like Egypt to be tortured – will continue. The President of the United States, the leader of the “Free World”, gets dictators to do his torturing for him. He then drags his feet when these same dictators are subjected to a popular uprising. And we are expected to believe in the rhetoric of “democracy” and “freedom”. If I was in first year university with little understanding of law or politics, I’d be joining Hizb ut-Tahrir myself. I hope the Egyptian people succeed in toppling Mubarak and bringing all his goons to justice. I hope they then elect a democratic government which respects human rights and which does not discriminate against anyone regardless of faith. If they can do this, they will restore my faith in democracy. And they might just set a good example to the White House. * Irfan Yusuf is a Melbourne based lawyer, he is a senior columnist with Crescent Times.
Page 9
Revolution stories
under oppression. Regarding the Egyptian revolution, however, the US has tried to look and act a bit smarter, considering the pressure on it from Israel. Israel, ironically and proudly touting itself “the only democracy in the Middle East,” is scared by this revolution on its borders, which appears to threaten it with the democratic will of the Egyptian people. The possibilities of the collapse of the Camp David peace treaty of 1978, the Muslim Brotherhood ruling Egypt, and even large scale war between it and Egypt are all on Israel’s list of concerns. Omar Suleiman made the news as the US choice in Egypt. Mubarak’s latest appointment of Omar
Security Investigations (SSI), which is another branch of the country’s intelligence community and responsible for monitoring political dissidents and opposition forces, is Egypt’s most notorious perpetrator of abuses, including routine forced disappearances. The Israeli media proudly reported recently that Suleiman would be an even better leader than Mubarak himself. Sources have even claimed that Suleiman has a home in Tel Aviv. My victorious Tunisian friend, let’s call him Jihad, has been in exile from Tunisia since 1991. As is the case for tens of thousands of his countrymen, he was subject to Tunisian secret police profiling, false
“So you printed books for Rachid Ghanouchi?” I asked. “Yes,” he replied with smile. “I distributed them in the rest of the Arab world too.” His books would be prohibited by secret police in many other Arab countries, with the notable exceptions of Morocco and Lebanon where the books were printed. “The funny thing,” added Jihad, “is that Ghanouchi is considered by many other Islamists, such as HT, to be a sort of heretic. Well, they use word bid’aah to describe his outlandish opinions. He believes, for example, that a Muslim woman could be a khalifah (head of the Islamic state), that Tunisian family law which goes against some Islamic
Suleiman as his vice president—his first after twenty years—was not an innocent choice. Obviously, the Americans and Israelis instructed Mubarak to appoint Suleiman, who is being prepped for future leadership of Egypt under their supervision. Suleiman, who enjoys a strong relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency, has largely been received with disapproval by Egyptian protestors, as allegations of his involvement with torture have been publicised. As the head of the Egyptian General Intelligence Service (GIS), Suleiman was directly involved in the controversial CIA “extraordinary rendition” program. “Our intelligence collaboration with Oman Soliman (sic) is now probably the most successful element of the relationship” with Egypt, said a 2006 US diplomatic cable leaked by WikiLeaks. According to a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report from six years ago, from the 1990’s through 2005, Egypt received the largest number of CIA detainees under the program, which delivered suspected terrorists to governments with questionable rights records for interrogation. Our fellow Australian citizen Mamdouh Habib was one of Suleiman’s victims. HRW’s latest report, titled “Work on Him Until He Confesses: Impunity for Torture in Egypt,” claims that the country’s State
reports and passport confiscation. Jihad lived in Beirut for most of his exile, as a refugee threatened with extradition to Tunisian torture chambers. Eventually, he was granted humanitarian refugee status by the Australian embassy in Beirut in 2003, through the UNHCR. “Ketebt ussa?” (So you wrote a story?) asked the lady at the Australian embassy in Beirut in 2002 in broken Arabic. “Ummm, no, it was a political book that put me in the firing line for all these years,” he replied with a sort of disappointment. With limited personal resources, Jihad published a small book in 1993, two years after he left Tunisia, about the Tunisian Islamic groups persecuted by the Ben Ali dictatorship. Ben Ali’s agents went to great lengths to investigate the author of that book—which was written under a pen name—even so far as contacting a long list of Lebanese publishers. Later on, Jihad started writing for Aarab major newspapers while studying in the Lebanese university. “I wrote hundreds of articles against the Ben Ali regime, so I feel that I am an authentic part of today’s Tunisian revolution” Jihad explained. In the late 1990s, Jihad, who was not then a member of any political party, helped Ennahdha with some publication projects to disseminate the thoughts of its leader, Sheikh Rachid Ghanouchi.
law is OK, and that we should accept a communist to rule us if that was the people’s choice in a free election.” Jihad told me that he met Ghanouchi during some of his secret visits to Beirut (his name was on the Interpol watch list for over twenty-one years), and in one of these visits Jihad took him to the airport and gave him most of his humble Islamic scholarly library. That day, the Lebanese airport authorities refused to let him out, and the books sadly got lost with luggage or possibly sent to the Tunisian regime, as was the case for al Jazeera’s famous journalist, Ahmed Mansour. Jihad also printed a book for the top Islamic scholar Yusuf Qaradawi about Tunisia and is proud to have interviewed Qaradawi in Beirut. Many other Tunisians from Ennahdha or any other banned political parties have similar stories of pride and bitterness to tell. “We used to be ashamed of being Tunisians for the last two decades because of Ben Ali’s regime, but now we are so proud,” said Jihad. Well, I may disagree with Jihad for once at least, because the real revolution in Tunisia and the entire Arab world just starts when the dictators are thrown out. The real revolution - or the real jihad - starts in Tunisia now.
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Issue # 28, February 2011
Jamal Daoud*
Web: www.crescenttimes.com.au
Email: info@crescenttimes.com.au
NSW : The upcoming election: what about real multiculturalism?
We need to stress here that Are you concerned about the lack of Real Multiculturalism in NSW the attacks on There is an election in multiculturalism NSW on 26 March 2011. affect the And we have a legitimate Do you want to send a strong message this election, 26 March 2011 s u c c e s s f ul question to ask political integration of parties before they ask us to Are you dissatisfied with the Labor government? Are you dissatisfied with the Liberal opposition? these groups and vote for them: what about Are you thinking of voting the Greens, because of the failure of the two big parties? consequently real multiculturalism? affects their If you are dissatisfied with the major two parties, remember that the Greens are not much different. We note here that lifestyle. We the representation of These parties (the Labor, the Liberals and the Greens) have failed the marginalised communities and did nothing to note the research non-English speaking practically promote real Multiculturalism. If you believe in multiculturalism, strong public services, oppose racism, about the growing communities in NSW please think who should get your vote d i sc r i m i nat i o n Parliament is virtually found in the nil. And we also note Social Justice Network runs three candidates from marginalised communities to defend employment that the mainstream market, for parties represented in the Multiculturalism and fight against racism and Islamophobia and for strong public services e x a m p l e , Parliament have decided We need your help that prevents to run mainly English Ahmad Al Yasiry Jamal Daoud Omar Quiader To support, donate to or volnew migrants speaking candidates for the unteer in the campaign, you The seat of Lakemba Fairfield The seat of Auburn The seat of accessing jobs coming election. can contact campaign coordiequal to their nator, Jamal Daoud, on 0404 First we need to explain qualifications and what we mean by “English 447 272 or email admin@socialjusitce.net.au expertise. speaking”and“non-English You can access more informaFor all these speaking” people. tion about the group on reasons, we urge www.socialjustice.net.au , our We were contacted NSW residents, during recent elections Facebook http:// www.facebook.com/pages/ especially the nonby many voters who had Social-JusticeEnglish speaking misunderstanding about Network/176524885700660 and the prothese two terms. They multiculturalism thought that non-English voters, to think speaking means the ones carefully before who cannot speak English deciding who to at all. vote for in the The term “non-English REAL MULTICULTURALISM = EQUAL REPRESENTATION upcoming NSW speaking” people describes Authorised by Jamal Daoud, NSW Social Justice Network, PO Box 1619, Auburn 1385 election. Voters people who have migrated should consider from non-English speaking particularly strong, voters in NSW need to think carefully before voting for parties countries. They may speak English very well; well; poorly or not deciding who to vote for. that demonstrate real commitments to real multiculturalism. at all. They usually speak English with an accent (unless they It is impossible to believe that mainstream political parties It is not enough for political parties to announce that they migrated while they were very young). can not find suitable candidates who speak English as second The parties that describe themselves as “progressive” language to run in the election to represent the needs of new support multiculturalism. They should have delivered on this by providing opportunities for non-English speaking politicians. (especially Labor and Greens) are proud of their achievements migrant voters. We need to mention here that we are not talking about small on “progressiveness”. We believe that in a time of racism, discrimination and minorities. People from non English speaking backgrounds They are proud to introduce white women to parliaments and Islamophobia, there is a great need to promote non-English to the top jobs of governor- general, premier and prime minister. speaking politicians and Muslims to parliament for many reasons. constitute more than 20% of the NSW population. If many of these 20% decided to vote on principles of real They consider white women to be the only marginalised group The main reason is to give a practical example of the fact that in the society. This is why they are racing to introduce more non-English speaking NSW residents have a comprehensive achievement on the issue of real multiculturalism, the three mainstream parties (Labor, Liberals and Greens) should expect women into their hierarchies. understanding of the political process and can be good a difficult campaign in this election and in future. They should But neither of these parties can be proud of introducing non- politicians if given the opportunity. This in turn will help to fight come up with some convincing arguments regarding why their English speaking politicians to the top jobs. prejudice against new migrants. Such a move would demonstrate While the Labor party has a better track history in this area, the that new migrants who speak English as a second language are tickets lack new migrants. Greens have nothing to be proud of. The Greens remain the only good citizens who will do everything they can to participate in Voting carefully will be the first step to changing the political landscape in this state. Such changes will benefit all marginalised pure white party at all levels, with no non-English speaking or advancing the prosperity of this nation. people and improve their representation in vital decision making Indigenous politician promoted to any parliament in Australia. It is also well-known that only marginalised people can fully For this fact, the Greens need to consider changing the name of understand the issues, suffering and needs of marginalised bodies. *Jamal Doud is a Sydney based peace activist, writer and a frequent their party to the “Whites”. communities. They need to be in decision making bodies to contributor to Crescent Times. In this election, where the attack on multiculturalism is voice their concerns and fight for their rights.
هل انتم قلقون من غياب التعددية الثقافية الحقيقية في والية نيو ساوث ويلز
Muslim Legal Network: International Horizons
A higher than anticipated number of law students, lawyers and respected members of the Muslim community filled the conference room of an inner city law firm on January 13th, 2011 for the Muslim Legal Network’s International Horizons Seminar, the first for 201 1. The evening began with an introduction to the Muslim Legal Network (MLN) and its vision by Br. Nizam Jazeer Nijamudeen, VicePresident of MLN. Br. Jazeer also outlined the purpose and objectives of the MLN before outlining the progress to-date. Points of interest included the establishment of the New South Wales chapter, the development of the Western Australian and Tasmanian chapters and the circulated discussion papers. An enlightened discourse by His Excellency, Brigadier General Pilot (Rtd.) Ali Al Nuaimi, Ambassador from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) followed. His Excellency provided an introduction to the commercial environment in the UAE following the Global Financial Crisis that rocked the Western world in 2008.
The key-note speaker, Dr. Nasser Al-Osaiba discussed the legal context of business in the UAE. As a Partner in a leading United Arab Emirates law firm, Global Advocates, with over 12 years of experience as a civil litigator, Dr. AlOsaiba provided considerable insight into the UAE legal system. Dr. Al-Osaiba’s presentation was followed by some intellectually-stimulating questions from the audience after which the seminar concluded – enabling the audience to network. Members of the audience expressed much appreciation for the opportunity to hear from and meet the speakers and other members of the Muslim community that were present. Sr. Fatima Dennaoui, President of the Muslim Legal Network said: “The MLN will continue striving to deliver professional education regarding the legal industry for the benefit of the Muslim community in Australia along with protection of their civil liberties and human rights.” Sr. Shameema Barekzai, co-secretary of the Muslim Legal Network explained that the MLN is also developing rapidly interstate in New South Wales with a launch scheduled for early March 2011. Lawyers and law students in NSW are encouraged to contact the MLN NSW Chair, Br Zaid via the MLN website.
Experience Palestine in Melbourne On the 19th of February, FAMSY’s advocacy committee invites you to Coburg Town Hall to experience, witness and feel Palestine right here in Melbourne. The issue of Palestine typically conjures up talks and speeches revolving around routine facts and figures. But in this event we want you to hear the cries of innocent civilians, to open your eyes to the reality at ground zero, the destruction, the chaos, the resistance and the rich culture of the Palestinian people. The daily life of the Palestinian living under brutal occupation is filled with constant harassment at checkpoints and uncompromising random attacks, this you will experience. Flavours of Palestinian tradition and culture will be on display for you to experience. It is with great pleasure and honour that we bring today’s Palestinian reality together with their embedded culture to Melbourne for you.
So what is the goal? Is it to receive donations? With much carnage occurring in Palestine, donations are what most functions and events have as their goal. The aim of this event however is intrinsically different. It is to revive, educate, reignite and inspire the young and the brave to take a stance against injustice. It is to remind us that the Palestinians do indeed have a culture and an identity that must be celebrated so that it does not cease to exist because we, the international community, have failed to keep it alive. Take part in this roller coaster journey. Empathise with our brothers and sisters who are living miles away in extreme conditions. The knowledge you gain will enlighten you to our responsibility to help those who have been unjustly dealt with. Justice lives and dies with our ability to establish it on earth, and what better chance have we been given than establishing justice in the occupied lands of Palestine. Come join us and Experience Palestine! For more information contact: Enas Sammak 0430018326 Abdulaziz Ali 0423693219 Or by email: enasms@hotmail.com
Email: info@crescenttimes.com.au
Web: www.crescenttimes.com.au
Issue # 28, February 2011
Page 11
Melbourne in solidarity with Egypt
Crescent Times, Melbourne:
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On the 30th of January, more than 400 people rallied outside the Egyptian consulate in Melbourne in solidarity with the Egypt’s fight for freedom. Over 100,000 Egyptians began protesting in the streets in many cities around Egypt on the 25th of January demanding that their basic needs be met and that the 30 year president, Hosni Mubarak, step down. The protests in Egypt were inspired by the people of Tunisia who forced their leader Ben Ali to flee the country. Since then protestors all around the world have shown solidarity with the plight of the Egyptian people. Braving the 38 degree heat, the protestors in Melbourne, people of different religious and ethnic backgrounds, demanded that Hosni Mubarak end his tyrannical rule over Egypt and that the Egyptian government to take proper action against the injustices affecting Egyptians on an everyday basis. They were also asking the Australian government to condemn the actions of the Egyptian government and formally ask President Mubarak to step down from. Speakers from a variety of organisations including the Australians National Imams Council (ANIC),
the Greens, The Socialist Alliance, FAMSY, The Socialist Alternative, as well as the Coptic community of Melbourne, all came together to send the same message of support to the Egyptian people. Ahmed Huwait from the Egyptian Solidarity group, one of the rally organisers, said that the protests will continue until the Egyptian people’s demands are met. People will not accept anything less than a total change of the corrupt Mubarak regime.
The Consulate General also received a letter signed by all the protestors. The letter demanded that the government of Egypt to step down and give the Egyptians their basic human rights. The rally ended with the protestors passionately singing the national anthem of Egypt.
Page 12
Issue # 28, February 2011
Web: www.crescenttimes.com.au
Email: info@crescenttimes.com.au
The Arab revolutions made in the USA!
continued from front page
officer. Like their intelligence agencies, these US Administrations have chosen only to listen to those who give them information they want to hear even if that information is a long distance from reality. As a result a deluded Iraqi man called “Curve Ball” conned US intelligence and in turn President George W Bush over the existence of WMD. It was all Bush and his neo-cons needed and wanted to hear to justify their illegal invasion of Iraq, assuring the world they would find Weapons of Mass Destruction. It was a blatant lie. It mattered not that the real experts, weapons inspectors, like Scott Ritter and Hans Von Sponek, said WMD simply no longer existed. It mattered not, it seems, that up to a million paid the blood price for this arrogance and ignorance. It matters not that today Iraq is still in turmoil. With the same reckless abandon the USA has been sucked in to a war in Afghanistan from which is can not retreat or make progress never mind peace. Bush told us the invasion of Afghanistan was all about getting Osama bin Laden and liberating Afghan women - neither of which has been achieved. And now, the Middle East is on fire with a Peoples’ Revolution which is busy eliminating all the dictators supported and installed by the USA. All of this could have been avoided if only the White House had listened - listened to their own people in the growing anti-war movement; listened to ordinary peace activists who mobilised in their tens of millions around the world marching against wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; listened to the tens of millions across the Muslim world about the injustices against the Palestinian people. Instead the US Administrations of Bush and Obama chose to listen to a few extremists and fanatics who think they can achieve whatever they want by pointing the barrel of a gun made in America. Might is not right nor does it guarantee a victory. And once the chains of fear and oppression break, ordinary people will seize their freedom from those who stole it with their bear hands. Tahrir Square in Egypt has been turned into the democratic capital of the Arab world and not one of the leaders of the revolution is armed with anything more than hopes and desires for a better future free from tyranny. For God’s sake Mr President, listen to the people before it is too late. And here’s another friendly piece of advice - there is a cauldron boiling fiercely in the region and if you don’t do something about it, the seismic and heroic events unfolding today in Tahrir Square will begin to look more like a convention of Tupperware agents by comparison. Pakistan is on the brink and so is Afghanistan. Uzbekistan is not far behind either. Where there is injustice there can never be peace and as long as Americans are seen to blindly trample on cultures, customs and laws in that region with blind arrogance it will come back to bite them himself in to a human torch in December he also small, insignificant events which trigger ignited a flame which has now become the Arab revolutions. in a big way. So I am asking the White House to pay special When a young Tunisian man called Tarek Peoples’ Revolution. History has shown that it is always seemingly attention to the incident involving Raymond al-Tayyib Muhammad ibn Bouazizi turned
Davis, allegedly a US diplomat, who is now residing in Pakistan custody suspected of killing three Pakistanis in Lahore last week. Already US lawmakers are banging on about the Vienna Conventions only because they now appear to need it so badly. These are the same Vienna Conventions ignored by America when His Excellency Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeeff, the Ambassador to Pakistan from Afghanistan, was stripped naked, beaten and handed over to US soldiers in January 2002 before being carted off to Guantanamo Bay. These are the same Vienna Conventions which were trampled on when Dr Aafia Siddiqui was shot by US soldiers at point blank range in a police cell in Afghanistan then kidnapped and renditioned to America in July 2008. It was nearly a full four weeks before she was given any consular access - yet US Ambassador Anne Patterson stood in Islamabad and lied and lied about the case of Dr Aafia Siddiqui claiming her rights were not violated. The sad thing is, Barak Obama and Hillary Clinton have probably never heard of Dr Aafia Siddiqui. Why would they bother with minor detail when they’ve got full-scale wars to wage? Their advisers, at the very least, need to read her story - the real one. Her story is vital because she epitomises all the injustices of the War on Terror and she is now becoming a rallying point for all Pakistani people. Don’t believe the propaganda that she’s the poster girl of the Islamists. Dr Aafia Siddiqui is another Tarek al-Tayyib Muhammad ibn Bouazizi. I am telling you this in good faith because it is something your best friends, paid informers, stooges and ill-informed intelligence agencies won’t tell you. The time has come for America to show humility - return Dr Siddiqui to her home in Karachi where she can be reunited with her children. And then - and only then - start concerning yourself with Raymond Davis and his activities. If he is guilty of anything put faith in Pakistan’s judiciary and let him stand trial in the country where his alleged crime was committed. The US has to start respecting other country’s laws instead of making up their own as they go along to cover up and protect American-made blunders and mistakes. The US is neither the peoples’ friends no their master but the influence it has brought to bear in the Muslim world in recent years has been extremely negative. Time for humility. Time to listen to the people - and while you’ve been meddling in everyone else’s backyard start looking at your own: there’s a great deal of unrest in the USA with rising unemployment, rising home repossessions, lack of health care and more than 50 million relying on food stamps to survive.
* British journalist Yvonne Ridley is the European President of the International Muslim Women’s Union * Photos collected from FaceBook Tunisian revolution pages. Courtesy of
all young Tunisians who contributed on sharing them online.
Email: info@crescenttimes.com.au
Christopher King*
Web: www.crescenttimes.com.au
Issue # 28, February 2011
Page 13
When the tyrant fights back
Christopher King argues that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s decision to use extreme violence by paid thugs and plain-clothes policemen against prodemocracy protesters must have been given the green light by Barack Obama, or at the very least, the US president’s vague pronouncements could have led Mubarak to believe that Washington endorsed his violent clampdown on the protesters. On the 3 February 2011, the demonstrations in Cairo turned ugly. President Hosni Mubarak’s supporters had been recruited through state television and, it is alleged, were being paid to fight the peaceful demonstrators occupying Tahrir Square. Mubarak’s supporters were shown on live television not as demonstrators, but making aggressive attacks. They were there only to attack the pro-democracy demonstrators who were protecting themselves but taking no offensive initiatives. Mubarak’s supporters, including police in plain clothes and uniforms, pelted the opposition with stones and rode into them on horses and camels. At 1450 London time, security services began using tear gas to clear the square and this appeared to anger the crowd. At the same time, Mubarak supporters began lobbing rocks, roofing materials, petrol bombs, chairs or anything at all from a high-rise building onto the crowd of anti-government demonstrators. There can be no doubt about their aggressive intentions and by whom it was. Many peaceful demonstrators were being injured on camera. Point of no return There is no doubt that the violence was organised by the police and the security services. Some of their attackers were captured by the pro-democracy demonstrators and they were found to be carrying police identification cards. The police and the security services, as well as an elite who have enriched themselves as friends of Mubarak, have a great deal to lose if he should fall. It is clearly the objective of Mubarak’s supporters, heavily reinforced by police and security men in plain clothes, to create trouble in order to provide a pretext for heavy-handed repression and to draw the army into the conflict. These scenes are being broadcast worldwide and are unmistakable. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon has condemned the government action against peaceful protesters. It is unlikely that the attitude of the antigovernment demonstrators will remain peaceful in the face of these attacks. Mubarak has stated that he will not stand down. It can only be concluded that this violence is his response to the pro-democracy demonstrators’ demands. In this course he has probably passed a point of no return. Opposition spokesmen are now speaking of putting him and his supporters on trial. This is the problem with dictators and criminals once in government. It is the case with British politicians who should be put on trial for war crimes. Such people will use all the apparatus of the state in order to avoid facing a court. They have nothing to lose once unforgivable crimes have been committed. There are two factors of major significance in this confrontation: • The Egyptian army has undertaken not to use force against their fellow countrymen • US President Obama has sent his envoy, Frank Wisner, to see Mubarak. It is likely that the army will have to intervene in order to restore order and this is doubtless Mubarak’s objective as he will calculate that the
advantages such as keeping Egypt on its side in relation to its invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, in the United Nations. Obama’s forked tongue More significantly, however, Egypt was the destination of first choice in the CIA’s programme of international kidnapping and torture that ended in illegal imprisonment and torture in the Guantanamo torture facility, Bagram air base in
army will, in the final analysis, choose to side with thought of internationally but less so in Egypt him and the existing regime in the interests of where he appears to be seen as Westernised or order and stability. Until now, the army has looked even Americanised, which is very far from the case.
on, despite scenes of great violence. This probably cannot go on but it would take great courage for senior army officers to decide to depose Mubarak and seek to organize a caretaker government. Mohamed el-Baradei, former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has asked the army to intervene in what he calls “criminal” aggression and has offered to head an interim government and organise democratic elections el-Baradei is a man of great integrity who did an excellent job as head of the IAEA, showing technical and professional qualities of the highest order in his inspections of alleged nuclear programmes in Iraq and Iran. Despite enormous pressure from the United States, including its attempts to get him dismissed from the IAEA, el-Baradei insisted on producing factual reports based on evidence rather than what the Americans wanted him to say. He is well known and well
Afghanistan and Abu G h r a i b prison in Iraq. Egypt was a major first-stage torture centre and Mubarak’s new vicepresident, Omar Suleiman, was the intelligence chief who was in charge of the torture programme. Obama speaks with a forked tongue. One cannot believe his public statements. One must believe what one sees; one must believe events and facts. America has an enormous past investment of many billions of dollars in Egypt and would see its entire Middle East policy disintegrate if a real democracy were to be established there. It cannot afford to see that happen. Mubarak’s actions following the White House envoy’s visit indicate clearly that he believes America to be behind him. He will try to hang on as long as possible and if not stay in power himself, to arrange for a pro-American government to take power. Mubarak says that he would rather die on Egyptian soil than leave. I do not think that he will choose that. He has, to be sure, ambitions for his son to take power, but as an old man he has to think beyond himself and at a certain point he will leave with as much money as he can take, along with his family. That is what dictators do. In the meantime, he has great scope for mischief and it is not clear how these events will turn out. Catherine Ashton, the European Union foreign affairs chief, makes bland statements exhorting Mubarak to listen to the people. Ashton is in fact a bureaucrat and her appearances only serves to convince observers that bureaucrats are completely unable to respond to change. The EU’s foreign policy follows America in the Middle East. It has learned nothing from the wars that have ravaged Europe in the recent past. Hopefully, the European Union will give much needed economic aid to a truly democratic Egyptian government in the near future and revise its Middle Eastern policy. We shall see.
Obama’s green light to Mubarak It is also likely that Mubarak’s decision to stand firm and attempt to maintain his grip on power is the result of the message brought by the US envoy, Frank Wisner. President Obama and US politicians speak vaguely of maintaining stability, avoiding violence and so on which is by no means inappropriate for a foreign government. There are even reports that Obama has said that Mubarak should prepare to step down. We know more about the relationship between the White House and Mubarak, however. The White House has supported Mubarak for many years with money and arms - in the interests, it is said, of stability in the region. By stability, the White House means avoiding supporting the Palestinians against Israel and maintaining a Re published with permission from Redress.cc. closed border with Gaza, which enables Israel to control Gaza completely. Naturally, there are other
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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Australia Wide Community Events: Victoria
conjunction with a number of other community based organisations.. JAAN will also develop a number of different art workshops to take place on Multifaith Future Leaders Program 21 March and will also carry out community legal Date: 21-23 February 2011 Are you a committed member of a faith community education seminars for the Migrant and Refugee - Muslim, Jewish, Christian or from a different faith communities in April. community? This could be for you. For more details and to apply, contact reception@antidef.org.au or Fiqh of Personal Obligations Purification, Prayer & Fasting click on the link at www.antidef.org.au Date: When: 1st March, 2011 Time: Tuesdays 7.30pm- 9.30pm JCMA Women’s Conference Date: Sunday 13 February 2011, Monday 14 Location: Al-Ghazzali Centre Academy, 1021A Canterbury Road (Cnr. Willeroo Street), Lakemba February 2011 Location: Edmund Rice Centre, 7 Amberley Way, Entry via Willeroo Street Cost: $60/person for the full course Lower Plenty The JCMA Womens Conference invites Jewish, Enquiries: Tel: (02) 9708 1539 Email: Christian and Muslim women who support the academydirector@alghazzali.org aims and purpose of the Conference to register An twelve-week study of the most essential rulings their interest and to participate in this event. that every Muslim is obligated to know in order to Muslim women are encouraged to participate fulfill their obligation for performing purification, and share information with other participants prayer and fasting. An ideal course for those new from other faiths. JCMA aims to enable people of into Islam that provides: the Abrahamic faiths to build relationships and •Introduction to the key fiqh terms used to understanding through experience and to provide classify acts of worship such as the obligatory, opportunities and programs for people of the recommended, disliked and nullifying acts. Abrahamic faiths to explore interfaith dialogue •The rulings of purification; How to purify oneself within Australia’s multicultural community. www. from minor and major impurities. jcma.org.au Subsidies are available for those with •Ablution; how to perform ablution, when it is a Concession Card or otherwise needing some required and what nullifies it and what doesn’t. assistance with paying the fees. To apply for subsidy •Rulings related to women including menstruation, please contact: Rev. Coralie Ling coralieling@ post-natal bleeding •How to perform prayer bigpond.com •Rulings of fasting; its requirements, conditions, what invalidates and does not invalidate fasting. Stories in the Park Date: Each Friday night between 4 February - 18 Recommended, prohibited and disliked actions during fasting. March 2011 (weather permitting & God willing) •Categories of those who are not obligated to fast Time: 7:30pm - 9:30pm Location: Coburg Lake Reserve (near the stage), during Ramadan Lake Grove, Coburg - Melways Reference 17H10 Beginning Friday 4 February with storytellers extraordinaire Belal Assad and Nadeem Hussain. Ahlus Sunnah Wal Jama’ah Presents: Sign up for event and weather notifications at www. Mothers of the Believers storiesinthepark.com. For more details contact Date: Saturday 12th February Siraj on 0400 094 720 Facebook: Stories in the Park Time: 8:00 pm Location: Belmore Masjid, 172b Burwood Rd, Melbourne. www.storiesinthepark.com Belmore Topic: I still love her Date: Sunday 13 February New South Wales Time: 8:00pm Location: ASWJ Auburn Harmony Day Celebrations Units 1-2/ 354 Chisholm Road, Auburn Justice and Arts Network, Mission of Hope Topic: Aisha (ra), Mother of the Believers Date: Sunday 20 March 2011 Brothers & Sisters Welcome Location: Wyatt Park, Church Street Lidcombe more information, please sms or call: 0423 376 A day full of jam packed family-friendly fun For Presented by: Shaykh Muhammad Anwar Sahib activities, including free rides for the kids, sporting 785 - Islamic Scholar and Da’ee. The Shaykh competitions, graffiti, painting and other art Al-Madani a PhD graduate from the Islamic University of workshops and loads of entertainment throughout is in the field of sharia and Quranic Tafsir, the day. The Justice and Arts Network ( JAAN), Madinah over 14 years in total. He is the chairman, which is a sub-section of Mission of Hope has studying and Khateeb at Masjid Al-Taqwa Manukau, been invited to run activities for Harmony Day in Imam New Zealand.
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Editorial
Aussie Muslims at the heart of national solidarity!
Salam dear readers, I have recently seen a number of - at times rather heated - discussions about the meaning of Australia Day and whether or not Muslims are permitted to participate in Australia Day celebrations. These discussions have mainly been conducted in forums and social networks neither of which are generally known as sites of sensible and polite debate. Aside from the inevitable remarks written by those who would never venture to say similar things in public, the discussions were generally reasonably sensible - if rather passionate. There seemed to be two main groups of participants. Those who believe that the entire idea of nationality and national pride is completely incompatible with Islam and those who believe that nationality is an aspect of a persons cultural identity that cannot be ignored - and that as Muslims do in fact owe a debt to the country in which we live. Indigenous Australians would no doubt feel more sympathy with the latter group as from their perspective we are all living on stolen land and have an obligation to behave in a way that maximises harmony and contributes to the well being of our society. One of the most heated aspects of the debate centered around the Australian flag and whether or not is permissible for a Muslim to wear or display the Australian flag. This debate was certainly intensified by the sisters who chose to wear the Australian flag as hijab to demonstrate their identity as Australians and Muslims simultaneously - a gesture that was met with gasps of horror from some members
of the community. There also seemed to be an extraordinary amount of ignorance on the part of some participants in the discussion as to the meaning of the flag - including the meanings it may have for those of us whose families have been resident in this country for hundreds of years. It is useful for all of us to consider the range of aspects that make up our identity - Islam is only one of these. In addition to our Muslim identity we are all men or women, brothers or sisters, employers or employees, married or unmarried - just a few aspects of the complexities of each person’s identity. In addition to these aspects, we are all citizens of somewhere - and for most of us here in Australia we are Australian citizens. The best celebration of our identity as Australians was not seen in barbecues or local celebrations or even in the hijab event. It was demonstrated in the voluntary service of our fellow citizens affected by the recent floods in Brisbane. Muslims in Brisbane came together to offer assistance to those affected - in the form of meals, donations, a friendly ear and hours upon hours of work cleaning up homes and streets. This is what it means to be a citizen, this is what it means to be an Australian and when I celebrate Australia Day it is the community spirit of this country that fills me with Aussie pride. I suspect that the Sahaba would find nothing unislamic in that!
Dr. Joanne McKeown Editor at large
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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Perth Lebanese Tunisia: national reserve Bakery Tunisia’s state coffers hold 1.5 tonnes of gold less than estimated by an industry group in December, according to a figure given by the central bank amid reports the ousted president and his wife collected the ingots before fleeing the country. Tunisia had 6.8 tonnes of gold in December, a level unchanged for at least a decade, according to a December online report issued by the World Gold Council, which is also in line with estimates issued by the International Monetary Fund in October. The WGC regularly publishes global statistics on gold and is considered an authority on the sector. Tunisia’s central bank this week said it
held about 5.3 tonnes, but dismissed reports that the family of ex-leader Zine El Abidine Ben Ali had withdrawn the gold, saying the bank vaults were “under draconian security measures.” The gold would be worth 45 million euros (about US $ 60 million). According to French intelligence, Ben Ali’s wife Leila Trabelsi had gone to the bank to withdraw the gold. The governor initially resisted, but backed down under pressure from Ben Ali himself Ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia amid an unprecedented wave of street protests against rising unemployment, his 23 years of iron-fisted rule and allegations of corruption against his family.
Qaradawi: urges Mubarak to leave Influential Arab cleric imam Yusuf alQaradawi urged Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to step down for the good of the country, saying his departure is the only solution to Egypt’s crisis. The sunni Muslim cleric, who holds Egyptian and Qatari nationalities, also encouraged Egyptians to keep up their peaceful protests demanding an end to Mubarak’s three-decade rule, in an interview with Al Jazeera television. “President Mubarak ... I advise you to depart from Egypt ... There is no other solution to this problem but for Mubarak to go,” Qaradawi said, accusing the veteran leader of having turned “blind, deaf and dumb.” The cleric, spiritual leader of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and longtime resident of Qatar, heads the International Union for
Muslim Scholars. “There is no staying longer, Mubarak, I advise you (to learn) the lesson of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali,” he said, referring to Tunisia’s deposed president who fled to Saudi Arabia. “Go Mubarak, have mercy on this people and leave so as not to increase the destruction of Egypt,” he added. He told Egyptians to “continue their uprising” but cautioned against any “attack on state institutions.” The uprising “must come through
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OPINIONS
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Issue # 28, February 2011 When we publish opinion articles in Crescent Times, we do not necessarily endorse their content. Opinion articles do not necessarily represent the opinion any of our team members, editors or publishers. However, we are not afraid of opinions. Our role is not to teach a
Web: www.crescenttimes.com.au particular package of opinions and beliefs to our readers. We do our best to provide space for all schools of thought, personal beliefs and directions of Islamic thought. All are free to submit articles for publication to defend and hold what they see as truth. The Editor In Chief
Halal Food Certification in Australia
Ikebal Patel*
the income from halal services is spent. Those organisations and individuals involved in this most noble of causes are entitled to a fair and reasonable share of income generated through the provision of halal certification services. Their income should be open to scrutiny by the community and they should be entitled to their expenses and a reasonable profit, with the surplus income used for the welfare of the Muslim community. Income from halal certification has previously been one of the principal sources of funding for the many mosques, schools and other services provided to the Muslim community in Australia. However, with the proliferation of halal service providers, particularly in the last twenty years or so, much of the income is in the hands of certain individuals or organisations only involved with particular mosques or a particular ethnic community. As a result of the lack of funds flowing to the community, there is now great difficulty in some Muslim communities in certain areas in establishing even a rented prayer room, let alone a small humble mosque. It is ironic that the areas of most need are the rural and regional areas where there are substantial abattoirs processing some three to five thousand lamb and up to one thousand cattle every day. So whilst the halal service provider makes substantial income from these processing plants, over $350,000 annually by conservative estimates, and despite the fact that these plants have been there for over twenty years in many cases, there are no facilities for the local Muslims - on the back of whom three to four hundred Australians are employed at each abattoir and incomes of tens of millions of dollars over the last twenty years or so have been generated by halal certifying organisations. I have visited one such rural location where women and children attending classes have to sit in freezing cold conditions with no toilets in a condemned building when there is a thriving abattoir with the halal certifier telling the community that there is no money for them to assist with the rental of a decent prayer room. Sadly, even this condemned building will shortly be unavailable as they have been given notice by their landlord. Even worse, the President of this society is the supervisor of the local halal certifying organisation. In conclusion, I would like to assure readers that Muslims Australia (AFIC), as the first and the oldest halal certifying body, is more than happy to work with the community to ensure that Australia is not recognised on the world market as a country of halal certifiers at each others throats, but more importantly as halal certifiers who are at the throats of sheep, cattle, goat and camel working with kindness and genuine integrity to uplift Australia’s standards and reputation as the premium halal certifier.
The provision of halal accreditation and inspection for meat (beef, lamb, camel, goat) export, chicken, food additives, colouring, processed food, halal butchers, restaurants, food for airlines, hospitals, and so on has been a matter of great concern and the impetus for disunity within the Muslim community, not only in Australia but in almost every other region of the world as well. As providers of halal certification services, the incumbents are fortunate in being blessed by Allah (swt) to carry out this very important responsibility. Whilst the subject matter is HALAL, let me assure the reader that the behind the scenes “goings on” are far from HALAL. All of this has rightfully left lingering doubts in the minds of many. When I - as the President of Muslims Australia (AFIC), the oldest halal certifier in Australia - am on a Qantas flight and I am offered my halal meal I have no confidence in the halal status of the product. How then can I justify that I am doing what I ought to as the President of AFIC to bring about some sense of confidence amongst the Muslim consumers in halal certification in this country. As the representative of Australian Muslims, I would also like to demonstrate to the Australian farmers and breeders of cattle, lamb and other livestock, producers and manufacturers of food products for export that we as responsible Australia Muslims are ready and prepared to support the close to six billion dollar annual trade in halal products for the export market. Australian Muslims do not wish to in any way jeopardise the prime status that Australian beef, lamb, cheese and other products presently enjoy due to the halal certification process. There have been previous cases of horse meat and camel meat exported as beef or lamb and there have been Royal Commissions into the halal export meat trade. At a more local and micro level, there have been halal certificates issued to butchers and restaurants who also end up selling “halal pork”, hospitals having halal certification for their meals but serving meals to the patients contaminated with pork products and similar. Provision of halal services is not only the stamp on the carcass for export or a halal certificate displayed in a butchers or restaurant but also includes education regarding the requirements of halal certification as well as the training of slaughterman and inspection staff; regular and random audits of processing plants and other outlets; employment of food technologists with an understanding of ingredients; existence of a board of Imams who are resourced to debate issues of halal; sponsorship of local and overseas scholars to visit and engage with the community and speak about the issues of halal. Together with the above goes the issue *Ikebal Patel is the president of Muslims Australia, AFIC. of openness and transparency about how
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Contribute to this country or leave!!
Umar Batchelor * As my wife and I were driving through the country of northern New South Wales on a recent weekend away, a V8 sedan overtook us and most striking was the car’s bumper sticker - “Love this country or leave it”. It echoed George Bush’s infamous quote prior the Iraqi invasion that lead us all to distrust and segregation amongst nationalities and beliefs… “You’re either with us or against us”. Do I love this country?? … I love Fraser Island and the Great Ocean Road; I love the various ethnic cultures which make up Australia; yes I do love this country, I love the “Black Star” coffee shop located at West End, who make the best coffee around; and am certainly looking forward to seeing the Socceroos play in the World Cup. But there is a reason why someone displays that bumper sticker. It is most likely because they don’t see us contributing to this beautiful country of ours. But…I hear one of the young Muslims ask…. “How do I contribute to this country?” To answer that, let me give a brief history sketch of Australia and how the early Australians contributed to the character of Australia. Before the arrival of the Europeans, the Aborigines roamed
the landscape with respect. Geographically Australia is a harsh and dry continent. I found this out when I took the quiet and arid in-land road from Melbourne to Brisbane. The Aborigines, however, had no problems as they lived comfortably in this environment. If only the settlers could have trusted less in their organisation and more in the skills and knowledge of the Indigenous people, we might have not needed to worry so much about water scarcity or land salinity. We have much to learn from their way of life. Those that traveled to America from Britain in the 1700s were those seeking freedom to express their beliefs. Australia’s white settlement was not that idealistic. Our first arrivals were a bunch of convicts who had the shock of their life. Here was a land that is back to front. The bark, not leaves, fell off the trees!! And what animals!! The biggest rats they ever seen bouncing about on their legs and a bird with a sense of humour looked down at the British settlers and seemed to kill itself laughing at their predicament. It was as if they had landed on another planet! After twelve years, there were about 1000 Australian born children. A good number of them were neglected or were orphaned. Thus they had to fend for themselves. Their character grew to be different to their British counterparts. They were seen as stray cats clinging together in groups for survival. They needed each other and no one was better than anyone else. They were in it together – they were mates. They were the “Currencies”. Unlike later Australians, many of these currencies lived and played with the Aborigines and learned from them the ability to see the bush as a home and not as an alien territory. They also felt the freedom to roam the country with no single abode much like the Prophet’s description of what a Mu’min (Believer) should be….a Traveler. An early British officer said of the Currencies: ‘The circumstances of their parents having come to the country in bondage (convicts), so far from making them humble causes the native born here to be the proudest people in the world. They’re high minded, even to arrogance, and the circumstance of being felt free is so important to them as to border on fierce enthusiasm.” He added, with great disdain, ‘that the native-born (the currencies) sit together around the campfire, sharing stories that fed the spirit of anarchy”. These human qualities that were displayed in those early days have contributed to the character of today’s Australia. Although the World may not see “the land down under” as a significant player both politically or economically,
Australians would argue otherwise. We are a populace of high minded individuals - which can be seen in the level of competitiveness during the Olympics. Having high mindedness is an important quality of a Muslim. The Arabs before the Prophet’s time were always known as backward and barbaric and were insignificant to the Roman and Persian Empire. The Muslims’ deep faith and high mindedness changed that. The Currencies placed great importance on freedom and fierce enthusiasm. They disliked the noblemen of the British aristocracy who controlled Australia. They were seen as the upper class. The Currencies had two terms that described them. We now often use the word “SNOB” to refer to someone who is arrogant. It is in fact short for “Son of NOBleman” – the English noblemen. Furthermore, “POM” is actually a derogatory term short for “Prisoner of Mother England”. To this day, Australians do not like arrogant individuals, this is reflected in the equality of white and blue collar workers. Unlike many other countries, you may also have noticed that many Australians are more comfortable sitting in the front seat of a taxi rather than sitting at the back directing the driver. In the mid 1800s, the corruption of the Victorian authority
and unjust taxes placed on Gold miners lead to the “Eureka Stockade”. More than 10,000 diggers pledged themselves to work for full and fair representation in government. Although their uprising was quashed in a bloody battle within 20 minutes, their spirit of struggle lives on. Muslims also have a spirit to fight injustice. It is called “jihad” which literally means struggle and not terrorism. The news of the Eureka Stockade injustice spread throughout Victoria and pressured the British aristocracy to change the political structure which gave the diggers voting rights. Australians’ reverence of the infamous Ned Kelly was mostly due to his willingness to stand up against the authority in his self-made armour (please note Islam would punish such highway robbers). The aristocracy never regained their status as is evident by the level of respect Australians today have for their politicians. Even with this rich history that has contributed to Australia’s character, Australia is still trying to define itself. We want to be independent and free from control by foreign countries but the British flag dominates ours, Britain’s Queen is still our Queen and the day we call Australian Day is really the day British dropped their criminals on this land. Muslims can make a difference to this country and contribute to define Australia. I don’t mean making curry the national dish of Australia which the Bengalis have successfully done in England. What I mean is contributing to the character and values of this country. We have the most beautiful way of life which we can share. That is Islam. The way of life that upholds justice and truth. The way of life that doesn’t allow someone to just sit on the couch and watch the World Cup while someone is starving. The way of life that offers comfort to the growing number of Australians without purpose. To all Muslim youth, you have a role to play just like those early Australians that built the character of Australia. Let’s change the perception of the person who placed that bumper sticker on his car. However, as an aside, if you are the driver of the car I initially mentioned, it might be worth keeping in mind that your V8 petrol guzzler is emitting tonnes of carbon emissions into Australia’s beautiful atmosphere whilst simultaneously destroying the notion of free-spirit and tolerance that forms an integral part of our country. *Umar is the president of FAMSY which is an organization that focuses on developing young Muslims to be contributors of Australia.
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2,200 Arab scholars, politicians and activists issue appeal for human rights and democracy In the aftermath of the Tunisian revolution and the beginning of a popular uprising in Egypt, more than 2,200 Arab scholars, politicians, and activists — from over 20 Arab countries — issued today an “URGENT APPEAL” for the defense and consolidation of human rights and democracy in the Arab World. “The Casablanca Call has been endorsed by leading thinkers and politicians from the Arab World, from all political leanings and persuasions, from the leftists and secularists to moderate Islamists and the Muslim Brotherhood, agreeing that democracy and human rights are an ‘absolute necessity’ for the Arab world today,” said Radwan Masmoudi, President of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID), and convener of the Casablanca Conference on Human Rights and Democracy. “The Tunisian revolution has shattered several myths: the myth of Middle Eastern democratic exceptionalism, the myth of achieving economic reform without political liberalisation, and the myth that
western backing of autocratic regimes in the region will maintain stability and protect western strategic interests,” said Emad El-Din Shahin, Professor of Religion, Conflict and Peace-building at the University of Notre Dame, and one of the drafters of the Casablanca Call. “We, the signatories to this call, as politicians, intellectuals and civil society advocates, believe that the achievement of democracy and the embodiment of human rights in the Arab world is an absolute necessity and requires a broader engagement of all citizens and political and social forces. We observe, with great concern, the dramatic and alarming backsliding of political reforms in the Arab world, due to several structural obstacles since the beginning of the new century. We hereby appeal to all concerned parties - governments, civil society institutions, political organizations, trade unions, and the media - in the belief that the achievement of real and effective reforms is the responsibility of all parties.” Source: PR agency.
Middle East fast bleeding money Emad Mekay forms of trade mispricing, and asset swaps,” says Raymond W. Baker, director of Global Financial Integrity. “Skyrocketing prices for oil, other minerals, and foodstuffs, generated funds which easily escaped abroad.” The 64-page report comes at a critical time in the Middle East when people of the region are witnessing an unprecedented popular revolution against the Westernbacked corrupt rule of President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali and his family. Tunisians say they revolted in part because they saw the slow obliteration of their wealth to corruption by the Ben Ali regime. Tunisian media online are reporting that the Ben Ali family accumulated hundreds of millions of dollars of wealth in stolen money that is now in Western banks. The new interim government in Tunisia has requested that foreign countries, especially Switzerland, freeze all assets of the Ben Ali clan. Authors of the report say they studied World Bank and IMF data of unrecorded capital leakages through the balance of payments which helps capture illicit transfers of the proceeds of bribery, theft, kickbacks, and tax evasion. The Washington-based GFI said it was recommending greater transparency in the global financial system to curtail further bleeding of wealth from already poor nations. “Illicit capital flight needs somewhere to go, therefore, one of the best ways of dealing with the problem of these illicit outflows is to increase transparency in the global financial system and make it much harder to hide ill-gotten wealth,” Monique Danziger, communications director told IPS. “This includes doing away with the kind of bank secrecy for which Switzerland is famous but also requiring financial institutions in places like the United States to be more open and accountable.” Source: IPS news.
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Official launch of Islamic finance e-course
The Islamic Finance Professional Development a positive and supportive role as it continues to (IFPD) course is the first of its kind to be offered grow and develop.” in Australia. La Trobe University in collaboration With more than 25 students currently enrolled,
with Dubai’s Ethica, the world’s leading certifier of Islamic Finance online learning have developed the course which was officially inaugurated on Monday 17 January by La Trobe University’s Vice-chancellor Professor Paul Johnson. He said “This course is primarily aimed at providing high quality training to cater for the growing needs of the industry. It will provide academic and industry knowledge of the products within the Islamic finance and banking industry in Australia and overseas”, and “It is thus highly appropriate that La Trobe University is leading the way in the development of programs such as the one we are launching today, following on from the inauguration in 2009 of the Master in Islamic Banking and Finance degree. The Dean of the Faculty of Law and Management, Professor Leigh Drake, said “The rapid growth in Islamic finance, and the response by both the Australian authorities and the finance industry, points towards a growing demand for trained professionals in this area” “Here at La Trobe University, and in the Faculty of Law and Management, we will continue to understand the needs of the industry, and to play
DENTAL CARE
Middle East countries have seen the largest increase of illicit outflows of funds to richer nations, depriving the developing nations of much needed development money, a new international report shows. Developing countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region lost 1.2 trillion dollars in the nine years of the study, an average of 130 billion dollars a year, most of which goes to banks in the U.S., the UK, Switzerland and other G8 countries, economist Karly Curcio told IPS in an interview. Four oil-producing Arab countries appeared on the top 10 list of illicit money transfer exporters. Saudi Arabia was the lead Arab country with outflows of 302 billion dollars over the nine years studied the report, ‘Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries 2000 – 2009’. The United Arab Emirates came next at 276 billion dollars, followed by Kuwait at 242 billion dollars and Qatar at 138 billion dollars. Curcio said that capital flight in the region was mostly in the form of bribes, kickbacks, tax evasion, deals in contraband goods, criminal activities and other forms of corruption. “The dramatic increase in the world price of oil this decade likely contributed to the rapid increased volume of illicit financial flows out of the resource-rich region,” added Curcio, who is co-author of the report. Egypt was the first exporter of illicit funds after the four top Arab oil- exporting countries in the region with estimated total outflows of 57 billion dollars between 2000 and 2008, an average of 6.3 billion dollars a year. Israel followed at 15.2 billion dollars, an annual average at 1.6 billion dollars a year, and Lebanon at 11 billion dollars for nine years, an average outflow of 1.2 billion dollars per year. “We regard our figures as conservative, since they do not include smuggling, some
Issue # 28, February 2011
the IFPD is an intensive program which aims to introduce participants to the important building blocks of Islamic finance, a 1.4 trillion-dollar global industry. On completion of the six week course – which can also be credited to the Masters of Islamic Banking and Finance program offered at La Trobe - students will receive an IFPD certificate from the University and be recognised as a Certified Islamic Finance Executive (CIFE™) by Ethica. Students will gain up-to-date practical knowledge designed to conform to the internationally acclaimed AAOIFI (Accounting and Auditing Organisation for Islamic Financial Institutions) standards. Key notes speakers at the inauguration included: La Trobe University’s Vice-chancellor Professor Paul Johnson; Dean of the Faculty of Law and Management, Professor Leigh Drake; Nicole Boldt Acting Director Financial Services, Department of Business Innovation, State Government of Victoria; Earle Harper, Senior Export Adviser, Financial Services, Australian Trade Commission.
Dental Emergencies
Yasser Khan*
Anyone can find himself in a dental emergency. Your kid falls off the jungle gym and loses a tooth. Or you wake up at 2 a.m. with an excruciating toothache. A filling falls out or a tooth breaks and you have a sharp edge hurting your tongue. These situations, and others like them, require emergency dental care. Many dentists offer emergency dental services throughout the day and even after hours. But taking care of dental emergencies isn’t completely out of your hands. There are some basic self-help rules that can mean the difference between saving and losing a tooth. Keep in mind, though, that emergency dentistry should follow; without it, your dental emergency could turn into a dental catastrophe. DENTAL EMERGENCY FAQS Q: What constitutes a dental emergency? A: A dental emergency can range from a knockedout tooth and a lost dental crown to broken dental braces or extreme tooth pain. Basically, it’s a dental situation that requires immediate
emergency dental services; feeling a little tooth sensitivity after downing a North Pole-cold iced tea does not a dental emergency make. (But if you’ve been feeling that sensitivity for a while, you should schedule a visit to the dentist.) Q: What are some home remedies for dental emergencies? A: Dental emergencies require the immediate care of a dentist, but there are some things you can do to preserve your teeth, alleviate pain or ease discomfort: save a knocked-out tooth in a cup of saline solution or milk; soak a pellet of cotton in clove oil and apply to the area of pain; reposition loose braces wires so they don’t cut your mouth, or cover the ends with orthodontic wax and gauze. Bear in mind that these are temporary solutions to help minimize pain or prevent further damage and that you should aim to get emergency dental work as soon as possible.
* Yasser Khan is a general dentist with special interest in cosmetic and aesthetic dentistry. He has been actively involved with various organisations locally and abroad in promoting the awareness and importance of oral hygiene care. He works mainly in Mansfield north east of Melbourne and part time in Pascoe Vale South.
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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The Kiki Principle: Debora McNichol*
A Lesson in Elegance How I became a Muslim
I was in transition. I lost my job, made the decision to divorce my husband and could not wait to leave the state where I’d lived for years and so hated. Strangely enough, I was not unhappy with my predicament. The decision to leave my husband, who was by most standards a catch, and someone who had always treated me with utmost deference and respect was painful, but it was something I had to do. The decision to leave the job was made for me, and was in retrospect a blessing. So despite the upheaval, the world, I thought, was a very good place. I met my husband-to-be and was happy about that. As we discussed the future, he brought up religion. Religion had never been a particularly strong part of my life, nor did it seem to be for him. I told him that I was a Christian because that’s how I was raised; specifically, I was a Catholic. Like many other religions, Catholicism taught that non-Catholics were going to hell. I always had a problem with that. I always had a problem with a lot of things in Christianity and Catholicism, but never really thought through as to why. So when Ahmed told me that he was a Muslim, and it didn’t matter what, he would never become a Christian, I shrugged my shoulders and said “okay.” I was confused as to how he could think I would spend any energy trying to convert him to Christianity when I never prayed or attended church myself - and in fact hated every church into which I ever set foot. During that conversation, Ahmed told me that I should learn about Islam and that I should get a book to read about it. (This was before the internet, obviously.) He made it clear that he would never make me convert to Islam, but adopting Islam had to come from the heart. I shrugged my shoulders again. Like he could force me to do anything I didn’t want to do. Snort. As if. So taking his advice to heart, I journeyed to a bookstore and found two books on Islam. One book was written by a brother whose heart seemed to be in the right place, yet I found the book to be quite sexist. Despite that, I was not turned off by Islam and in fact the brother, Allah bless him, made several decent arguments for Islam. Not convinced however, I turned to the second book, which was the Quran. I found the Quran amazing. It was majestic. It was authoritative. It was scientific. It was insightful. It understood individuals and humanity in a way that no one did. It fleshed out those reasons why people intuitively believe that there is a God. It filled in those many puzzle pieces that had been missing in Christianity, in the Bible, and in my world view. Perhaps the most fascinating thing, I found Islam is not apologetic, as many religions are. For this American who was raised a Christian, having been exposed to dozens of Christian sects, all of which had tried to get me in their clutches, Islam came as a breath of fresh air. There is a reason that Christianity is broken up into as many sects as it is. It has to appeal to so many people, yet it is based on assertions that simply don’t make sense. So it is quite capable of further misshaping in order to fit the people whom it wants to attract. Islam on the other hand, makes sense and is perfect as is, and warns us not to warp it. There is one God. His name is Allah. He is the God of Moses, Abraham, Jesus, and Adam. He is the God of the Jews. He is the God of the Christians. He is the Lord of the World. There is no God but God. He has no use for a son. He has no reason, nor an inability, to walk the earth as a man. He created the earth and everything on it, and the rest of the
universe. Devising a rival of Allah that could in any way match him, whether dressed as Shaitan, a stone idol, or Jesus, peace upon him, is plain foolishness and a waste of time and energy. La ilaha il Allah. I knew I was a Muslim after I read the Quran once. Years later, I came to realise that I really never was a Christian. My future husband told me, incredulously, “No one can become a Muslim after reading the Quran one time.” I shrugged my shoulders. “Well, that’s what I am.” “But there’s more to being a Muslim than reading the Quran once or twice.” Of course there is. Did you ever walk into a furniture store for no particular purpose, and you see the perfect couch? You didn’t know you needed the couch, but once you saw it, you knew that it was perfect for your living room. Okay, maybe you have to draw your own analogy. Then magnify its importance infinitely. I knew upon reading the Quran that Islam was what I was missing all my life, though I did not know it until then. The pieces clicked. Simple and perfect. Like an elegant math proof. I like to tell myself that reading the Quran converted me to Islam, but that is not entirely correct. The thing is, I would have never considered reading the Quran, learning about Islam, let alone converting to Islam if the one Muslim I knew pretty well was a jerk. I held no preconceptions about Islam, though I had met many Muslims in my life. Palestine was about land, not religion. Israel and Egypt was about Israelis and Egyptians, not Judaism and Islam. Had I understood that “Muslims” could run airplanes into buildings and murder people and then call it Islam, I would have been unable to look at Islam objectively, astaghfurallah. My model however, was my extraordinarily handsome future husband who is kind, sweet, easy-going, patient, and funny, as well as deferential to his mother (always a plus when being sized up for future use). It turns out that Allah gave me just what I needed, when I needed it. Alhamdulillah. People convert to Islam by so many avenues. Some are searching; I was not. Some are pious; I was not. One conversion scenario will not fit all, which is the beauty of Islam. If I were to be forced to attend a mosque, forced to become a Muslim, forced to study Islam, for example, I would certainly turn around and run as fast as my legs could carry me, screaming. Allah, in His wisdom, instead let me catch Islam in my two hands as it floated through my arms in front of me. What more beautiful way to become a Muslim than that? * Debora McNichol has written for Crescent Times since its first issue. Debora is an American Muslim lawyer, editor, restaurant manager, and writer, who lives in Virginia and North Carolina, US with her ever-so-patient daughter and husband. She practices business, intellectual property and criminal law in those states. To contact Debora, email her at DebMcNichol@hotmail.com
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My revert story
Fa’izah Batchelor* Alhamdulillah I have been blessed by Allah (swt) with the absolute firm knowledge that there is a God and there is a life after death. I know with the surety of sight that there is a heaven and that there is a hell. This is my story. I was adopted by my maternal grandmother and grew up in Auckland, New Zealand. I knew both my parents. My mother was a lovely person, she had however chosen a life of addiction, a hard life to try and forget her past. When I moved to Australia at 18 I started to spend more time with her.
In October 2001 I moved to Seoul in South Korea to teach English. On Christmas Eve of that year my mum was diagnosed with terminal cancer and was given 3 months to live. I went back to Australia in February to help my grandmother nurse my mum and to help look after my younger brother who was 9 and my two younger sisters who were 7 and 5. Mum died in a hospice in Brisbane at about 1am on the 24th of April 2002. Her body aged 20 years in the death process - so much so that my siblings no longer recognised her. She spent the 2 weeks before her death in a coma fighting something on her left shoulder. Her soul was ripped from her body. Both my Nanna and I saw a shadow in the doorway a large dark figure that took my mother, we believe it was the angel of death. At the moment my mother died more than two thirds of the patients in the hospice ward woke up screaming. It
was a horrible sound that I will never forget, the sound of terror. It took the nurses about half an hour to quieten the patients before they could come and confirm that Mum had died. From then on I knew that there was a God, that there was a heaven and a hell. I knew that my mum had gone to hell even though she had accepted Christianity in the last months of her life. I was back at work in South Korea within a week. Questions remained. Who was God? Why had my mum gone to hell if she had accepted Christianity? She of all people deserved to be welcomed by God with open arms because of all she had been through. I began to ask everyone everything about religion. Finally I was in a nightclub and a Muslim guy that I knew asked me what I believed in. I hadn’t thought about it before because I was so focused on what everyone else believed in. I thought about it for a moment and answered “I believe that there is only one God and I believe in Jesus and his miraculous birth but I don’t believe Jesus is God.” The guy smiled at me and said “You sound like a Muslim girl.” A what! My mind screamed. One of those poor oppressed women in Afghanistan, like hell I am. In that moment I realised I was making judgements about something I didn’t know anything about. I went to the local bookstore to get a copy of the bible and the Quran. They of course had the Bible, the even had The Book of The Devil but when I asked for the Quran I was promptly told with disgust that “We don’t have THAT book here.” So I ordered an $80 English copy of the Quran online. I remember clearly sitting on my bed with the Bible in my left hand and the Quran in my right. I looked up at my ceiling and said “OK, if one of these is the truth let me find it.” I read the Bible to Exodus and I couldn’t put the Quran down. When I read Surah Al Kafirun I knew it was the truth. When I heard Surah Al Fatiha recited in
Arabic for the first time I broke down because I was hearing the word of God, the actual word of God, for the first time in my life! I said my shahada privately first. I had been to the mosque in Seoul previously, the Imam wasn’t there but the man who saw me had looked me up and down like I was something despicable. I didn’t want a repeat of that experience, so I went to my tailor and asked him to make me a big black dress to wear for church. I got a thick black scarf as well, made ghusul [ritual bathing. Ed] with great pain and care and then made my way back to the mosque. I walked all the way from my small apartment on the wall of the largest American army base in Asia. The guards were on red alert as they had just invaded Iraq and were standing almost shoulder to shoulder around the perimeter with their M16s pointed outwards. I nearly threw up 4 times but was afraid that I would invalidate my careful washing. I made it to the mosque and met a new Korean convert who took me upstairs for prayer (we were the only two women there and didn’t know what to do - I thought the sunnah prayer was exercise in preparation for the real thing). After prayer finished I was taken to the Imam and I said my shahada with witnesses and from then on have been known as Fa’izah which means victory and success (resembling my English name Victoria). I made a decision in those first days not to let any Muslim turn me away from Islam. I am glad I did. Even though the majority of Muslims are lovely people I still have been hurt so many times by Muslims. I have even been told “What the F*%$ do I know I’m just a f*%$ing convert.” I am also saddened when people ignore their religion. It has been such a struggle for me just to learn to pray. I see Muslims giving up this diamond, the truth, their path to heaven for Coca-Cola dreams. Alhamdulillah I am still here seven and a half years later. My iman goes up and down like everyone’s. But I am happy, truly everyday life happy with the decision I made to become Muslim. I look forward to the time when I can meet my Creator and I pray that I will be handed my book in my right hand. My Allah guide us all to the straight path, the path that leads to heaven. My Allah keep us for heaven and spare us from the torments of hell. Ameen.
*Fa’izah Batchelor is a QLD based relationships coach.
Why did I choose Islam? Judy Nelson-Eldawy I came to Islam as the result of much research and study and soul searching. Research that started when I was looking for something that would cause my husband to convert to Christianity, oddly enough. The history of early Christianity makes for some thought provoking reading with the fighting and political machinations of the various Christians factions. The works of Ahmed Deedat and “The Bible, The Quran and Science” make some compelling arguments that also deserve much thought. I didn’t read the Quran in its entirety until later. It’s quite different from the Bibles narrative style but you still get a sense of deja vu. Once I had read the biography of the Prophet Mohammed(pbuh) and
got a frame of reference, it was easier to understand. I remember reading about the Prophet’s first revelation and thinking,” How cool is it that, the first admonition of the angel Jibreal is “Read!”. Also, a religion that tells you to study everything is pretty cool too. I really hate the phrase,” You just have to take it on faith” which is what I got a lot in response to questions about Christianity. I found Islam to be democratic (no one is better than another except in their degree of worship of Allah) and an advocate for women’s rights. At a time when the Christian Church argued over whether women even had souls, Islam gave them the right of inheritance, the right to work and keep their own money, the rights to choose their husbands and of divorce and to be treated kindly and fairly by
husbands and families. Islam states that Paradise is assured for the believer, male and female. The really sad thing is that many Muslims today do not know their religion and the oppression that happens is a result of this ignorance. In addition to my research, I had the excellent examples of my husband and my sweet mother in law ( May Allah grant her paradise) who lived their belief. I have always believed that a person’s relationship with the people around them is a reflection of their relationship with God. Kind, compassionate, generous and absolutely authentic, these two people had something that merited a close inspection. When I made my shahada 10 years ago, it was because I had found the truth.
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HYDER’S CASE OF INTEREST: Hyder Gulam* CT legal editor
Recently the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) heard a matter in its Anti-Discrimination List.** This matter was an application for exemption against antidiscrimination for the opening of swimming pool facility out of ordinary opening hours for women only and to be staffed by women only at those times. VCAT was satisfied that it was appropriate to grant an exemption from the relevant law to engage in the exempt conduct. The purpose of this article is to outline some key steps that community groups can undertake to achieve the same result: 1. Advertise the application at the relevant facility and allow a time for the public to make submissions on the application. 2. Have letters of support for the women-only sessions to be provided to reinforce the application – have as many other community and religious groups endorse your applications. Work your neighbourhood. 3. Consider whether there is some less restrictive way in which the purpose of the exemption might be achieved. 4. Make sure you are able to clearly argue on the salient legal issue: which is whether the interests served by the exemption are sufficient to justify exempting the conduct from the prohibitions of the relevant anti-discrimination law. When you are collating your argument for the application for exemption, consider: •Previous exemptions (if any) and other exemptions granted elsewhere; •Letters and other materials in support of the exemption application ie signed letter of support from other community groups; •Arguments on how the facility serves the community and also surrounding suburbs; •If your municipality is culturally and linguistically diverse, say so; •Including the support of any Muslim organisations, such as the peak Muslim body in
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your state, ie the Islamic Council of Victoria; •Stating the health benefits and opportunities for women to meet and socialise. One very strong point is to state the benefit that the women can meet others from different backgrounds. This provides opportunities for social connection, friendship and increased understanding of and tolerance for others from different cultural or religious backgrounds. In this case, the exemption sought did not attempt to change the current operation of the facility. It continued to be open to all during normal public opening hours. Those who used the facility during women-only sessions paid the same fees as the public who attend during normal hours. The women only swimming nights were held each Friday from 8pm to 9pm, those hours being outside the facility’s usual operating hours. The evidence provided was that during summer up to 50 women have attended and during winter the nights are also well attended. Muslim women from the Horn of Africa attended when they otherwise would not participate in swimming sessions. In addition, women from a range of other backgrounds also attended. VCAT was informed that a local community health centre referred women patients who have had surgery or who have other health conditions which make them self conscious to the facility and those women who attended also preferred to be amongst women only. While the exemption involved the possibility of prohibited discrimination against men, the exemption provided an opportunity for sport and recreation (swimming) for women who, for cultural, religious or health related reasons, could not take advantage of those opportunities in mixed gender company. To put it another way, the exemption gave these women the same opportunities for programs of this kind as were available to men and women who do not have these personal circumstances and who therefore are able to access programs during the facility’s public opening hours. In this sense, the exemption promoted equality of opportunity for the women to whom it is directed. The purpose of this article is to show that a clearly planned and well thought out application for exemption against discrimination for a public facility, such as a swimming pool, can not only benefit Muslim women, but also comply with local laws. The key is to get community support and to engage the wider neighbourhood. *Hyder Gulam is the legal editor of CT. He can be contacted at: hyder.gulam@crescenttimes.com.au ** Kensington Community Recreation Centre (AntiDiscrimination) [2010] VCAT 2058
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Issue # 28, February 2011
Saudi Arabia: women in the workforce duration of which is not less than eleven consecutive hours, except in cases determined pursuant to a decision by the Minister. Saudi culture and legislation are Islamic and Islamic rules encourage equality as much as possible. So, salaries and wages in Saudi labour law are the same for men and women. Moreover, because women have special conditions, such as giving birth, Saudi law gives women more facilities. An illustration of this is: -A female worker shall be entitled to maternity leave for the four weeks immediately preceding the expected date of delivery and the subsequent six weeks. The probable date of delivery shall be determined by the physician of the firm or pursuant to a medical report certified by a health authority. -A woman may not work during the six weeks immediately following delivery -During the maternity leave, an employer must pay the female worker half her wage if she has been in his service for one year or more, and a full wage if she has served for three years or more as of the date of commencement of such leave. -Babysitters are provided in a workplace to look after children under the age of six years. An employer who employs fifty female workers or more must provide them with a suitable place for child care with an adequate number of babysitters to look after children under the age of six years if the number of children reaches ten or more -When a female worker returns to work following maternity leave, she is entitled to, in addition to the rest periods granted to all workers, a rest period or periods not exceeding in aggregate one hour a day for nursing her infant. Such period or periods is calculated as part of the actual working hours and must not entail any reduction in wages. -The female worker in Saudi Arabia whose husband has passed away is entitled to fully paid leave for a minimum period of fifteen days as of the date of death
Yousef Alnamlah**
I want to shed some light on the terms and conditions of employing women in Saudi; there have been a number of changes recently to the law in this area. There are a number of nationwide provisions including: -When implementing the provisions of Saudi labour law, the employer and the worker must adhere to the provisions of sharia. -Arabic must be the language used for data, records, files, work contracts and the like, as well as the instructions issued by the employer to his workers. If the employer uses a foreign language, the Arabic text shall prevail. -All periods and schedules are stated according to the Hijri calendar unless otherwise stated in the work contract or the work organisation regulations. On 26 September 2005, the government of Saudi Arabia approved a set of new labour laws and as a result was granted full membership of the WTO in November 2005. The stated objectives of the new legal framework were to replace foreign workers with competent Saudis, create more jobs for Saudis in the private sector, regulate the management of both local and foreign workers, and improve the welfare of all those employed in the private sector through provision of basic legal rights such as the right to annual leave, health and safety. Islamic theory does not prevent women from working but it recognises that men and women are suited to different roles as a result of their different natures. Therefore, every person has his or her natural role in the workplace, however men carry more responsibility. In addition to this, according to Islamic theory men are expected to be maintainers and protectors of women. Islamic theory also prohibits women from working at jobs that may be hazardous. To clarify these points, examples from the labour laws in Saudi Arabia state: *References available to request -Women shall work in all fields suitable to their nature. **Yousef Alnamlah is a PhD Student, Department of It is prohibited to employ women in hazardous jobs Business, Macquarie University or industries. -Women may not work during a period of night the
IHRC: the wave of popular demonstrations across the Arab World The Islamic Human Rights Commission, IHRC condemns the hypocrisy of Western governments who for decades have propped up, financed and supported the oppression and human rights abuses of the tyrannical regimes of Mubarak, Ben Ali, Saleh and others in the Muslim world. IHRC Chair Massoud Shadjareh stated: “Token statements of criticism now from Obama and others is a matter of too little, too late, and will not fool the Arab people who are finally breaking free from the life
sentence they received over 30 years ago. “We urge the West to end their promotion and sponsorship of tyrants whose crimes against humanity have bred intolerable resentment and anger throughout the Muslim world.” The Islamic Human Rights Commission can be contacted on: +442089044222 or +447958522196. Right: protestors injured in recent uprising in Tunisia Prayer Schedule February 2011 Sydney, New South Wales
Prayer Schedule February 2011 Perth, Western Australia Date 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28
Fajr 4:11 4:12 4:14 4:15 4:16 4:17 4:18 4:20 4:21 4:22 4:23 4:24 4:26 4:27 4:28 4:29 4:30 4:31 4:32 4:33 4:35 4:36 4:37 4:38 4:39 4:40 4:41 4:42
Sunrise 5:41 5:42 5:43 5:44 5:44 5:45 5:46 5:47 5:48 5:49 5:50 5:51 5:52 5:53 5:53 5:54 5:55 5:56 5:57 5:58 5:59 5:59 6:00 6:01 6:02 6:03 6:03 6:04
Dhuhr 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:31 12:30 12:30 12:30 12:30 12:30
Asr 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:11 4:10 4:10 4:10 4:10 4:10 4:09 4:09 4:09 4:08 4:08 4:08 4:07 4:07 4:07 4:06 4:06 4:05
Maghrib 7:19 7:19 7:18 7:17 7:16 7:16 7:15 7:14 7:13 7:12 7:11 7:11 7:10 7:09 7:08 7:07 7:06 7:05 7:04 7:03 7:02 7:01 6:59 6:58 6:57 6:56 6:55 6:54
Isha 8:45 8:44 8:43 8:42 8:41 8:40 8:39 8:37 8:36 8:35 8:34 8:33 8:32 8:31 8:29 8:28 8:27 8:26 8:25 8:23 8:22 8:21 8:19 8:18 8:17 8:15 8:14 8:13
Date 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28
Fajr 4:43 4:44 4:45 4:47 4:48 4:49 4:51 4:52 4:53 4:55 4:56 4:57 4:59 5:00 5:01 5:02 5:04 5:05 5:06 5:07 5:08 5:09 5:11 5:12 5:13 5:14 5:15 5:16
Sunrise 6:15 6:16 6:17 6:18 6:19 6:20 6:21 6:22 6:23 6:24 6:25 6:26 6:27 6:28 6:29 6:30 6:31 6:32 6:33 6:34 6:35 6:36 6:37 6:37 6:38 6:39 6:40 6:41
Dhuhr 1:09 1:09 1:09 1:09 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:10 1:09 1:09 1:09 1:09 1:09 1:09 1:09 1:08 1:08
Asr 4:53 4:53 4:53 4:52 4:52 4:52 4:52 4:52 4:52 4:52 4:52 4:51 4:51 4:51 4:51 4:50 4:50 4:50 4:49 4:49 4:48 4:48 4:48 4:47 4:47 4:46 4:46 4:45
Maghrib 8:01 8:01 8:00 7:59 7:58 7:57 7:57 7:56 7:55 7:54 7:53 7:52 7:51 7:50 7:49 7:48 7:47 7:46 7:45 7:44 7:42 7:41 7:40 7:39 7:38 7:37 7:35 7:34
Prayer Schedule February 2011 Melbourne, Victoria Isha 9:30 9:29 9:27 9:26 9:25 9:24 9:23 9:22 9:21 9:19 9:18 9:17 9:16 9:14 9:13 9:12 9:10 9:09 9:08 9:06 9:05 9:04 9:02 9:01 8:59 8:58 8:57 8:55
Date 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28
Fajr 4:53 4:54 4:56 4:57 4:59 5:00 5:02 5:04 5:05 5:07 5:08 5:10 5:11 5:13 5:14 5:16 5:17 5:19 5:20 5:21 5:23 5:24 5:26 5:27 5:28 5:30 5:31 5:32
Sunrise 6:33 6:34 6:35 6:36 6:37 6:38 6:39 6:41 6:42 6:43 6:44 6:45 6:46 6:47 6:48 6:49 6:51 6:52 6:53 6:54 6:55 6:56 6:57 6:58 6:59 7:00 7:01 7:02
Dhuhr 1:34 1:34 1:34 1:34 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:35 1:34 1:34 1:34 1:34 1:34 1:34 1:34 1:33 1:33
Asr 5:24 5:24 5:23 5:23 5:23 5:23 5:23 5:22 5:22 5:22 5:21 5:21 5:21 5:20 5:20 5:19 5:19 5:18 5:18 5:17 5:17 5:16 5:16 5:15 5:14 5:14 5:13 5:12
Maghrib 8:34 8:33 8:32 8:31 8:30 8:29 8:28 8:27 8:26 8:25 8:24 8:23 8:22 8:21 8:20 8:18 8:17 8:16 8:15 8:13 8:12 8:11 8:09 8:08 8:07 8:05 8:04 8:03
Isha 10:09 10:08 10:07 10:05 10:04 10:03 10:01 10:00 9:58 9:57 9:55 9:54 9:52 9:51 9:49 9:48 9:46 9:45 9:43 9:42 9:40 9:38 9:37 9:35 9:34 9:32 9:30 9:29
Prayer Schedule February 2011 Brisbane, Queensland Date 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28
Fajr 3:55 3:56 3:56 3:58 4:00 4:01 4:02 4:03 4:04 4:04 4:05 4:07 4:07 4:08 4:09 4:10 4:11 4:11 4:13 4:14 4:15 4:16 4:17 4:17 4:17 4:19 4:20 4:21
Sunrise 5:20 5:20 5:20 5:22 5:23 5:24 5:24 5:25 5:26 5:26 5:27 5:28 5:29 5:30 5:30 5:31 5:32 5:32 5:33 5:34 5:34 5:35 5:36 5:36 5:36 5:38 5:38 5:39
Dhuhr 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:03 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:02 12:01 12:01 12:01
Asr 3:34 3:34 3:34 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:35 3:34 3:34 3:34 3:34 3:34 3:33 3:33 3:33
Maghrib 6:43 6:42 6:42 6:41 6:41 6:40 6:39 6:39 6:38 6:38 6:37 6:36 6:35 6:34 6:34 6:33 6:32 6:32 6:30 6:29 6:28 6:27 6:27 6:26 6:26 6:24 6:23 6:22
Isha 8:03 8:02 8:02 8:01 8:00 7:59 7:58 7:57 7:57 7:57 7:56 7:54 7:53 7:52 7:51 7:50 7:49 7:49 7:47 7:46 7:45 7:43 7:42 7:41 7:41 7:39 7:38 7:37
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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Free Our Schools Iftikhar Ahmad*
Almost all children now believe they go to school to pass exams. The idea that they may be there for an education is irrelevant. State schools have become exam factories, interested only in A to C grades. They do not educate children. Exam results do not reflect a candidate’s innate ability. Employers have complained for years that too many employees cannot read or write properly. According to a survey, school-leavers and even graduates lack basic literacy and numeracy skills. More and more companies are having to provide remedial training to new staff, who are unable to write clear instructions, do simple maths, or solve problems. Both graduates and school-leavers have also been criticised for their sloppy timekeeping, ignorance of basic customer service skills and lack of self-discipline. Bilingual Muslim children have the right to be taught their culture, languages and faith alongside a mainstream curriculum. More religious schools will be opened under sweeping reforms of the education system in England. There is a dire need for the growth of state funded Muslim schools to meet the growing needs and demands of Muslim parents and children. The time has come for parents and communities to take over the running of their local schools. Parent-run schools will provide the diversity, choice and competition that the wealthy have in the private sector. Parents can perform a better job than the Local Authority because parents have a genuine vested interest. The British Government is planning to make it easier to schools to “opt out” from the Local Authorities. Muslim children in state schools feel isolated and confused about who they are. This can cause dissatisfaction and lead them into criminality. The lack of a true understanding of Islam can ultimately make
them more susceptible to the teachings of fundamentalists. Fundamentalism is nothing to do with Islam; you are either a Muslim or a non-Muslim. There are hundreds of state primary and secondary schools where Muslim pupils are in the majority. In my opinion all such schools could opt out to become Muslim Academies. Muslim schools turn out balanced citizens, who are more tolerant of others and less likely to succumb to criminality or extremism. Muslim schools give young people confidence in who they are and an understanding of Islam’s teaching of tolerance and respect which prepares them for a positive and fulfilling roles in society. Muslim schools are attractive to Muslim parents because they have better discipline and teach Islamic values. Children thrive with discipline, structure and boundaries. Bilingual Muslim children need bilingual Muslim teachers as role models. None of the British Muslims convicted following the riots in Bradford and Oldham in 2001 or any of those linked to the London bombings had been to Islamic schools. An American think tank studied the educational background of 300 jihadists; none of them were educated in Pakistani madrasas. They were all western educated by non-Muslim teachers. A Cambridge University study found that singlesex classes could make a big difference for boys who tend to perform better in single-sex classes. The research is promising because male students in the study saw noticeable gains in the grades. The study confirms the Islamic notion that academic achievement is better in singlesex classes. *Iftikhar Ahmad is a UK based Muslim community activist and educator.
The management of Australian Muslim schools Amirudin Ahamed* The recent issues of Crescent Times have highlighted quite a few aspects of Muslim Schools in Australia. However, one notable omission was the style of management of these schools. This article aims to redress this omission. After working for and with non-Muslims (including Hindus, Buddhists, Christians, Africans, British, Swedes and Kiwis) in more than two decades of a professional career in four continents, I was looking forward to working in a Muslim organisation for the first time in my life when in January 2000 an Islamic school in Victoria offered me a teaching position. I thought that this would be my last workplace, from which I would retire (unless Allah recalled me earlier) as, in addition to earning my living, I would also be serving my community. As it turned out, I risked retiring from the world itself as a result of the high-blood pressure caused by the most horrible experience I had ever encountered in a workplace! Until that time, I thought that no superiors would ever be worse than the four racist British men under whom I worked for four years (1980-84) in the Zambian Copper Mines. But my superiors (practising Muslims at that!) in this Islamic school were far worse. In Zambia, after the initial few months of hostility, I developed a working relationship with the British. But in this school, it only became worse with time and ultimately I literally ran away from a permanent full-time position to a half-time contract position in a school managed by AngloSaxons – where I am still working to date. True, I cannot generalise and accuse all Islamic schools in Australia of functioning in the same way as this school. Some of your readers may have had first-hand personal experience in other
schools and they are welcome to correct me if the schools they worked in were better. Let me begin with the first step of application procedure. Qualification wise, my credentials were impeccable with two master’s degrees, a PhD from Europe and a Diploma in Teaching from Auckland University. Students in the two grammar schools I had taught in Auckland – including the prestigious Auckland Grammar, the premier state school in the whole country – had rated my teaching highly as proved by student surveys. However, when I applied to Islamic schools in Australia, some never bothered even to reply and others were lukewarm. In fact, some schools even prefer to hire Anglo-Saxon teachers in preference to Muslims believing that this enhances their image. One wonders how nonMuslims can integrate Islam with the subject they are teaching! Whenever I missed the Friday jummah because of my teaching commitments in non-Muslim schools, I used to curse the management of Muslim schools for depriving me of this jummah by preferring to hire nonMuslim teachers. John Howard’s regime wanted to audit Islamic schools to ensure that they were not teaching fundamentalist doctrines. His priority was misplaced. Instead, he should have queried the style of management in these schools. These schools function like dictatorships in democratic Australia! Some of these schools were founded by Muslims moving here from dictatorships, they know only one style of management. Teachers are hired and fired at the whim of the founder. Even principals are not exempt. In some of these schools, teachers have to sign in and sign out like factory workers. When they want to go out of the school in their non-contact hours, they have to enter their name in a register. The head honcho,
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Al-Hidayah Islamic School: the fight for survival (part III) Crescent Times features the history of one of Australia’s most successful Islamic schools
Umar Abdullah * After seventeen years of operation the Al-Hidayah Islamic School is still operation as a primary school only, preprimary to year 7, with no high school, and no plans to open a high school any time soon. Why? No reasonable certainty of economic viability. Not viability in terms of just covering the basic costs of running a high school, but most importantly, viability in terms of providing Islamically oriented education in all subject areas to the highest possible standards; something that cannot be done on government funding assistance alone. Unfortunately this is what our community has been conditioned to expect for more than 2 decades now, and we all now know how it was done. Sadly, not much has changed,even over the last few years. We are still hearing of fee collection rates of around 10% or less, which means the situation has not improved. Firstly the majority of our community wasn’t paying school fees because it was given to understand that it did not really have to: “pay what you can afford”. The message going out now is that fees must be paid, but the collection rates are still abysmally low. Is it a management problem or is it that the culture of not paying fees has just become too deeply rooted; or is it that the majority now see the payment of fees as being fruitless because the situation is too far gone, and they are prepared to accept even the lesser standards that are possible on government
funding assistance because of a false belief that nothing can be done about it? Something can be done. Parents with high school age children should not only demand higher standards but must also be prepared to contribute to the attainment of those higher standards through the payment of school fees. Management that is determined to collect fees at a reasonably high collection rate at or near the national average for nongovernment schools and parents who are prepared to pay school fees are the answer. Let’s do something about the high schools we have before we clamour for new ones. A revolution is needed; not just from the top down, but, like all successful revolutions, from the grass roots up. If in the future we still do not have the high schools we need, we will only have ourselves to blame. Before we go on let’s be clear on one point: affordability was never an issue; something the Al-Hidayah Islamic School has been proving over and over again since 1994. In the meantime the AlHidayah Islamic school will do what it has always done: continue to look for better ways to prepare its students for any high school in Australia. After a highly successful trial in two classrooms last year, the School has over the summer break installed interactive electronic whiteboards in every classroom, including the pre-primary. The School has acquired sufficient laptop computers stored in mobile trolleys to enable several classes to conduct lessons with a laptop in front of each
who calls himself “director” (because he is not qualified to be a principal!), walks around the school checking on the teachers as all teachers are guilty until proven innocent! Some Muslim schools employ non-Muslim principals – who may openly flaunt their atheism! Dictators can be overthrown and hence nepotism is rife so as to protect one’s flank. Wives, sons, daughters and in-laws occupy strategic positions in the school. Membership in trade unions is discouraged and no place is provided for union meetings. Quite a few schools fudge student numbers to boost federal funding. Only two were unlucky enough to be caught! The non-Muslim teachers try to undermine the Islamic character of the school. But, for some unfathomable reason, they are loved by the Muslim students judging by the gifts they receive from the students. Muslim teachers feel insecure and are very fearful and jealous of new arrivals, especially if they are also Muslims with high qualifications. A principal who has a PhD would be reluctant to employ another Muslim with a PhD but will not hesitate to employ a non-Muslim PhD as the latter would not be a threat to him. Certain teachers claim monopoly on teaching some subjects despite the fact that they are awful teachers. Some teachers act either as spies of the Director or as his hatchet-man. It seems as if taqwa is inversely proportional to decency. I worked for a year in a secular Turkish school with non-practising Muslims and was treated far better than the Islamic school. The management and my colleagues in my present Aussie school (all non-Muslims) are more Islamic than the “Muslims” I worked with earlier, in their treatment of fellow human-beings. * Amirudin Ahamed is a Melbourne based teacher and a writer.
student interacting with the teacher and the internet; a staff initiative. All PC’s in all learning areas of the School have now been decommissioned. This change has freed up a valuable classroom space, and the School has started a process that will see all classes limited to a maximum of thirty students within three years. These changes and others that will flow from them will improve the School’s ability to achieve even better results and will enhance the education process in terms of satisfaction for the teachers as well as preparing our students to embrace and utilise new technology from a very early age. Despite the changes already mentioned and the amount of time and effort the teachers will need to put in to get the most out of them as soon as possible, the main focus for this year, insha Allah, will be on improving the Islamic atmosphere in the school; another staff initiative. Over the last 17 years the AlHidayah Islamic School has been fine tuning the Islamically oriented education process and has a well earned reputation both here and abroad in the education community as being a highly efficient education institution, Alhamdulillah; evidenced by the fact that the school recently passed its registration inspection with flying colours and has been granted a 4 year extension. Beyond that, Insha Allah, more of the same. *Umar Abdullah is chair of the school board and was a member of the founding group of Al-Hidayah School.
UK: Religion must be in key school exam, insist faith leaders
Religious leaders and theologians have condemned the decision to leave religious education off the list of GCSEs that go towards the controversial new English baccalaureate. Annual league tables on schools’ performance published last week measured the proportion of pupils obtaining the English bac, which is awarded to teenagers who achieve GCSEs at grade C or above in English, maths, science, a foreign language and a humanities subject (history or geography) – but not in RE. Pointing to claims last week by the Conservative party’s co-chairwoman, Baroness Warsi, that Islamophobia had “crossed the threshold of middle-class respectability” and to the rise of the EDL, the chairman of the Church of England’s education board, the Bishop of Oxford, the Right Rev John Pritchard, bishop said: “RE is a real tool for creating that kind of cohesive community and society that we’re looking for... we neglect it at our peril.” The subject, he said, was just as academic and rigorous as history and geography and was also extremely popular, with the number of students studying it to GCSE level climbing from 113,000 to 460,000 over the last 15 years. Dr Hojjat Ramzy, vice-chairman of the Muslim Council of Britain’s education committee, said he was “extremely worried” that RE was not being afforded a higher status, especially given the challenge posed by Islamophobia. “In our ever-growing multi-cultural and multi-faith society, it’s very important that people, especially the younger generation, are aware of the religions and cultures of others,” he said.
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Issue # 28, February 2011
Why is it necessary to establish an Islamic Union? Harun Yahya The Islamic world covers a huge geographic area populated by 1.2 billion Muslims. Unfortunately, it is characterised by tension, conflict, and disorder, all of which continue to threaten global peace and prosperity. All attempts to solve the region’s problems have so far failed. But a review of its history shows that a strong central authority, ruling according to Quranic morality and tolerance, as well as respecting all people’s rights and belief
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systems, had enabled this vast region to live in peace. The Ottoman Empire was the most recent example of this. And now, it is time to bring about a new Islamic Union, for the current system, based upon nationalism, materialistic philosophies, and atheism can only worsen the current situation. Such an Islamic Union would enable the Muslim world to live in peace, both internally and externally, and allow the entire world to benefit from its vast natural resources. One of the first things we notice when analysing the state of the Islamic world is its many internal divisions due to deeprooted distrust and disputes. Recent history has seen the Iran-Iraq war, Iraq’s occupation of Kuwait, and East Pakistan’s (Bangladesh) war of independence from West Pakistan. The civil wars and internal conflicts in Afghanistan, Yemen, Lebanon, Iraq and Algeria due to political and ethnic differences made it obvious that something is wrong with the Islamic world. In addition, very divergent religious views and models are being practiced in the Islamic world, because there is no central authority to determine what is and what is not compatible with Islam, to establish consensus, or to provide guidance to the general public. Catholics have the Vatican and Orthodox Christians have the Patriarchate, but there is no religious unity or central authority for Muslims. However, solidarity is central to Islam’s character. After the death of our Prophet Mohammed (may God bless him and grant him peace), the Islamic world was for a
long time led by the institution of khilafah, which provided religious guidance to the Muslims. In our day, too, a progressive central authority could be formed. Establishing an Islamic Union and a central Islamic authority, based on democratic principles and the rule of law, would be major steps forward in resolving the Islamic world’s current problems. We can summarise several aspects of this proposed Islamic Union, such as its ability to:
Mohammed (may God bless him and grant him peace), Muslims led the way in science, reason, thought, art, culture, and civilisation, and produced many benefits for humanity. When Europe was in its dark ages, Muslims taught the world science, reasoning, medicine, art, hygiene, and countless other subjects. In order to restart the rise of Islam, powered by the Quran’s light and wisdom, present-day Muslims have to acquire guidance based on the Quran’s morality and the Prophet’s (may God bless him and grant him peace) sunnah (his example, or way of life). Also, it must be remarked here that out of all Islamic nations, Turkey in particular has an important role to play, as it is the heir of the Ottoman Empire, the founder of such an Islamic Union which it ruled successfully for over 5 centuries. Turkey has the social infrastructure and state tradition necessary to fulfill the requirements of this important responsibility. Furthermore, of all Muslim states, it has the best-developed relations with the West and is therefore ideally placed to mediate the differences between the West and the Islamic world. Turkey also has a tradition of tolerance and harmony, and represents the Ahl as-Sunnah belief as the majority of Muslims believe, rather than a certain sect. All of this makes Turkey the most qualified candidate for leading the envisaged Islamic Union. Finally, the solutions proposed here need to be implemented immediately, because the risk of a clash of civilisations between the Western and Islamic worlds is increasing by the day. Setting up the Islamic Union will cause this danger to disappear. History proves that the coexistence of different civilisations is not necessarily a source of tension and conflict. A multicultural state does not experience difficulties because of existing internal differences, but because of its inability to manage those differences. Different cultures that exist side by side choose either conflict or peace and cooperation, depending upon their existing levels of tolerance and whether they can or cannot control those factors leading to intolerance. At present, some Westerners and Muslims prefer hostility and conflict over tolerance and harmony. Thus, misunderstandings and prejudices against Islam and the Muslims continue to present certain difficulties. On the other hand, Westerners feel unnecessarily threatened because of various misunderstandings. Therefore, a solution to these problems is needed urgently to avoid even worse conflicts and misunderstandings. And the Islamic Union will play an important role in preventing the escalating risk of conflict, for all Islamic countries will move together as one body.
1. Reach all of the Islamic world. Therefore, it must be founded upon Islam’s core principles and not become the organ of a particular denomination or sect. 2. Support human rights, democracy, and free enterprise, and seek to achieve its mission of economic, cultural, and scientific development in the Islamic world. 3. Establish friendly and harmonious relations with other countries or civilisations, and cooperate with the global community and the UN on such issues as controlling weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, international crime, and the environment. 4. Deal with the minority rights of Christians and Jews, as well as foreigners who migrate to Islamic countries, consider their safety a priority, and value interfaith dialogue and cooperation. 5. Seek fair and peaceful solutions whereby both sides make compromises to end conflicts between the non-Muslims and Muslims in Palestine, Kashmir, the southern Philippines, and other regions. It must defend the rights of Muslims as well as prevent radical Islamic movements from driving the situation to into a dead-end. Such a rational, considered, and just leadership will benefit the 1.2 billion Muslims who are struggling with so many problems, as well as all humanity at large. An Islamic Union founded upon Quranic principles will enable humanity to find peace and justice, and the good character prescribed by the Quran will deliver To purchase the works of Harun Yahya, please happiness. Since the era of the Prophet visit www.bookglobal.net”
MUSLIMS IN AUSTRALIA - TIME TO WAKE UP
Muslims in large numbers have migrated to many Western countries USA, UK, Canada and Australia for better prospects. They made these countries their home by their choice. The countries needed them for their development, welcomed them with open arms and granted them citizenship. By and large, fortunately these nations have freedom of religion and one can adhere to his/ her faith and live freely in the society mutually benefiting from and contributing to the welfare of the nation they live in. While maintaining our religious values, we are duty bound to fulfil our social obligations as well. But unmindful, we have not been conscious enough in respect of several such things. Every
Muslim is a representative of Islam and good or bad as he presents himself, his actions create the image in the minds of others. If good we become source of dawa and contrary to it we become object of criticism and repulsion. Our interaction with the society here is minimal and we mostly live in isolation creating doubts in the minds of our non Muslim neighbours. All of us live and work with other Australians but due to little interaction we remain strangers and aliens. I am not yet an Australian citizen but feel that our lack of respect at times puts us in bad situations. The lack of coordination, cooperation and interaction with neighbours, fellow workers, travellers, sightseers with whom we come in contact, creates suspicion and a bad image, highly detrimental to our cause. Australia Day is a day of national importance,
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The US arms industry and the people’s revolt in Egypt
Paul J. Balles
Paul J. Balles comments on the USA’s ambivalent line on the people’s revolution in Egypt. He argues that although the administration has a growing fear that a government hostile to Washington could gain control Egypt, “the unspoken fear is that American arms manufacturers will lose a reliable customer”. “The military was greeted warmly on the streets of Cairo. Crowds roared with approval as one soldier was carried through Tahrir Square today holding a flower in his hand,” reports Democracy Now! senior producer Sharif Abdel Kouddous. He speaks of “a great sense of pride that this is a leaderless movement organised by the people. A genuine popular revolt. It was not organised by opposition movements, though they have now joined the protesters in Tahrir.” According to Abdel Kouddous, “The Muslim Brotherhood was out in full force today. At one point they began chanting “Allah Akbar” only to be drowned out by much louder chants of “Muslim, Christian, we are all Egyptian.” What he describes, reflected in the TV coverage, is truly a “people’s revolution”. Will it play out that way? So far, the main concern of the protesters has been to get rid of Hosni Mubarak, Egypt’s “president”-cum-dictator for the past 30 years. The US has kept Mubarak in power, giving his regime 1.5 billion dollars in aid last year – mainly because he supported America’s pro-Israel policies, especially by helping Israel to maintain its stranglehold on Gaza. Egypt has been the number-two recipient (after Israel) of US foreign aid. In both 2009 and 2010, the economic aid amounted to 250 million dollars while military aid reached 1.3 billion dollars. US military aid to Egypt has been spent primarily on strengthening the regime’s “domestic security” and its ability to confront popular movements. In a report for the Carnegie Foundation on US aid to Egypt, Ahmad al-Sayed El-Naggar asks: “Why don’t Egyptians notice the role of American aid to their country? The simple answer is that US economic aid to Egypt, which amounted to 455 million dollars in 2007, translated to only 6 dollars per capita.” It was even less in 2010 when the total economic aid of 200 million dollars could provide less than 3 dollars per capita income. The people have suffered poverty while Mubarak supported his army and the US military-industrial complex. The US has no reason to begrudge the amounts of military aid to Egypt. Much of it goes back to American defence contractors. Lockheed Martin received a 213 million contract for 20 new F-16s for Egypt in March 2010, according to its website. BAE Systems, General Dynamics, General Electric, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin have all done business with the Egyptian government, selling tanks, fighter jets, howitzers and radar arrays to its military. Meanwhile, half the people of Egypt live on less than 2 dollars a day. Is it any wonder that they have taken to the streets in protest? When the tanks rolled into Cairo, some protesters climbed on them to a friendly reception by the soldiers. A couple of noisy fighter jets swooped threateningly overhead, but the protesters and the army remained friendly. Throughout the day people chanted: “The people, the army: one hand.” That wasn’t the case when the police and the security forces threw tear gas canisters with labels “Made in America” into the crowds. The security police have represented much of what the Egyptian people have come to hate about Mubarak. Meanwhile, the US administration has been waffling when asked whether they support the Egyptian public or Mubarak. Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State, stressed that Egypt’s future lies in the hands of its people, towing the administration line of refusing to take sides publicly. However, the administration has a growing fear that a government hostile to the US could gain control of such a large and important Arab nation. The unspoken fear is that American arms manufacturers will lose a reliable customer. * Paul J. Balles is an American academic and regular columnist. Published permission from Redress.cc
we ought to participate in it keeping aloof only from what is not lawful for us, if any, but how many of us do so? We have to be firm in our faith but we must integrate where permissible. Integration as citizens of a nation does not mean assimilation. Muslims now are in sizable numbers, alhamdulillah and have mosques, imams and organisations to guide them. In my last decade of experience of living in Australia, I have found Australians are highly disciplined, helpful and accommodating. The elders here in Perth and in other Australian cities have to sit together, form a committee and chalk out an action plan to save the community from bad days, Allah forbid. In this regard we must support the efforts of leading Muslims who are doing the commendable work of guiding the community
and maintaining rapport with the higher ups in the community. However the whole community has to wake up, each individual must contribute and play his/her role. We all are answerable to Allah for good conduct and behaviour and conveying the Message to all humanity. It is time to educate our fellow citizens in a beautiful, rational way on why we need halal food, Islamic schools and mosques. How we remain Australians despite our religious uniqueness. To explain our viewpoints through half page metro newspaper advert repeated every six months may be a good starting point. Why let doubts and ill feeling multiply and make Australia a bad place for the generations ahead by our inaction?
Saiyid Akhlaq Nabi Queens Park, WA
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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QLD: When the sun went into hiding!
Shaazlah Hafreth , QLD editor
An unexpected December deluge paved the way for inevitable torrential floods causing severe destruction to millions of Queensland homes and businesses and ripping the country’s already shaky economy. Even before the New Year, emergency evacuations were underway in the townships of Chinchilla, Dalby and Theodore, followed
washed under the house. Two houses down from us were lower to the ground and they were flooded.” After the flash flooding, the City Center of Toowoomba was closed as businesses all over the city were trying to salvage whatever they could and repair damage. After leaving the residents of Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley to ‘pick up the pieces’, the flood surged its way into Ipswich. Queensland Premier Anna Bligh said on Channel 9 news that the river Bremer was expected to peak at 22.5 metres which was higher than ‘The Big Wet’ of 1974. She went on to say that the city had changed dramatically since then, with the rise and layout of infrastr ucture and a higher number of inhabitants, and this might result in more damage than back in ’74.
by Bundaberg which experienced its worst flooding in fifty years. Ms Bligh also urged people to retreat to flood As the weeks progressed and the downpour evacuation centres, if they had no friends or continued with no respite, more cities and family living on higher ground. suburbs succumbed to its disastrous influence. However by the 12th, residents of Ipswich Te n s i o n gripped the nation and on the 11th of January, a ‘wall of water’ slammed into the Lockyer Valley, west of Brisbane, after tearing t h r o u g h Toowoomba. Over 5000 people were urged by the Police to flee their homes and the death toll rose to 11. On the 12th of January, more than 90 people were listed as missing. were relieved when the expected flood peak was downgraded by three metres, even though 3000 “I was fortunate not to be greatly affected by homes and business were swamped. the floods, Allahu Akbar!” recalls Toowoomba resident, Aseyah Shipman. “We were about to “That’s three metres less and it’s that three go down to the main part of Toowoomba when metres that would have caused a drastic my husband suddenly decided we needed to go situation,” Ipswich Mayor Paul Pisasale is reported to have said. Thankfully, Thursday, the 13th of January dawned brightly and was followed by clear skies for the rest of the week. Recovery and stabilisation Premier Anna Bligh announced on January 18th a year-long $15 million royal commission-style inquiry into the state’s unprecedented flood disaster. It will look at rezoning and other actions to protect homes and businesses from
home, getting home about half an hour before the downpour started that caused the flash flooding.” “We watched as the highway in front of our house became a creek and were grateful that we are on stilts, as the almost meter of water
future floods. Ms Bligh said the Government would work closely with local governments and would not make any rash decisions. “I think we have to think very long and hard ... Maybe it’s not about rezoning. Maybe we’re saying if you’re living in that area you have to
have a house on stilts,” Ms Bligh told Channel 9. “We want to be, at every step of the way, thinking about not only about how we rebuild what was there but how do we, perhaps, build it differently or it maybe in a slightly different location to make it better and safer.” Ms Bligh said it was disappointing that relatively new homes had been swamped. She also said that it was important to learn from what went wrong and what the state did well in response to the natural disaster. “One thing we know in Queensland is that we’re likely to see other weather events sometime in our future.” Ms Bligh also said the recovery efforts would revive the state’s construction industry, which
preparing 1000 hampers containing some basic necessities to be handed out unconditionally to affected fellow Queenslanders. More than 300 people responded to the Crisis Meeting by offering financial aid, vehicles and essential supplies. Many also warmly offered their homes for shelter. Sherri Qusay, who was involved in the packing of laundry baskets of goods to hand out to the people affected by the flood said,“ The laundry baskets contained toiletries, cleaning supplies, bath towels, food like cans of baked beans, tuna, rice, long life milk and colour pencils and activity books for the children, amongst other things.” After helping out at the Gold Coast mosque, she and her fellow brothers and sisters in Islam moved on to the suffered during the global financial downturn. City Council where they helped pack and load (source: www.heraldsun.com.au) more hampers at the ‘Flood Hamper Drive’. On Saturday the 15th, The ISGC (Islamic Mercy Mission, a charitable organisation Society of the Gold Coast) undertook the task of based in Australia but with branches all over the world, mobilised the Muslim community of Queensland to provide warm meals to flood victims. By January 17th, more than 4000 meals had been prepared and delivered to both victims of the flood and volunteers assisting in relief efforts. It is refreshing to see that the sun did not set on the community as many individuals and organisations, both local and overseas, united to help out in more ways than one. “Those who (in charity) spend of their goods by night and by day, in secret and in public have their reward with their Rabb (only God and Sustainer). On them shall be no fear nor shall they grieve.” (Qur‘an, 2:274) For more info on volunteering efforts visit http://www. crescentsofbrisbane.org/ Qld%20Floods.htm * Photos courtesy of Shaazlah Hafreth friends, with many thanks. Shaazlah Hafreth is a QLD based writer, she is QLD editor of Crescent Times.
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Issue # 28, February 2011
Page 23
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Issue # 28, February 2011
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Ghanouchi: historic Islamist leader returns to Tunisia
The leader of a long-outlawed Tunisian Islamist party has returned home after two decades in exile, telling the world that his views are moderate and that his westward-looking country has nothing to fear. Rachid Ghanouchi and about 70 other exiled members of Ennahdha, or Renaissance, flew home from Britain two weeks after autocratic President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was forced from power by violent protests. At the airport on his arrival, thousands of people welcomed him, cheering, shouting “God is great!” and drowning out his attempt to address the crowd with a megaphone. Ghanouchi rejected any comparison to more radical figures, including the hard line father of the Iranian Revolution. “Some Western media portray me like (Ayatollah Ruhollah) Khomeini, but that’s not me,” Rachid Ghanouchi said. During 23 years in power, Tunisia’s ousted president cracked down on opponents, including proponents of political Islam, jailing them and sending many into exile. As Tunisians protested over corruption and repression, Ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia on Jan. 14. With Ben Ali gone, Ennahdha has moved quickly to carve out a place in the political scene, taking part in demonstrations and meeting with the prime minister. Some Tunisians fear that a revival of Islam could hurt their hard-won gains and quality of life, or inspire an extremist movement like the al Qaida linked network that has waged an insurgency in neighbouring Algeria. But, while Ennahdha was branded an Islamic terrorist group by Ben Ali, it is considered moderate by scholars. Experts say Ben Ali used
a fear of Islamists to seduce Western allies keen for a bulwark against terrorism in a volatile region, and win their blessing despite widespread repression. Ghanouchi said he wants his party to help Tunisia carry out democratic reforms, though he is not interested in standing in elections expected in upcoming months. “I am not going to run for president of Tunisia, nor as a minister nor as a parliamentarian,” he said in an interview at his brother’s home, where family members celebrated with a festive meal of couscous. Another long-exiled opponent - Moncef Marzouki, a secular leftist and human rights activist - was there to welcome him. Ghanouchi, 69, left the country as Ben Ali came to power in 1987. In 1991, he was convicted in absentia to life in prison, as were most of the party’s leaders. Ben Ali banned the party, accusing it of conspiring to kill him and establish a Muslim fundamentalist state. Ennahdha denied those accusations. Ghanouchi said he seeks to reinforce women’s rights set out by Tunisia’s Westward-looking modern-day founder, Habib Bourguiba. In 1956, Tunisia abolished polygamy and gave women the right to divorce their husbands. Ghanouchi said his party still supports that historic turning point, along with freedom of religion. Asked about his view on abortion, he dodged the question, saying the issue was complicated. Ghanouchi compared his politics to those of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Despite Erdogan’s Islamist roots, he has been
widely viewed as a pragmatist largely loyal to the legacy of Turkey’s founding father Mustafa
country after weeks of unrest - fuelled by widespread corruption and repression - that led
Kemal Ataturk, who sought to create a secular, modern state. “Why do people want to compare me to (Osama) Bin Laden or Khomeini, when I am closer to Erdogan?” Ghanouchi said. In Tunisia meanwhile, the interim government has been trying to stabilise the
to Ben Ali’s flight. For the first time since its establishment in 1981, Ennahdha has finally been granted permission by the current interim government to form a legitimate political party Source: AP and other agencies.
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