imam zaid shakir on egypt

From Imam Zaid's article: Bravo Egypt!

The people of Egypt have shown that they are not the property of any foreign power to be owned, used, abused and then discarded or possibly “lost.” They are human, men and women determined to carve out a dignified existence for themselves and their progeny. In so doing, they have shattered, to this point, virtually every myth and stereotype encouraging Americans to view Muslims as our inherent enemies. For example, we have been told that Muslims are bloodthirsty savages. We have been told that political Islam is a totalitarian system that knows of no compromise. Yet in Egypt, as in Tunisia, we have seen a majority Muslim population engage in a nonviolent revolution.

[...]

Here in the United States many politicians and pundits are asking, “Why didn’t we see this coming?” I will offer my answer here. Specifically, American policy-making towards the Middle East has become dominated by anti-Muslim bigots. They have projected their own fears onto the governing elite and created such an obsession with so-called radical Islam that the latter has accepted the draconian (and profitable for some) measures being put into place to fight it, including support for “moderate” regimes like Mubarak’s. All the while, they have failed to take note of the real, dynamic politics on the ground in the Middle East and the civil society that has sprung up around those politics.

[...]

The road ahead in Egypt will not be an easy one. There are powerful interests, both in Egypt and in other countries who were profiting lavishly from the ancien regime and the system of crony capitalism it has put in place to syphon off the country’s wealth. They have much to lose from a new system and will fight hard to preserve at least some of the privileges they formerly possessed. New institutions will have to be built. A new balance of power will have to be hammered out between the groups the protesters represent and the older, more established parties and groups who supported the protests, along with those who did not. The healthcare and university systems, both of which have been destroyed by mindless and neglectful policies, will have to be rebuilt. The minefields of the Palestinian situation will also have to be traversed. However, that is tomorrow’s work and tomorrow’s worry. As for today, let the people of Egypt celebrate. Bravo, Egypt, Bravo!

See also, Imam Zaid's: Reflections on the Situation in Egypt

go egypt! it's your birthday! it's your birthday! it's your birthday!

"Freedom" (Song for Egypt) - Wyclef Jean (h/t to Sons of Malcolm)

continuing soundtrack of the revolution

Both of these sites feature a round-up of clips of chanting and singing from Tahrir Square as well as studio tracks by artists expressing their solidarity with the protesters.

KabobFest: The Soundtrack of #Jan25
hawgblawg: Music of the Egyptian Revolution

roger stockham arrested on terrorism charges for trying to blow up islamic center

This story got swept up in the wake of news from Egypt, but last month Roger Stockham, a 63-year-old Army veteran from California who has a history of being angry with the U.S. government was arrested outside of the Islamic Center of America (in Dearborn, Michigan) wearing a black ski mask and with a large number of M-80s and other explosives in the trunk of his car. Stockham has a "colorful" history of mental illness, criminal activity and substance abuse. The most recent twist in his case is that he fired his court appointed lawyer Mark Haidar, for being Shiite.

Detroit Free Press: Mosque attack plot suspect demands a new lawyer
Huff Post: Roger Stockham Arrested With Explosives Outside Major U.S. Mosque
NPR: California Man Arrested For Planning Attack On Michigan Mosque
Detroit Examiner: Examiner: Mosque terror suspect has history of making threats
All Voices: California man charged in trying to blow up Michigan Mosque served time for threat against President Bush

seham's links on egypt

Seham's links on Egypt (8 February 2011)

head of state - el general (hamada ben aoun)

From Hip-Hop Diplomacy: The Rap That Sparked a Revolution: El General (Tunisia)

hip-hop for revolution

PRI's The World: Hip-Hop for Revolution

The poetic tradition in North Africa has also woven its way into more modern forms of expression. Rappers and hip-hop artists from Algiers to Cairo have been casting critical eyes on governments and dictators for years now. In the wake of unrest across the region, their rhymes have become a kind of soundtrack for revolution.

egyptian rappers give uprising a soundtrack

From WSJ blog: Egyptian Rappers Aim to Give Uprising a Soundtrack



Rebel - Arabian Knightz featuring Lauryn Hill

constructive role of faith in the egypt uprisings

Dalia Mogahed: U.S. Must Understand the Constructive Role of Faith in Egypt's Democratic Aspirations

us state department on egypt situation (with subtitles)

zaid shakir & mohamed magid on curbing extremism in the muslim community

From Ify Okoye's blog: Zaid Shakir & Mohamed Magid | Curbing Violent Extremism in the Muslim Community

islam and the secular state (part two)

So I finally finished reading Abdullahi Ahmed An-Naim's Islam and the Secular State: Negotiating the Future of Shari'a. To be honest, I was a little disappointed with the book. That isn't to say that An-Naim's ideas weren't provocative or intriguing or worth further contemplation. But I was more impressed by him as a speaker and as a thinker (based on various clips of lectures and interviews available online) than as a writer per se. In the earlier chapters of the book he tended to sound a bit repetitive and I found him a little abstract for my taste.

But he does get particularly eloquent when he is laying out his central premise in the very last chapter:

As a Muslim, I need a secular state in order to live in accordance with Shari'a out of my own genuine conviction and free choice, personally and in community with other Muslims, which is the only valid and legitimate way of being a Muslim. Belief in Islam, or any other religion, logically requires the possibility of disbelief, because belief has no value if it is coerced. If I am unable to disbelieve, I will not be able to believe. Maintaining institutional separation between Islam and the state while regulating the permanent connection of Islam and politics is a necessary condition for achieving the positive role of Shari'a now and in the future.

In many ways, the above paragraph is the heart of the book and the rest of the text is an elaboration and an unpacking of his words here.

I almost want to say that I wish he were more opinionated. I was left wondering how he concretely imagines the "separation of Islam and the state" on the one hand, and the "permanent connection of Islam and politics" on the other. He was at his most engaging when describing the interplay between Islam, the state and politics in particular settings; the caliphate of Abu Bakr (ra) and then more recently in India, Turkey and Indonesia. But I would have liked to hear him share his views on Islam and secularism in other locations; for example, Saudi Arabia, Iran, France, the US and especially his own native Sudan. I also would have liked to see him engage a bit more with the religious arguments of those who advocate for some form of "Islamic government". Maybe that's for the next book?

islam and the secular state
the postcolonial condition of muslim states
conversations with history: abdullahi ahmed an-naim

oklahoma and the sharia

As you may have heard, 70% of Oklahoma voters recently approved a measure to ban the use of sharia law in Oklahoma courts. I've been thinking about this for a couple of days now and I'm still not sure what the measure really means.

Most of the examples which come to mind when I even try to imagine what "applying the sharia" would mean in the U.S. context are either things which are already clearly prohibited by the First Amendment or things which are clearly protected by the First Amendment. So the Oklahoma referendum fundamentally seems either redundant or unconstitutional.

The U.S. Constitution already protects non-Muslim from having "the sharia" imposed on them, while Muslims should be free to follow the sharia in matters such as marriage, inheritance, business contracts and financial arrangements. And if the terms of such agreements were drawn up in a sufficiently clear manner, why couldn't or shouldn't they be adjudicated by a U.S. court? In fact, Jews and Christians in the US already have established several institutions which allow for alternative conflict resolution according to their own religious principles but with a certain amoutn of legal validity as well. Why couldn't Muslims set up similar "courts" in the U.S.? I've never been to law school but I find it hard to imagine that a referendum which actually singles out a specific religion for special exclusion could pass constitutional muster.


Here is what appeared on the ballot in Oklahoma:

STATE QUESTION NO. 755 LEGISLATIVE REFERENDUM NO. 355
This measure amends the State Constitution. It changes a section that deals with the courts of this state. It would amend Article 7, Section 1. It makes courts rely on federal and state law when deciding cases. It forbids courts from considering or using international law. It forbids courts from considering or using Sharia Law.

International law is also known as the law of nations. It deals with the conduct of international organizations and independent nations, such as countries, states and tribes. It deals with their relationship with each other. It also deals with some of their relationships with persons. The law of nations is formed by the general assent of civilized nations. Sources of international law also include international agreements, as well as treaties.

So in addition to the sharia, the Oklahoma courts apparently can not consider the Sharia Law is Islamic law. It is based on two principal sources, the Koran and the teaching of Mohammed.
SHALL THE PROPOSAL BE APPROVED?
FOR THE PROPOSAL — YES
AGAINST THE PROPOSAL — NO

The only thing clear about the law is that it loudly says: "We hate Muslims and want to give them a hard time."

But even apart from its impact on Muslims, it seems like the proposal opens up a whole can of worms. It doesn't just try to exclude the use of the shaira but international law as well. Maybe they can start building Black site prisons in Oklahoma to replace Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo since the Geneva Convention apparently doesn't apply there? Or maybe Oklahoma will become a resort for international criminals if extradition treaties are no longer valid there? How does the referendum effect Indian casinos if Oklahoma courts refuse to respect tribal law?

CAIR has already made some legal moves against the referendum (An initial hearing is set for today.) InshaAllah sooner heads will prevail.

Ballotpedia: Oklahoma "Sharia Law Amendment", State Question 755 (2010)
Huff Post: Caliphate on the Range? The Shariah Precedent in American Courts
The American Muslim: Islamic Sharia and Jewish Halakha Arbitration Courts - updated 5/21/10

...and they apparently hate muslims too

Colorlines: Tea Party Leader: Target Rep. Ellison Because He’s Muslim

yup, the tea party is racist

Tea Party Nationalism: A Critical Examination of the Tea Party Movement and the Size, Scope, and Focus of Its National Factions is an incredibly extensive 94-page report on the Tea Party which, among other things, outlines its connections to various hate groups. While affirming the most Tea Partiers are people of goodwill, the report identifies non-trivial links to more extreme groups.

Based on analysis of media coverage, site visits to tea party events and tea party literature, the report finds that the tea party itself has become a site for recruitment by white supremicists and others. And, beyond this susceptibility, some members of the leadership of the core tea party groups are connected to extremist groups or positions. Tea party leaders and core members are connected or affiliated with the Minuteman, the birther movement, antisemites, professional Islamophobes (Pamela Geller), and the Council of Conservative Citizens.

And because of the decentralized nature of some of the tea party organizations, they’ve made themselves susceptible to insidious efforts of white nationalists to grasp onto the movement’s success.

From: Yup, the Tea Party’s Racist, Study Finds (But It’s Not Alone)

cornel west and prophetic christianity

Here is a new interview with Cornel West from the newly reorganized Jesus Radicals site. In the hour-long interview with Eliacin Rosario-Cruz and Mark Van Steenwyk, West discusses a wide-range of topics including his recent disinvitation from this years Christian Community Development Association conference in Chicago due to an interview he gave to Playboy magazine, the ways in which Latin America challenges the Washington consensus, Puerto Rican independence leaders, how to chant down Babylon, how so many Caribbean activists joined the Black freedom struggle in the U.S., the Tea Party, some fierce but loving criticisms of Obama's presidency, but mostly he talks about how prophetic Christianity (and as an afterthought Judaism and Islam etc.) can constitute a counter-hegemonic force, voice and vision to challenge the American Imperial moment.


Some excerpts from the Playboy interview:

On President Obama’s shortcomings: "While he’s made some good, positive changes, I don’t think he’s a messiah or even a very progressive politician...It’s already getting late for him, when you have a chance to speak to jobs, homes, infrastructure and you end up bailing out investment bankers. They’re too big to fail? They’re too big to be managed! And what do you do? You allow them to get bigger! So you’ve got the same conditions in place that will reproduce the same catastrophe from which we’re still cleaning up from the Bush years. And you don’t speak to jobs, you don’t speak to homes, and again the poor remain invisible."

On President Obama’s inability to push a strong black agenda: "I wish [President Obama] could be more Martin Luther King-like. Set an agenda that at root is a black agenda, and it would also be the best agenda for the nation and the world. King did that. His concern for civil rights was also the best agenda for the country...By necessity, Obama has had to downplay his blackness to appease the white moderates and independents and speak to their anxieties. He knows black folk will support him anyway, so he doesn’t need to spend too much time on the chocolate side of town."

On Michelle Obama: "Somebody of her brilliance, somebody of her vision, somebody of her courage confined to keeping gardens at the White House, reaching out to military families, highlighting childhood obesity. I think she could be a great force for change if she could only set herself free. She can’t though. Black sister exercising her power, willing to take a stand, would be too much of a threat."

On corporate greed and "gangsterism": "Humans have always had the propensity to be gangsters...but for much of the past century you had sanctions in place. You had regulation. You had a stronger trade union movement. You had some balance between the rich and the poor. More of the wealth was distributed to working people. But what is it now? CEOs in the 1950s made around $25 to every $1 for an average worker. Now it’s about $275 to every $1, and the CEOs say, ‘No, we deserve it. We’re working harder.’ That’s a lie. They’re getting away with more by holding on to a larger percentage of the profits...When you read the business pages in the past three years, it’s just gangster activity, people getting away with anything they can—looting the Treasury, billions of dollars made on speculation. Those people knew it was wrong, but it was short-term gain, scandal, preoccupation with the 11th Commandment: Thou shalt not get caught. The result is, we’re feeling the aftershocks of moral bankruptcy, and it’s going to hurt us for a long time."

On the Tea Party movement: "The Tea Party might look a mile wide on Fox News, but it’s only a few inches deep...Tea Party folk are not crazy people. They’re just misguided. They’re deeply conservative people who see the corruption of government. They’re right about that. But they react by being antigovernment. They’re wrong about that. They see the need for individual initiative and entrepreneurial possibility. They’re right about that. But then they affirm a corporate agenda and don’t realize corporations are a big part of the problem...They’re much weaker than people like Glenn Beck think they are. But I’ll fight for the right of Glenn Beck to express his opinion. Even he has a right to be wrong, which he is most of the time."

On Glenn Beck’s preoccupation with black people: "Glenn Beck appears to have a certain preoccupation with black folk. Why is he so obsessed with black people? I notice he doesn’t give the Amish that much attention. [laughs]"

On eliminating poverty: "Given our wealth, we could create a society with no poverty. We could do it...Brother, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to eliminate poverty. Make it a priority. You allocate assets for everyone’s basic needs—housing, food."

On acknowledging race: "Some would like to believe we live in a postracial society, but that’s completely false. You’ve got to acknowledge race. Little kids notice it from the time they’re six or seven. ‘Dang, Jamal is darker than Johnny over here. What does that mean?’ Some people will try to say, ‘It doesn’t mean anything. We’re all the same.’ That’s wrong. That’s denial. We are different because of race, and we need to learn to embrace the differences, embrace the whole person...Then again, we have to make sure our awareness of our differences doesn’t translate into a hierarchy of how you treat people."

On the dismissal of his academic career: "My academic career is dismissed by means of invisibility. And I’m not the only one. If a martian came down to America and read The New York Review of Books, it would hardly know there were any black writers. There is a de facto segregation in the life of the mind in America, and black scholars, brown scholars, black intellectuals feel it every day."

On the hypocrisy of the Catholic Church: "Anytime you have people making claims of being virtuous, you have massive hypocrisy...Don’t project purity or an image of being pristine because you end up falling on your face. Or worse, you end up projecting a face of hypocrisy, as we see with the Vatican—a gay sex scandal among the people who preach against gay marriage and other deeply important issues. Not right."

On the things our culture is yearning for: "All across this culture I see a yearning for quality relationships, a yearning for integrity, a yearning for spirituality. But people—young people in particular—are manipulated by many forces to believe that what matters in life is something else: money, materialism, short-term gain, power and the kind of show that goes along with it."

On sexuality: "Sexuality is such a precious gift, but it does take on a life of its own. I see people who fall down the path of lust, seduction and temptation, and increasingly I sense this conquest mentality in which sex becomes almost another thing to acquire. How many women can I satisfy myself with? It’s a form of pathology, and it’s a sign of our deep spiritual malnutrition."

On white fear of black sexuality: "Historically, white fear of black sexuality was always a basic component of white racism. Black bodies, white bodies bumping against one another—it’s been one of the major forms of mobilizing white citizens...Ancient associations still linger about the sheer touch of black body against white body, of being disgusting, dirty, repulsive."

cnn on rick sanchez

Ok, I'm not going to blog on this for a while after this...Today on CNN's Sunday morning show Reliable Sources, (transcript) there was a "discussion" of the firing of Rick Sanchez. I put "discussion" in quotes because CNN basically used the show to justify their decision to get rid of Sanchez.

What I thought was ironic is that Sanchez got in trouble for saying that Jews were not really a persecuted minority in the news industry, while several of the pundits on the CNN show were essentially saying the same thing about Sanchez himself.

Carole Simpson said:

he thinks that he could have been better and bigger and all of these other things, and he wasn't because of his race, as being a Cuban-American. And then it tickles me, because he looks as white as any white man. I mean, without his name, you probably would not know he was Cuban.

While Jamie McIntyre was much more dismissive: "...to say that he was made uncomfortable at CNN because of his Hispanic heritage, I think it's close to delusional."

The most accurate comment on the show came from Paul Farhi:

Well, I mean, CNN is an employer, and in America, if you criticize your employer the way he did, you're going to lose your job. He went public. It's on satellite radio. Potentially now millions of people have heard Rick Sanchez' criticism of his own company. Not kosher.

Also see Matthew Yglesias: Rick Sanchez for a perspective from a Cuban-Jewish blogger.

former guerrilla set to be the world's most powerful woman

The Independent: Former guerrilla Dilma Rousseff set to be the President of Brazil and the world's most powerful woman

sidney, ny wants local muslims to dig up their graves

A town in upstate New York is trying to force a local Muslim religious community to dig up a small cemetery on its property and never bury anyone there again because it says it's illegal. Part of the "problem" is that there are no laws in Sidney -- or New York state, for that matter -- covering cemeteries on private land -- religious cemeteries included. Plus, the town approved the cemetery in 2005.

The cemetery is part of the Osmanlı Nakş-ı'bendi Hakkani Dergahı led by Shaykh Abdul Kerim al-Kibrisi.

For more details about the facts of the case, you can check out: Tiny Upstate New York Town Wants Local Muslims to Dig Up Their Cemetery

For me the case raises a couple of different issues. Obviously on one level its just a basic (and all-too-frequent) example of Islamophobia. What makes this case especially frustrating is that Sufi groups like the above mentioned Naqshbandis are supposed to be among the "good Muslims" and yet they are still facing difficulties finding acceptance.

the f-word: feminism in islam

Religion Dispatches: The “F” word: Feminism in Islam by Amina Wadud