Progressive Muslims: Friends of Imperialism And Neocolonialism (Or: The blog formerly known as Progressive Muslim Union North America Debate)
Islamic Fundamentalism and Sufism: Continuities and Confrontations through Modernity and Globalization Research Workshop of the Israel Science Foundation
Chertoff is credited with authoring the Patriot Act, the 300-plus page blueprint for the modern National Security State; patterned to great extent on the successes of the KGB in the Soviet system. He's admired among his Bush cadres for making sure that government surveillance operates at maximum efficiency. Under his stewardship at the Dept of Justice, the 4th amendment has withered like summer grass. The long-held belief that citizens, have a right to a "reasonable expectation of privacy" has buckled under the demands of "Big Brother" and the new "intrusive" security paradigm.
It hasn’t been too long since the release of the RAND report part II, and it seems that the government is already following suit. San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), otherwise responsible for spying on, harasing or setting up Muslims (watch out for the friendly neighborhood informant as he joins the government to make big $$ or arrange for his past-crimes to be forgiven) is now actually working with Muslims to “rebut radicals”. I am sure DHS has good intentions, but they have to produce something to show for all the $$ they are spending… it’s all part of the job.
1) Shahed Amanullah: He is from Austin, Texas. He will be DHS’s friend in the blog world. That of course holds special meaning to us, because we too reside in the blogosphere. Mr. Amanullah runs the notorious (for normal Muslims) website altMuslim.com. He wants to push forward an ‘alternate’ Muslim opinion, which is just a proxy, softer terminology for progressivism.
Well, let’s get it it clear: AltMuslim is nothing but a Muslimwakeup, PMUNA, eteraz, or other ‘we know better than the Sunnah’ websites in disguise. In fact, the folks there are not too shy about espousing the ‘opportunity’ to follow RAND’s guidance.
Also, browse the list of guest-writers. Don’t miss out Muqtedar Khan, the owner of the website called ‘ijtihad.com’… a personal favorite since he resides in the local community, in which he is mostly shunned because his views are so progressive that not even the nutty ones in the community can stand him. Ali Eteraz, the writer of classics such as ‘how to denude the niqabis’, and other sick perversions, is also a star writer. These pro-regressive (shout-out to Dr. M) websites usually generate a lot of hits, because normal, mainstream, average Muslims like us, usually go there to check out what the newest wacko opinion is. It provides for a good laugh and some stomach muscle movement, which can only help burn some calories for the stagnant web-surfers (ahem abu ameerah )
read more here
Partners in this network-building effort should be those who share key dimensions of democratic culture, the study says. The report recommends targeting five groups as potential building blocks for networks: liberal and secular Muslim academics and intellectuals; young moderate religious scholars; community activists; women's groups engaged in gender equality campaigns; and moderate journalists and scholars.
As America learned during the Cold War, moderate groups can lose credibility – and therefore, effectiveness – if U.S. support is too obvious. Effective tactics that worked during the Cold War include having the groups led by credible individuals and having the United States maintain some distance from the organisations it supports.
“This was done by not micro-managing the groups, but by giving them enough autonomy,” Rabasa said. “As long as certain guidelines were met, they were free to pursue their own activities.”
To help start this initiative, the report recommends working toward an international conference modeled in the Cold War-era Congress of Cultural Freedom, and then developing a standing organisation to combat radical Islamism.
more here
Why is it that when A’isha Bewley, who actually speaks Arabic, and is a known and respected translator of classical texts, published a translation of the Qur’an the NYT didn’t profile her? Heck, most Muslims didn’t even know she’d done this, and you have some people today talking about “the first translation by a woman” wrt Bakhtiar (and prior to Bewley’s, there was at least one other version that was done by an Egyptian woman). Is it because Bewley doesn’t fit the image of what Cheryl Benard and Rand told us “friendly” Muslims look like? Scoff all you like. I’m not a fan of conspiracy theories, but more and more coverage of Islam and Muslims seems to take a page from the infamous Rand report. And we go along with it.
Or is it because Bewley didn’t set out with the mindset that she was going to change what the Qur’an meant to English readers or not do it?
“I decided it either has to have a different meaning, or I can’t keep translating.”
What Bakhtiar is doing, then, is a grave, grave disservice to those people who pick up her version. She is doing what liberal Muslims accuse the ‘ulema of having done for 1400 years. It’s not a translation if she decides what the meaning is based on what she wants. It’s wishful thinking. Alhamdulillah, it doesn’t change the meaning of the Qur’an… but saying that English speakers are alienated by Arabic names, deciding yourself to do tafsir, even though you don’t really know Arabic and you admit to having no classical or scholarly training is changing how people who pick up your book will perceive the capital-T Truth, and this can lead one into spiritual territory where one would not want to be caught on the Day That Counts.
more here
The chaplain, Imam Yahya Hendi, was in India for three days late last week to debunk myths about the status and treatment of Muslims in America, much as he has done in State Department-sponsored trips to the Middle East, Africa and Europe.
The visit, arranged by Karen Hughes' two-year-old public diplomacy office at the State Department, did produce successes.
At our mosque the imam wanted to lead a mass prayer and interact with the people," said Hyder Ali, a spokesman for the Baitul Aman Mosque, the largest in West Bengal. "But we turned down the request ... because he was acting on behalf of a government which for long years has been responsible for killings and sufferings of innocent Muslims in many countries including Iraq, Palestine and Afghanistan. We did not want to betray our brothers and sisters in those countries by extending him hospitality in our mosque."
Nur-ur Rahman Barkati, the chief of another prominent Calcutta mosque, said he would be pleased to allow Imam Hendi to conduct a prayer at his mosque had the American been on a "purely religious mission, with no connection with America's foreign diplomacy."
"He is a Muslim -- he is our brother. But we could not take him in our arms because he was here as a representative of the American government and George Bush -- the enemies of Islam and the world's Muslims," he said.
"We took part in this ... prayer only because we knew an American imam would conduct it. Had we known that he was sent by the American government we would have never dreamed of standing behind him on this prayer," said Rifat Hossain, a 21-year-old student. A dozen of his friends nodded in agreement.
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A glance at Vali Nasr’s career shows where he is coming from — and whom he is serving. In January 2006, Nasr was named the Adjunct Senior Fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, the main Neocon Think Tank, focusing on foreign policy. He is currently Professor in the Department of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS). He joined NPS in 1993. The Naval Postgraduate School's Department of National Security Affairs (NSA) specialises in the study of International Relations, security policy, and regional studies. The NSA, according to its Web site, ‘brings together … faculty, students from the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines, National Guard and various civilian agencies, and scores of international officers from dozens of countries for the sole purpose of preparing tomorrow's military and civilian leaders for emerging security challenges’.
By liberating and empowering Iraq's Shiite majority, the Bush administration helped launch a broad Shiite revival
Iraq's liberation has also generated new cultural, economic, and political ties among Shiite communities across the Middle East.
the U.S. strategists have struck a common chord with self-identified secular liberal Muslim reformers who have been trying to refashion Islam along the lines of the Protestant Reformation.
According to Hannah Arendt, the two key characteristics of colonialism are racism and bureacracy. The professional elites were clearly created to support the colonial bureacracy, and is also not surprising that they adopted, in essence, the same disdain for their fellow Muslims (especially the 'Ulema) which more likely than not, was due to absorbing British racism. The professional elites often adopted the same purported "reformism" that was used to justify imperialism in the first place. Just like the "White man" had reached the pinnacle of human evolution and it was his duty to uplift the lesser races from their anthropological shortcomings, so did the professional elites view themselves as the pinnacle of Islamic history and had achieved material success and, thus, it was their duty to uplift the Muslim masses from their decadent superstitious faults.
The following letter was sent to Tarek Fatah some ten days ago. The response was so flailing and off topic that we felt it was worthwhile to post the original note to him as an open letter, though we have no illusions of generating a coherent response or a change of course. Mr. Fatah’s slide to the Right – in his case from the NDP to the Liberals, and from opposing Israeli apartheid to collaborating with authorities and some of the most repellant columnists the corporate media has on offer – is hardly unique, but disturbing nonetheless.
In 2002, the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth quoted with dismay one of Lieberman's many disgusting proposals. If the Palestinians did not comply with Israeli dictates, he suggested, the occupying forces should "bomb all the commercial centers... gas stations... [and] banks."
Lieberman's ghastly plan for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel was to drown them in the Dead Sea. He offered to provide the buses to transport them.
In May, 2004, he said that 90 percent of Israel's 1.2 million Palestinian citizens would "have to find a new Arab entity" beyond Israel's borders. Lieberman, an immigrant from Russia, claimed the Palestinian citizens of Israel "have no place here." Russians do, of course. This newcomer has the nerve to tell Palestinians with ancient lineage to "take their bundles and get lost."
Despite the vitriol of this hatemonger, the Brookings Institution is proudly hosting the former nightclub bouncer on his upcoming trip to Washington. Officials at the Institution said they were "honored" to host Lieberman's first address abroad since joining the government.
Although it (the radical middle way) is being presented as a grassroots Muslim initiative, the website and the entire project are in fact funded by the Foreign Office, through the Home Office, with the objective of fighting “extremism”. The hidden aim is to pacify Muslims into accepting an ‘Islam’ that is submissive to the agendas of the West. This project is not to be understood in isolation but as part of a larger effort at social engineering of the Muslim community. This effort has been going on since September 2001Read complete article hereWe should not be surprised by such intricate plots by the enemies of Islam; they have been taking place in vain for over 1,400 years. The sheep should not look to the wolf for protection. What is more worrying is the change in attitude of the shepherds of the Ummah, those entrusted with its guidance and protection, its own leaders and imams. It seems that the events of 11 September 2001 in the US and 7 July 2005 in London have paralysed these people, and forced them to implement the RAND and Operation Contest recommendations in record time. The very groups and individuals named in the latter document are those we see today at the forefront of this attempt to ‘reform’ Islam.
As the Sunday Telegraph has stated, Operation Contest has been implemented primarily through the Radical Middle Way Project. One of the schemes of this Project was a national roadshow of Muslim scholars flown in from all over the world to preach a more pacific message to British Muslims. Perhaps we should not question the intention of the scholars themselves, and certainly many of those associated with the project are sincere and well-meaning, but it does seem that they have allowed themselves to become pawns of the government, letting themselves be manipulated by it to complete its agenda. The roadshow has become a platform from which to bash so-called Wahhabi groups in the most cynical manner, as Muslims begin to divide themselves even more along lines drawn for them by the West. In doing so, these speakers take on the very characteristics they so vehemently attack.
In all this darkness, there is one light. History shows us that one of Islam’s wonderful characteristics is that the more it is pushed down, the higher it rises.
Slowly but steadily, more and more Muslims are realising that it is not terrorism or extremism or the niqab that is being targeted, but Islam itself. The enemies of Islam will continue to attempt to divide Muslims and to ‘reform’ Islam as they have done throughout the centuries. At such times, it is vital for Muslims to educate themselves about these plots but to always bear in mind Allah’s words that “they plot, but Allah also plots; and Allah is the best of plotters” (Q. 8: 30).
Before the sentence was complete, something entered the room.
It was a bit of a shock to me to see this mass of black! A black niqab, where even the two tiny holes where the eyes would be were covered in black gauze, entered the room. Thick black gloves sticking out of two wristbands attached to the shapeless black garb, tightly fastened, allowing only the black gloved hands up to the wrists to escape the dark cloud were placed the right hand on top of the left one on the chest, as if in a silent prayer.Further down the article, Amin again refers to the individual person as a "black creature" - and again as "that black being, now dangerously armed" and yet again " black niqab then turned to the next victim" and once more "a faceless black creature."
