Category Archives: Media

To Lionise Former Extremists is Injustice on Moderates

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Ziauddin Sardar in an excellent article protesting the lionisation of Ed Husain, a self proclaimed former extremist.

[...] When erstwhile sinners gain the limelight, the support of neocon luminaries and the backing of respectable Muslim leaders, sinning acquires a certain cachet. We prove again that radical extremism is the way to get attention. We make flirtation with violent ideology the way to be heard and become acceptable.

The embrace of former extremists is a slap in the face for Muslims who have worked tirelessly to build a British Muslim identity and foster inclusion by constructive community activity. It’s another attempt at the marginalisation of the overwhelming majority who never had a moment’s doubt that Islam gives no sanction for such murderous and misguided perversion of belief.

(Emphasis mine.)

[Image: What What]

Miracles and the Chain Emails

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A Yunus over at Islam, the way of life warns against forwarding chain mails without verifying them.

[...] The baby dajjal mail — just think it in this way, how would you feel if you see your baby’s photo in such a mail? And the recent one being Sand fountain…claiming that even scientists have no word to describe it. IS THAT ALL THE KNOWLEDGE OUR UMMAH HAS?????

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Believing in Karaamahs and miracles is a part of our deen. But, but, but… we need to understand fully that Allah does not need to create miracles everyday to prove His existence. [...]

Continue reading.

Geert Wilders’ “Fitna” – Muslim Reviews

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Indigo Jo reviews Geert Wilders’ controversial, new film “Fitna”:

The flaws are not hard to spot. This is basically Jihad Watch or Little Green Footballs as a film, and is not intended to try and convince anyone not of that mindset. For a start, only a small minority interpret the verses Wilders cites to justify the acts depicted; the majority of Muslims in the world simply do not behave like this and mainstream scholars reject such interpretations.

Austrolabe also presents some interesting legal ramifications of “Fitna” within its own review:

As far as such things go, Wilder’s film is quite a weak effort. It’s unlikely to provoke anyone to anything except, perhaps, fall asleep or yawn. [...] The thing that strikes me more than its offensiveness is its lack of originality. Wilders, apparently unable to come up with a suitably offensive shtick of his own, attempts to ride on the coattails of the Danish cartoons; appropriating one of their cartoons — without permission — and using that to start and close his video. He’s now being sued for that. He used footage from an interview with Theo van Gogh without permission. And the owner of that footage is considering legal action too. Where he was original — perhaps too original — was in using the photo of a Dutch-Moroccan rapper instead of a terrorist. He’s now being threatened with legal action for that. Fitna is proving to be more of a fitna for Mr Wilders than for anyone else.

The Good Reverend Jeremiah Wright

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Last night, I was listening to a speech by Cedric J. Robinson about his latest book; Forgeries of Memory and Meaning: Blacks and the Regimes of Race in American Theater and Film before World War II.

At the end of the speech during the Q & A section, the topic quickly turned into the war in Iraq and the role of media played. One of the role the media had was displaying the country France as a coward nation because French refusal to participate the war. The most importing thing was the short period of time (weeks) it took for the media to have the public on their side followed by the waves of Anti-French feelings and even re-naming French fries to Freedom fries. It shows not only what we are facing, but also the Western media is not about black and white; against non-Christians, Muslims, Islam or the Black Man, but everyone who stands against their agenda and dares to challenge them.

One of their approach is to collect pieces of different snippets together and present them as the “truth”. This week we have been a witness to such “truth”: Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright’s sermon, which he hold few days after the 9/11 tragedy. Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright is the former priest of Senator and President candidate Barak Obama. The sermon was presented as racist and anti American, even non-Christian. And so the victim becomes the perpetrator, and whole ethnic group are taken hostage and questioned their loyalty in their own country and insisted to condemn something they were not part of.

Brother MT Akbar put this video and shows what we have not seen in the sermon:

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I have to say that even though as a Muslim I have disagreements with the Reverend on theological grounds I am in total agreement with him as far as social and political issues go, and I WILL NOT BE A PARTY TO THE “HIGH TECH LYNCHING” that is taking place upon his character. ”and nearest among them in love to the believers wilt thou find those who say, “We are Christians”: because amongst these are men devoted to learning and men who have renounced the world, and they are not arrogant. “(Holy Quran 5:82)

Race & Obama

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Ginny gives a positive reviews of Barrack Obama’s responds to Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright, but Ginny continues the race issue in the USA, which is still a painful to talk about:


I’ll never forget that. I’ll never forget how sick I felt, how I literally almost threw up, how sad, upset, and angry I felt. This added to the sense of fear and foreboding I felt after 9/11, how I was afraid to go outside of my home because of the fear of being attacked. How some of my friends at that time (non-Muslim) stopped speaking to me. How someone who was a friend of a frend said “go back to where you came from”, and the friend stayed silent.

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I wish I could put into words all of the things I still want to say. how sometimes I feel like I don’t fit in anywhere, how hard it is to say “yeah white people have done this”, and not sound like a guilty white person for saying it. Because I’ve been thinking a lot about my previous posts, and methinks they are a bit harsh. I feel badly for saying them.

Because maybe they are true, but I don’t like voicing those sorts of thoughts, because I feel like no matter what, if you’re white, you can’t be in the middle, you can’t say “yes we’ve done a lot of htings”, because then you seem guilty, but if you don’t admit to certain things, like that racism still exists, for example, then you seem like a racist.

Dunner however, sees where the anger come from this way:

More Thoughts on the Deoband Anti-Terrorism Conference

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Last month, we mentioned the Deoband Anti-Terrorism Conference, which received a fair amount of coverage. This month, Tabsir reflects on the discussions, findings, and conclusions of the Deoband conference.

By and large, the non-Muslim press has focused almost wholly on the resolutions that were passed that labeled ‘terrorism’ as ‘anti-Islamic’, leaving out other crucial issues that were raised by numerous ulema who spoke on the occasion, particularly about Western Imperialism and Zionism as major factors behind global ‘terrorism’, and the hounding of Muslim youth and mounting Islamophobic offensives across the world, including India, in the name of countering ‘terror’. Muslim papers have dealt with these issues fairly extensively, but, following most of the speakers at the convention, they have placed the blame for ‘terrorism’ almost entirely on what they identify as ‘enemies of Islam’, thus presenting a very one-sided picture. In short, media reporting about the convention, by both the Muslim and non-Muslim media, has been inadequate and somewhat imbalanced. The same can be said of several of the speeches made at the convention.