Somali Man Pleads Guilty in Terrorism Case

Back in October 2007, while he was living in Minnesota, he said he met “some guys,” as he put it, who were talking about going back to Somalia to fight the Ethiopian soldiers who invaded Somalia. From October to December, they met secretly in Minneapolis.

Ahmed said he knew he would be fighting with Al-Shabaab. That’s the hard-line Islamic group that is creating much of the violence we’re seeing in Somalia today. But back in 2007, the group had some popular support because the fighters were taking on the Ethiopian occupation, and some people saw their cause as nationalistic.

…

After the hearing, Ostgard told me Ahmed stayed in Somalia from December 2007 until April 2008, but Ahmed left the camp before the U.S. officially declared Al-Shabaab a terrorist group in March of 2008. Ostgard said the fact that Ahmed left Al-Shabaab before the designation helped Ostgard negotiate the deal with prosecutors. “He would have faced more serious charges” if Ahmed left after March 2008, Ostgard said.

This next story just makes me shake my head.  People are looking for insediousness everywhere.  To me, it just looks like they’re making a mountain out of a mole hill.   The right wing blogs I read are like oooo, let’s play 6 degrees of seperation, Ellison to TIZA to MAS to the Muslim Brotherhood, zmog, terrorism! 

Rep. Ellison’s trip under increasing scrutiny

Islamic nonprofit paid for Rep. Ellison’s pilgrimage to Mecca

Ellison fires back over Strib story on Mecca trip

For those not from around these parts, TIZA has been the target of much scrutiny over the years, which has crested now with lawsuits and countersuits.

Inver Grove Heights charter school sues Education Department

Charter school countersues over ACLU religion claims

I wish I had something original to report on the goings on here in the Twin Cities, but unfortunately, I’m learning most of what I know from the news, just like everybody else.

I can mention one little tidbit – as I’ve mentioned before, I occasionally attend a masjid that was mentioned in connection with the missing men.  According to AbuS, the imam has now taken a strong stance supporting the current somali government and against the insurgents.

The indictment against 2 somali men, one currently of the twin cities, another a former resident, has been unsealed.

According to the indictment, federal investigators allege the men “provided material support and resources, namely personnel, including themselves, knowing and intending that the material support and resources were to be used in preparation for and to carry out a conspiracy to kill, kidnap, maim or injure persons in a foreign country” from September 2007 through December 2008.

Also, AbuS and I watched this video piece that was in the NYT article I linked toyesterday.  In it, one of the interviewees made a good point – al Shabab was/is something that transcends clan lines and united it’s participants towards the common goal of achieving some kind of peace.  As an outsider, I can’t even begin to understand the importance of clans and clan divisions in the somali community.  I know they exist, but I cannot wrap my head around the concept that the clan is more important than your fellow muslim brothers and sisters, and the peace and stability of your home.

It would seem to me that what needs to be done now is to find another organization that transcends the clan culture and that will work for peace, without using terrorism.  Does that exist?  Allahu Alem.

I wish our community could be well known for our charity or a large number of converts or something.  I’m even longing for the days of the taxi drivers, guide dogs, flying imams and incedious charter schools.

We made the New York Times yesterday – A Call to Jihad, Answered in America:

Most of the men are Somali refugees who left the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul in two waves, starting in late 2007. While religious devotion may have predisposed them to sympathize with the Islamist cause in Somalia, it took a major geopolitical event — the Ethiopian invasion of their homeland in 2006 — to spur them to join what they saw as a legitimate resistance movement, said friends of the men.

For many of the men, the path to Somalia offered something personal as well — a sense of adventure, purpose and even renewal. In the first wave of Somalis who left were men whose uprooted lives resembled those of immigrants in Europe who have joined the jihad. They faced barriers of race and class, religion and language. Mr. Ahmed, the 26-year-old suicide bomber, struggled at community colleges before dropping out. His friend Zakaria Maruf, 30, fell in with a violent street gang and later stocked shelves at a Wal-Mart.

If failure had shadowed this first group of men, the young Minnesotans who followed them to Somalia were succeeding in America. Mr. Hassan, the engineering student, was a rising star in his college community. Another of the men was a pre-med student who had once set his sights on an internship at the Mayo Clinic. They did not leave the United States for a lack of opportunity, their friends said; if anything, they seemed driven by unfulfilled ambition.

Just to be a bit glib, what kind of minnesotans are these guys?  Starbucks?  Pshhh, if they were really minnesotans, it would be all about Caribou.  Imposters!

Even among the world’s jihadists, the young men from Minneapolis are something of an exception: in their instant messages and cellphone calls, they seem caught between inner-city America and the badlands of Africa, pining for Starbucks one day, extolling the virtues of camel’s milk and Islamic fundamentalism the next.

This however is a good question we should all be asking ourselves.  But, did they need to go to fight?  These boys had the potential to bring their education back to Somalia and rebuild a shattered society.  Instead, they’re helping to destroy it. 

“Allah will never change the situation of a people unless they change themselves,” Mr. Hassan, the engineering student, wrote in a Facebook message he posted on April 15. “Take a sec and think about your situation deeply. What change do you need to make?”

And from our local papers, we find 2 more Minnesota muslims have died in Somali recently -  Relative confirms death of fourth young man from Minnesota in Somalia.

Via AbuS:

‘Run Hadji Run’ fireworks at Wis. store not so patriotic after all

Nothing says patriotism like lighting off racially and religiously insensitive fireworks!  Proud to be an american bigot!

…that my non muslim sister has been to ISNA and I haven’t?  Yes yes, I know it’s one big meat market and fitna fest, but they have some awesome speakers and a kick behind bazaar.  One of her muslim friends was in DC for ISNA and my sister went with her to the bazaar.  *pouts in the corner*

Ah well, at least they have some of the sessions from last year up on the web.   Still waiting for this years.

• This is in no way a review of any sort, just my thoughts. A review would actually require concentration, and with little sleep, I have none.
• Alhamdulilah it was 90 minutes.  I wish it had been longer.
• On the other hand, that meant I was up past 11:00 p.m.  And I’m here at work with 5 hours of sleep.  And I don’t do good on anything less than 8.  Ur.
• loved the muslim version of ring around the rosy: Ring around the kaaba/follow the sahaaba/sajda, sajda/we all bow down.
• MashaAllah those brothers were rocking some awesome beards and thobes
• Ditto mashaAllah rocking those tasbih.
• Didya hear Imam Zaid? I’m pretty sure it was him introducing the event in Chicago.
• I was speculating from the beginning that the masjid was related to Uthman dan Fodio in some way. I was right.  I found an interview with Br. Hamza done last year after watching the movie that mentions it, but can’t find it now.  Dur.
• Now I have an urge to go dig up my african history books from my freshman year of college and reaquaint myself with muslim west africa. 
• Also, need to introduce AbuS to Uthman dan Fodio (ra), cuz he needs to know some kick butt sufis.
• The way Br. Hamza talked about the Prophet (saws) is exactly how I feel about him.  You read more, you change for the better and your love for him increases.
• The dawah Br. Hamza was doing in the prison was awesome.
• Can’t say I’m a fan of gender mixing crowds at hip hop concerts.
• Overall, I thought the movie presented muslims in a very positive light.

Thanks to Rebecca for the reminder.

New Muslim Cool on P.O.V.

It’s on at 9 pm here, which is my bedtime (after maghrib), but I think I’ll make an exception and stay up late tonight

Somali activist tried to stop missing boys from traveling

St. Paul, Minn. – People who know Abia Ali say she is a voice of conscience in her community.

At a rally last week against Minneapolis street violence, she held a bullhorn on the steps of City Hall, urging her fellow Somalis to help police solve a fatal shooting that took place in front of a popular community center.
Proud graduatesA sturdy woman wearing a blue hijab that drapes over her head and body, Ali used her faith to make the case for putting the killer behind bars.

“If you get away with this — in front of Allah, you will not get away,” Ali said to the crowd. “Come forward, and please tell what you saw right there.”

…

But lately, she has felt the spotlight of a federal investigation. The FBI is looking into whether the young men were recruited to fight with an Islamic militia that the U.S government considers a terrorist group. The disappearances have also triggered secret grand jury proceedings.

Ali has heard that FBI agents, working on what she says are false leads, have been asking about her in connection to the case. Agents have been showing Ali’s photograph while conducting interviews as part of their probe, according to some of the young people who attend Abubakar.

Ali said she’s even heard talk in her community that she was the one who sent the boys to fight in their homeland, a country where anarchy and violence are the rule. She denies the accusation.

“It’s very sad,” she said, pausing to dab away tears with the hem of her skirt. “It’s hurting me so much. I’ll be the last person on earth encouraging violence. I’m against violence.”

The truth, Ali said, is that she tried to prevent the boys’ trips to Somalia, even before the disappearances began to garner headlines.

 Click on the link above to read it all.  May Allah (swt) continue to protect this sister’s good work.

Other recent Minnesota Muslim news:

• Charges dropped in shooting of Augsburg student
• Young Somali men escape homeland, but not violence
• Somali students from Augsburg College refused visas by Egyptian government
• CAIR – Somalis take to the street to protest group’s actions vs. Demonstrators support area Muslim group
• Burnsville mosque fills gap for Islamic community - this is a branch of the masjid near our home.  In fact, I think Amin Kader is the imam who married us.

• Agenda to Change our Condition
• The Difference of the Imams
• Love for Allah (swt)
• Muslim Character
• Every single Star Wars novel written after 2000.

1st – the deeny books are totally awesome mashaAllah.  Agenda to Change our condition gives me motivation and direction to continue to improve my taqwa.  T he Difference of the Imams makes me want to become a muhaddith.  Love for Allah (swt) always gives me a boost in my relationship with the Beloved.  And Muslim Character makes me happy and sad.  It makes me happy because it clearly lays out what a beautiful character our beloved Prophet (saws) had.  And it makes me sad because I realize how far the muslim community falls short of the ideal.  If we muslims embodied the beautiful behavior of the Prophet (saws), people would be clamouring to embrace the deen.

Oh yeah, the Star Wars books.  In 1992, Timothy Zahn created the first in a huge number of novels that expanded and continued the universe created in the Star Wars movies.  Throughout the 90s, my sister and I avidly collected and read ever new addition. 

Then in 2000, I went away to college and my disposable income was sucked up by textbooks.  Coupled with my severe disappointment with the prequels, I stopped reading the novels.  A short while ago, I happened upon the Star Wars section of a used bookstore and found dozens of books I hadn’t read.  Inexplicably, I was compelled to pick up the series where I left off.

I’m still ambivalent about the books surrounding the prequel time frame, so for now, I’m concentrating on the post RoJ universe.  Yes, I am well aware of my dorkiness.

I am so tired of opening up the newspaper/turning on the tv/surfing over to cnn.com and seeing another harebrained, completely unislamic act of terrorism was being plotted against an innocent target.

Because we know blowing up a synagogue in NYis really exactly what the Prophet (saws) would have done had he lived in america.  Or not.

Please pick up a book of seerah and learn how a real man acts.

(not) sincerely,

UmmSqueakster

111 days for an act of domestic terrorism?  And the possibility of it being reduced to a misdemeanor????

I hate to be one of those people who is constantly talking about how muslims get a bad rap in the media, but if this were a muslim who was shouting ayat after crashing his truck in the PP building (or anyplace else for that matter), wanna bet he’d get longer than 111 days?  Heck, muslims don’t even need to crash their truck into a building to get beat down.  Merely being muslim is enough.

Excuse me while I go weep at the stupidity and inequality of our justice system.

Cottage Grove man gets 111 days in Planned Parenthood crash‘

A Cottage Grove man who drove his truck into the front of a Planned Parenthood clinic on the anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision legalizing abortion was sentenced to the 111 days he has already served.

If Matthew Lee Derosia, 33, follows rules of his probation for the next five years, his conviction will be reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor, Ramsey County District Judge John Van de North ruled Tuesday.

Derosia pleaded guilty to one count of criminal damage to property in the Jan. 22 incident at the clinic at 1965 Ford Parkway in St. Paul’s Highland Park neighborhood. When police arrived, he was standing by the truck, holding a crucifix and shouting Bible verses, according to the criminal complaint in the case.

No one was injured in the crash.

Derosia was later celebrated in a list of “prisoners of Christ” on an anti-abortion Web site.

…jummah bad.

Over all, jummah good:

• Met a new sister on the bus
• Saw Keith Ellison
• Saw lots of dads bring their kiddos with them.  There is nothing cuter then a little kid in a kufi or hijab.  Except Squeaky.  Squeaky is the cutest thing ever

jummah bad:

• Drunk wedged himsef into the seat on the bus next to my new friend and proceeded to slobber all over and call her names.  Rrrrr.
• Brothers, I know you think you’re all that, but is it really appropriate to wear a shirt that says F(emale) B(ody) I(nspector)?  Is that how you want to present yourself to the community and to Allah (swt)?  Lower your gaze!

If you haven’t donated yet, do it!

I really really liked this movie.   AbuS did as well.  Thoughts with spoilers after the cut. Read the rest of this entry »

As I (think that I) learn more about arabic, I find that arabic plurals slip into my vocabulary.  Ahadith, faraid, and ibadat are some that I’ve use most frequently as of late.

So my tangent is this – when speaking muslimgish (muslim english), should we pluralize singular arabic words following english grammatical norms, or arabic grammatical norms.

hadiths vs. ahadith

fards vs. faraid

ibadahs vs. ibadat

muslims vs. muslimeen

dhikr (I don’t think I’ve ever heard this made plural englishly, people just “do dhikr”) vs. adhakar

sheikhs vs. shuyuk

salats vs. salawah

and to go further

hijabi (probably the most prevelant muslimgish word) vs muhajabah

and even further

hijabis vs. muhajabat

Of course, the danger in all of this is that my knowledge of arabic grammar is pitiful at best, and I run the risk of looking like a fool when I pluralize something wrong (like I probably did somewhere in the preceeding  list).

So if you look up at the top of this blog, right there above the beloved Squeakster, you’ll notice a bunch of links.  One of these says “converts.”  If you could, please click it and look through the list. 

Is there anything missing that you think a new convert absolutely must read/listen to/watch?

I am adding this video.  MashaAllah excellent advice that doesn’t scew too heavily towards any one group.  I’m really liking this post-sufi/salafi/traditionalist infighting that has been emerging recently.   At the fundraiser last weekend for Imam Siraj (btw if you haven’t donated yet, DO IT!) it nearly brought me to tears that these beautiful brothers of knowledge from all across the spectrum came together in their love for another brother, who was from a completely seperate part of that spectrum.  If there is hope that the sufi and the salafi can live together not only peacefully, but with a high level of respect for the “other” inspite of our differences,  it’s coming here in america inshaAllah.

     Yay or nay to civil disobedience?  My inner squishy liberal heart when all pitty pat when I saw this picture yesterday.  However, my sister, who works on capital hill for another equally squishy liberal democrat, was not impressed.

    Congressman Keith Ellison (D-Minnesota-Muslim) was arrested at a protest in front of the Sudanese Embassy yesterday in a calculated act of civil disobedience.

Ellison said he and the other members of Congress who were arrested succeeded in bringing national attention to the Darfur crisis that they wouldn’t have received otherwise. “I could have sent out a press release, but it would be, ‘Yeah, so what?’”

…

“They told us three times to leave, we didn’t leave and they arrested us,” Ellison said nearly four hours later, after he paid a $100 fine and was released.

Secret Service spokesman Darrin Blackford said uniformed officers made eight arrests, including Ellison. “They were charged with crossing a police line, which is a misdemeanor,” he said.

Also arrested were Reps. Jim McGovern, D-Mass.; John Lewis, D-Ga.; Donna Edwards, D-Md.; and Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif.; and three Darfur activist leaders

…

Since 2007, early in his congressional tenure, Ellison has tried to make conditions in Darfur a major legislative priority.

     There is something romantic about civil disobedience for us squishy liberals.  Who wouldn’t want to emulate Gandhi and MLK Jr?  And it did bring the issue to the fore.  But will it actually make a difference?  Alas, my inner cynic is also a pessimist in this case.

     On a related note, it does perk up the inner cynic that a muslim is taking a stand on an issue that is not Palestine related.  While we should continue to work for justice for our brothers and sisters in Palestine, we need to take stock of our ummah’s actions and behaviors elsewhere as well.

In Sahh Bukhari, we find that the beloved Prophet (saws) said:

“Help your brother, whether he is an oppressor or he is oppressed.”  He was then asked:  “It is right to help him if he is oppressed, but how should we help him if he is an oppressor?”  He answered:  “By preventing him from oppressing others.”

     From my own humble observations of the muslim ummah, we’re very good at screaming bloody murder when non muslims oppress muslims.  We’re also very good at looking the other way when muslims oppress others.

    It’s high past time that we got our head out of the sand and took this sunnah to heart.

Lots of stuff to share today: 

I think there is scarcely a muslim community in the US that has not been helped by Imam Siraj at one point or another.  It’s high time we give back.

Via Indigo Jo, an article on the civil war in the right wing islamophobe blogosphere.  I must have a bit of a masochistic side, because I semi-regularly browse several of the blogs mentioned.  This story gave me warm fuzzies.

Faraz Rabbani has been putting out some mashaAllah excellent podcasts.  Two new ones in the last 2 days, one on the significance of wudu, and the other on the goal of seeking sacred knowledge.

 And out of Minnesota, the war on pirates hits close to home.  The director of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center, Omar Jamal, is out in New Yorktrying to get a lawyer for the young pirate.  Back home, (republican) Marty Seifert isn’t too happythat someone is actually, you know, helping the wheels of justice progress.  The right to an attorney?  Pshhh, who needs an attorney?  He wants government funding to the SJAC taken away. 

See, here’s what I don’t get.  We have a system here in the US, a justice system.  You either work within it (legally) or outside of it (illegally).   If someone wants to work within the system, they’re bad and must be punished?  What exactly are we suppose to do with this accused pirate?  Turn him over to a lynch mob? 

I’m getting depressed listening to the radio on my commute, and will have to set up itunes on the new computer so I can start listening to more deeny things on the bus.  However, I’ve got to figure out how to set up a news feed or alert, so that whenever “somali” and/or “muslim” is mentioned in MPR, I’ll get an alert.

Heard on the radio this morning:

“American” calls for Somali action in extremist recruiting video

But will the video’s message resonate with its intended audience? At least one leading scholar on Somalia thinks the answer is no.

“The hip-hop dimension was almost a parody,” said Ken Menkhaus, a professor at Davidson College in North Carolina. “I can imagine a lot of people watching it and giggling, but I can’t imagine it would succeed in recruiting anyone to that cause.”

Menkaus doubts the video will succeed in recruiting new fighters because the timing of its release seems to miss the mark. Al-Shabaab had popular support among Somalis when it was fighting against the Ethiopian invasion. But now that the Ethiopian forces have left Somalia, Al-Shabaab has lost its main rallying point.

Menkhaus also doubts the claims made by Abu Mansoor, the American.

“He came across boasting that he was training or leading attacks on the Ethiopians,” Menkaus said. “Anyone who knows anything about Somalia knew that was a fraud. The Somalis are experts at ambushes in their own country. The last thing they need is some American telling them what to do, in English, so it would have to be translated. I mean, what kind of ambush leader is that?”

Menkhaus says Abu Mansoor was a bit of an urban legend — an American who for some time was rumored to be fighting against the Ethiopians. But the decision for Abu Mansoor to reveal his face on this video was a big mistake, Menkhaus said, “because the myth was a lot larger than the guy.”

…indictments near?

Somali man’s return to Minnesota sets community abuzz

Omar Jamal, executive director of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center, said Saturday that the 22-year-old man was recruited for jihad before a change of heart led him to return in recent months. Jamal wouldn’t confirm the man’s identity, saying that he and his family fear for their safety and are in hiding. Others identified him only as Kamal.

The disappearances of perhaps a dozen young men from the Twin Cities have traumatized and divided the local Somali community.

…

Farhan (Omar) Hurre, director of the Abubakar As-Saddique mosque in south Minneapolis, said Saturday that he knows of at least 10 people within the Somali community who received subpoenas in the past two months.

…

While FBI director Mueller never said where Shirwa Ahmed was influenced, much of the focus has been on Twin Cities mosques, and Abubakar specifically.

Somalis Missing From Minn. May Have Returned

Now, as many as four of the men have returned from Somalia, and NPR’s Dina Temple Raston, who has been reporting on this story tells host Renee Montagne that sources say the men have been seen around the Somali community in the Cedar Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis, but now it appears they have gone underground.

“It is unclear whether they are under protective custody or whether their parents are keeping them under wraps just to keep them safe,” Raston says. The FBI initially thought that the men who returned to the U.S. were dangerous, but after interviews with two of them, investigators no longer think that is the case.

…

A grand jury has been convened, indicating the FBI has some suspects in its crosshairs, but those proceedings are secret. So far, the grand jury has brought some indictments, but there could be more, as the grand jury is still working. Details of the indictments are sealed, as is the investigation. Similar investigations have also been convened in San Diego and Boston.

Ok, also, I somehow managed to miss this story – Probing the Somali-Minneapolis Terrorist Axis – um yeah, does that title weird anyone else out?

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/leMWi2asGPw" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

coming to PBS in June inshaAllah.

Just the other day I was saying alhamdulilah that I live in Minnesota.  Here, we have no problem with hijab on our driver’s license, while sisters in other states like Oklahoma have faced discrimination.

Or should I say we HAD no problem.  Apparently, Steve Gottwelt, a republican state representative, has introduced a bill to bad headgear on drivers licenses.  He claims it’s to deter gang bangers from using their clothing to obscure their identity, but there’s no exception for people who cover their heads due to a religious belief.  There is an exception for people with medical conditions and ”deformities,” so why none for hijabs, turbans, kufis, kippahs and the like? 

I can’t imagine for a second that this would pass, but it does hint at an underlying anti muslim sentiment is creeping into the open.

Via MR:

As Salamu Alaikum, Dear Brothers and Sisters!

It is well known now that I have been suffering from hypertension. Al Hamdulillah, I have been working with it for a while now, and insha’Allah it’s pretty much under control. As a result of being thoroughly checked by the competent doctors in Atlanta , I have been recently diagnosed with prostate cancer. Al Hamdulillah, inna lillahi wa inna ilaihi rajiun. (All Praise is for Allah. Truly, to Allah we belong and truly, to Him we shall return.)

My diagnosis is not as bad as it sounds on the surface. Many men have been cured from prostate cancer. My doctors are very optimistic about my cure, and so am I. Insha’Allah the treatment should last about two months. But you and I know that the cure is in the Hands of Allah. If Allah heals me, I will be very grateful. If Allah doesn’t heal me, then I will be patient and happily accept my fate. This is the way of the Believers. I am looking forward to full recovery and getting back to work in the not-too-distant future, insha’Allah.

Many people will ask the question, what can we do? Don’t waste your time feeling sorry for me. Make du’a. But don’t just make du’a for me. There are a lot of Muslims, men and women, with cancer (and other diseases). Make du’a for them also. There are so many among the elderly, who need our help, make du’a for them. There are so many Muslims who have lost their jobs, lost their homes, make du’a for them! Beyond the prayers, go visit the sick, those in prison, and others in need.

Get involved more with Islamic work. Support organizations like MANA, ISNA, ICNA, MAS, CAIR, SIFCA, the community in association with Imam Warith Deen Mohammed, the community of Imam Jamil Al Amin, etc. Support good brothers and sisters, like Mauri’ Saalakhan of the Peace and Justice Foundation. Support Islamic education and schools. If you want to help Imam Siraj, then help support his Masjid, Masjid At-Taqwa, in Brooklyn, New York and all the other struggling Masjids throughout America.

Every challenge we face in life presents us with many opportunities for growth. With a heightened awareness and sensitivity about health-related issues, I will feel better when we, as an ummah, learn more about our health. We have to be very careful about the foods we consume! I urge all of us to cultivate healthy appetites such that we begin to love and crave foods that are good FOR us and eliminate foods that are not. I intend with Allah’s help to share information with you in the coming weeks about our health.

On behalf of MANA, I encourage you to lend your support to our growing Organization. Every MANA project is structured to strengthen American Muslim communities. The SHARE Centers, Healthy Marriage Initiative, Community Reentry Program, and Healing and Reconciliation Project all need input and active service urgently. Please contact the MANA office to find out more and look for regular updates in our newsletters, insha’Allah.

In closing, I am humbled and very thankful for all the prayers, and well wishes of the Muslims, and am very appreciative for all the help extended to me and my family in the past. Alhamdulillah! I am also overwhelmed with gratitude that a number of you want to lend financial support, and have asked how you can do that. Online donations can be made here, or feel free to correspond with me directly at Siraj Wahhaj, P.O. Box 312264, Atlanta, GA 31131.

Thank you kindly. May Allah guide and protect us all.

Your brother in faith,

Imam Siraj Wahhaj

Imam Siraj has been to the twin cities several times since I’ve moved here to raise funds for one organization or another.  He travels all over the country doing fundraisers, without receiving much in return.  It’s fair to say that Imam Siraj has dedicated his life to Allah (swt) and to the american muslim community.

Now is the time for us to give back to Imam Siraj.  Donate and make abundant dua for the Imam.

Halaltube has 45 lectures by Imam Siraj.

Two muslim related stories on my NPR station here today:

 Was Bridges TV Beheading an Honor Killing?

With an excerpt from Sh. Hamza’s khutbah last Friday and a short interview with him.

Somalis worried after suicide bomber details emerge

As federal authorities continue to investigate the disappearances of a number of young Twin Cities men, some Somalis say the climate feels similar to the months following 9/11.

Mueller on Monday told the independent Council on Foreign Relations that authorities believe Ahmed, a naturalized U.S. citizen, “was radicalized in his hometown in Minnesota.”

…

Sharmarke Jama, 26, said many Somali-Americans bitterly opposed the 2006 Ethiopian invasion of their homeland. Jama, and his friend, Ramla Bile, said they heard stories about the Ethiopian troops raping Somali women and looting property. And they said it’s not surprising that some Somali-Americans were moved to action.

“But you heard it in the sense of, ‘I want to go back to Somalia and bring change,’” Jama said. “But then the suicide bombing changed the dynamics. I think it scared a lot of people. It was seen as something so anti-Somali.”

…

And now, Bile said wonders what the general public might think of Somalis in Minnesota.

While she was riding a light-rail train recently, Bile said she overheard a group of men harassing a teen-age Somali boy, telling him that his people were terrorists and that they didn’t deserve to be here.

 

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Feb. 18, 2009
Media contact: Wajahat Ali, 510-909-7506, wajahatmali@hotmail.com

American Muslims Call for Swift Action Against Domestic Violence

Murder of Buffalo resident Aasiya Zubair spurs American Muslims to forcefully address domestic abuse and violence against women; call on imams to address DV in Friday sermons

SAN FRANCISCO – A coalition of Muslim organizations, journalists, community leaders, imams, and other concerned citizens are calling for immediate action by American Muslim leaders and religious figures to address domestic abuse and violence in America, including that found in the American Muslim community, on Friday, February 20, 2009. 

In response to the collective concern of the American Muslim community, imams and religious leaders across America have been asked to speak out against domestic violence to their congregations. They are asked to remind congregants of the Prophet Muhammad’s abhorrence of harshness, abuse and violence, and emphasize solutions that strengthen families and ensure all members are treated with fairness and respect, free of fear of abuse or violence.

Members of the coalition are contacting imams and religious leaders in major Islamic centers and mosques. They are encouraging sermons addressing domestic violence and are offering resources available through the Peaceful Families Project, a Muslim-run domestic violence prevention organization founded in 2000, to help educate the American Muslim community. This education addresses the extent to which domestic violence exists and strategies to stop it.

Several prominent imams have heeded the call to action by concerned American Muslims including Shaykh Hamza Yusuf of the Zaytuna Institute in Berkeley, Ca. and Imam Tahir Anwar of the South Bay Islamic Association in San Jose, Ca. These imams have committed their Friday sermons to addressing domestic violence and preaching that in the Islamic tradition and by the example of the Prophet Muhammad, family harmony can never be achieved by force and that emotional and physical abuse is never acceptable.

This call is being broadcast through various channels, including blogs, Facebook groups, personal contacts, and news media. “The outcry among Muslim Americans against this type of violence is a heartfelt one,” said Shahed Amanullah, editor-in-chief of the online newsmagazine altmuslim.com. “It is essential that we address the problem and take steps to ensure that no one else faces the same tragic fate as Ms. Zubair.”

Specific calls to action for imams and religious leaders include:

1. Unequivocally denounce domestic violence and any attitudes that enable or excuse it
2. Remind Muslims that the Prophet Muhammad condemned with unequivocal language all forms of spousal abuse.
3. Immediately create community social service committees made up of qualified social service providers to supply educational resources and staff institutional programs that support abused and battered women.
4. Promote educational and awareness programs that outline abusive and violent behaviors. 
5. Allow community members ways of pointing out and preventing the emergence or escalation of possibly abusive relationships and environments

Individuals and organizations helping to organize this call (partial list, titles for identification purposes only):

• Salma Abugideri, Peaceful Families Project
• Wajahat Ali, Playwright, Attorney and Journalist, domesticcrusaders.com
• Shahed Amanullah, editor-in-chief of the online newsmagazine altmuslim.com
• Zeba Iqbal, Council for the Advancement of Muslim Professionals
• Ruby Khan, Director, Hamdard Center for Health and Human Services
• Dr. Aminah McCloud, Professor of Islamic Studies, DePaul University
• Hussein Rashid, Visiting Professor, Hofstra University, husseinrashid.com

Mosques, imams, and organizations confirmed to have joined this effort (partial list):

• Arab American Association of New York (New York, NY)
• Arab Muslim American Federation (New York, New York)
• Council of the Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago – Imam Abdul Malik Muhajid
• Islamic Society of San Francisco – Imam Khalid Siddiqui
• Islamic House of Wisdom (Dearborn, MI) – Imam Mohammad Elahi
• Islamic Center of Greater Lansing (Detroit, MI) – Imam Dawud Walid
• South Bay Islamic Association (San Jose, CA) – Imam Tahir Anwar
• The Islamic Center at New York University – Haroon Moghul
• Zaytuna Institute (Berkeley, CA) – Shaykh Hamza Yusuf

Resources for the media regarding Muslim efforts to confront domestic violence:

• ACCESS (Michigan): www.accesscommunity.org
• Apna Ghar (Chicago): www.apnaghar.org
• Central Texas Muslimaat (Austin, Texas): http://www.ctmaustin.org
• Domestic Violence Resources for Muslims:  http://www.crescentlife.com/psychissues/domestic_violence.htm
• Facebook Call to Action: www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=54807221754 
• Hamdard Center for Health and Human Services (Chicago):  http://www.hamdardcenter.org
• Manavi (New York, NY):  http://www.manavi.org
• Muslims For Progressive Values (Los Angeles): http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/mpv-dv
• Narika (San Francisco):  http://www.narika.org
• North American Islamic Shelter for the Abused (San Francisco): http://www.ask-nisa.org
• Peaceful Families Project: www.peacefulfamilies.org
• Sakhi (New York, NY):  http://www.sakhi.org
• SEMAH (San Francisco): http://www.semah.org
• Tahirih Justice Center (Falls Church, Va..): http://www.tahirih.org
• Turning Point for Women and Families (New York, NY): www.turningpoint-ny.org

US congressmen express shock at Gaza devastation

Ellison, a representative from Minnesota, harshly criticised restrictions on the delivery of desperately needed goods into the coastal strip that has been under a crippling Israeli blockade imposed after the Hamas takeover.

“People, innocent children, women and non-combatants, are going without water, food and sanitation, while the things they so desperately need are sitting in trucks at the border, being denied permission to go in,” he said.

“The stories about the children affected me the most,” said Ellison. “No parent, or anyone who cares for kids, can remain unmoved by what Brian and I saw here.”

Rep. Ellison heads to the Middle East

Ellison spoke with MPR News from the ruins of a high school that he said American taxpayers had helped build.

“Why would this school, the American International school get bombed?” he said. “Just thinking about these seniors and all the kids that go to this school and how we’re trying to create kids with a democratic and liberal education, and how now all those dreams have just collapsed with this building.”

Homeland Security to meet with Somali community leaders

Officials with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security are visiting Minneapolis this week. The agency says it wants to build better relationships with the area’s Somali community, which has been shaken by the recent disappearances of young men.

Minnesota Somali Religious Leaders Welcome New Unity Government in Somalia

Somali imams and religious leaders in Minnesota fully support the process of peace, reconciliation, and unity that lead to the election of President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed. Minnesota enjoys the largest number of Somalis in the nation and we add our voice to strengthen the peace process. Cognizant of the significance of this historic moment for stability, we propose the following:

1. The government and people of Somalia – inside the country and outside – must work together for peace and unity.
2. The new government and the Resistance forces must resolve the differences through peaceful negotiations, and work together for the benefit of the people.
3. The Somalis as Muslim people must desist from extending the civil war, and forgive one another.
4. The new government must work for justice and equality to achieve peace.
5. The government must apply Islamic Law as the basis of the constitution.
6. Somalis must rely on themselves in determining the future of the country to avoid foreign interference.
7. Somali scholars and intellectuals must realize the special responsibility placed upon their shoulders in determining the future of the nation.
8. The government must act quickly to provide relief the suffering of the displaced people inside and outside the country.
9. The Somali religious leaders in Minnesota are willing to play a constructive role in mediating the conflicting groups in the country, if needed.

Via TWFKAJAABMW?

RESPONDING TO THE KILLING OF AASIYA HASSAN: AN OPEN LETTER TO THE LEADERS OF AMERICAN MUSLIM COMMUNITIES

By Imam Mohamed Hagmagid Ali
Executive Director, ADAMS Center
Vice-President, The Islamic Society of North America

The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) is saddened and shocked by the news of the loss of one of our respected sisters, Aasiya Hassan whose life was taken violently. To God we belong and to Him we return (Qur’an 2:156). We pray that she find peace in God’s infinite Mercy, and our prayers and sympathies are with sister Aasiya’s family. Our prayers are also with the Muslim community of Buffalo who have been devastated by the loss of their beloved sister and the shocking nature of this incident.

This is a wake up call to all of us, that violence against women is real and can not be ignored. It must be addressed collectively by every member of our community. Several times each day in America, a woman is abused or assaulted. Domestic violence is a behavior that knows no boundaries of religion, race, ethnicity, or social status. Domestic violence occurs in every community. The Muslim community is not exempt from this issue. We, the Muslim community, need to take a strong stand against domestic violence. Unfortunately, some of us ignore such problems in our community, wanting to think that it does not occur among Muslims or we downgrade its seriousness.

I call upon my fellow imams and community leaders to never second-guess a woman who comes to us indicating that she feels her life to be in danger. We should provide support and help to protect the victims of domestic violence by providing for them a safe place and inform them of their rights as well as refer them to social service providers in our areas.

Marriage is a relationship that should be based on love, mutual respect and kindness. No one who experiences a marriage that is built on these principles would pretend that their life is in danger. We must respond to all complaints or reports of abuse as genuine and we must take appropriate and immediate action to ensure the victim’s safety, as well as the safety of any children that may be involved.

Women who seek divorce from their spouses because of physical abuse should get full support from the community and should not be viewed as someone who has brought shame to herself or her family. The shame is on the person who committed the act of violence or abuse. Our community needs to take a strong stand against abusive spouses. We should not make it easy for people who are known to abuse to remarry if they have already victimized someone. We should support people who work against domestic violence in our community, whether they are educators, social service providers, community leaders, or other professionals.

Our community needs to take strong stand against abusive spouses and we should not make it easy for them to remarry if they chose a path of abusive behavior. We should support people who work against domestic violence in our community, whether they are educators or social service providers. As Allah says in the Qur’an: “O ye who believe! Stand firmly for justice, as witnesses to Allah, even as against yourselves, or your parents, or your kin, and whether it be (against) rich or poor: for Allah can best protect both. Follow not the lusts (of your hearts), lest you swerve, and if you distort (justice) or decline to do justice, verily Allah is well-acquainted with all that you do” (4:136).

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) never hit a women or child in his life. The purpose of marriage is to bring peace and tranquility between two people, not fear, intimidation, belittling, controlling, or demonizing. Allah the All-Mighty says in the Qur’an: “Among His signs is this, that He created for you mates from among yourselves, that ye may dwell in tranquility with them and He has put love and mercy between your (hearts): verily in that are signs for those who reflect” (30:21),

We must make it a priority to teach our young men in the community what it means to be a good husband and what the role the husband has as a protector of his family. The husband is not one who terrorizes or does harm and jeopardizes the safety of his family. At the same time, we must teach our young women not to accept abuse in any way, and to come forward if abuse occurs in the marriage. They must feel that they are able to inform those who are in authority and feel comfortable confiding in the imams and social workers of our communities.

Community and family members should support a woman in her decision to leave a home where her life is threatened and provide shelter and safety for her. No imam, mosque leader or social worker should suggest that she return to such a relationship and to be patient if she feels the relationship is abusive. Rather they should help and empower her to stand up for her rights and to be able to make the decision of protecting herself against her abuser without feeling she has done something wrong, regardless of the status of the abuser in the community.

A man’s position in the community should not affect the imam’s decision to help a woman in need. Many disasters that take place in our community could have been prevented if those being abused were heard. Domestic violence is not a private matter. Any one who abuses their spouse should know that their business becomes the business of the community and it is our responsibility to do something about it. She needs to tell someone and seek advice and protection.

Community leaders should also be aware that those who isolate their spouses are more likely to also be physically abusive, as isolation is in its own way a form of abuse. Some of the abusers use the abuse itself to silence the women, by telling her “If you tell people I abused you, think how people will see you, a well-known person being abused. You should keep it private.”

Therefore, to our sisters, we say: your honor is to live a dignified life, not to put on the face that others want to see. The way that we measure the best people among us in the community is to see how they treat their families. It is not about how much money one makes, or how much involvement they have in the community, or the name they make for themselves. Prophet Muhammed (peace be upon him) said, “The best among you are those who are best to their families.”

It was a comfort for me to see a group of imams in our local community, as well as in the MANA conference signing a declaration promising to eradicate domestic violence in our community. Healthy marriages should be part of a curriculum within our youth programs, MSA conferences, and seminars as well as part of our adult programs in our masajid and in our khutbahs.

The Islamic Society of North America has done many training workshops for imams on combating domestic violence, as has the Islamic Social Service Associate and Peaceful Families Project. Organizations, such as FAITH Social Services in Herndon, Virginia, serve survivors of domestic violence. All of these organizations can serve as resources for those who seek to know more about the issues of domestic violence.

Faith Trust Institute, one of the largest interfaith organizations, with Peaceful Families Project, has produced a DVD in which many scholars come together to address this issue. I call on my fellow imams and social workers to use this DVD for training others on the issues of domestic violence. (For information, go to the website: www.faithtrustinstitute.org/). For more information, or to access resources and materials about domestic violence, please visit www.peacefulfamilies.org.

In conclusion, Allah says in the Qur’an “O my son! Establish regular prayer, enjoin what is just, and forbid what is wrong; and bear with patient constancy whatever betide thee; for this is firmness (of purpose) in (the conduct of) affairs” (31:17). Let us pray that Allah will help us to stand for what is right and leave what is evil and to promote healthy marriages and peaceful family environments. Let us work together to prevent domestic violence and abuse and especially, violence against women.

I was going to bold parts I found especially important, but I realized halfway through I was bolding just about the entire letter.  Read it, pass it on, implement it.

So there’s this jehovah’s witness lady who rides my bus.  She’s quite nice, and I used to sit next to her often.  However, our schedules have changed and we don’t take the same bus anymore.

As an ardent JW, she would try to share her faith with me every time we saw each other.  I nod, smile, take the occasional magazine, and in time, I pointed her towards the husband.  The husband actually enjoys talking with proselytizers.   Unfortunately, he has a knack for scaring them away.  When the mormons came knocking, he was happy to talk, but when he asked if they had the signs of faith in Mark 16:17-18, ie they’d be able to drink poison, they left rather quickly.

The JW lady set him up to talk with several different “brothers,” all of whom got frustrated with my husband questions about scriptural discrepancies and stopped returning his emails and refused to meet with him.  For a group of people who profess to be serious students of the bible, they weren’t very good at answering questions about the scripture.  The last brother actually told my husband to just read the message and stop concentrating on the text itself.  The husband countered that if the text is flawed, how could anyone believe the message?

Last year, we had the JW lady and some of her friends over to our apartment.  Their goal was to do some witnessing.  My goal was to do some reverse dawah.  I cleaned everything from top to bottom, and prepared fresh fruit and dessert.  She couldn’t stop thanking me for being so kind to them, that normally people were very terse when they came around.  I explained that our Prophet (saws) made hospitality a matter of faith:

Whoever believes in Allah and the Last Day, let them treat their guest generously. (Bukhari, Muslim, others)

And that it was my duty to make them feel comfortable.  Then they got into the discussion with my husband re: the bible.  No headway was made.  After awhile, the JW’s friends started to look uncomfortable, so they prepared to leave.  As they were about to head out the door, I pulled a few qurans off the shelf and offered them.  They refused.  I was floored.  Here was had given them the opportunity to preach their faith to us, offered them the hospitality of our home, and they refused a gift in kind?  After that, I began to politely decline the offers of magazines and discussions on the bus.  If you’re going to witness, at least be open to witnessing in kind.

My husband still sees the JW lady on the bus on occasion.  This morning, he called me up as I walked to work, and was very excited.  He’d been having an email discussion with the JW lady recently, and this morning on the bus, she gave him a list of questions for him to answer about islam.  Alhamdulilah, her first interest in the religion, aside from a few passing questions about the end of times.

Make dua for Allah (swt) to open her heart and to guide our hands as we answer these questions.

define chutzpha.  To stand outside someone’s place of worship with a megaphone and slander their religion.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/nPZxsuRlvh4" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/-v1DtuYOEYc" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

I especially like the rant at minute 6 of the first video.  We don’t convert to christianity because we don’t want to give up our sin, that we’d rather have a few minutes of pleasure then all of eternity.  Srsly?  Aside from polygamy and not believing in the divinity of Jesus (as), I can’t think of anything muslims are allowed to do that is considered a sin for christians.

If they took down the signs, put away the megaphones, and just tried to engage in dialogue (a’la the Prophet Muhammad), I’d have no issue.  But dudes, a megaphone?

Interesting, a collaboration between Madison and WPR:

Inside Islam: Challenging Misconceptions, Illuminating Diversity

When I went to Madison, they were just starting to build up their program re: Islam.   I took an excellent class on Islamic History with Michael Chamberlain, and if I had had more time, I would have taken every class he taught.  Joe Elder also taught courses on the middle east and islam that were well worth the time taking.  Assema Sinha taught a course on South Asia in the International System that greatly helped me understand Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.  I kept a lot of books from those classes, which means they must be awesome if a poor college student passes up the chance to make a few bucks selling them, ha.

Since my time there, I see they’ve been developing their ME program and adding faculty, in particular Asifa Quraishi at the Law School as a specialist in Islamic Law.

Ok, enough musing about my college days, check out the Inside Islam webpage and the WPR programs.  They have a program on Eco-Islam planned for the future that looks exciting.  If there’s a topic you’d like them to discuss, or someone you’d like to hear, they’re open to suggestions.  It would be nice to see more guests who come from outside academia.  Also, no topics on american converts yet.  Maybe I’ll have to suggest something…

The story that’s been playing here in Minnesota for some months has now made it to the big time – NPR.

Just hours before President Barack Obama took the oath of office, the FBI had word from overseas of a possible terrorist attack. The threat was linked to a Somali hard-line jihadist group called al-Shabab, or The Youth.

The threat came at a time when the FBI was focused on what looked like a massive recruitment effort of young men from Somali communities in the U.S. As many as two dozen of them have disappeared from Minneapolis alone in the past year.

Federal agents are worried these young men are training in Somalia and could end up returning to the U.S. to launch a terrorist attack.

The most recent disappearances happened last November, on Election Day. That’s when 17-year-old Burhan Hassan and six of his friends seemed to vanish. As the rest of the Somali community in the Twin Cities’ Cedar-Riverside neighborhood were watching the election returns, the boys slipped away, boarded a plane and headed to Africa.

It’s surreal to hear places you know well talked about on the national news. The Towers?  Been there.  Minnesota Dawah Institute?  Been there too.

So now this is the question to ask – will these kids keep the fighting in Somalia, or will they bring it back to the US?  The later appears to be the FBI’s fear.

Thoughts later.  inshaAllah the Obama administration’s policies towards muslims will extend beyond a few words in his inaugural address:

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

…

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West — know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

…while working overtime on Sunday, I was listening to the inaugural concert on NPR.  Now, aside from the increadibly bugie act of being a dedicated NPR fan and supporter, I further exposed myself as a RIM when I squeed as Bono listed Palestine as one of the countries yearning for freedom.

Also, when Bruce Springsteen and Pete Seeger sang “This Land is Your Land,” I sang along.  Then I tried to call my sister, who was at the concert, just so I could feel like I was there.

However, I’m conflicted.  I’m a Hamza Yusuf Fan girl and an obvious RIM, but I attend a ghetto masjid.  Contradictions…make…head…explode…

Umar Lee blogs about “RIMS” undermining Islam in the west and their “chief,” Sheikh Hamza.

Indigo Jo responds.

I’ll just comment a little further on one point:

7 – Using English Instead of Arabic

The Sunnah becomes the Prophetic Tradition. Shariah become Sacred Law, Allah becomes God, etc. RIM converts usually keep their non-Muslim names (especially if they are white). The more Western and white Islam can be made by RIMS the better (although this is a futile effort).

There is no need to take an Arabic name, or indeed any new name unless one’s existing name is offensive to Islam, for example, the name of an idol or an anti-Islamic Arabic Christian name like Abdul-Maseeh. Most of the Sahaba did not take new names, and non-Arabic names are common in parts of the world where Arabic is not spoken; Arabic naming customs are rare outside the Arabic-speaking world, in fact, other than among converts and “salafis” in the West. The rest of what he refers to here is not unlawful or offensive, particularly when explaining Islam to non-Muslims, and those scholars who use these terms in writing (e.g. Shaikh Nuh Keller in the Reliance of the Traveller) use the Arabic words otherwise.

I kept my name when I converted for many reasons.  First, my parents gave me my name and I did not want to dishonor them by changing it.  Second, as Indigo Jo writes, it wasn’t necessary for the sahaba to change their names, so why should I?

But perhaps most importantly now, I kept my name because I don’t need to be an arab to be a muslim.  I’m not attempting to make Islam more western and white.  I’m showing that Islam is for euro-americans, just as it is for black americans, egyptians, pakistanis, nigerians,  indonesians, heck, every person on this planet.  I don’t need to give up my cultural identity when I embrace Islam.  It become part of my muslim identity.

I didn’t need to take a “muslim” (read arabic) name when I converted.  When I became muslim, Jennifer became a muslim name.

Tangent – I wonder if UL has a beef with the scholars of the subcontinent who refer to islamic terms in urdu, ie namaz for salat.  Are they part of the vast RIM conspiracy too?

Via Sufi News and Sufism World Report:

“You’d believe me if I said I was from Minnesota, right?” asks Charlie Sanders, noting his appearance, at the top of his new solo show.  “But if I told you I was raised Muslim. you’d think I was kidding. ”

…
Sanders draws in the audience by recalling, with hilarious acuity, the confusion of his teenage peers in the early ’90s. Spike Lee had just made Malcolm X; when some of the African-Americans at Sanders’s school found out he was Muslim, they accused him of posing, of trying to co-opt something “black.” Then he recited a prayer in perfect Arabic, and they lionized him.

…

The piece teems with misguided characters searching for meaning.  In spite of this – or pehraps because of it – Sanders offers no message.  His disinterest in dogma might mirror a decision to leave behind the religion of his youth (he admits he’s agnostic now).

I’m disapointed by that last bit – would love to see more practicing muslims creating “halal theater.”  The husband is in theater, if only as an accountant for one, lol.  It does mean we get lots of tickets to lots of shows though

Did a little googling, and found that he’s posting as “Bacon Shakin” on an improv board.  It would be interesting to see the show, if only to try to suss out why someone raised in Islam in the same environment I’m in would leave.

As I’ve written, several young somali american men have disappeared from the Twin Cities in this last year.  Their concerned family members report that these men call them to say that they’re in Somalia, and from what can be gathered, they’re there to fight the jihad.

So what’s the problem, if they’re simply fighting for freedom in their homeland and not killing innocent people?

For starters, the fiqh of jihad.  When my husband arrived in the US, a white convert approached him in the masjid and attempted to engage him in a conversation about jihad and how he hoped he would be able to go and fight soon.   The husband was suspicious that the man was possibly an informant, trying to snag him in some kind of drag net.  He simply told the man that first he needed to learn the fiqh of jihad, and then he walked away.

The fiqh of jihad is complicated and places a lot of rules and restrictions on what a fighter can and cannot do.  There would be a lot less slaughtering of innocent civilians and a lot more noble fighting if these men actually took the time to learn what the beloved Prophet (saws) taught his companions about fighting.

These young men snuck away to fight without telling their parents, and caused them much worry and distress.  Is this what the Prophet (saws) advised?

Ab Sa’eed Khudri (ra) narrated that a person migrated to Rasulullah (saws) from Yemen. He enquired of him: “Do you have anyone in Yemen?” He replied: “Yes, my parents.” “Did they grant you permission?” he asked. He replied: “No”, upon this he said: “Return to them and seek their permission. If they agree, you may wage Jihad or else do good unto them.”[Ab Dawud]

Hadhrat Abdullah bin Amr (ra) reports that a person came to the Holy Prophet (saws) seeking permission to go for Jihad. He asked: “Are your parents alive?” “Yes”, he replied. Upon this he declared: “In them both you should make Jihad.” (Meaning that you should wage Jihad by serving them since this entails the same reward as Jihad) [Bukhari, Muslim and Tirmizi]

Mu’wiyah bin Jahimah (ra) reports that Jahimah once came to Rasulullah (saws) and said: “O Rasulullah! I intend to go into Jihad. I’ve come to you seeking your good counsel.” He asked him: “Is your mother alive.” “Yes,” he replied. Rasulullah (saws) then said: “Hold fast onto (serving) her as paradise lies near her foot.” [Ahmad, Bayhaqi, Nasaie]

Ibne Umar (ra) narrates that the Holy Prophet (saws) stated: “As a measure of good behaviour unto your parents, by you relaxing on the bed making them laugh and they making you laugh is more superior than you waging Jihad with a sword in the path of Allah azza wa Jalla.” [Kanzul - Umm'l]

Certainly, I’m no faqih, but I’m pretty certain that the parties that are recruiting these men from area masjids aren’t either, because there seems to be a pretty clear consensus among the ulema about how one should deal with their parents before partaking in jihad.

“Obeying parents is an individual obligation (fard `ayn), while Jihad (fighting in the Cause of Allah) is a collective obligation (fard kifayah). So, the former takes precedence over the latter. Hence, one is not allowed to participate in Jihad without seeking the consent of one’s parents. Consequently, parents can prevent their son from fighting, if they consider it too dangerous.

Al-Qastalani states that the majority of scholars maintain that one is not allowed to set out for Jihad if his parents or even one of them do not agree. But this is only applicable if parents are Muslims and Jihad does not become an individual obligation (fard `ayn).

Therefore, kindness and obedience to one’s parents are preferable to Jihad, for as we know, the former is an individual obligation, while the latter is a collective one, so long as there is no urgency.

For example, when `Abbas ibn Mirdas wanted to participate in Jihad, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) told him – on knowing his mother to be elderly – that he was to take care of his mother, because obeying her would lead him to Paradise.

Al-Bukhari also reported in his Sahih (Authentic Collection of Hadith) that Ibn Mas`ud asked the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): “O Allah’s Messenger! What are the best deeds?” The Prophet replied, “Performing prayer on time.” Ibn Mas`ud asked, “Then what?” The Prophet said: “Obeying one’s parents.” Ibn Mas`ud said, “Then what?” The Prophet said, “Jihad.”

Thus, we see that the Prophet made kindness and obedience to parents a priority over Jihad. It is also reported, on the authority of `Abdullah ibn `Amr ibn Al-`Aas that a man came to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) to take his permission to fight in the cause of Allah. The Prophet asked him whether his parents were alive. The man said that they were. Hence, the Prophet said: “Taking care of them equals Jihad.”

Moreover, it is reported in the Authentic Books of Hadith, on the authority of Zayd ibn Khalid, that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Whoever provides a fighter in the Cause of Allah with the necessary equipment for Jihad gains the same reward equal to that of the fighter.”

‘Providing for a fighter in the Cause of Allah’ means supporting him whether financially or physically. So, the Prophet stated that such a person receives the same reward as the fighter, even though he is not actually involved in fighting. This is because without such support one can not afford Jihad.”

Ok, nothing to wake me out of my cold induced kitty high like a bs islamaphobic lawsuit:

AIG Bailout Promotes Shariah Law, Lawsuit Claims

The suit — brought with the support of the Thomas More Law Center, a non-profit law firm that promotes conservative Christian values — claims that making U.S. taxpayers comply with Shariah, the Islamic legal framework based on the Koran, is unconstitutional.

This month, AIG announced that it would offer Shariah-compliant homeowner insurance policies, known as takaful, to U.S. customers through one of its subsidiaries. To be Shariah compliant, companies cannot earn interest and must agree to send a percentage of their revenue to Islamic charitable groups.

The lawsuit — by Iraq war veteran Kevin Murray, on behalf of U.S. taxpayers, against Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and the Federal Reserve — claims that by subsidizing AIG, the federal government is conveying “…a message of endorsement and promotion of Shariah-based Islam … and [a] message of disfavor of and hostility toward Christianity and Judaism.

I hadn’t heard of a shariah compliant insurance policy.  We have renters insurance through state farm at present.  *makes mental note to investigate further*

ps – to the lawsuit filers I say bwahah!

…to Wells Fargo for making it easy for their muslim customers to avoid riba.  The husband and I were going to change all our savings accounts (which earn interest) into non interest bearing checking accounts.  We were pleasantly surprised to find that we didn’t need to do that – all we needed to do was fill out a form saying that we declined to earn interest.  The banker who helped us even had the forms all ready printed out, and wasn’t phased in the least when we asked.

Alhamdulilah.

Why is Riba, such as bank interest, forbidden?

How to get rid of haram money

…see, I told you I’m no good at sticking with things!  Too many things that I read/hear and I think, ah, gotta blog about that!

Congressman Ellison makes his pilgrimage to Mecca
Rep. Ellison completes “hajj” pilgrimage to Mecca

“It was transformative. It was a wonderful experience,” Ellison said in a telephone interview today. “I learned a lot about myself, about my faith.”

He said that word soon got around that he was a congressman — some people had recognized him from TV — and he wound up talking to groups of 60 or 70 people.

“I didn’t want to turn it into a politics thing,” he said. “I was trying to play it low. I really wasn’t trying to play the role of the public official.”

Ellison said he talked to the groups about “the importance of calling on your spiritual journey, and that whether you’re a postman or businessman or a congressman, we all need to do what we do better. With more purpose and more focus, and a greater sense of serving humanity and looking out for the poor and stuff like that.”

Ellison says he was struck by the diversity of the people who made the journey, seeing people from many different parts of the world.

“You had people of all backgrounds, all races, all descriptions,” he said. “You had people there who were clearly well-to-do, you had people who were desperately poor,” but everyone was “kind of the same.”

People were encouraged about the role the U.S. will play under President-elect Barack Obama, Ellison said. The fact that Obama’s middle name is Hussein and he had a Muslim father came up in conversation.

“People think that the (incoming) president might have a higher level of sensitivity,” Ellison said.

The comments on the articles are typical, expected and sadly amusing. 

This American Life – Act One. You Gotta Ask Yourself One Question: Do You Feel Clucky? Well…Do ya, Punk? 

Still available for a free download, so get it while it lasts!  I listened to this via podcast over Thanksgiving.  Amusing story about a taweez and a chicken in Afghanistan.

Egyptian Students Explore America In ‘Chicago’

Former Egyptian presidential candidate Alaa Al Aswany is a journalist and the Arab world’s best-selling fiction writer. He makes his living as a dentist in Cairo, which affords him an intimate look at the everyday lives of Egyptians — who often inspire his works.

His latest book, Chicago: A Novel, follows several recent Egyptian emigres as they study at the University of Illinois and their professors, who emigrated to the U.S. decades earlier.

Al Aswany says he drew from his own experiences as a student at the University of Illinois in the 1980s. And he tells Weekend Edition host Liane Hansen that the experience had a big impact.

“I learned something very important in my life in America … what I call the know-how of success. How do you become a successful person?” Al Aswany says he took this knowledge back to Egypt and applied it to his writing.

Holiday Cow shopping in Kabul

Finding A Connection To Judaism During the Eid

The Chabad center they led is about a mile from my grandmother’s apartment in Mumbai. That is where I learned what it means to be a Muslim.

I traveled to India 10 years ago with my friend Kevin, a Jew. My grandmother treated him like family from the moment he walked in the door. Every morning, she would call for Kevin to come into her room. She would hold his head in her lap and whisper Arabic prayers over him, asking God to keep him safe, to guide him on the straight path, to help him be a mercy upon the world.

When she saw Kevin’s books on Judaism, she could hardly contain her excitement. “He is ‘Ahl al kitab,’ ” she would say — meaning he was part of the Abrahamic tradition, a son of the patriarch. My grandmother knew there was a Jewish community in Mumbai and ordered my cousin to track it down so Kevin could have Shabbat dinner. That’s when I first learned there were Jews in India.

My grandmother told us a story about the Prophet Muhammad. A funeral caravan passed him one day, and he was told that it carried the body of a Jew. The prophet stood up to show his respect.

I’m temporarily emerging from my self imposed hiatus to comment on local news that’s become international.  The curious case of the disapearing Minnesota Somalis has made it big time.  It was even on CNN arabic, according to my husband.

I went to the Minnesota Dawah Center, one of the masjids being investigated, on Friday night for an eid get together.  It was rather nice.  We played trivia (I won a hat) and we had somali food for a late dinner.  The only talk while I was there was about teenagers and keeping them engaged with Islam. 

It does appear the masjid is being harassed by local authorities.  An inspector came out this week and found that the sprinkler system was deficient, and that they have to make $20,000 in improvements on it by the end of the year, or risk being condemned.  Granted, the sprinkler system probably does need improvements, but the timing is suspect.  This masjid has been in place for probably 2 years, and it’s being worked on and improved every time I’ve been there.  To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time they’ve received a letter threatening condemnation.

So now the question is – donate money to a group that is possibly being investigated, or let the mosque close?  In general, it does good things for the community – it provides a place for young muslims to come and hang out, it educates people, and has social events to keep kids out of trouble.  But then there’s the suspicion of terrorism hanging over head.

*sigh*

Mabrook to Br. Keith Ellison, who performed hajj this year!  Boo to certain segments of the right wing blogosphere who once again lump all muslims into the ZOMG they’re evil!!1!1!!!1!! camp.

In Abraham’s Footsteps

As Keith Ellison, the first Muslim member of the US Congress who performed Haj this week, told CNN, you forget who you are –- black or white and American or African  —  and where you come from when you are before God circling the Kaaba in a two-piece unstitched garment.

From Farhman Memon

Between the prayers recited by world class imams and speeches, we find out that Congressman Keith Ellison is doing Hajj with us, He exhorts us to bring morality back to America by playing a leadership role in civil society

No sign of a CNN interview on their website unfortunately.

mashaAllah.

Introducing Zaytuna College

Islam has never become rooted in a particular land until that land began producing its own religious scholars. During its twelve-year history in the San Francisco Bay Area, Zaytuna Institute has helped a generation of American Muslims appreciate the enduring legacy of Islamic scholarship. Now, Zaytuna has arrived at a new chapter in its history—and, God willing, in the history of Islam in America.

Please join Imam Zaid Shakir and Shaykh Hamza Yusuf during this special evening as they introduce Zaytuna College, discuss the need for establishing an accredited institution of higher learning, describe the details of the Bachelor’s degree programs the College will offer, and introduce the Bay Area Muslims who will help make it a reality.

Finally, they will invite you to support Zaytuna College, where future generations of Muslims can begin to shape the land in which they live.    

Share your Pictures and Stories with Illume Magazine

With precise vision and the right lens, a picture says more than a thousand words. The editors of Illume Magazine are searching for freelance photography for our thriving periodical. Pictures may be used in both print and electronic media.

Illume Magazine is an emerging publication that emphasizes the Arts and we endeavor to present the talents of photographers. This call for submissions is open to those of all ages, races, cultures and religions.

The Muslim-American experience can be conceptualized and expressed through commanding imagery just as the power of language in literary and journalistic works found in Illume Magazine have.

Help us to incorporate a total sensory experience with the contribution of your visual insight.

from MPR:

 St. Paul, Minn. — Khalifo Shali said she has heard the talk that her 21-year-old son joined the insurgents in his homeland.

While it is true Abdul Mohamud left St. Paul for Somalia last month, Shali said he went for medical reasons — not to become a terrorist.

“My son is sick. He [will go] on a little vacation and maybe visit his family.”

Shali said her son has struggled with bipolar disorder for years. With his doctor’s blessing, she sent him to back his homeland for three months to visit relatives and seek traditional medicine.

Her husband, Dahir Guled, said rumors are feeding rumors in the Somali community about the missing men. And he’s worried the allegations will forever damage his stepson’s name, and maybe those of others who have gone back to their homeland for other reasons.

“People making allegations are a disease, actually. They spread rumors without proof,” Guled said.

Their son attended a storefront mosque called Islamic Da’wah Center. Monday, on the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha, worshippers said their prayers on a red carpet along rows marked by masking tape.

The mosque leader, Imam Hassan Mohamud, said the reports of missing men have put a cloud over the holiday. He had to postpone a big feast because he was busy answering calls and talking to other imams about the issue.

“They disrupted our Eid. People are living in fear instead of happiness.”

Mohamud has even heard of others accusing his mosque of recruiting and training men to fight overseas. He said that claim may have affected yesterday’s fund-raising for the mosque, on a traditional day of giving.

Didn’t hear anything about this at the immigrant and african american dominated masjids that I’ve attended recently.  The husband says that he’s heard some people who’ve heard people say that minnesota somalis should go back to Somalia, without right out saying they should go to fight.

I think they’re talking about the Minnesota Dawah Center.  I’ve been there a few times, most recently for Laylat al Qadr.  They always have very tasty food, but unfortunately, the women’s section is usually full of chatter, and I can never hear the program. 

More recent news coverage:

• Somali Leaders Concerned for Families Missing - MPR
• Families of Somalis missing from Minnesota Speak Out - MPR
• Missing Somalis’ Families speak out, fear their kin have been brainwashed - Pioneer Press
• Holy War Rumors worry local Somalis - Pioneer Press

Minneapolis Somali community facing dark web of murders

At first, Asha had not wanted Ahmednur to volunteer at Brian Coyle. There had been stabbings and shootings in the neighborhood, and Asha feared for his safety. But Asha’s husband, Ahmed Ali Ulusow, a respected elder of the Twin Cities Somali community, thought his son should serve his people. Ahmednur had big ambitions: to work for the United Nations, and, ultimately, to become president of Somalia. He’d even set up a Facebook group for his campaign. “Somalia will be ruled by me in the upcoming years, so I might as well start campaigning now,” he wrote on the group page. He promised to reunite the country and rid it of “qabil minds,” a reference to the clan warfare that catapulted Somalia into civil war in 1991 and continues to tear it apart today. “Islam means peace,” wrote Ahmednur, “and peace we will live in.”

At Brian Coyle that day, Ahmednur helped the other kids finish their homework in the computer lab. As he was supervising little kids in the gym, 16-year-old Ramadan Abdi Shiekhosman came in, wanting to play basketball. Ahmednur told him to come back later, when the younger kids finished. Shiekhosman allegedly got angry, shoved him, and left.

At 5 p.m., Ahmednur finished his job at Brian Coyle for the day and walked into the sunny parking lot. According to the charges against him, Shiekhosman confronted Ahmednur, pulled out a dark-colored handgun, and struck him over the head. The young gunman fired one shot into the back of Ahmednur’s head and then ran away.

(MINNEAPOLIS, MN 11/13/08) ­ On November 14, 2008, the Abuubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center will host a community forum called “Threats to Our Youth: Gangs, Drugs, Homicides, Dropping Out” to address recent incidents in the Somali community.

WHEN: Friday, November 14, 2008, 6 p.m.
SPEAKERS: Representatives from Abu Bakr Islamic Center, Abu Bakr Islamic Center youth program, CAIR-MN, Dar ul Hijrah Islamic Center, and Minneapolis Police.
LOCATION: Abuubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center, 2824 13th Ave. Minneapolis, MN 55407

May Allah (swt) bless and protect these people as they work to confront the troubles facing our community.  Amin.

To my Grandpa, who served in World War 2 in the South Pacific…

to my Great Grandfather, who earned his US citizenship fighting in World War 1…

and to a Great Great Great Grandfather, who died for the North in the Civil War…

…this country isn’t perfect.  But it is a great place to live.  Thank you for keeping it safe.

Via City of Brass, a letter from a muslim who is an active member of the republican party and a candidate for office who’s own party waged war on her because of her religion and ethnicity.  Read the whole thing on City of Brass:

Soon after my nomination, a certain segment of the Republican party made it known that they rejected the nomination due to my ethnic and faith background. They claimed that I was not a “Real” Republican and launched an intensive “character assassination” campaign, in which I was labeled a “radical” and “terror apologist.” My Republican opponent claimed that my intentions “may not always have been so benign towards America.” He invited volunteers to join him to defend the “home front in the War on Islamist Terror.”

Regrettably, the Republican leadership refused to address the problem. The Colorado Republican Chairman, dismissed the claims as the usual “campaign business.” The Republican US Senate Candidate announced  his unqualified endorsement of the abuser. Others, like the Colorado former Speaker of the House went so far as to circulate e-mails that accused me of being an “Islamist mole” and a “strong threat” to Western civilization. My attackers were invited to bring forth any evidence to sustain their charges, but none did.

“She should be jailed for treason” and “The wombs of Arab women are bomb factories,” said the letters in multiple media outlets. To no avail, I pleaded with party officers to urge a minimum standard of decency and truthfulness in campaign politics. The response was that the attacks had not reached the “extreme or outrageous” level which would warrant action to “arbitrate campaign rhetoric.” Instead, I was warned to drop out of the race or face a scandal that would so completely ruin my reputation that I “won’t find anyone in town ” to talk to me. Needless to say, I felt relief when the so-called “real” Republican won the Primary election. Only God knows what other trumped-up claims they would have made, if I had won.

Apparently the Twin Cities is going to find out!  wo0t!

http://www.stthomas.edu/mcdc/events/default.html#daliamogahed

 Dalia MogahedWho Speaks for Muslims?  What A Billion Muslims Think
7:00 PM Wednesday, November 5, 2009
3M Auditorium, Owens Science Hall

Looks like this is becoming a weekly thing.  I think I’m going to change the name of it though – ah minnesota, doncha know.

Judge’s Email Raises Questions

Hennepin County District Judge and Minnesota Supreme Court candidate Deborah Hedlund received an e-mail Monday with the subject line, “Can Muslims Be Good Americans?”

The e-mail came to Hedlund and several other people from Matt Look, owner of Ramsey-based Look Signs, with whom Hedlund was negotiating for some lawn signs.

…

In her reply message to Look — which she inadvertently sent to all original recipients — Hedlund wrote: “Matt, We speak the same language. And I still need to let voters know they have a choice to ‘Seek Justice, Vote For Experience’ for the Minnesota Supreme Court.”

She goes on to discuss negotiations for the signs she wants him to make.

Hedlund said Tuesday that she did not read the message about Muslims and that her comment about speaking “the same language” referred to the fact that she believed she and Look had a deal on the signs.

*Looks around for rolling eyes smilie*

Some republicans have warmed my cold, cold, cynical liberal heart:

McCain supporters defend Islam, shout down Obama attackers

But, lest I get too warm and fuzzy, McCain camp doesn’t allow Muslims for McCain to speak with CNN. 

Worried it will alienate your base?

(muslim) student charged with reporting fake attack

Two words:

Audrey.  Seiler.

I was there.  It was crazy.  The entire campus banded together to search for her.  Donations were made.  The government spent $100,000 looking for Audrey.  All the national media was there.  And when they found her, and were closing in on her “kidnapper” in the swamps, I watched it unfold live on CNN from the cafeteria where I was working.

It was all a hoax, and 4 years later, Audrey isn’t even notable enough to warrent a wikipedia page.

Now the usual suspects are out there raging about those dang muzzies who’ve done it again.  Now they have a reason to look on hate crime reports with suspicion. 

Moral of the story:  Don’t cry wolf.

*sigh*

Because college republicans across the country sponsor speakers like this.

Robert Spencer, who has written several books on the topic of Islamic extremism, discussed why certain sects of Islam are a threat to the West in an event sponsored by UW College Republicans.

From the other student paper:

The College Republicans of UW-Madison hosted Robert Spencer, head of Jihad Watch, to voice his views against Islamic extremism Wednesday at Memorial Union.

Spencer’s presentation, “Jihad: What Muslims Say it Means and Why it Matters,” instigated students to speak out in a question and answer session.

Spencer said he believes the Islamic religion is not a peaceful one and many Islamic groups in the United States have the potential to impose Islamic law on nonbelievers in a violent way.

Say what you will about assorted leftists, socialists and atheists, but when Daniel Pipes came to town in 2003, they rallied together with the MSA to provide a coherent response, and it looks like they did the same this time around as well.

 Also from the first article:

CR Chair Sara Mikolajczak said she thought the event went well overall but called the outbursts by MSA “absolutely ridiculous.”

“It’s one thing to ask a question. I mean, that’s perfectly legitimate — that’s why we open it up to Q-and-A,” Mikolajczak said. “But it’s a completely different thing to talk over a speaker and not to adhere to the rules.”

From the comments:

…isn’t that what the College Republicans did at the John Kerry event? Oh SNAP!

bwahaha, hypocracy at it’s finest!

An updateon the Episcopal Priest(ess) who claims to be both a muslim and a christian.

Wolf has affirmed that determination, barring Redding from functioning as a priest for the next six months.

According to church law, unless Redding resigns her priesthood or denies being a Muslim during those six months, the bishop has a duty to defrock — or depose — her, as the process is formally known.

…

While she does not regret going public about her embrace of Islam, she does acknowledge being naive about the controversy her announcement would stir up.

“I can definitely be a Pollyanna,” she said. “It never occurred to me it was something to be in the closet about. I just thought it was great.”

Getting to know Islam was “like falling in love,” she said. “You want to share it, you want to get on a rooftop and start shouting.”

The article discusses the Episcopal church’s reaction to this synchronism of faith, but nothing about the muslim view.  And as much as I feel for the sister, if you fall in love with Islam, you fall in love with Allah (swt) and with Muhammad (swt).  Seriously, WWMD (what would Muhammad do)?  Christians and Jews who converted under the Prophet (saws) often still maintained their kinship ties with their christian and jewish families, but they didn’t practice those faiths anymore. 

This was forwarded to me by Rebecca.  It’s an excellent piece by an excellent american muslim author Mohja Kahf.  If you haven’t read her “The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf,” get it and read it asap.

This new piece in the Washington Post eloquently expresses what I’ve been trying to get across for ages.  I love Allah (swt).  I love my religion.  I love my Prophet (saws).  And I love my hot pink hijab.  I don’t need saving.  We don’t need saving.  Alhamdulilah I’m a muslim.

Yes, the article is fluffy.  But I think that was purposeful – so often we’re faced with doom and gloom, OMG you’re so oppressed!!11!!!1! that a little glibness is needed.

It irks me that I even have to say this: Being a Muslim woman is a joyful thing.

…

As beautiful as veils are, they are not the best part of being a Muslim woman — and many Muslim women in Islamic countries don’t veil. The central blessing of Islam to women is that it affirms their spiritual equality with men, a principle stated over and over in the Quran, on a plane believers hold to be untouched by the social or legalistic “women in Islam” concerns raised by other parts of the Scripture, in verses parsed endlessly by patriarchal interpreters as well as Muslim feminists and used by Islamophobes to “prove” Islam’s sexism. This is how most believing Muslim women experience God: as the Friend who is beyond gender, not as the Father, not as the Son, not inhabiting a male form, or any form.

…

Yet even all that gorgeous history pales when I open my closet door for the evening’s pick: teal georgette, pink-and-beige plaid, creamy fringed wool or ice-blue organza? God, why would anyone assume I would want to give up such beauty? I love being a Muslim woman. And I’m always looking for my next great polka-dot scarf.

Dear muslim lady on the bus:

I don’t mean to be rude, but this is America.  I know dogs are not held in high regard in your country and culture.  However, in this country, there are dogs. Granted, most dogs don’t belong on the bus but we do make exceptions.  One of those exceptions are guide dogs that help the blind and physically disabled.  These dogs have been trained almost since birth to provide assistance and greater access for their owners.  These dogs will not bite.  They do not bark.  They are very well behaved. 

Please stop freaking out.  There is no need to scream, cry and knock people down as you push your way through a very crowded bus to get away from the dog as he helps his owner move out of the way for the wheelchair that’s getting on the bus. 

The dog is not going to hurt you.  He is doing his job.  The Prophet (saws) specifically allowed people to keep dogs that served a purpose.

There is no need to be afraid of these dogs.  If they happen to touch you, what is the worst that will happen?  You’ll have to wash your clothes if they get impurities on you.  That’s not too bad is it?

Now I have to explain your actions to all the people on the bus.  They wonder why you reacted the way you did, and are all muslims that strange?

While I fully embrace the idea of multiculturalism, tolerance is a two way street.  We can’t expect people to accept our strange customs of covering our head and stopping to pray 5 times a day if we don’t try to accept certain aspects of american life that may seem strange to us.

We’re not going anywhere, and neither are the guide dogs.  Chances are, we’ll all run into one some day.  How we react to this animal will be a reflection of Islam.  Will it be a positive one, or a negative one?

Sincerely,

your sister in islam

Fear, questions after Augsburg student ambushed

Ali was the third Somali man from Minneapolis killed since April. Nobody has been arrested in any of the cases, and Huffman said it’s too early to determine if the killings are related.

Ali’s death stunned the Augsburg campus, where more than 700 students, friends and faculty joined for a gathering at Foss Chapel on Tuesday morning. Ali, who was studying political science and international relations, had played on the college’s soccer team and helped start the campus’ Muslim student association.

To come so far, fleeing war and violence, only to meet that end on your doorstep.  inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji’oon.  To God we belong and to Him is our return.

Apparently there is a growing gang problem among the somali youth here in the twin cities.  And it looks like they’re targeting those who are trying to make something of themselves.  Ya Allah!

As much as it pains me to write something positive about the Buckeyes (On Wisconsin!), the Columbus Dispatch did an interview with Nader Abdallah, their defensive tackle, to which I tip my cheesehead, er scarf.

Via Get Religion:

Q As the team’s only Muslim, do you enjoy educating your teammates about your faith?

A Over the offseason, coach (Jim) Tressel asked me to bring Muslim Hadiths (written traditions of the prophet Muhammad) and quotes from the Quran to put in his Winners Manual (book). He wanted me to enlighten the team about my spirituality, and it was great, because a lot of guys got to learn different things. I had guys coming up to me all the time asking me, “Hey, can you bring more stuff in? I would love to learn about this.” I’m happy I was able to open the horizons of some of these guys.

From GR’s commentary:

What is also interesting about Abdallah is that he was known as a “good character” recruit for the school’s football program in the sense that he wasn’t going to be the party-all-night, [3] type of players that sports fans hear more and more about these days.

MashaAllah. 

Thought provoking post by Umm Zaid.

 I’ve sported the American Muslims Against Terrorism banner on the web probably since    Shaikr first made it.  But, what does that really mean?  I certainly don’t agree   with the actions of those who intentionally target the lives of non combatants.    Is it enough to talk the talk if you don’t walk the walk?

  I’ve had my brush with terrorism.  The husband worked at a hospital in   Sharm el Sheikh in 2004 and 2005.  He considered applying for an accounting   position at the Ghazala Gardens hotel, but instead left Sharm in May 2005.    Two months later, two bombs ripped through Sharm- one at the Old Market, and one at the Ghazala Gardens hotel.  Depending on who’s account you believe, 64 or 88 people lost their lives.

After seeing the the devastation, I flip through the photo album my husband had sent me.  There was a picture of him in front of the gates of the Old Market.  Now it lay in ruins, covered in the blood of innocents.  Egyptian, foreigner, worker, tourist, bombs are indiscriminate.

I can talk the talk, but can I walk the walk?  I don’t want to have to be a puppet, popping up to with the same old script, condemning the actions of yet another parade of idiots.  I won’t apologize for something I haven’t done.  But this is my community, perpetrating these awful crimes.  I won’t stand behind their actions, and my words clearly show that.  But what about my actions?  Doing nothing can’t help.

What is there to do?  I feel helpless.

Via Dawud Walid:

 Watch the janazah of Imam Mohammed at 1:30 pm central time today at the Muslim Journal website.

I’ve heard that he passed away today.  There isn’t much to confirm this, aside from word of mouth and wikipedia.

*update at 4:00 pm*  The AP is confirming that he has passed away.  Inaa lillahi wa inna ilayhi rai’oon.

If this is true, inaa lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji’oon.  To God we belong and to Him is our return.  Alhamdulilah this is a blessed month, when the shaytan are chained and Allah’s (swt) blessings and mercy are flowing.  May Allah (swt) make the grave comfortable for this towering figure of American Islam.

If you have not heard of this man, please take the time to read about his life and work today.  Keep him in your dua as your break your fast this evening.

• New Africa Radio
• Anointed Son
• This Far by Faith
• The Most Important Muslim You’ve Never Heard of
• Profile at Religion & Ethics

I’ve got my sign (peace and love dove) prepped, and my outfit all picked out (my fav FUNdamentalist shirt + my hot green scarf).  Now I’ve just got to steel my nerves.  The RNC is coming to town, and along with it, a massive bunch of protesters  and major trouble.

The police have been conducting raids, arresting potential rabble rousers.   My bus goes by the jail, which is starting to look more like the US Embassy in Cairo than anything one should find in US cities.  I write that because I wanted to post a picture of the fortifications, but couldn’t find any of the jail here.  I thought I could find some of the embassy, but alas, sheikh google has let me down.  Think giant concrete blocks, 10 foot high fences and a corral system, guarded by guys with very large guns.

My grandma asked me last week if I was going to volunteer.  I had to stiffle a snicker.  Sure Grandma, I’m going to be part of the welcoming committee.  I’ll throw on my black abaya, maybe a niqab for good measure and drive out to the airport with a big ol Welcome to Minnesota sign, in hopes that the delegates will take one look at me and turn right back around.

No, my grandma isn’t a republican, she’s just civic minded.  Her boss was the chair of the Republican Party of Wisconsin back in the 50s, so she got dragged into it too.  One of my favorite stories that she tells is of a dinner she went to, where Joseph McCarthy was the guest of honor.  While everyone stood and applauded when he entered, she stayed seated and shot him an evil eye.  Go Grandma!

Monday is D day, potentially the first day of Ramadan, and the march on the RNC.  inshaAllah I’ll get pictures.  The husband will not be joining me.  He’s still a permanent resident, and doesn’t want to risk getting in trouble with the law.  I’m not planning on doing any civil disobedience, and as such, hope not to get arrested, but please make dua that I don’t.   If you see a girl in a neon green hijab being dragged away kicking and screaming, that’s yours truly.

Muslim Rep. Ellison preaches peace, democracy, here and abroad

Minnesota is home to a fair number of African immigrants, so Ellison’s work on Africa is local as well as international. This year, he hosted a forum in Minnesota on the Horn of Africa, with the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Africa subcommittee, New Jersey Democrat Donald Payne.

“We had these immigrant communities from Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Kenya voice how they felt about U.S. policy toward the Horn of Africa,” Ellison said. “It was a tough meeting, because everybody wanted to be heard. You had people with long-standing grievances, really just wanting to be heard by people who represent them.”

At one point, someone said he supported the Ethiopian presence in Somalia — “a minority view,” Ellison noted.

“And people began to shout him down. I then stood up and said, ‘Everyone gets to say what they think here, and we’ll listen.”‘

I was at the forum. He handled it very well.

Ellison accompanied local Muslims for Islamic prayers in Mauritania and Kenya, and in Saudi Arabia, the king invited him to go on the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca.

That’s one trip that Ellison plans to do as a private citizen — not as a guest of the king, but “on my own nickel.”

Ellison said he gets plenty of invitations to go on congressional trips, but as for the rest of this year, “The only place I really hope to go is Mecca.”

May Allah (swt) make the trip easy and accept his hajj, ameen.

Oh no wait, it’s Ingrid Mattson.  It’s all I can do just to shake my head at the foolishness of the right wing blogosphere.  Seriously, really, she’s a radical islamist?  If she’s radical, who’s not?

Faith is what we live for

Another [standing ovation] was reserved for Mattson, who said she tells Islamic leaders abroad that Muslims in the United States still face discrimination constantly.

Despite the difficulties, Mattson said she remains convinced that the United States “is still the best place in the world to practice our faith.”

Democrats kick off convention with interfaith gathering

Among the most compelling remarks, however, were those from Ingrid Mattson, the president of the Islamic Society of North America. She said she had been asked in whispers by Muslims abroad about how Muslims have been treated in the United States since the 2001 terrorist attacks.

While there is prejudice, Mattson said, there is also tolerance. She recognized other religious leaders who have stood up for Muslims.

“This is still the best place in the world to practice our faith,” she said.

You can view the entire event here on the CSPAN website.  I haven’t looked through it yet, so I’m not sure where she speaks.

Yaay!  From CAIR:

Minn. Muslim’s Workplace Bias Complaint Resolved

CAIR-MN welcomes company’s ‘prompt and professional’ response to incident

(ST. PAUL, MN, 8/14/08) – The Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MN) today said a Muslim teenager who was initially denied a job at an Old Country Buffet restaurant in that state will be offered a second interview.

CAIR-MN welcomed what it called the “prompt and professional” response to the bias complaint by Buffets Inc, the company that operates the restaurant. Buffets Inc also communicated that it has a long-standing commitment to diversity and it has a number of team members both locally and nationally that wear Islamic head scarves, or hijabs.

The Muslim job applicant told CAIR-MN she was denied employment at the Fridley, Minn., restaurant because of her religious head scarf. She said a restaurant manager told her that her religiously-mandated scarf violated the company’s uniform regulations. The manager allegedly told her to reschedule the interview if she decided to take off the scarf.

SEE: Old Country Buffet’s Hiring Under Fire (Pioneer Press)

http://www.twincities.com/ci_10144154

SEE ALSO: Old Country Buffet Accused of Discrimination (KSTP-TV)

http://kstp.com/article/stories/S537400.shtml

CAIR-MN called on Buffets Inc to investigate the incident. After completion of the investigation, the company has agreed to do the following:

1. Offer the teen an apology and invite her to finish her interview with the company while wearing her scarf.

2. Ensure that employees are complying with the law by allowing for religious accommodation to the company’s uniform policy.

3. Offer CAIR’s workplace sensitivity and diversity training.

“We thank Buffets Inc for its prompt and professional handling of this incident,” said

CAIR-MN Civil Rights Coordinator Taneeza Islam. “Our goal is to educate employers to ensure that such incidents can be avoided in the future.”

She said CAIR encourages employers who have questions about how to accommodate Muslim employees to contact the Washington-based civil rights and advocacy organization.

CAIR offers a booklet called “An Employer’s Guide to Islamic Religious Practices” to help corporate managers gain a better understanding of Islam and Muslims in the workplace.

SEE: An Employer’s Guide to Islamic Religious Practices

http://www.cair.com/Portals/0/pdf/employment_guide.pdf

CAIR, America’s largest Islamic civil liberties and advocacy group has 35 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.

- END –

Boo! to some in the local community who were getting their undies in a bundle about the fact that Sr. Taneeza doesn’t wear hijab.  Heaven forbid someone offer a muslim FREE legal help without wearing a hijab.  Further boo! to the insinuations that those who disagree with the undy bundlers do not understand islam. 

…what can I say? While we’re known for Minnesota Nice, the husband has commented how people are often nice and hospitable to one’s face, but they’ll stab you in the back as soon as you can turn around.

Old Country Buffet’s Hiring Practices Under Fire

A civil liberties group for Muslims on Friday called upon the Eagan-based company that owns Old Country Buffet to investigate an incident involving a girl who says she was denied a summer restaurant job because of her religious headscarf.

The Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations is asking Buffets Inc. to investigate the incident, offer a written apology and participate in the group’s workplace sensitivity and diversity training.

H. Thomas Mitchell, an executive vice president for privately held Buffets, which owns and operates more than 550 restaurants across the country, said he couldn’t comment on the specific allegations. “We are diligently investigating it,” he said.

“We are an equal opportunity employer and frankly view ourselves as a strong anchor in the diverse communities we are frequently in,” he added.

An even scarier thing – the 344 346 353 comments at the time of this posting. *shudders* It’s so nice to know how some people really feel when they see a woman in hijab. Very few of the commenters seem to be aware of the actual law on the matter:

• Employers must reasonably accommodate employees’ sincerely held religious practices unless doing so would impose an undue hardship on the employer. A reasonable religious accommodation is any adjustment to the work environment that will allow the employee to practice his religion. An employer might accommodate an employee’s religious beliefs or practices by allowing: flexible scheduling, voluntary substitutions or swaps, job reassignments and lateral transfers, modification of grooming requirements and other workplace practices, policies and/or procedures.
• An employer is not required to accommodate an employee’s religious beliefs and practices if doing so would impose an undue hardship on the employers’ legitimate business interests. An employer can show undue hardship if accommodating an employee’s religious practices requires more than ordinary administrative costs, diminishes efficiency in other jobs, infringes on other employees’ job rights or benefits, impairs workplace safety, causes co-workers to carry the accommodated employee’s share of potentially hazardous or burdensome work, or if the proposed accommodation conflicts with another law or regulation.
• Employers must permit employees to engage in religious expression, unless the religious expression would impose an undue hardship on the employer. Generally, an employer may not place more restrictions on religious expression than on other forms of expression that have a comparable effect on workplace efficiency.

Please tell me, Mr. Old Country Buffet manager, how is a cashier wearing a headscarf creating an undue hardship on your business? Unless you’re saying your clientele are bigots, in which case, I could see how they’d be offended at the mere sight of a woman covering her hair working and earning a living…

I should note that we ate at Old Country Buffet once prior to our going zabiha, and there was a woman who wore hijab who refilled the food on the buffet. This leads me to believe that this is an isolated incident. The bigotry in the comments section, sadly, is not.

…and thank them.  At a plant in Tennessee, Tyson Foods has agreed to the union’s request that Eid be considered a holiday and a paid day off.   Between 250 (Tyson’s number) and 700  (the unions number) muslims, mainly somalis, work at the plant.  Is that a majority of union members?  A majority of the workers?  If the 700 number is correct, then they are, according to this source.  If this is the case, why not give them eid off?  After all, many employers give their workers Christmas off (which is also a holiday at this Tyson plant).  There’s obviously nothing wrong with giving the majority their religious holiday as a paid day off, according to that precedent.

As always, stories like these have taken on a life of their own.  Those of us here in Minnesota are used to a local story involving muslims blowing up into something huge and out of proportion.  People huff and puff without asking questions to get the full story.  I wonder if that’s what is happening here as well?  I’ve gone to the websites of local papers and fallen down the rabbit hole of linkage, trying to get a local view on the story.  This blog piece in particular is quite informative in the sifting and winnowing of all the information out on the interwebz.  And speaking of rabbit holes, if you have time, read through the series the local paper in Shelbyville did about the Somali Community in December. 

 In any case, the usual calls for boycotts have sprung up in the right wing blogosphere.  If you have a minute, please write or call Tyson to thank them for accommodating their workers.

Twin Cities Somalis are moving down to Postville, Iowa, to fill positions at a kosher food plant previously filled by illegal immigrants.

The influx of Somalis has been met with some surprise in a community still bewildered by the Agriprocessors raid, the largest raid of its kind in the United States. Federal agents arrested 389 people, mostly Guatemalans and Mexicans who had established roots and become part of the community.

The new immigrants have “raised some eyebrows, which is pretty normal when you get somebody different in town,” Mayor Robert Penrod said.

“That said, as far as I know, they haven’t caused a whole lot of problems. They’ve been keeping to themselves,” he said.

It’s not the first cultural change in Postville. The slaughterhouse attracted eastern Europeans in the 1990s, including immigrants from Bosnia, Poland and the former U.S.S.R. Hispanics became the majority in the past decade.

The result is a town barely covering two square miles is home to people from 24 nationalities speaking 17 languages.

It’s situations like these that increase my wariness of mass produced meat.   Not only are those who do the slaughtering treated like crap, the animals are often subjected to degrading conditions.  One of the (many) things I’m struck with when I read about the life of our beloved Prophet (saws) is his kind regard for everything, including animals.

The Prophet (saws) said “The merciful are shown mercy by the All-Merciful. Show mercy to those on earth, and He Who is in heaven will show mercy unto you.”

If we do not treat every living thing with the dignity it deserves, be it the cow that will become our hamburger or the human being working to bring that hamburger to our table, how then can we expect Allah (swt) to treat us with dignity?  If every bite you take is tainted with the mistreatment of animals and man, how can we face Allah (swt) on the day of judgment and claim that we showed mercy to those around us, when we ignored their plight?

Heck, this extends to all massed produced food and products.  How are the workers would make our clothes treated?  The migrants who are out in the fields picking our lettuce?  Methinks muslims need to get more involved in the fair trade movement.

From the NYT, sent to me by Christine.  A lot from Br. Keith:

As Senator Barack Obama courted voters in Iowa last December, Representative Keith Ellison, the country’s first Muslim congressman, stepped forward eagerly to help.

Mr. Ellison believed that Mr. Obama’s message of unity resonated deeply with American Muslims. He volunteered to speak on Mr. Obama’s behalf at a mosque in Cedar Rapids, one of the nation’s oldest Muslim enclaves. But before the rally could take place, aides to Mr. Obama asked Mr. Ellison to cancel the trip because it might stir controversy. Another aide appeared at Mr. Ellison’s Washington office to explain.

“I will never forget the quote,” Mr. Ellison said, leaning forward in his chair as he recalled the aide’s words. “He said, ‘We have a very tightly wrapped message.’ ”

…

“This is the ‘hope campaign,’ this is the ‘change campaign,’ ” said Mr. Ellison, Democrat of Minnesota. Muslims are frustrated, he added, that “they have not been fully engaged in it.”

…

“A lot of us are waiting for him to say that there’s nothing wrong with being a Muslim, by the way,” Mr. Ellison said.

Mr. Ellison, a first-term congressman, remains arguably the senator’s most important Muslim supporter. He has attended Obama rallies in Minnesota and appears on the campaign’s Web site. But Mr. Ellison said he was also forced to cancel plans to campaign for Mr. Obama in North Carolina after an emissary for the senator told him the state was “too conservative.” Mr. Ellison said he blamed Mr. Obama’s aides — not the candidate himself — for his campaign’s standoffishness.

Weather here has been pretty cruddy as of late.  I’ve lost count of the number of tornado sirens that have gone off in the last week.  But alhamdulilah, nothing major has happened up in our neck of the woods. 

The same cannot be said for many of our midwesterly neighbors to the south.  The flooding in Iowa, Wisconsin and Illinois has been devestating.  It hits a wee bit close to home when the roads you’ve traveled dozens of times to both your grandmother’s and parents’ homes are impassible and that places you used to live are flooded.

Now word comes from CAIR-MN that one of the first mosques in America has been damaged:

Flood Damages Historic American Mosque, Destroys Documents
CAIR-MN urges American Muslims to assist flood victims of all faiths(ST. PAUL, MN, 6/16/08) – The Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MN) today called on American Muslims to help repair damage to one of the first mosques in America caused by recent flooding in Iowa.The Mother Mosque of America in Cedar Rapids, completed in 1934, was one of the first permanent structures built specifically to serve as a mosque in the United States. The mosque had recently completed a renovation project.

Documents inside the mosque, including photographs of American Muslim immigrants from the early 1900s, were destroyed by the flood waters.

“The mosque has been visited by people from all over the country,” said Imam Taha Tawil, Director of the Mother Mosque of America. “It is part of the American Muslim identity.”

CAIR-MN is asking Muslims to donate to help restore the mosque and to assist flood victims of all faiths throughout the region.

SEE: Mother Mosque of America

mothermosque.org

The Mother Mosque is listed on both the Iowa State Historical Register and the National Register of Historic Places as an “essential piece of American religious history, which symbolizes tolerance and acceptance of Islam and Muslims in the United States.”

MAS Service Corps are consolidating muslim efforts in the area.

Some of the first mosques in the United States was built in the Midwest.  Many of them claim to be first, although there is evidence that some were built out on the east coast before them.  It seems to come down to semantics – those in the midwest (Ross, North Dakota and The Mother Mosque claim to be the first purpose build mosques.  Were the mosques on the east coast buildings converted into mosques?  Definately something to look into further.

Greetings from backhomelandia aka cheesecurd central aka the land of 10,000 Prius. As has become a tradition, I trek across the border to spend the extended memorial day weekend with family.

First up was a visit with my grandma in the land of 10,000 Prius aka Madison, Wisconsin. Seriously people, I should have counted. 3 minutes didn’t pass while we were driving about town when I didn’t see one of these little hybrids zipping around.  Ah, my people, my hippy dippy tree hugging people, how I love you.

And now, we shall digress, but I promise this will come back to my grandma and my weekend…

…growing up, I never wanted to rock the boat.  I was terrified of upsetting people, so I always laid low and tried to avoid conflict.  I ordered always ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, so as not to be a burden on my parents.  I never asked to go out, because I didn’t want to bother my parents for a ride.  I only hosted parties on my birthday and later when my mom saw that I was a hermit and insisted that I invite friends over.  I played oboe in junior high, which requires reeds that needed to be purchased every so often.  However, I hated to ask my parents for money, so I went away to band camp with one old reed.  It broke 2 days in and I had to beg the oboe teacher to make me one.  I came away looking like a fool, all because I didn’t want to upset my parents by asking for money to buy new reeds.

It is with this background that I’ve approached my conversion vis a vi my family.  Not wanting to rock the boat, I didn’t tell anyone I had converted.  I was waiting, waiting, waiting for the right time.

I transfered schools a few months after I converted, and there I wanted a fresh start.  Part of that fresh start was being known as a muslim on campus.  And part of that was donning the hijab.  One small problem – my sister went to the same university.   Granted, there were tens of thousands of students, so the chances that I would run into her were small.  I worked my way into the traditional hijab, and switched to a bun style when I had lunch with my sister.  One evening, we went to see a lecture by Ben Stein.  I wore my undercover bun style hijab, and when we went up to get our books signed, Ben Stein asked me if I wore a scarf for religious reasons.  I said yes without even thinking.  Crap, I was caught.  He asked me what my religion was, and I meekly said Islam.  He must have thought that I was nervous, as he is jewish, so he smiled warmly and told me that his best friend as a child had been muslim.  Ah, but it wasn’t him I was worried about.  No, I was worried about disappointing my sister.  She turned out to be cool with it, except for the occasional digression into “OMG, what happened to you?  You used to be such a feminist, blah blah blah.”

My parents suspected something obviously, as I started to cover my hair with bandanas when I was at home.  Eventually, they snooped in my email over christmas break, found the evidence and confronted me.  I sat on the couch, crushed through the confrontation, feeling like crap that I had disappointed them.  For years, I was ashamed to show my Islam around them.  They pretended it didn’t happen, and I didn’t do anything obviously Islamic in front of them.  Gradually, I started to be obviously “muslim” in front of them, even to the point where my mom gave me a beautiful scarf for christmas (ah, how to confront them about the fact that I no longer want to celebrate christmas.  but that’s another story).

Circling back now to my grandma – how to tell her that I converted to this religion that she knows nothing about, beyond what she has seen on television from terrorists?  My solution – don’t tell her.  Sound familiar?  She knew something was up when I started covering my hair when I visited during college, but she didn’t say much aside from commenting on my change in wardrobe.  She didn’t even say anything when she came to visit last October during Ramadan and we took her to an iftar at the local masjid and I went to pray.

No, it wasn’t until this weekend when she actually outright asked me if I had “converted to the muslim religion.”  SubhanAllah, here I am more than 6 years beyond my conversion, and when asked outright, I hang my head and meekly say yes.   Suprisingly, she doesn’t say anything about terrorists, or muslim men treating women like shit.  No, she continues to focus on my dress.  I’ve taken to wearing skirts instead of pants, and will now cover my hair in a more conventional muslim-ish fashion when I go to visit.  That’s what bothers her – not the fact that I don’t celebrate christmas or easter, nor that I no longer believe Jesus (as) is the son of God – no, she wonders why I don’t wear pants and why I cover my hair.   It could be worse.  God bless her.

But even then, confronted with such a mundane little triffle, I can’t express myself well in this regard.  When I speak with people I’ve met after my conversion, it’s very easy for me to explain my choice in dress.  Covering my hair is an act of worship, and it identifies me as a proud, strong, intelligent muslim woman.  I humble myself in front of my Lord every time I put it on, and I shatter stereotypes in my interaction with Joe Schmoe at the office.

But with my family, it’s different.  We never talked about God…never EVER.  We went to church on Sunday, and that was it.  Oh, we went to sunday school, got confirmed, but as a family, we never discussed the Almighty.   That child who was afraid to ask for $3 for a reed lest she upset her mom is still very much in control when it comes to interacting with my family.  Even with my dear sweet grandmother, I cannot work up the nerve to challenge the status quo, to bring God into our discussions, and to express my devotion to Him in my choice of dress.

SubhanAllah, I’m so ashamed.  I’m 26 years old, and I’m more afraid of my family than I am of Allah (swt).  That scared little child inside of me won’t go away overnight, but inshaAllah, she needs to start heading out of town.   I shouldn’t be ashamed of my deen and it’s requirements.  If I cover my head, so what?  If I stop and pray 5 time a day, so what?  If God is a real and important part of my life, and I want to talk about Him, so what?  inshaAllah inshaAllah inshaAllah I am going to quash this shame, and be proud of my faith, with everyone.

Whew, that was more than I’ve talked about hijab in a long time.  I wear it, but I don’t obsess about it.  Heck, I’m even pulling back on my online window shopping sprees.  No more hijab talk for awhile inshaAllah.

Still to come in my backhomelandia series:

• my sister and (no) God
• couldn’t the husband convert to be lutheran?
• on a (salat) roll, and I feel fine
• and perhap more, seeing as how I have 2 days left before I head back home

This will be just a brief post on this weekend.  I took pages and pages of notes, and inshaAllah I will post a few highlights from the lectures and some of my thoughts.

First, the negatives:

• Where were the Minnesota Muslims at?  Seriously, one of the best speakers our american ummah has to offer is right in your backyard, and you don’t represent?  Granted, this meant more access to Imam Zaid, but come on!

Ok, there was really only one negative, and I shouldn’t really complain.  SubhanAllah, it was an awesome weekend for my deen, my iman and inshaAllah, for my marriage. 

• Imam Zaid presented a two day workshop on Islam, Marriage and the Family.  I’ve read probably half a dozen marriage/relationship books, both secular and islam based, and I benefited more from this workshop than I have from all those other books combined.  Some books in my collection are quite good (like Blissful Marriage), but there is nothing quite like having something presented to you by a dynamic speaker in a clear, concise manner. 
• The presentation differed from other Islam based marriage advice, in that it didn’t focus on the duties and responsibilities of the husband and wife.  Instead, it discussed common problems, and offered Islam based solutions that both parties could enact.
• Imam Zaid is funny.  Seriously, we were doubled over with laughter like, every 5 minutes.  No one could fall asleep during this presentation.
• Imam Zaid presented a lecture on the Ethical Foundation of Islamic Civilization at a local university.  Again, the information was presented in a clear and concise manner, and I learned quite a few things I didn’t know before. 
• Imam Zaid performed a marriage on Sunday, alhamdulilah.  It was something truly beautiful to behold.  Plus, we got to sing Tala’al Badru afterwards, so my years of singing along to various youtube versions has finally born fruit.
• I got a lot out of the presentation in part because I took notes.  I have tons of lectures from Imam Zaid, Sh. Hamza, Sh. Nuh, etc, but most of the time I listen to them on the bus and zone out.  inshaAllah in the future when I listen to something that conveys knowledge, I’ll have my notebook out to take notes.
• If this program comes out on CD or DVD BUY IT!!!!  inshaAllah when it does, I’m buying it in bulk and gifting it to all my married friends.  Even if one is not married, they would benefit from the lessons taught therein.  We all have relationships, be they with family, friends or work colleages, and the problems that face a husband and wife in communication aren’t necessarily unique to that specific type of relationship.

Day 1 down, 2 to go.

Went to Jummah at a Somali Masjid yesterday, which alhamudlilah, what a much better experience then I’ve had in the past when venturing out to jummahs in new, exciting, unknown locations.  It was in an old garage, and when I asked the group of men in front where the women’s section was, a teenage boy personally walked me around back.

The sister’s section was the curtained off back section of the hall, and was festooned with fake flowers, glittery streamers, holiday lights and giant misbahas on the wall.  Whenever a sister would enter, she would go around to everyone in the room, kiss her hand, then shake yours, giving salaams.

I arrived very early, as I had taken the bus and wanted to make sure I left wiggle room in case I got lost, so I chilled out with some Imam Zaid lectures on my ipod (this weekend is all Imam Zaid, all the time).  Closer to jummah time, Imam Zaid’s wife came.  mashaAllah, what a beautiful and patient sister.  I can’t imagine how stressful it must be to be constantly traveling around the country, but she had such a beautiful smile on her face and a sense of sakina, it was awesome.

The khutbah started at 1 pm, and Imam Zaid spoke on the address Abu Bakr (ra) gave after being elected khalif.   I took notes and inshaAllah will write more when I have time (just getting the blog post in before I run out the door for another Imam Zaid filled day).  In particular, I was struck by how he took just a few lines from this address and pounded home their importance in our american muslim community:

Now, it is beyond doubt that I have been elected your Amir, although I am not better than you. Help me, if I am in the right; set me right if I am in the wrong. Truth is a trust; falsehood is a treason

Seriously think on these few lines, and how much our ummah would change if we took them to heart and implimented them.

Well, I’m off to masjid an nur to set up for the all day workshops alhamdulilah.  More updates to come inshaAllah

I recently commented on on a post by Izzy Mo about how often Minnesota Muslims are in the news. From the way the news covers it and the right wing blogosphere hypes it, sharia is creeping hard and fast here in the upper midwest. Of course, I laff in the face of these allegations. Life here is virtually indistinguishable from the small midwestern town I grew up in, except that there are a few more women walking around in khimar here, and there are plenty of places to buy halal meat.

That being said, there are issues, and we shouldn’t shrink from addressing them. In fact, on my way to work this morning, I was plotting a blog entry in response to this deplorable incident. Sure, muzzies in general aren’t fond of dogs. But Islam allows us to keep them when they’re working animals, and a dog specially trained to help a man in case of siezures definately fits the bill.

Alhamdulilah, I didn’t have to go on a tirade against the local community’s innaction. CAIR-MN beat me to the punch.

However, “the moral and legal need to accommodate individuals using service dogs far outweighs the discomfort an individual Muslim might feel about coming into contact with a dog, which is one of God’s creatures,” said CAIR-MN Communications Director Valerie Shirley.

There’s some serious need for education on certain issues in our community. Guide dogs is one. Not making a huge watery mess in the bathroom after wudu is another. I’ve been making wudu in public restrooms for 6 years now, and I’ve never left a puddle. Maybe this is something Imam Zaid can adress when he comes this weekend?

you’d better not cry

better not pout I’m telling you why

Imam Zaid is coming, to town!

Ok, so I have this weird habit of making up lyrics to old christmas carols, cuz, well, I’m weird.

FRIDAY:
May 16th Friday Jumaa – Khutbah by Imam Zaid
Masjid Ar Rahman at 12:45PM
http://www.mccminnesota.org/

Friday Evening:
Fundraiser for Somali Qubaa Masjid.
Time and Location to be announced later…

SATURDAY:

An intensive 2-day workshop at Masjid an Nur.

Marriage, Family and Islam
Sat 10-5 & Sun 10-4
Location:  visit www.MasjidanNur.org
$40 (adult) $30 (student)
One day only $25 (adult) and $15 (student)
Registration will be onsite,

Space is limited so we need your cooperation.

Please RSVP via the website below to assist us in planning.
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=uT84Bk1wjCLNpKvsUrj61w_3d_3d

Sat evening: Ethical Foundations for Islamic Civilization

Time:  7-10PM
Location: Metropolitan State University, St Paul Campus
700 East Seventh Street
St Paul, MN
Free lecture:

The husband and I recently made the switch to eating zabiha slaughtered meat only.  On occasion, fast food commercials will tug at my heart strings when I think that I’ll never again have a chicken breast from KFC or a double cheeseburger from Burger King (at least here in the US).  But, for the most part, I’m over it.  We’re eating more vegetarian food at home, and the zabiha meat we do eat is often raised in a more humane manner than what we used to get from the local Rainbow.

Today however, I had one of those horrible realizations.  When I was in junior high, our foreign language department packed us all on buses and took us on a four hour bus trip up to the Twin Cities to attend the Festival of Nations.  Now that I live up here, it’s something the husband and I love to do every year.  My favorite part?  The food.  Ah, but alas, much of it isn’t zabiha.  Heart drops, dark pit forms in the stomach, nooooooooooooo!  Maybe the food from some countries (egypt, pakistan, somali?) will be, but I’m not getting my hopes up.

 Ah well, at least pisan goran is vegetarian.

The husband and I attended a CAIR MN dinner on Saturday on African American Muslims and the Civil Rights Movement.  I was looking forward to some down home southern cooking, but alas, it was catered middle eastern food.  Dude, we’re at a predominantly african american mosque that has it’s own kitchen and puts out delicious bean pie.  Why are we eating kabobs and hummus?   Ah, but I digress.

Rep. Keith Ellison and Br. Dawud Walid from CAIR-MI were the two main speakers.  Unfortunately, I don’t think Keith’s speech was recorded, but it was quite inspiring.  I’m kicking myself for not taking notes.  In particular, he called on muslims to get involved in a wider variety of issues, including environmental justice.  I’ve noticed that green muslim movements have been springing up across the country, so now I need to get back in touch with my inner tree hugger and get one going here in Minnesota.

As Br. Dawud was speaking, I was thinking, mashaAllah this guy is an awesome speaker.  I wonder if there’s anyplace online that has his speeches.  Low and behold, there is, and there’s even a recording of Saturday’s speech.

Unfortunately, we had to duck out right after the end of the program, so I didn’t have a question to ask Br. Dawud about one comment in particular – that some were accusing BA muslims of being manipulated into supporting foreign causes like Palestine, but that in reality, it was that BA muslims understand suffering, can empathize with the suffering, and so feel a connection to these causes that naturally lead to their support.  I was wondering if this had anything to do with the recent accusations by a blogger alleging that the immigrant muslim mafia controls BA muslim leadership.

Obama Name Games Painful to Muslims

NPR covers some Pennsylvanian Muslims’ reaction to the whole muslim as a schmere re: Obama flap.

On a tangent, is anyone else sick of the “Islam is the religion of peace” bit?  It seems to me that this phrase emerged post 9-11, when the american muslim community was in shock and didn’t know how to respond to the increased, often negative attention their faith was given.  But here we are, several years later, and this phrase seems contrived and stale to me.  Shouldn’t we have had time to come up with something a little more descriptive, a little more accurate?  Islam is an increadibly complex religion, and this simplistic phrase doesn’t do it justice.

Islamophoboes have ceased on the phrase, and now everytime a muslim somewhere does something stupid and violent, they’ll be on their message boards crowing “look at this fine member of the religion of peace©.”  If I ever chose to engage these people (and my more recent response has been to steer clear of places where these kinds of statements are bandied about), my response is usually as such:

Islam is not a religion of peace.  It is a religion of balance that seeks peace.  Islam is the middle path.  We are not to vere off towards any extreme.  We are to be neither pacifists nor aggressors.  Islam allows for warfare, but it places strict guidlelines on it’s warriors.  Terrorism happens when muslims do not follow these rules.  They are not acting in accordance with the religion.  If they were, these incidents would not happen.

It saddens me that Islam is reduced to violent acts of those who have strayed off the middle path.  It saddens me because Islam is so much more than that.  Islam has had a profound impact on my life and my relationship with God.  For me, it’s all about the Rememberance of God.  Islam has given me the means and the encouragement to bring God into my everyday life, to thank Him, to praise Him, to worship Him in every act I do.  It’s not about killing people.  It’s about God.

…learned about Islam before I met muslims.  It’s a phrase that has become popular among some converts in recent years, and this weekend, it was more evident to me than it has been in a long long time.  I just celebrated another year as a muslim last week, and sometimes, it seems like nothing has changed.

When I began to investigate Islam, I ordered a Quran from half.com.  I picked another up from the local new age store in my town.  I got another free from the Saudi Embassy, and rescued two from the “books we wanted to sell back but the bookstore wouldn’t take them” box at the university bookstore.  I was on a spiritual quest, and knowing some muslims on a social level at school led me to include islam in my search.  I was picking up sacred texts from other religions as well, but there was something unexplainable in the Qur’an that kept leading me back to it, compelling me to aquire as many as I could find.

I branched out, checking out every book on Islam that the university library had to offer.  Farid Esack’s On Being Muslim had a profound impact on me.   I read through every article on the Modern Religion and Islam for Today.

Oh, I interacted with muslims too, mainly online.  But the main push towards my embrace of Islam came not through my conversations with them, but instead came from my reading of the Qur’an.  Here was what I had been looking for.  I lost faith in Christianity after I studied the history of biblical composition my freshman year of college.  I could no longer hold that collection of books as God inspired.  They’d been messed with too much, disperate pieces taken and mashed together, books chosen by a council of men, rather than something given by the son of God. 

In my search, I wanted a text that was revelation, something that was from God and that had been preserved.  I found that in the Qur’an.  Here God had revealed a text to a man who, I would later find, set an excellent example for man’s conduct with one another, with God and with the earth.  That text was memorized and passed down, perfectly preserved until this very day.   Alhamdulilah, thanks be to God, I had found my path!

After I converted, it was a few more months before I had an opportunity to interact with muslims in the real world.  I transfered schools, and while at the summer orientation, I plucked up the courage to visit the islamic center near campus.  I attempted to put a scarf on, akwardly, and walked through the front door.  big.  mistake.  A big burly man with a bushy beard rushed towards me, arms waving, sisters through the back, sisters through the back!

I stumbled out the door, tears clouding my vision.  I made my way around to the back, only to find the sisters door locked.  I sat dejected next to the door until a woman came up and punched in the code – without saying a word to me.  I entered after her, hastily prayed zuhr and got the heck out of dodge.

I’d like to say that this was an isolated incident and that my experiences with muslims from then on only helped to strengthen my iman and help me to learn the deen.  Alas, it was not to be.  Although I’ve had stints of activity in the muslim community, for the most part it’s just been me, my books and the internet.   Oh, and the husband

This past Saturday, a local masjid had it’s grand opening, a whole day of lectures with 20 imams and sheikhs.  The husband and I went about halfway through the day.  I was reluctant to go, as I’d been to the masjid a few months earlier and wasn’t a fan of the sisters’ accomidations – a tiny room in the back, accessable only by going around the back and taking off your shoes in a garage.   Despite my misgivings, I bucked up and went.  MashaAllah, it was both a mistake and a blessing.  Sisters were packed wall to wall, talking and yelling at each other across the room.  I tried to make my way to be near a speaker, but it was hopeless.  I couldn’t hear a word of the lecture.  Some sisters were trying to quiet the others by hssst-ing at them.  Eventually, I got so frustrated, I got up and shouted, sisters, please, please be quiet so we can hear!  Didn’t work.  I left, dejected once more.

I called the husband and told him I was going to sit in the car and wait until he was done eating so we could leave, which I did.  Alhamduililah for my ipod and Sh. Hamza lectures.  At least my time wouldn’t be a total waste.  Just as I settle in, what to I see out my window?  A small somali child, running bare foot up the middle of the road and almost getting run over by a car!  I leapt out of the car and tried to call the child to me, but he ran right past.  I hurried after him (not an easy thing to do in a skirt and clogs), and eventually coaxed him into my arms.  Meanwhile, a guy at the laundrymat had seen the kid run by and had called the police.  I knew the kid was from the mosque, so I sent several sisters who walked by to find his mother while we waited.  5 minutes pass…no one came.  10 minutes pass…no mom.  15 minutes…the policewoman arrives.  I explain that I think I know where the child came from and she says that she’ll walk us over to the mosque to find the child’s mom.

So off we go, child drooling fruit juice all over my shirt, a non muslim man carrying his laundry and a police woman.  As I enter the sister’s section, someone snatches the child from me and runs inside without a word.  Umm, hello?  Don’t you want to know why I have this child?  No thank you?  I ran in after the sister and told her that her brother (still no mom to be found) had almost been run over and that she needs to watch him more carefully.  She looks at me blankly and slips away. 

Now I turn to the brothers doing security outside the masjid and try to explain what had happened and that could they please watch for any children escaping outside?  What did I get?  Yelled at, that’s what.  Dude, I know the sisters need to watch their kids, all I’m asking is that since you’re out here, please just watch for kids, since this one obviously slipped past you and almost became a road pancake.

At this point, I return to the car and call the husband.  The tears begin to flow and he dashes out to find out what happened.  Blubbering, I tell him the story, and he stalks back to the masjid.  A few minutes later he’s back, with the imam of the masjid in tow.  The imam apologizes for the guard’s rude behavior and begs me not to judge the masjid by this one incident.  I try to smile and tell him that inshaAllah I’ll come to another event in the future.

But, deep inside, I know that it will be a long time before that happens.  I don’t blame this masjid.  It’s not their fault.  It’s a general disease infecting our ummah.  Thank God I found Islam before I found muslims.  I can’t imagine if I was a non muslim and had gone to the mosque on Saturday to learn about Islam.  I would have booked it out of there so fast and probably never looked back.  I can’t imagine what the non muslim man who called the police when he saw the child running down the road must think about muslims and Islam.  I know what some non muslims think when they see muslims rioting in the street, burning embassies and commiting acts of terrorism.   

Alhamduililah I found the Messenger of Allah (swt) before I found those who claim to follow his Sunnah.  Thank God I have the life of the beloved Meseenger (saws) to look to when I need a role model in my faith.

Thank God I found the Allah (swt) before I found those who claim to follow Him (swt).  Who knows what I would be now if that had happened?

I’ve sported the “American Muslims against Terrorism” Banner in message board signatures for quite some time.  I first put it in there when I was accused of not condemning terrorism in each and every post I made on that board.  Stick it in and wa’la, there’s instant condemnation, so we can move on and get to the point.

But it’s really more than that.  It’s a graphic reminder of the hadith of our beloved Prophet (saws) recorded in Sahih Muslim:

“Whoever sees an evil deed (committed), let him change it by his hand. If he is unable, let him change it by his tongue. If he is unable, let him change it by heart, and this is the weakest of faith.”

Putting a modern spin on it, let him change it with little pixels on the internet.  Sure, it’s not the most effective means of combating terrorism, but it’s definately a statement against an evil deed.

Which now brings me to the original point of this post.  Check out the awesomeness that the graphic designer behind the “Muslims against Terrorism” banners has come up with now:

*huggles new graphics*

Building Sisterhood

And Ibrahim isn’t most people’s vision of a personal trainer. An observant Muslim, Ibrahim hosts her classes in traditional attire, all in accordance with Islam’s decree that a woman show no more than her face and her hands in public. Today Ibrahim’s workout ensemble includes loose black track pants, a pink tunic and a flowered pink hijab, or head wrap, worn chicly with a matching pink baseball cap.

…

Ibrahim has become something of a poster child for a breed of Muslim women who are publicly defying the stereotypes of suppressed, submissive women of Islam. By entering the workplace on their own terms, as business owners, Muslim women are combining religion and profession in a way that forces clients to encounter them in a professional light. Even more surprisingly, many of these small businesses are popping up because of Islam, not in spite of it.

Now that’s my kind of sister.  Visit her gym’s page here, where you can sign up for her email newsletter.

Wow, our community seems to be ground zero for the supposid islamization of america.  Taxi drivers, Target cashiers, flying imams, yup, that’s us.  And now we’re known for the ebil ebil Islamic Charter School with it’s insideous plots to allow students to make wudu, pray jummah and have islamic studies classes after school hours.

 A local reporter isn’t too fond of the local muslim community, and has written on us often.  Recently, she’s reported on Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (aka TIZA), a local arabic language charter school that has a strong islamic flavor. 

Predictibly, this story has been taken up by the right wing blogosphere and waved about as a sure sign that the muzzies are taking over.  As a result, the school has been getting hate messages and death threats.  Charming bunch o folks they are, threatening a bunch of kids.

 Thus far, one TIZA parent has done a good job of collecting info and creating a coherent response on the local muslim email lists that I’m eagerly waiting to be published, and a teacher wrote a letter to the editor:

I am often in classrooms observing teachers and modeling instructional strategies. I have never witnessed any religious instruction during school or any pressure to adhere to particular religious beliefs. In fact, I am a Christian and have always felt completely welcome at TIZA. Why would the school hire a Christian to implement curriculum if it were indoctrinating students in Islam?

I have witnessed excellent teachers from different religious and cultural backgrounds focused on improving instruction and student achievement. That’s why student achievement is so high.

Other local coverage of the issue can be found here and here.  MPR did an excellent story on high test scores at TIZA last year.  Several Minnesota Muslims write for the website Engage Minnesota, where there are already a few articles on the issue with inshaAllah more to follow.  Finally, an article on the use of the term madrassa as a pejorative.

 There’s another aspect of this story that needs to be investigated and presented – the role of religion in other Minnesota Charter schools.  I haven’t seen anything official yet, but through word of mouth, there are several Minnesota charter sponsored by overtly religious orgnizations, and other that are aimed at other ethnic groups like african americans that incorporate christian prayer and ancestor worship.   inshaAllah an intrepid reporter will take this issue up and write on it.  A list of all Minnesota charter schools can be found here.  There are quite a few religiously oriented groups on the list.  Part of the outcry with TIZA is that it’s housed in the same building as a mosque and is sponsored by Islamic Relief.  How is religion interwoven in these schools?

FIRST OF THE MOHICANS: A MUSLIM IN CONGRESS

In a lot of interviews, the subject of Islam is briefly touched on.  In this interview with Wajahat Ali however, there’s quite a bit more meat to sink one’s teach into.  

ELLISON: Well, the thing is you have to face these kinds of challenges with patience. Quite frankly, the barrage of taking hits everyday has made me a better Muslim. I find myself returning to my faith just to be able to deal with this kind of stuff on a regular basis. The Quran says, “The struggle is ordained.” Well, certainly it is. But, we have to deal with these challenges with patience, with confidence. We cannot let one person’s bitterness turn us bitter. We have to overcome evil with good, right? That’s how you do it. You can’t overcome evil with evil. You just get more evil. My thing is to try to urge people who are Muslim and not Muslim to understand America is a country that has deep roots of tolerance and religious inclusion. My message to the Muslim community is keep on doing good works like building clinics, building literacy sessions at the masjid, work with non Muslim, fellow Americans to try to improve things. And keep putting your best foot forward, because if we start going tit-for-that with those putting out religious bigotry, then we end up just like them.

Can I just say mashaAllah, can you imagine what kind of ummah we had if there were more brothers and sisters like Keith out there?

Keith Ellison looks back at his first year in office in an interview with the Minnesota Monitor.

I just gotta say, mashaAllah, the people of Minnesota are awesome. 

 *~*~*~*

MM: So you’re confident that a fear campaign that plays obliquely on race or on Islam won’t work?

Ellison: Right. But I’m also confident that it will be tried. Vigorously.

MM: Are you expecting to get baited and attacked about your Muslim faith again this time around?

Ellison: Yeah. It’s never really stopped. I could show you a very thick folder of some of the most hateful, vile, nasty, rude, insulting, racist stuff you’d ever want to see. But it ain’t nothing, man. It doesn’t mean anything. I look at it as entertainment. These are guys sitting at their computer in their boxers with nothing to do.

I mean, they’re really more sophisticated than that. But they’re also a small group, and they don’t represent the mainstream of American thought. In the last election, they dropped 110,000 pieces of literature basically calling me a terrorist. Didn’t work. They dropped it on the same day that I was at a seniors’ center in St. Louis Park. Old ladies were saying, “Oh, honey, so glad to meet you. Thanks for spending time with us.” One lady really warmed up to me, and I said, “Did you see that piece?” She said, “I saw that garbage. I put it on the bottom of my birdcage.”

People have a sense of other people. They know who’s negative and who’s not, who’s for them and who’s not, who cares and who doesn’t.

Today, though, it’s not about swaying large numbers of Americans [in national elections]. That’s not the point. They just want to shave at the margins and keep it close enough to steal. [laughs] That’s my opinion. They want to keep it close enough so that you can credibly steal the election.

I now have a second major muslim politician to hyperventilate over – Andre Carlson won yesterday’s special election to fill the seat left open by his grandmother’s death.  It isn’t a landslide by any means, as he must continue the fight through to the November general election.

In this victory, as well as Keith Ellison’s in 2006, we’ve seen a particular melding of the american muslim identity:

“I’m a proud Hoosier,” Carson said after his speech Tuesday night. “I’m an Indy 500 Hoosier, I’m a Covered Bridge Festival Hoosier, I’m a Black Expo Hoosier, I’m a state fair Hoosier. I just happen to be a Hoosier of the Muslim faith.”

More on his religious identity can be read here.

Also, random facts:  Both muslim congressmen attend WD Muhammad affiliated masjids named Nur -Nur-Allah Islamic Center and Masjid an Nur. 

Oftentimes, I’m sitting at the masjid for jummah or some other event, and I’ll go “dang, I should blog about this.”  But, I have the attention span of a knat and a memory to go along with, so by the time I get to the computer, I’ll have forgotten what had inspired me. 

Not today.  Today, I took notes on my little hello kitty notepad.  Here are the highlights:

• Met Multicultural Muslimah.  Turns out we’re both converts, both married to egyptians, and live and work 2 miles from each other.  Spooky.  inshaAllah we’ll be hanging out in the future, and perhaps even encouraging each other to exercise.  Talks are also in the works for a Twin Cities muslim blogger meetup, and the formation of a Wives of Egyptians Twin Cities chapter.
• Keith!  Some girls are musician groupies.  Others swoon over acters.  Me?  I go gaga for islamic scholars and muslim politicans.  And, since there’s really only one national level muslim politican, and he happens to attend the same masjid as me, well, I freak whenever I see Keith Ellison. 
• Little kids (especially girls) praying with their daddies.  MashaAllah.  There was one little african american girl who was praying with her dad at the beginning of jummah, and I was all awwwww…and then halfway through, another dad came in with his daughter and son, and they all offered 2 rakats together.  I just about melted.
• The khutbah.  It was good, but it just didn’t seem complete.  The point was that we have our 5 pillars.  The shahada is the foundation, and salat, zakat, sawm and hajj are the pillars.  We build our islamic houses, but we don’t live in it.  We don’t flesh it out.  The khatib said we should build walls and a roof, but then didn’t say what those should be built of.  inshaAllah I’ll create a seperate entry and perhaps my readers (I know you’re out there!) can give suggetions on ways to flesh out your deen house.
• The khatib.  He was a guest from Virginia Tech, and was good.  His english was clear, just a light trace of an accent, and he spoke with decent grammar.  He was a middle age arab brother with an excellent white sunnah beard, and he was so cute when he used slang.  My favorite that I wrote down was “24 hour 7.”

http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/faith/16116652.html

Odds are there’s no ‘holy war’ in Qur’an

By JEFF STRICKLER, Star Tribune

February 29, 2008

Want $1 million? All you have to do is find a reference in the Qur’an to “holy war.”

The offer is being made by Jamal Badawi, professor emeritus of management and religious studies at St. Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. His only requirement is that the reference be in the original Arabic, not an English translation of the holy Islamic text.

Is that $1 million Canadian or American? “It doesn’t matter,” Badawi said. “It can be a million Canadian, a million U.S. or even a million euro [which would be worth almost $1.5 million]. I don’t have that much money, anyway. I’ve been making the offer ever since 2001. I’ve never had a taker, and I never will.”

Badawi was in the Twin Cities a week ago as part of a continuing effort to combat negative stereotypes about Muslims and violence, especially terrorism. He said that one of the biggest misconceptions he encounters is that the Qur’an promotes war, especially against those of different faiths.

“There is nothing in the Qur’an that says you should fight someone because they are of a different religion,” he said. “Just the opposite is true. In its writings on other faith communities, it encourages dealing with them with kindness and justice.”

The only time war is mentioned is in passages saying that believers can defend themselves from attack or oppression. Asked if a Muslim who sees the West as a threat could interpret that as an endorsement of a preemptive attack, Badawi said, “Humans have an inexhaustible ability to justify the wrong they’re doing. It’s no different than a Christian who is opposed to abortion using that as justification for bombing an abortion clinic. He’s not indicative of Christians as a whole. He’s a religious extremist, and the same term applies to anyone who plants a bomb in the name of their god. … The ends do not justify the means in Islamic philosophy.”

Badawi also mentioned the news media’s misappropriation of the term “jihad,” often using it as a label for Muslim aggression.

“It means to exert maximum effort, to strive to the utmost of your ability,” he said. “It is not a synonym for war.”

So, I visited my parents this weekend.  And a few days before I went, my mom called me up and asked me if I’d like to work out at her gym on Saturday.  And not only to hang out at her gym, but to go hot tubbing after working out.  It’s like, umm, mom, you do know that my swimsuit is all hijabified right?  Well, no, I didn’t actually say that.  She knows I wear my splashgear suit swimming, and when I work out, I wear hijab.  The fact that she actually was ok being seen with me decked out in all my hijabi goodness is a major step in our relationship islam wise.  Since I converted, she likes to pretend it didn’t happen.  Hijab makes that hard to do.

On top of that, she gave me a gorgeous purple shayla scarf with embroidered swirls on it.  Dude, who are you and what have you done with my mother?

Of course, nothing can be perfect.  She did have to get in remarks about how muslim women have a higher rate of vitamin D deficiency since we cover and don’t get enough sunlight.  I countered with the fact that we don’t get skin cancer nearly as much as the rest of the population.

Ah family.  Can’t live with em, can’t live without em.

From NPR, a piece on an american convert married to an Imam.

But it would take another five years before Jerusha made the leap of faith. It was March of 2000. She was living in Ghana as a Fulbright scholar, studying Islam, and she began to have dreams.

“I had one dream where I was standing outside of a mosque and crying,” she recalls. “And then I had another dream where I was inside the mosque, and the feeling, I can’t even describe it, everything was white, and bright, and this very peaceful feeling. And that solidified it for me.”

I found much in her story familiar – except for the being married to an imam part, lol.  I was especially intregued by her sister’s contribution to the piece.  I went to the same university as my sister for 2 years, and would often walked around campus with her while wearing an abaya and hijab.  She’s never commented directly on my hijab, only to occasionally say that she doesn’t understand, that I used to be such a femenist.  I wonder how she views me now – as the same girl she grew up with, just more God concious, or as someone alien and strange?

Jerusha Lamptey has been defying perceptions ever since she converted to Islam, says her sister, Molly Naughton. Jerusha is a traditional Muslim who prays and covers and lives for the glory of God and an American woman who earns a doctorate in philosophy and keeps up with pop culture.

“My sister is a brilliant, amazing person, and you look at her and you think, ‘She’s covering her hair, and she’s doing all these things.’ But then, she’ll call me up and say, ‘Did you see what Justin Timberlake did?’”

And in this, Jerusha Lamptey may be a glimpse into the future for American converts adapting to Islam and Muslim women adapting to America.

Via Islamica:

(c) 2008 Ahmed Bedier, CAIR Tampa. All rights reserved. ( TAMPA, FL 2/22/2008)- The Tampa Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR Tampa) today extended condolences to the family of First Lieutenant Ali Jivanjee, a young American Muslim, who died this week in a mid-air collision while conducting training exercises outside Eglin Air Force Base.

Photos

F-15C Pilot Killed In Collision Over Gulf Was From Tampa

‘A true American hero’

Innaa lillaahi wa innaa ilayhi raaji’oon

I’m growing increasingly frustrated at the attempts to smear Obama as a muslim.   Is it such a terrible thing that one has a connection to Islam?  Ooo, look, he’s wearing “muslim garb.”  OMG I wear muslim garb every day!  Does that make me evil and unamerican?

I also am frustrated that Obama will not, or cannot reach out to the muslim community.  Why can’t he say “I’m not a muslim, but so what?  There’s nothing horrible about being a muslim, and there are many awesome, patriotic american muslims out there, who I’m very glad to have the support of.” (ok, perhaps something a little more eloquent without the dangling preposition at the end)  Where are our muslims for Obama buttons?

The American Muslim Community’s “Obama” Problem

Vocal Muslim support for Obama, if it happens, will likely be used as subtext for character attacks against his background and to fuel baseless rumors that he is actually a stealth Islamist who will subvert the establishment after taking power. As Don Imus can attest, racism and bigotry against African Americans is now largely unacceptable in public discourse. However, the same cannot be said of vitriol against Muslims. Attacking Obama for his pseudo-association with Islam is a far safer and more acceptable strategy for right-wing zealots than attacking him for being black. So if Obama has a campaign strategist worth his or her weight, we will never hear any serious public support or defense of Muslims from him or his campaign. For Muslims to demand anything from him simply demonstrates a misunderstanding of reality. Muslim support for Obama is akin to George Bush’s support for democracy in the Middle East. The mere association with the former will undercut the credibility of the latter. It is an analogy that Muslims should understand.

How did I miss this?

My local congressional district has a special election in a couple of weeks to fill the House seat vacated by the late Rep. Julia Carson, D-Ind. You wouldn’t know it from reading our local newspaper The Indianapolis Star, but the Democratic candidate for the seat, Carson’s grandson Andre Carson, could become the nation’s second Muslim member of Congress.

I do have to wonder about this though:

For the record: 7th District Dem candidate Andre Carson is “an Orthodox, universal, secular Muslim” who “frequently attends” services at Nur-Allah Islamic Center.

Gah, what is “an Orthodox, universeal, secular Muslim?”  Too many terms, not enough definition!

It is interesting to note that the first and now possibly the second muslim in congress both come from TMC and WD Muhammad affiliated masjids.  Is there something about these masjids and these communities that nurture civic participation?  And how does this relate to the series “Why Blackamerican Muslims don’t stand for Justice?”  While immigrant muslims may control the community, it does seem that some blackamerican muslims have carved their own niche and are leading the rest of us into mainstream politics. 

Not a lot of muslims organizing on the net that I can find, and unfortunately any search for “muslims for Obama” will mainly bring up the “obama is a secret muzzie” campaign.  Dur.

Muslims for Barack Obama ‘08

If there’s one thing you can say about me, it’s that I’m a voracious and quick reader.  I started Do Me Twice on my bus ride home and finished it before 7:30 pm.  However, I’m not much on writing formal reviews.  Although I loved to read as a child and teenager, I really didn’t like english class all that much.  I didn’t see the need to disect a book for it’s themes or write papers on character devlopment.  But, as an adult, I can see the importance of at least being able to write a decent review of a book, especially when one wants to recommend or not recommend it to others.  As such, here’s my review of Do Me Twice.  I can’t promise that it will be pretty prose, but inshaAllah I’ll improve as I write more.

My overall impression with the book was disappointment.  I picked it up becasue I had enjoyed the author’s first book Little X: Growing up in the Nation of Islam.  I hadn’t been dazzled by the prose, but the story was interesting and compelling – Little X provided a window into the world of NOI before and during the transition to mainstream Islam.

This sequel left a lot to be desired.   The beginning is rife with graphic depictions of sex.  Did we really need to know all about how her boyfriend did her up against a wall, among other places?  I dunno, maybe I’m a prude, but it made me quite uncomfortable, especially since I was reading it on the bus.

The back of the book proclaims:

Who are African-American Muslims? What do they stand for and why? How far-reaching are their lifestyle choices? With the global focus on terrorism and interest in the Islamic state, readers are hungry for answers that aren’t influenced by government spin or newscast ratings. They will find those answers here.

I didn’t find any answers.  In fact, I’ve gotten more profound insights into the blackamerican muslim community, warts and all, from reading Tariq Nelson’s blog.

I see the book more as one woman’s rejection of a tumultous, ever changing religious upbringing.  At one point in the book, the author writes about how she had believed in three gods – NOI, the transition out of NOI and finally “sunna” islam.  Her family’s approach to Islam, especially following the death of Elijah Muhammad, seems haphazard.  The author expresses a distain for all things arab, as her mother especially struggles to put together how to practice mainstream Islam, which seems to her to be heavily saturated by seeking to become arab – especially in eating on the floor with their hands.  Her father is addicted to pot and his stint in jail, leaving the author, her mother and her 9 siblings to fend for thmselves, deeply and negatively effects the author’s worldview.   The author is angry at her mother for having so many children, and for being a stay at home mom, as her family struggles to get by on her father’s meager income.

The author finally outright rejects Islam after marrying her muslim boyfriend, a ghetto superstar with a rapsheet a mile long.  In her attempt to halal-ify their booty calls, she ends up in a disasterous, abusive marriage to a man who seems to think Islam is only about about saying akh to other brothers and making your wife obey you.  Alhamdulilah, she gets out after he ends up in jail, but while doing so, she rejects not only Islam but everything “traditional.;” ie women should work and not stay home with the kids ever, one should feel free to have sex outside of marriage, heck, marriage is overrated. 

The author also appears to be angry with God.  One of the most devestating events that eventually leaders her away from Islam is when her uncle, a devout muslim, withers away with MS throughout the book, and eventually dies.  She is angry that all her family’s salat, fasting and religiousity didn’t save him.  Her family attempts to explain that this is a test, but she won’t have any of it.   She seems to blame this on Allah (swt) and on islam, but in reality, it’s a struggle people of all faiths endure.  Practicing Islam (or any faith) doesn’t guarentee you a free pass through life, immune from hardships.

When I finished the book, I wasn’t angry with the author, as I often am after reading stories by ex muslims.  Instead, I contemplated how Islam was presented to her, how it was lived around her, and what she resented in her muslim upbringing.  I can’t help but wonder if her family’s situation had been different, if they had implimented islam in a different, more cohesive manner, that she might have come away thinking differently.  If she had a strong muslim community to support her, not one that was constantly battling with crime and drugs.  If if if…  Her experiences remind me of this post of Tariq’s – although her parents weren’t strangers, her family certainly did seem disfunctional.

I know my approach to islam has been heavily geared towards finding strong female role models within the faith.  The author’s only role model is her mother, who insists that the only way to be a good muslimah is to stay at home and have a ton of kids.  Her parents discourage her from attending college, and chide her for not helping out around the house while studying and working. 

If that had been my introduction to Islam, I may have rejected it as well.  Instead, I came to Islam on my own, while in college.  My husband encourages me to think about going to grad or law school, and he supports me in my exploration to deepen my faith (except for the sufism bit, lol).   I don’t see submission to God as something confining, pointless and stupid, as I have explored the faith, and concluded that our acts of worship and the restrictions places on the muslimeen are reasonable and well thought out.

It does make me wonder how we present islam to our children, and how I’ll raise my children.  Thank God I have a few years before I have to get serious about that, inshaAllah.

The muzzies are coming, the muzzies are coming!  Seriously, some in the right wing blogosphere are hyperventalating over these photos of muslims at “mObama” rallies.  *gasp*  American muslims participating in politics?  The end is near!  Start prepping for the rapture!

Let me get this straight, mkay?  “They” claim they want us to integrate, yet when we step up to participate in the very american passtime of political rallying, apparently it’s a sign Barak is a secret muzzie and we all must be kicked out of the country.  Scuwz me while I go barf.

In other news, rahma is set to caucus at the county level this March 8th, inshaAllah.  My dormant poli sci major has been awakened by my first experience with democracy at the grass roots.  I’ll be looking to join the “people of faith” caucus, which thus far apparently doesn’t include much.  Who knows, maybe I’ll end up taking a leading roll.  That would piss off these RW fundies, bwahaha.

In honor of black history month, Beliefnet created a who’s who of Blackamerican religious leaders.  Alhamdulilah, my reason number 3 to move to San Franciso (after 1. Zaytuna and 2. Sh. Hamza) is on the list.

Imam Zaid Shakir is an internationally respected Islamic scholar, author, and speaker. A lecturer at the Zaytuna Institute in Berkeley, California, he has become a national voice for moderate American Muslims. While many imams in the U.S. are foreign-born, Shakir is an American-born convert who served in the Air Force, graduated from American University and Rutgers, and pursued his Islamic studies in Syria. He helped found Masjid Al-Islam in New Haven, Conn., and served as imam there for six years. He now teaches courses on Arabic, Islamic law, and history. Shakir is the author of several books, including “Scattered Pictures: Reflections of an American Muslim.”

If you haven’t done so already, bookmark and  browse Imam Zaid’s webpage.  There’s a new audio up every month or so, as well quite a few excellent and timely articles. 

OMG OMG OMGosh!ÂMinnesota Public Radio hat tipped me! I’m dying here.  Sadly, i wish it were for a better reason.

One of the leaders of the Minnesota Muslim community passed away this last weekend in a car crash in Saudi Arabia. inna lillahi wa inn ilayhi raji’oon.  May Allah (swt) help his family through this most difficult time.

…two very different faces of the muslim ummah.

Exploring the Status of Muslim Women in Europe

Muslims Increasingly Choose Matrimony Networks

 I’ve only listened to the “behind the wall” story thus far in the European series, but it made me quite sad.  The marriage story, on the other hand, made me smile at the inguinuity of the american muslim community.

 Other NPR stories of note as of late:

‘Muslim Girl’ Magazine Marks One Year in Print

Bangladesh’s Largest Brothel

Color me shocked…a (quasi) hijabi runner has made the yahoo news front page spread.  It seems silly to me that they would let her run in the multicolored under uniform for 3 years, but now that it matters to get into college, they’re going to have an issue with it?

Thanks to the wonders of google, I’ve found a bit more about about this running sister.

Washington Post article on running during Ramadan

Local Sports Pictures

MD Runners

I definitely like her earlier uniforms over the one from the yahoo video. The baggier jersey and shorts definitely make it a bit more hijab worthy.

thanks to Rebecca for the heads up on this story!

*digs around in closet looking for cheesehead earrings*

Ah, the travails of a hijabi Packers fan. 

1.  Tailgating severely curbed.  No brats or beer for the muslim football freak.  I found some decent brats at the halal grocery store, but nothing matches a Johnsonville brat fresh off the grill.

2.  Cheeseheads always look silly, but they look even more silly on top of a hijab.  Howeva, since I can’t really wear a cheesehead to work on Friday, I’m trying to work out a scarf dealy with my cheesehead earrings.  Unfortunately, all my turtlenecks get stretched out of shape after one time through the was, so they don’t really cover my neck when I tie my scarf up.  I’m going to have to find a way to pin it to the bottom of my scarf, creating maximum coverage, while still allowing the earrings to dangle down.

*continues to prep for Sunday’s game*

Via Imam (soon to be Sheikh?) Suhaib Webb’s blog:

Egypt Today Article: Faces “Suhaib Webb” by Farzina Alam

As a Western convert to Islam, Webb has found himself in an unusual position: smack in the middle of East and West. Coming to terms with the responsibility such a position holds isn’t always simple. “As Western Muslims, we have a complex when we deal with the tradition. [In the sense that] we are told that traditional Islam is the savior for everything in the West. But I don’t buy that.  Our job as Western Muslims is to synthesize and articulate a Western Islam.

“There’s nothing wrong with that. The Malaysians articulate a Malaysian Islam. The Pakistanis love biryani; the Arabs hate spices and the Africans like a mix. We in the West, because of the society we live in, because of the way our society moves, we cannot just merely regurgitate sixth- or seventh-century texts and try to answer the crisis of humanity. Our job is to fuse both.”

As a convert, knowing what aspects of East and West to adopt or reject is also a challenge. “I have to engage the tradition first, understand it, then what I learn from the teacher, I have to translate into my experience as a Westerner. And I shouldn’t be ashamed of that.

“We have a lot of brothers and sisters who convert to Islam who experience crises in dealing with modernity. What brought sovereignty to women and urbanization is modernity, what brought management — we don’t have any management here — is modernity.

“At the same time spiritually, I have issues with modernity. The absence of God, the absence of a creator. The outcome of modernity was basically Hitler and Mussolini, but we can take just the good. I felt that I didn’t want to lose my identity as a Westerner. I don’t want to start speaking like,” and he adopts a fake Indian accent for a moment, “‘Hello, my name is Suhaib from Oklahoma.’ I meet brothers who go through this crisis. I meet people who don’t want to dress like a Westerner — why not? You’re a Westerner, brother! The Prophet rarely asked people to change their dress or their names unless their names meant something really bad.”

Webb believes converts in the West have not really come to grips with this fusion. “Our job as Western Muslims is to learn our religion well, to have an understanding and articulation that’s balanced within the confines of our environment, because we represent a reservoir of prophetic guidance to the West. And the West represents a reservoir of material guidance for us.” The trick, he believes, is knowing how to fuse the two.

“All of us, whether you like it or not, here [in the East] we are representatives of the West; [over] there, we are representatives of the East. Although I’m definitely not Eastern: My hair is blond, my eyes are blue. But immediately people assume I have experience with the East because I’m Muslim.”

This is quite possibly the first country song that I’ve ever liked:

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/sbcmPe0z3Sc" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

 …with bean pie.  There’s been some talk in the islamo-blogosphere as of late about this tasty treat that peaked my interest.  Low and behold, today after jummah, some sisters were selling fresh bean pie.  I got myself a piece, still slightly warm from the oven, and OMGosh.  It’s like pumpkin pie, only better. 

My mission this weekend:  make some bean pie.  (Tongue in cheek), is it haram to make bean pie from a NOI recipe?   This recipe looks a bit healthier.  I wonder if I can make it with egg beaters and evaporated skim milk, or would that be haram too?

No doubt, we all need some warm fuzzies right now.  Here they are:

 

 

Via Izzy Mo, I just learned that my alma mater is being subjected to the sham that is islamo fascism awareness week.  I had celebrated earlier when I didn’t see UW’s name on the list, but alas, our college repubs even got the big man himself to speak.  MSA and other orgs organized a “wear green” campaign to show displeasure, but I didn’t see too many people wearing green

 However, positive news in that both the “conservative” student newspaper and the “liberal” student newspaper agree that something fishy this way comes (looks like things are going in a more positive direction at the Badger Herald, since publishing the Muhammad cartoons last year, blah).  Also, Hillel disassociated itself with Horowitz.  This makes me wonder how interfaith dialogue is going on campus.  We had a few first timid steps when I was a part of the MSA.  It would be interseting to know how it has continued.

As much as I am happy to see the MSA and other student orgs are working together to provide an alternate view, I am soooo glad that I am not there.  I was there for the whole Daniel Pipes fiasco, and let me tell you, it was exhausting, both physically and emotionally.  Haters tire me out.

Will be looking for more info on what the MSA is doing and will post as found inshaAllah.

The now defunct muslim charity Holy Land Foundation/several of its leaders were on trial in Texas on numerous charges related to support of terrorism.  Looks like there’s some reasonable doubt. 

One of the nasty little side shows related to the trial is the list of the “unindicted co-conspirators” that included many prominant american muslim organizations such as CAIR and ISNA.   Um, yeah, these people conspired with the baddies, but we can’t prove it in court, so we’re just going to taint your name and not allow you the chance to defend yourself within the legal system.  Despite the mistrial, these organizations are going to be forever tarred with the unindicted co conspirator label for a very long time, much like Imam Siraj Wahhaj is still an unindicted co conspirator in the 1993 WTC bombings. 

I dunno about you, but something seems distinctly unamerican about being not being able to have your day in court to clear your name, and being convicted (in the public’s eye) without a trial.  I guess I’m just an idealist who actually believes that stuff the founders put in the Bill of Rights.  Guess I’m just naive.

From Tariq Nelson:

I was told of an Islam that spoke of God’s Infinite Love and Mercy for His creation. I was told of an Islam that inspired people to make positive changes to their lives. I was told of an Islam that offers to serve others and offered solid solutions to problems. All of these things were attractive and this is the Islam that people were flocking to in the 1990’s. This is the Islam I accepted

Now all of those things are a “waste of time”. This new “Islam” is about hate, killing, rape and murder. I am told by a person visiting this site that I should be praising the daily carnage that I see on the news and to believe in wacky conspiracy theories and blood libel. (I have been accused several times by my co-religionists of being a spy and a closet Zionist)

Now I am told that I never understood Islam and that the things I mentioned above represent an “American” Islam and hence bidah (rejected innovation) and that I should accept this “real Islam”

Wish I could come up with something profound and constructive to add, but words escape me.  But if I had to pick someone to speak for me and my Islam, I’d chose Br. Tariq any day of the week.

“Those who have no mercy on other human beings (NAS), will not receive the mercy of Allah.” Bukhari

Note the NAS.  NAS, people, not Momineen, believers.  Have mercy for PEOPLE.

How do I love you?  Let me count the ways…

 Via Deenport, the quarterly Zaytuna Newsletter.  Can one make hijri within a non muslim country, cuz dang, I want to move out to Berkley! 

But, until the time where it’s actually possible to move out to California, I’m very excited about the distance learning courses offered, and inshaAllah will be taking the getting right with Allah (swt) one, if I can sign up for it before it starts this weekend.  Looking at it, a set of lecture CDs costs $20-60, and oftentime these are recordings of courses offered at Zaytuna.  This way, you get the lecture and access to the teacher via forums, alhamdulilah.  Then, when the course is done, burn em onto a CD and wa’la, you’ve got another set of CDs.

Via Suhaib Webb

“All of the sectarianism that we see in the Muslim world we know has nothing to do with our religion …. Sectarianism is something that Allah (swt) and his messengers have despised… Hold together to the rope of God… that says that we are brothers. And lets not allow this sectarian poison to come into the American Muslim community…. The people from Al-Maghrib Institute and the Zaytuna institute, let’s put our hands together in an American Islam that recognizes diversity… and if we’re not about this were harming our religion, we’re harming our faith, and in the end we’re disgracing our messenger who came as a mercy to all of mankind.”- Shaykh Hamza Yusuf

Via Tariq Nelson from the LA Times.

 Ah, this brings back memories of my time as an american muslim in Cairo.  Most of them are positive – heck, it’s where I found my husband so that right there is a huge plus.   It wasn’t a muslim utopia, but I did receive a lot of hospitalility.  I did get my fair share of freebies when people found out I was an american convert.

Unfortunately, there were a lot of negatives as well, sadly mainly related to masjids.  I loved going to Al Azhar and praying.  Walking into the wide open courtyard, the cool marble under your bare feet, that is what going to a masjid is suppose to be like.  After prayer, my husband and I settled in at the back of the main section of the masjid and read quran.  Unfortunately, one of the janitors didn’t seem to like the fact that a husband and wife were sitting next to each other in the “men’s” section and shoed us out.  The same janitor then spotted a bunch of western tourists - a mixed group of men and women - and quickly swooped in to offer them a personal tour of the complex, including the very area we had just been booted from.  So, apparently it’s ok for non muslim women to hang out with non muslim men in the men’s section of the masjid, but it’s not ok for married muslims to study qur’an?  Le sigh.

Via Umar Lee, Critics Ignored Record of a Muslim Principal

For anyone who bothered to look for it, Ms. Almontaser left a clear, public record of interfaith activism and outreach across the boundaries of race, ethnicity and religion. Her efforts, especially after the Sept. 11 attacks, earned her honors, grants and fellowships. She has collaborated so often with Jewish organizations that an Arab-American newspaper, Aramica, castigated her earlier this summer for being too close to a “Zionist organization,” meaning the Anti-Defmatin League.

…is Ingrid Mattson, according to USA Today, which is all right. I suppose if I had to vote for someone to be our face, it would be either Ingrid, Sheikh Hamza or Imam Zaid. Perhaps I’m bias towards muslims born in North America, but if we’re not the majority of NA muslims now, we will be very soon.

She talks of nurturing a genuine American Islam, rooted in the classical faith, which dates back before the theological, political and legal schisms fractured the Ummah, the Muslim world, centuries ago.

Also, on a personal note, a friend of mine is her assistant, lucky duck! *waves to Amera*

From Tariq Nelson – out of control dogma

RIYADH, 6 August 2007 — A new convert to Islam, fired with zeal to do a righteous act, had no idea that he would pay a heavy price for helping a sick woman, one that has landed him 50 days and counting behind bars.

Abu Hurairah, radiyallahu ‘anhu, reported that the Messenger of Allah, sallallahu ‘alayhi wasallam, said:

“Let whosoever believes in Allah and in the Last Day either speak good or be silent. Let whosoever believes in Allah and in the Last Day honour his neighbour. Let whosoever believes in Allah and in the Last Day honour his guest.”
[Al-Bukhari & Muslim]

some commentary on this hadith:

The second part of this hadith stresses on being courteous and generous to our neighbours and guests. This is stated in the Qur’an – Surah An-Nisa’(4): ayat 36: “…do good to parents, relatives, orphans, the poor, the neighbour who is near of kin, the neighbour who is a stranger, the companion by your side, the wayfarer (you meet), and those (slaves) whom your right hand possess.”

In one hadith, the Prophet, sallallahu ‘alayhi wasallam, said: “Jibril kept advising me concerning the neighbour to the point that I thought that he would inherit from his neighbour.” [Al-Bukhari and Muslim].

In another hadith [also recorded by Al-Bukhari and Muslim], it is stated: “Whoever believes in Allah and the Last Day should not harm his neighbour.”

Another hadith records the Prophet, sallallahu ‘alayhi wasallam, as saying that the person who does not have complete faith (iman) is the one from whose affairs the neighbour is not safe. Al-Bukhari and Muslim also records another hadith which states that when you cook stew, you should add a little bit more water and give some to your neighbours. This sharing of food between neighbours can strengthen the relationships between them. We should be nice to our neighbours and share our food even if they are not Muslims.

Does anyone else want to cry when they read stories about the sorry state our ummah is in? My mind keeps wondering why doesn’t somebody do something? Then I remember – I am somebody. Guess that means I should be the one to do something.

The husband and I were talking last night about our future plans inshaAllah. He’d like to be a da’ee and write a best selling book about muslims. He then wondered about how to get on tv shows and I told him that writers do that for free to promote their books, but if Jon Stewart invited him to be on the Daily Show, he should say that he would only come on if his wife could meet Jon, ha. My husband responded – of course, he’ll be happy to meet you. Why, I ask. Because you’re going to be a famous moderate muslim of course, and he’ll want you to be on to talk about Islam. We’ll be a team, like Madam Curie and her husband.

Now, all my issues about the term moderate muslim aside, his faith in me and what I could do with my life is increadibly uplifting. Alhamdulilah for my husband. Now I just have to figure out how I can go about being somebody and change the ummah.

I have a very schizophrenic relationship with the state of Minnesota. On one hand – it feels like home (aka Wisconsin). We also have awesome public radio. But, there are some things lacking that make me long to move elsewhere – a tightknit muslim community where I can feel at home, a place where I don’t need to drive everywhere to get stuff done.

CNN.com links to a local SF news source saying “19 detained in raid on muslim bakery.” The actual news story itself carries the title Predawn Raids Target Troubled Oakland Bakery.

From what I remember reading in the past and from this bakery’s own website, it’s a Nation of Islam (aka NOI) operation or affiliation. Reviews of the place mention murals of Elijah Muhammad. According to the founder’s obituary:

“I practice Islam as taught by Elijah Muhammad,” Bey said in an interview in February. “His religion is a way of life. He has taught how to resurrect us from the dead state — the so-called American Negro men. We’re white people with black skin. It’s all a mentality.”

But, there’s no mention of NOI anywhere in the article, just the ubiquitous term muslim.

So now unsuspecting islamophobes will link the story and muslims (aka the non NOI kind) will be blamed for some wackos we have nothing to do with. I mean, come on, do we not have enough wackos in our midst that we need to take the blame for NOI wackos as well?

Humph.

From the LA Times, who apparently know a bit about arabic noun declension.

Some will object that Lindh pleaded guilty knowing he could receive this sentence. His plea was entered, however, under what one can only call extreme duress. A poll of potential jurors in the Eastern District of Virginia at that time found that more than a third were ready to sentence him to death without even hearing the case against him. His lawyers cut the best deal they could, but Lindh has spent nearly a quarter of his life in custody for his foolish decision to pursue his religious convictions by aiding another country in its civil war. Without relief, he will spend another dozen years, at least, behind bars.

The concept of mercy spans testaments and faiths, and any system of justice requires the embrace of mercy for leavening and legitimacy. In this case, justice has been served by Lindh’s time in prison. Now Bush is uniquely positioned to grant mercy, for while many will long argue over the effectiveness if his war on terror, none question his commitment to it. By giving Lindh a commutation, Bush could prove that his war is, as he often and properly asserts, not against Islam but against those who seek to harm America. Lindh never sought to harm his country; he has served long enough. Bush should send him home.

Esquire magazine wrote an excellent piece last year that explores Lindh’s background, his conversion to Islam, his zealousness that drove him to Afghanistan, and his life at present in jail. Reading things like this, it makes me take a step back to examine my life. Lindh and I are almost the same age. We come from similar family backgrounds, and sought to escape the white mundaity that was suburbia, although his path to a turn mine didn’t before returning to Islam. Malcolm X peaked both our interests in Islam. And yet, he ended up in prison, not allowed to speak arabic, at the same time I was safely attending classes at University and flirting with the idea of putting on hijab, my big jihad. Granted, our similarities are probably only superficial, but it does make me ponder the choices I’ve made and where I’ve ended up.

I hope the brother has found some stability at last and that he can grown and mature in his deen. It’ll be interesting to see if anything becomes of his case.

Via MR:

The comedian Dave Chappelle has been shy about broadcasting his muslim faith. Rumors abounded when he absconded to South Africa and dissed his highly rated comedy central show. Had he finally cracked, or was he seeking spiritual solas with fellow muslims.

Now, it looks like he’s finally embracing his muslim identity and producing a full length video of the Allah Made me Funny Comedy Tour. Br. MR has a press release on his blog, although I can’t seem to find it on the tour website. I hope he talks about his faith more often.

Ok, I admit it, I’m an avid reader of polygany blogs. Although I don’t have time to watch soap operas, I’m thoroughly addicted to these online, real life muslim mini soaps that have unfolded in front of my very eyes over the past few years. I’ll recount the tales to the husband, flaburgasted by what I read – OMG, guess what happened to HA this time?

The husband then takes the opportunity to make polygany jokes, to which I remind him that he’s certainly allowed to have more than one wife – I just won’t be one of them. And, as always, he smiles, hugs me and tells me that one wife is headache enough. It’s a long running joke between us, although I do have a clause in my marriage contract that gives me the right to an excellent settlement and divorce if he decides down the road to become polyganous. We continue to have serious, deen-y talks about the subject, exploring hypotheticals, but at this point in my life and most likely in the future, I’ll stick to monogamy.

Now, polygany blogs have lept from the shadows and landed in the mainstream media, or at least at Slate.com. Polyganous Blessings is on my CW (cowife) blog roll, although she rarely updates it anymore. There have been several CW bloggers, but unfortunately, most don’t write for very long. HA and Safa update much more regularly, and I’ve laughed and cried along with them on their journeys down the bumpy road of polygany. There are other CW (and ex CW) blogs out there that are accessable through the spiderweb of blogrolls, but HA and Safa are definately the cream of the crop.

Wow, Newsweek is all over Islam this week.

Newsweek and MSNBC has a section on Islam in America. Heck, it looks like their upcoming issue is a whole special on Islam in America. Too bad my parents don’t subscribe to this publication anymore. I’ll just have to buy it from the local Barnes and Noble, check to make sure the content is decent, and accidentally leave it behind next time I go to visit them.

And, Newsweek and the Washington Post have subsection in their On Faith Series on Muslims Speak Out. Haven’t gotten a chance to read much from either of these two sections yet, but I am hoping that they are knowledgable and go beyond the “Islam means peace” that american muslims have been reduced to parroting these last few years.

Worshipers say they reported him to authorities after he asked to become a convert and began talking about jihad.

At the beginning, worshipers at the Islamic Center of Irvine said, they thought
Craig Monteilh was just an overzealous convert when he criticized U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. But when he started talking about jihad and dropped oblique references to violence, congregants contacted authorities.

Can’t find much else on it, although I’ll keep my eyes peeled. Can’t say I’ve come across any of these crazed converts or similarly thinking born muslims in real life, but I’ve run across them online.

Why Molly ran

When 12-year-old Molly Campbell disappeared from her Scottish home last year, it was feared she had been kidnapped by her father to be married against her will in Pakistan. But, like her name, the truth wasn’t quite as it seemed. Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy report

I’ve been following the Misbah/Molly story on and off for quite some time now, and this article definately provides a lot of much needed background.

But even more than being the sad story of a broken family, it speaks of the difficulties that intercultural/interfaith couples face. This marriage started out between a nominal christian/secular young white british girl, and a nominal muslim/secular young pakistani british man. Where as the usual m.o. is that the husband will practice more and become more conservative as he grows older, in this case the wife feels drawn to Islam. Maybe it was a way to feel connected to and accepted by her husband’s family and culture, but for whatever reason, her embrace of Islam draws her husband back to practicing the faith. While I can’t tell for sure what was going on in her mind from the article, it seemed like she longed for acceptance, but didn’t really have Islam in her heart. Islam can seem oppresive if you don’t embrace it with all your heart, and from the article, it looks like Louise was crushed by it.

Women who embrace Islam through their relationship/marriage with a muslim man are often subjects of suspicion. Did they convert because their husbands influenced them? How will their faith hold up if things go south with their husbands? Heck, even those who were muslim before marriage are still viewed under a cloud of suspicion. Alhamdulilah, I’ve seen women become increadbly devout in their practices, content with Islam as a way of life. And unfortunately, I’ve seen women be crushed far too often for my liking.

When an american woman marries a muslim man, she will inevitably be told to watch Not Without my Daughter. We roll our eyes, sigh and try to change the subject. We’re intellegent, independent, and think we know what we’re getting ourselves into. Unfortunately, we often times don’t.

So, I propose that american women who want to marry muslim men read this article. We’ve all heard the nasty things muslim men can do to western women. But how often do we examine ourselves and ponder on the problems our issues may create? Here now is an (extreme) example of what western women can do to themselves if they’re not prepared for an intercultural/interfaith relationship. inshaAllah ta’ala, nothing like this will befall myself or any of my friends in similar situations, but one never knows

Also, on a random side note, either Louise or the article messed up a wee bit on the hajj thing. Hajj isn’t during Ramadan. You don’t (have to) fast during hajj. Maybe they made umrah during Ramadan, but umrah ain’t hajj.

“Oh you who believe! Seek help with patient perseverance and prayer, for God is with those who patiently persevere.” (2:153)

When I embraced Islam, I didn’t tell my parents. I didn’t know how I could explain to them my choice, especially in the post 9/11 world where the general perception of Islam was negative. I wish I could have told them on my own terms, at a time of my choosing, but Allah (swt) is the best of planners. While visiting my parents during a school break, I logged into my email and forgot to log out. My parents were worried, as they suspected I was getting serious with someone I had met online (my future husband), so they snooped in my email, and found out both about the future husband and my conversion to Islam. They confronted me about both, and unfortunately, I could do little more than stutter.

Since then, their attitude has been to pretend it never happened. When I visited, I wore my hijab up, hippy style, so as to not draw attention to myself as a muslim in public. I hid my salat from them, never letting on when I prayed, and often skipping prayers when I couldn’t get away (astaghfirullah). I left some articles and a book with them, but that book sat next on the nightstand for years, never moving, getting covered in dust until it disapeared. I don’t know if they ever read it.

At family holiday gatherings, I argued with my uncles about civil liberties and the war in Iraq, which would inevitably lead to discussions on Islam. My parents said I embaressed them, and that I shouldn’t talk that way.

Every once in awhile, my mom would point out a cource offering or a book on native american spirituality, hinduism, buddhism, etc. “Wouldn’t you be interested in that?” They would be happy if I was anything other than a muslim. It didn’t matter that as a religious studies major, I had already gotten a decent introduction to most world faiths and that I was content in my choice. All the open mindedness they had raised me with disapeared once the aarabs and muzzie terrorists got involved.

So, I remained an undercover muslim when my parents were around. They knew I was muslim, but prefered to pretend otherwise. With patience and prayer, I continued, praying that one day my parents would accept my choice. I tried to remain on good terms with them, per the advice of the Prophet (saws):

Asmaa’ bint Abu Bakr was the Prophet’s sister-in-law. She was the daughter of his closest companion and the sister of Aisha, his wife. Her mother, however, did not become a Muslim for quite a long time.Asmaa’ states: “My mother came to me during the time of the Prophet (saws), hoping to get something from me. I asked the Prophet (saws) whether I should be kind to her. He answered: “Yes,” (Related by Al-Bukhari, Muslim and others).

And now, alhamdulilah, a small break through! Truely Allah (swt) is the best planner. My mother is a teacher, and was given an opportunity to travel around her state with other educators on a summer trip. She was originally not going to go, but decided at the last minute to take the trip. One of the stops was a (benedictine?) monastary, where 3 speakers – a jew, a christian and a muslim – gave a presentation on the similarities between the faiths. Alhamdulilah! I think this was the first time my mother had ever heard about Islam from a muslim source. The muslim speaker apparently impressed her, because she sought out his wife after the presentation for a chat. She mentioned her daughter was married to an Egyptian immigrant. The woman, herself an immigrant from Egypt who had been in the US for 37 years, immediately invited my husband and I to visit her home and said that they could be like a family for us. I am not sure what else they talked about, but I got the distinct impression that my mother liked this woman.

Alhamduilah, I had been unable to reach my parents and Allah (swt) found another way to reach them. Make dua for my family.

Scary scary shit happening these days. Read about how an islamophobe goes undercover at Dar al Hijrah in Virginia, and makes shahada (!) to “expose” their “true intentions.” Both Tariq Nelson’s and Umar Lee’s blogs has eye witness, first hand accounts of the incident.

Last month, a local Minnesota college caused an international stir when it got out that they planned on installing foot baths for wudu for the muslim population on campus. Now it appears the University of Michigan – Dearborn, is doing the same. And, of course, it’s the same ol same ol out of the same ol bloggers. They’re asking their readers to write letters to Robert Behrens to express their displeasure over the accomidation of those dang muzzie terrorists in Dearbornistan.

Phillip Davis, president of the Minnesota school, mentioned in the NPR interview linked above that he was inundated with emails from all over the world, when word got out about his school’s plans. I’m betting most of those were negative.

So, why not take 5 minutes and write a letter to thank Mr. Behrens and the University of Michigan – Dearbon for their thoughtful gesture. He can be reached at bbehrens at umd.umich.edu. His address is linked above as well, if you’d like to write a letter.

In fact, whenever you see someone doing something to help the muslim community here in the US, take the time to say thanks. They’ll certainly get a lot of flack for their actions, and they deserve praise as well.

Planned foot baths are not the highly anticipated automatic wudu machines, unfortunately

Ok, doing a quasi happy dance/impatient stomp. Why? Because this Friday is suppose to be the reopening of Masjid an Nur. “Suppose to” being the key phrase of course. Despite the fact that this masjid is predominantly African American, they still seem to be afflicted with the maladies that effects the immigrant portion of our american muslim community – chronic lateness.

It wasn’t long after I became muslim that I was introduced to the concept of “muslim time. And I’m not just talkin a few mintues late…noooo, sometimes I’ve witnessed people come hours after the appointed time. Being that I’m an increadibly impatient person, this doesn’t really mesh with me. You say you’re going to pick me up to go somewhere at 5, I’m waiting outside my door at 4:55. I’ve gotten a lot of practice learning how to remain calm in the face of tardiness, especially since marrying my (formerly) chronically late husband. Alhamdulilah, he understands now how important it is for me that I’m on time places, and he does an excellent job being (mostly) on time.

So, it would be no suprise if the masjid doesn’t open on Friday, but please, ya Allah, please let it open on time! I haven’t been to the masjid for anything other than praying since Ramadan. Ok, there was the time I attempted to go to another masjid for jummah, but it was in arabic, so I can’t really count that as going for something other than prayer since I spend the entire khutbah trying to stay awake.

I neeeed a muslim community where I fit, where I belong, and I hope, inshaAllah that I can find it at Masjid an Nur. I attended a few jummahs there before and during Ramadan last year, but then they closed for renovations. I can’t wait to go to jummah each week in a beautiful new masjid, where everyone is so friendly, and people actually talk to me. Plus, this masjid is really involved in helping the community. It’s kind of a dream come true, a place where people actually live the whole deen, and reflect Nur out on the rest of the community.

If you happen to be flipping through the channels in the Twin Cities, you’d probably pass by channel 14, the local religious programming channel. One frequent group is a set of three african american gentleman dressed in a rather garish, shiney version of what I can only guess is a version of ancient Israelite priestly robes.

The middle one flips through the bible, asks one of his companions to read, and then proceeds to tell the audience about how the bible is all about black people.

This same trio, plus several others decked out in the same robes, camp out on the corner by my office at least once a week during the summer. They try to engage the african americans waiting at the nearby bus stop, but are usually ignored.

I’ve had an inkling in the back of my mind for some time now that this scene is somehow familiar. Then, last week, it hit me. As I was walking past the group, I noticed that on one of the signs, they had pasted a picture of Brother Malcolm. Ah, so that was what this reminded me of – scenes from the movie Malcolm X, where he would stand on the street corners outside of the church and try to steer the black churchgoers towards the temple.

I smiled to the gentleman, pointed at the picture and said, “he was muslim.” The man scowled at me and turned away. I can only suppose that this group finds Malcolm before Mecca useful, but that after Mecca, his words don’t fit their race centric view of religion.

As a euro-american muslim, I definately feel more kinship with post Mecca Malcolm than I do with pre Mecca Malcolm. I can see the fruits of Malcolm’s post Mecca attitude in the masjid I started attending before Ramadan this last year (which is unfortunately closed now for renovations). It’s an ex NOI temple that is associated with WD Muhammad’s association.

The majority of the congregants are african american, but there are plenty of muslims from other backgrounds that are welcomed with open arms. I feel more at home there than I have at any of the other masjids I’ve attended that are dominated by various immigrant groups. The masjid runs a soup kitchen and a food pantry and is quite involved in the community around it.

So, back to the group of people on the corner – I’m debating whether or not I should print off Malcolm’s letter from Mecca and shove it at them. There are always police nearby, so I doubt any trouble would start. I’m not nearly as brash and bold as Brother Malcolm, so I don’t think I would do any good trying to engage them in a debate. Nope, just on the run dawah, I think.

Browsing advice columns daily is a guilty pleasure of mine. I quasi store the information in some recess of my mind, in the future event that I may one day be put in one of the situations discussed. Ask Amy has become one of my favorites, and now she’s even more my fav:

Dear Amy: I live in a retirement community where all residents are provided one served meal each day. This meal is served by high school students in a dining area accommodating about 200 residents. These servers are both male and female, and wear white shirts/blouses and black pants/skirts. It is a uniform of sorts. Two of the female servers wear black scarves over their heads and around their necks, consistent with, I presume, their Muslim tradition. It offends my sense of propriety and decorum to have these two servers display their religious symbols in a private dining area, such that they cannot be ignored. I would like to complain to management, but I don’t want to stir up a hornet’s nest. Am I wrong?– Kilroy

Dear Kilroy: I’m not sure what you find offensive. Are you offended by evidence of any religion in the dining room? Or do you mind the fact that these girls are Muslim and it is impossible for you to ignore that fact? The ideal function of the hijab is to project an air of modesty to avoid attention — not draw it to themselves. And it seems that a black head scarf fits in with the black-and-white uniform for servers.
I wonder if you would be similarly offended if these girls wore Amish caps or if some of the young male waiters wore yarmulkes? Perhaps you would be. If so, and if any evidence of religion in your dining room offends you, then complain to management. But you will be stirring up a hornet’s nest if you do.Unless these scarves somehow impair these young people’s ability to serve you dinner, I don’t think you have a leg to stand on. We live in a pluralistic society, and while it might be changing a bit fast for your taste, the freedom to practice and express one’s religion is a pretty important aspect of what it means to be an American, right?

Word has gone out in the right wing blogosphere, and once again, the entire world is watching Twin Cities muslims. In an NPR interview, the college president talks about thousands of angry letters and phone calls they’ve received.

If we were to so much as sneeze, people would freak, saying we’re secretly smuggling avian flu in or something.

Editorial: Muslims deserve a welcoming campus
Minneapolis college is not out of bounds.

Minneapolis Community and Technical College has been bombarded with letters and e-mails — most of them hostile, some of them hateful — since disclosing that it is considering the installation of a foot bath for some Muslim students to use before prayer. This reaction is out of proportion to the modest and cautious inquiry the school has undertaken, and it is certainly out of keeping with Minnesota’s long tadition of social tolerance and temperate thinking.

If the downtown Minneapolis school were discriminating in favor of Islam and against other faiths, we would understand the outrage. But it’s not. When Christian students asked for space to study the Bible and conduct prayers, the school obliged them. When a Jewish student asked to reschedule an assignment because of a religious observance, the college agreed.

If MCTC were setting some unusual precedent, we might worry. But it’s not. St. Cloud State University, the University of Minnesota-Duluth and at least a dozen other colleges around the country have installed small foot-washing facilities for their devout Muslim students — at modest cost and often using student fees rather than state revenues.

It’s worth remembering that this question first arose at MCTC as a matter of safety, not religion. A student slipped and fell after another student used a campus sink to bathe her feet. School officials could have banned the practice of foot-washing in hand sinks, but then they might have run afoul of state law governing religious discrimination and court decisions on religious accommodation.

And so the school found itself wading into that murky question of what the Constitution’s “establishment clause” permits and forbids. In our view it has handled that question appropriately. Banning Christmas carols on the official campus coffee cart — which incensed the school’s critics — seems plainly in keeping with a long string of court rulings that forbid the use of public resources to endorse a particular religion. But accommodating the prayer practices of some devout Muslims seems akin to putting kosher items on the cafeteria menu and letting employees display religious objects in their private workspaces — accommodations that MCTC has in fact made in the past.

We don’t pretend that these decisions are simple. A growing Muslim population means that Minnesota will face difficult questions, time and again, about how far the majority should accommodate the minority — and how much the minority should adapt to majority norms. But Minnesota will be a stronger state if it tackles these questions in a spirit of generosity and confidence — and who wouldn’t be confident when the state’s schools are full of pious, ambitious young people who are trying to get a college education?

©2007 Star Tribune. All rights reserved.

While I’m glad to see this, it does make me wonder. I never stick my foot in the sink or make a mess when I make wudu in a public restroom. Couldn’t we be a little less vigorous with the water splashing? Hmm, maybe some enterprising young muslim could come up with some wudu foot wipes or something that people could keep in their backpacks.

Unfortunately, all we’ve accomplished is now Fritos has put up a list of it’s products that are made without pork in response to the huge “aayyyy, Cheetos and doritos are haraaam…the world is ending” hysteria that has been floating around the net for the last few weeks.

Imagine what we could accomplish if we put that same energy towards something important…

*I will be going to Target at lunch to pick up some baked cheetos however*

Innaa lillaahi wa innaa ilayhi raaji’oon

At the Convocation on Tuesday, four college religious leaders spoke. You can listen to the muslim speaker starting around 20:00.

At least 150 people were killed in Iraq today. I wish we could have profiles of all the people killed in Iraq like what we are getting for those killed at Vtech on Monday. I mourn the loss of the students, because I can identify with them. American college students, gunned down while in class. It wasn’t too long ago that I was a student in class. The deaths in Iraq are more distant. If I knew more about these people, maybe I would mourn their passing more, rather than just feel, oh, more people died there today…

The documentary by Canadian film maker Zarka Nawaz is up on YouTube. Posting it for viewing after work.

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6

Related content around the net:

Flickr set of the premiere
Izzy Mo review
Islamica Magazine article

Got this via email

The Minnesota House of Representatives yesterday invited a Muslim chaplain to deliver the opening prayer. Hesham Hussein, president of the Muslim American Society of Minnesota delivered the opening prayer, yesterday, April 11 2007.

After opening with the recitation of Sura al Fatiha in Arabic, Hesham prayed for justice and blessings of all the people in the state of Minnesota. He also prayed to join our hearts, to enable us to live in peace and resolve our differences in peace.

The full opening prayers can be seen in the following video (starting at minute 6)http://www.house.leg.state.mn.us/htv/programa.asp?ls_year=85&event_id=1305

The full text of the opening prayers is attached below.

The Muslim American Society of Minnesota seeks to encourage the participation of Muslims in building a virtuous and moral America. MASMN seeks to foster unity, encourage cooperation, and promote the human values that Islam emphasizes, namely: brotherhood, equality, justice, mercy, compassion, and peace. MAS is a national organization with over 50 chapters across the country.To learn more about MASMN or donate & support the ongoing activities, please visit http://www.masmn.org/
Sincerely,The MAS-MN Team

FULL TEXT OF THE OPENING PRAYERS BY SHEIKH HESHAM HUSSEIN ON APRIL 11 2007
· In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
· Praise be to God, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the worlds;
· Most Gracious, Most Merciful; · Master of the day of judgment.
· We worship you, and seek your help
· Guide us to the straight path,
· The path of those whom you blessed, not those who deserve wrath, nor those who went astray.
· God, show us the truth as it is true and give us the ability to follow it
· And Show us falsehood as it is false and give us the ability to avoid falsehood
· And not confuse it with truth
· God you are Just.
· We seek refuge in you from injustice; whether suffering injustice or causing injustice to others, we seek refuge in you
· God, join our hearts in all goodness and give us the ability to understand those who have different opinions than us. Make our debate a way through which you guide us to what is best for us.
· God, our knowledge is limited and your knowledge is not
· Bless our time and our efforts and help us speak for those who can not speak for them selves,
· Help us provide a shelter for everyone who needs a shelter, Help us provide care for everyone who needs care, Help us take care of our elders and provide education for our children
· God increase our resources and bless them for us
· Bless our budget and guide us to the best way to spend it for the benefit of every resident of our state.
· God, You are the peace, the source of peace, enable us to live in peace and resolve our differences in peace.
· God Bless our hearts, our souls, our bodies and our minds. Protect us from all evil, Protect us from Greed, from arrogance, ignorance, from violence, from fear.
· Bless our time, our effort, our people and our state.
· Ameen.

Will download when I get home tonight, stick it on my ipod and listen on my commute next week:

Nawawi Foundation – Video and Audio – Islamic Law in the West: Theory, Doctrine, and Practice

On the weekend of February 2nd, Dr. Umar Abd-Allah was invited to be the keynote speaker at the Washington College of Law at American University annual Founder’s Conference. With the theme of “Islamic Law and the West,” this conference addressed contemporary issues in the Muslim world related to Islamic law, development, human rights, women’s rights and international law. Speakers addressed the current state of Islamic law and its possibilities for survival and advancement in the modern world. Dr. Umar’s keynote address and panel presentation are provided at the links below, courtesy of the American University Washington College of Law.

Keynote – Muslims in the Mainstream -As more Muslims and persons of non-Christian faiths enter the public arena, we are observing a bitter reaction from mainstream America. While the founding fathers had strong religious grounding, their intentions were not to make religious requirements for public service. Over time, the fact that one religious group has dominated creates traditions that are more akin to a certain religious understanding and practice, particularly the Christian faith; however, such traditions are not constitutionally mandated. The traditions and practice have become the accepted norm, and any deviation – while permissible and legally accepted – cause tension. As the number of American-born Muslims increases to create an indigenous Muslim community, the number of Muslims in public office and in mainstream society must increase to accurately represent this growing community of citizens.Audio (16.7MB)

Islam and Gender Politics – Issues such as women’s rights and gender equality are at the forefront of the current debate in the development of the Islamic world. This session will discuss the impact of culture and custom in Muslim practices worldwide. Additionally, this session will examine the tension between international human rights norms under CEDAW and Islamic law and its impact on Muslim women worldwide. Audio (28.2MB)

Panel with Speakers – Dr. Anouar Majid (Professor, University of New England, Maine) – Anne Goldstein (International Association of Women Judges, Washington, D.C.)

Video (Hosted by American University)

*off topic rant before the thread – stupid blogger, won’t do the spacing I ask for @#$!@#^@#$#$#*

Every Ramadan, I troll the yahoo news pictures, and become engrossed in pictures of the ummah fasting and celebrating. This has become a habits out of longing for a community to belong to. I’ve been muslim for nearly 5 years now, and still haven’t had muslim community to call home. I converted by myself at University. It took me 2 weeks to work up the courage to say salaams to a girl in my class who was muslim. Then I transferred to another school. It took me 6 months to work up the courage to start going to MSA events. I had quite a few muslim aquiantences in college, and a few sisters who I thought were real friends, but alas, those friends were apparently superficial and didn’t survive past graduation.

First off, let me just state I’m CAIR neutral. I may or may not volunteer for CAIR MN to get a better feel for the organization, but my interactions with them thus far haven’t been too hot. I greatly appreciate their Muhammad Asad Qur’an program, but I was deeply disappointed with the political worship they put on at my University, where the CAIR political person admitted that he just figured out how the electoral college worked, so he could explain it all to us *rolls eyes* I also wasn’t happy when I asked this political person how one gets a job at CAIR. He said that he was interning on the Hill (aka the Capital) and hobnobbed with CAIR people at jummah prayer. Umm, ok, so how can someone who (a) doesn’t have mommy and daddy to help pay for an internship on the Hill, and as such can’t and (b) is a woman, so can’t really hobnob with the guys after prayers, get a job with CAIR? He didn’t have an answer.

Ok, now on to the thing I was actually going to post about

Anti-CAIR accusations have been flying around the internet for ages. A few months ago, I emailed them asking for something to counter these accusations. No response. Dur. Today though, I stumbled on a list that counters the common accusations. Alhamdulilah. Of course, it would have been nice if they had emailed it to me. You know, save the emails of people asking how they can help your organization and actually responding to them would be a good idea.

I used to be a fan of Muslim Wake Up, and an excited progressive. Then I joined the PMU (progressive muslim union) mailing list, and found that their big tent wasn’t quite big enough to accomidate someone who identified strongly with more traditional interpretations of the faith.

I haven’t visited MWU in ages, but on a whim today I decided to, thankfully. Paul Barrett, the author of the new book “American Islam: The Struggle for the Soul of a Religion” that I had previously blogged about has a selection of his chapter on Imam Siraj Wahhaj up. Take a gander:

There may be no better place to take the measure of African-American Islam today than at Masjid At-Taqwa in Brooklyn, N.Y. Formerly a clothing store, then a junkies’ shooting gallery, Taqwa sits at the busy intersection of Fulton Street and Bedford Avenue. In the mid-nineteenth century, free blacks had helped settle the area, now known as Bedford-Stuyvesant. In the 1930s, a new subway line from Manhattan encouraged African-Americans to move to the neighborhood from a crowded and deteriorating Harlem. As the number of blacks in Bedford-Stuyvesant tripled over the next three decades, most whites fled for the suburbs. Housing projects and crime went up; businesses disappeared. Today some blocks are starting to gentrify, but much of the area remains bleak.

At one o’clock one summer Friday afternoon, the jostling to get into the mosque and find a space to sit was getting intense. The imam was in town and would be delivering the khutbah. Some 500 men crowded into the windowless main hall. Among them were cab drivers and security guards, ex-convicts in do-rag stocking caps and merchants wearing embroidered West African robes of crimson and gold. There were school teachers, municipal clerks, and mobile-phone salesmen. Most were American-born blacks, the rest immigrants from Africa, South Asia, and the Middle East. Their shoes were stored in green plastic bags set on long shelves near the door. They sat on dingy gray-striped carpeting laid to indicate the qibla, or direction of prayer toward Mecca. The walls, painted mustard yellow and green, were bare except for a torn poster of the holy city. Invisible from the main hall, a small group of women in headscarves and ankle-length dresses entered through a side door. They sat in a separate room connected via closed-circuit TV.

Br. Umar Lee has been writing an excellent blog series on the Rise and Fall of the Salafi Dawah in the United States. As someone who has never identified with the salafi movement, it has provided me an insight into an area of American Islam that I have little experience in.

The series is not finished yet, so be sure to check back

The Rise and Fall of the Salafi Dawah in the United States

Download it and read all the lyrics for free here.

(Clip from Farenheit 911)
Awootho billahee min shaytaan nirrajeeme bismillah hir Rahman neer raheem
(Athaan)
This is one’s for all my brothers and sisters who died in Iraq, Israel,
Afghanistan and right here in America (Jesus Walks)

Abraham Talked
Muhammad Talked
And Moses split the sea
(Jesus Walk with me)
I ain’t tryin to profit of the prophets so this one’s for free

G’s up along with Muhammad and Jesus
In the Quran they call him Isa
Don’t think Osama and sadaam are is our leada
We pray for peace, but the drama intrigues us
All, so we fall for the illusions of the beast
So instead of tryin to teach we show our teeth
Saying God, different beliefs
Hijabs, Sunday clothes, yamika, kufi, same mission beneath
We all tryin to get to where the sufferin ends
In front of the Most High bein judged for our sins
Can front for the Most High, so the struggle
Continues
You, every bird, bird and tree, me, her and me
We virtually on the same boat
With the same goats, on the same sea
Tryin to stay afloat, and put the devil in the yolk
With a couple of God’s quotes

If you’ve spent anytime in the online world, you’ve most likely come across the sentiment that muslims are all complicit in terrorism and that we don’t ever say anything against terrorism. I know I’ve blogged about my frustrations as the resident muslim apologist of Christian Forums, where I heard this claim at least once a week. It gets really old, but over time, I developed a list of muslim organizations and statements about terrrorism and violence that I could easily copy and paste.

Now, the American Muslim online zine has done a much better job. Anyone who discusses Islam and muslims online should bookmark these lists for easy reference:

Muslim Voices Against Extremism and Terrorism – Part I – Fatwas

Part II – Statements by Organizations

Part III – Statements & Articles by Individuals

Part IV A few Quotes

Part V The Muslim Majority

Selective Hearing of Muslim Voices Against Extremism and Terrorism

Claim that all terrorists are Muslims ignores history

Ooo, my future library continues to grow. On my lunch time walk today, I wandered into the religion section of Barnes and Noble and came upon several books to add to my to read list.

One of the reasons I am a muslim is because I love the Prophet Muhammad (saws). When I picked up my first biography of the Prophet (saws), I felt an instant attachment to this man. His life is full of poweful examples of how a good person should live, full of compassion, mercy and justice. Tariq Ramadan’s new book In the Footsteps of the Prophet: Lessons from the Life of Muhammad highlights these moments in the Prophet’s life. inshaAllah non muslims will pick up this book, as opposed to say, ones by islamophobes, and will be introduced to this fantastic man and to Islam.

In every aspect of his life except his adopted faith, Abd-Allah shows, Webb was quintessentially a man of his place and time. It was because he was so typically American that he was able to serve as Islams ambassador to America (and vice versa). As Americas Muslim community grows and becomes more visible, Webbs lifeand the virtues he championed pluralism, liberalism, universal humanity, and a sense of civic and political responsibility exemplify what it means to be an American Muslim.

al-maraya at Bidayah wa Nihayah and PM at PM’s World have written about a subject near and dear to my heart – the Universality of Islam and the culture of the convert wife. I have noticed a tendancy of my convert aquaintences to adopt completely the cultural trappings of their husband, or at least squash most of their previous “jahilyyah” culture in favor of becoming a pseudo arab or pakistani. Heck, sometimes this happens even without marriage. Around the time of my conversion, professor told me the story that still sticks in my mind today, of a single american woman who had converted to Islam and adopted the culture of Saudi Arabia. She wore the complete Saudi outfit, cooked only Saudi food and would only allow Saudi Arabic in her home (which was quite difficult for her and the kids at first, not knowing Saudi arabic). Islam is for all times and places, but all too often, we restrict it to a narrow subset of muslim cultures. In order to be muslim, one must be arab, or be pakistani, etc.

As a girl growing up in the small town midwest, my idea of diversity was lutherans and catholics with a side of chinese food once a month. But, alhamdulilah, my parents raised me to be very open minded. Sometimes, I bet they wish they didn’t raise me quite so open minded to have embraced Islam, hehe. I have always loved to explore new culture and new ideas, and with islam came a bunch of new cultures and things to try. I enjoy wearing abayas and jelbab, but I look terribly silly in salwar kameez. I really dig afghan food, kabob, briyani and shwerma, but I can’t stand moloqiya. However, even when exploring new cultures, I’ve always maintained my identity as an american muslim. Sure, I wear abayas on occasion, but I’m just as comfortable in a jeans, long tshirt and a scarf. I love going to the gym or out for a run with my husband.

Alhamdulilah, I’m married to a very sweet Egyptian man, but he has never expected me to be an Egyptian wife. He immigrated to the United States in 2005, and alhamdulilah, he’s found america to be pleasantly suprising. He takes the good from this country and our culture, and leaves the bad. If anything, I think the american-ness dominates in our apartment, as opposed to egyptian-ness, and that’s unfortunate. I’ve been to Egypt 3 times, and I love it more each time I’m there. We watched the Yacoubian Building a few months ago, and I felt homesick for Cairo. I need to learn arabic, inshaAllah, not only to read Qur’an but also to watch Egyptian movies with my husband. My Egyptian cooking needs help. I can make tamiyyah and muddle my way through fried cauliflower, but yet can’t manage to make foul out of the can taste good. Oh, heck, to be honest, my cooking in general needs help, lol.

I have this dream of a raising bicultural children in a bicultural, bilingual house, children who are proud to be Egyptian/Italian/German/Norweigian Americans and American/Italian/German/Norweigan Egyptians. It’s definately a balancing act, but it’s a challenge I’m willing to take on. Viva the bicultural muslimeen!

December 19th note – inshaAllah I am going to revise this. I don’t think I adequetly expressed my bitterness in an articulate enough manner. I’ll repost at the top of my blog once I rewrite it.

My husband sent me these pictures and asked what my thoughts were on them.

In looking at these pictures, the most interesting thoughts that come to my mind aren’t my impressions of the pictures. Rather, I think about what my fellow americans must think when they look at these pictures.

I’ve mentioned before how I am fatigued after spending several years as the muslim apologist on Christian Forums. In addition to my stint there, I’ve also lurked in the right wing blogosphere for ages. Forums like F-r-ee Re-pu-blic, S-ea-n Han-nit-y Message board and Rapture Ready, blogs like D-e-bb-ie S-ch-l-u-ss-el and Mich-elle M-a-lk-in (names divided so they hopefully won’t search me out and blog about me) have me gripped in morbid fascination. Some will claim that they only are mad at radical muslims, while others will drop the PC stuff and openly declare their hatred of all things islam related. I haven’t decided which I dislike more, because at least the latter is honest, while the former shows through their postings that no one outside of Salman Rushdie fits their definition of a non radical muslim.

I’ve become fatigued from my paroosal of the right wing blogosphere as well. I pretty much know what they will say before they say it. For example, the incident with congressman elect Keith Ellison of Minnesota is the perfect example. Search for Ellison and takbir or Ellison and Akbar to find examples of the kind of hatred that permiates sections of the right wing. The typical response was a hysterical piece of “OMG, there are terrorists in Minneapolis, listen to them chanting Allahu Akbar OMG!!!!1111!!1!!” What really happened is that many muslims were excited about the prospects of a muslim running for congress. Several worked hard and put in a lot of hours participating in their first politial campaign. At the end of a long and hard campaign, Keith won, and the muslims expressed their delight in a natural way – by making takbir. Takbirs (saying Allahu Akbar, God is greater) permiate muslim life. We say them in our daily prayers, in rememberance of God, and in appreciation for something good. So of course, Allahu Akbar is natural. But no, Allahu Akbar is only a terrorist call, and heaven forbid anyone do some actually study to find out some real information.

How do I know they weren’t terrorists, one might ask? I was there. I made takbir. I ain’t no terrorist.

Examples of this are rife in the right wing blogosphere. It’s sickening. Can you tell I’m just a wee bit bitter?

So, what does this have to do with the pictures? Sadly, when I look at those pictures, I immediately think about what the right wing loonies would say in reaction to them. I worry about a good muslim and a good american being slandered all around the internet. I worry about the place of muslims in america. I worry.

The American Muslim is an excellent online journal to browse through when one has the time. There are two articles in particular that stood out to me today, because they speak to the problems I have encountered on the net and in real life in defending Islam and muslims.

Selective Hearing of Muslim Voices Against Extremism and Terrorism addresses the pervasive assertion that muslims in general and american muslims in particular are silent on the issue of terrorism. During college, I was a board member of my university’s Muslim Student Association. Part of being a muslim student representative and a hijabi on campus is that you’re visibly muslim, and as such, often called upon to answer people’s questions about Islam. For the most part, I enjoy these questions coming from my fellow students and from the occasional reporter. But, there was always that underlying assumption that even if I wasn’t a member of a terrorist organization, I was at least a terrorist sympathizer. No matter what proof I would bring, the long lists of condemnations, it all fell on deaf ears. I guess this is a problem many muslims encounter.

The second article is The Dehumanization of American Muslims, another phenomenon I’ve witnessed and experienced with growing concern over the years. Read it.

Dehumanization is defined as a process by which members of a group of people assert the “inferiority” of another group through subtle or overt acts or statements. Dehumanization may be directed by an organization or may be the composite of individual sentiments and actions.

A coalition of anti-Muslim bigots have formed that sit at their computers full time seeking out news – no matter how vague – of bad Muslim behavior to demonstrate to their growing numbers of readers that all Muslims are irreparably evil and ultimately must be put into internment camps and/or systematically eliminated whether by getting them to leave Islam or by killing them.

Their assault on Islam and the Muslims is unrelenting and uncompromising. There are no good Muslims. If you meet a good Muslim, then he/she is making ‘tuqiyyah’ and/or part of a “sleeper cell”. Muslims can do no good. NONE!

Their blogs are growing in readership. They are coming out with more and more best selling books smearing and slandering Islam and the Muslims, and are continuously invited back to major media outlets to promote their books and offer their “expertise” on Islam.

Recently, NPR revived the “This I Believe” series first aired in the 1950s. Listeners and famous people are asked to write in with a statement about what they believe. I’ve been toying with an essay on being an american muslim for some time. But, it looks like Yasir Billoo beat me to it. It’s an ok essay. I think I could have done better, but dang my laziness. If they keep this going, maybe I’ll submit something in a year or 2 from the perspective of an american convert who sees that being a good muslim makes her a good american. My experiences resonate a lot with Yasir’s, albiet from a non immigrant point of view. I do most of my online defending on the internet, and it’s brutal.