Meant to say so yesterday, but barely touched the computer, so a belated but no less hearty "Happy Easter" to Christians lurking out there. Learning about theory and doctrine is important–For all the complaints about the lack of awareness of Islam in America, how many American Muslims could tell you two of the differences between a Catholic and a Protestant?* –but you don't understand a tradition until you observe it in practice, in the trenches. * Granted, a lot of... Read more
I’m sorry, I just can’t resist. It’s just too entertaining. National Geographic News: Chimps Trade Meat for Sex — And It Works The time-honored tradition of the dinner date may be just one more example of evolution at work. Wild male chimps that share meat with females double their chances of having sex with those females, a new study says. The findings support a long-held hypothesis that food sharing improves male chimpanzees’ chances of mating. Studies have long shown […]... Read more
The irony. I wonder just how off target these mihrabs are. BBC NEWS | Middle East | Mecca mosques ‘wrongly aligned’ Some 200 mosques in Islam’s holiest city, Mecca, point the wrong way for prayers, reports from Saudi Arabia say. I’m tempted to make some jokes, but I will take the high road. Read more
Just read about the fascinating and inspiring case of a former Klansman who recently sought forgiveness for a half century of violence, harassment and intimidation against black people. One man’s ambivalent retreat from his racist past – Associated Press Wilson doesn’t have answers for much of how he has lived his life — not for all the black people he beat up, not for all the venom he spewed, not for all the time wasted in hate. Now 72 and... Read more
I rarely have anything positive to say about the Gulf, but you must give Dubai some credit for this. Gulfnews: Dubai appoints 27-year-old as first woman judge Women can achieve just as much as men, Dubai's first woman judge, Ebtisam Ali Rashid Al Bedwawi, told Gulf News on Thursday. Ebtisam, 27, became the first woman to work as a judge in the Dubai Courts Department (DCD) after she was sworn in before His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum,... Read more
Political life after 9/11 often seems to imitate fiction. Increasingly, pulp fiction, alas. According to Seymour Hersh–who's probably the most respected investigative reporter of our time and who has sources in government that would make a James Bond criminal syndicate green with envy–the US government entered into the assassination business big time after 9/11, and without any oversight or legal guidelines. It really sounds likes something out of "The X-Files", only with an infinitely less entertaining villain. The symbolism is... Read more
Am still mulling over Gorenberg's piece, but while those wheels make their glacial turns in my head, here's a snippet I wrote last year on this subject in reaction to one of Mark Steyn's trademark artful-but-intellectually-wanting rants against Muslims. My thinking has evolved somewhat since then, but it raises some concerns that I think remain valid. Akram's Razor – "The resurrection of Willie Horton in the age of Islamophobia ": Then there's how baldly hypocritical Steyn's Gandhi-invoking rhetoric is given... Read more
Needless to say, I don't often find myself tempted to link to The Weekly Standard on much of anything, let alone the Middle East peace process. Its editor Bill Kristol is, after all, a proverbial hawk and neocon, one of the thought (mis-)leaders whose Ahab-like ideological obsessions and truly abysmal geopolitical prognostications helped drag America over the cliff after 9/11 into a chasm of dangerous war-mongering and grossly unconstitutional lawlessness. Nonetheless, the current issue has an cover article worth pondering... Read more
Check out this brave, touching and thoughtful essay by a friend of mine on the challenges facing unmarried Muslim women over 30. This and a host of related issues need to be widely discussed in the community. (reposted due to bad link) Read more
I'm pretty forgetful about wishing other people well on their holidays–and Judaism has so many of 'em–so allow me to atone a bit with a hearty Purim mubarak to Jewish readers. [Eid mubarak, or "blessed festival", is how Muslims greet each other on the Islamic holidays.] Purim has always fascinated me. In its pageantry and boisterousness, it reminds me of the cathartic communal holidays of medieval European religious life. As a Muslim, one aspect in particular has inevitably always caught... Read more
Akram's Razor
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